BEFORE HE NEEDS

by Blake Pierce

  “How long were you a member?” Ellington asked.

  “About a week,” Chino said. “I went one night and nothing really happened. I hooked up with this one woman but it didn’t go very far. I just…I don’t know. I wasn’t ready for it. I got freaked out. So we made out for a while and then left the room where everything was going down. We hung out on the porch outside the building and just talked.”

  “Did you ever return?” Mackenzie asked.

  “Yeah. One more time. My last night as a member, I guess. I wasn’t there for very long. I hooked back up with the woman I had met the first time. We were fooling around but…the way they do things…everyone is screwing in front of everyone else. It’s this big open space. I think there are private rooms that Samuel uses, but I never saw those. Anyway, me and this woman, we were about to start actually having sex. But it was just too weird for me. So I stopped. I started putting my clothes back on.”

  “And did Samuel call you out for that?”

  “Not at first. I don’t think he even noticed at first. He was over on the other side of the room, watching this group of people go at it. But someone saw me leaving and made this really crude comment. Said I was a perv. Someone else called me a virgin. I argued back and when Samuel did finally get involved, he asked me to leave. He was very rude about it, too. So I told him to go fuck himself and then got out of there. And I never went back.”

  “Well,” Mackenzie said, “Samuel claims that you have been harassing him. He says you’re begging him to become a member again.”

  “Seriously? Well, that’s just a blatant lie.”

  “He says you’ve sent emails,” Mackenzie said.

  “More lies,” he said. “You’re welcome to have a look at my computer. Do whatever you need to do.”

  “Thank you for that,” Mackenzie said. “If nothing really pans out, we may have to take you up on that. In the meantime, tell me…while you were at Tidal Hills, did you ever meet a couple named the Kurtzes?”

  Chino thought about this for a while and then shook his head. “Not that I know of. The only person I really ever spoke to was the woman I nearly hooked up with. And to be quite honest, I don’t remember her name. Anna, maybe? Annette?”

  “Is there anything else you can tell us about Tidal Hills itself?” Ellington asked.

  Chino shrugged. “I’ve tried to forget about it. It was creepy. I know they parade themselves around as this exclusive spiritual retreat, but that’s nonsense. It’s an excuse to have orgies. That’s it. It’s like a sex cult almost. Samuel tries to weave bullshit meditation and awakening into it, but that’s about five minutes at the beginning. And by then, people are already partnering up with each other.”

  Mackenzie nodded. She’d also gotten a creepy vibe from just being around Samuel. If there had been something strange taking place there when the Kurtzes had been members, maybe there was some digging left to do.

  “Any abuse taking place?” Mackenzie asked.

  “I don’t know,” he said. “Samuel, though…he had this weird way of convincing people he was this chilled-out guru. The women went nuts for him. On the night I left, he was watching three people go at it while two other women were pawing at him. It’s disgusting. The woman I was messing around with…she even said that she’d heard from other women that there were no interviews for them. They just had to audition for him.”

  “Audition?” Ellington asked.

  “Yeah,” Chino said. “Use your imagination.”

  Mackenzie had heard enough. She was thoroughly disgusted and rather pissed at herself that Samuel had played her so well.

  Maybe I was just so creeped out and eager to get out of there, she thought. But that creep is definitely up to something.

  “And you have never called him or anything?” Mackenzie asked.

  “God no,” Chino said. He reached into his pocket and removed his phone. He handed it over to her and said, “You’re welcome to check this, too. Computer, phone, anything.”

  Mackenzie took his phone after Chino punched in his passcode. She scrolled through his contacts, emails, photos, everything. She saw nothing that instantly linked him to Samuel.

  “You’d be okay for us to call the phone company and go through your records?”

  “If you have to,” Chino said. “Anything you need to do to prove that I have no connections to that asshole, you have my permission.”

  Mackenzie nodded and handed his phone back to him.

  “I don’t think that will be necessary,” she said. “Mr. Castillo, thanks so much for your time and willingness to help.”

  “No problem,” he replied. “I’m just glad he’s being exposed for what he is.”

  Mackenzie didn’t see the point in arguing that Samuel wasn’t the object of their interest. However, now that she was pretty sure he had blatantly lied to them, he sure as hell was now.

  She and Ellington headed back to the car. As they glanced at one another over the roof before getting in, Ellington said: “We heading back to Tidal Hills?”

  “Yep.”

  “Taking Samuel up on his invitation to join in?”

  “Nope.”

  “You’re no fun,” he joked.

  “Shut up and get in the car.”

  As she pulled back out, once again heading for Tidal Hills, she started to feel a sense of progress. The Kurtzes were connected to Samuel, even if in a very small way. And now that she had caught Samuel in a pretty extensive lie, she couldn’t help but wonder what other information he might be hiding.

  Maybe, if they were lucky, a clear and direct path to a killer.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Mackenzie had made some very awkward arrests in the past. But as they neared Tidal Hills for a second time, she tried to imagine what it might be like to arrest a man while orchestrating a strange and cult-like orgy. The concept did not sit well with her, which was why she was very grateful when they arrived back at the location before anything had the chance to get properly started.

  As before, the front door was locked. She wasted no time, hammering on it with her fist. She could hear multiple murmuring voices the other side. She could even see a few people looking toward the glass along the top of the door—a few middle-aged women and a younger male. They looked confused, maybe even a little worried.

  Finally, after she had hammered on the door for roughly fifteen seconds, it was answered. It was the same scrawny man from before. He looked irritated but she also saw fear in his eyes. It had not been there the first time she’d seen him. It was the sort of expression that was very telling. Just seeing it as he opened the door for her told her that someone—maybe not him, but certainly someone he knew—was guilty of something.

  He opened the door and did his best to appear defiant. “I’m sorry, Agents. We’re in the middle of a meeting here and—”

  “From what I can see,” Mackenzie said, “everyone still has their clothes on. So I’ll do my very best to get in and out before anything too disgusting happens.”

  “But you can’t just—”

  Mackenzie stepped forward, making it clear that if she had to, she’d roll right over him. He stepped aside, allowing both of them into the entryway. They walked into the large open room they had been inside less than an hour and a half ago. Mackenzie took a quick count of the room as she walked toward the front, where Samuel was standing on a raised platform. She counted twenty-two people in all. Most of the women were clearly not wearing bras beneath their shirts; she assumed most also went sans panties beneath their shorts and skirts.

  She made it halfway through the crowd before Samuel started to speak from the stage.

  “Sorry, friends,” he said, apologizing to the gathered crowd. “It appears that some people simply have no regard for privacy.”

  Mackenzie smirked at him as she reached the little stage. She kept her voice low so only he could hear it, doing her best to remain as professional as possible.

  “And it appears that some others,”
she said, “have no regard for being truthful with federal agents.”

  Samuel gave his audience an apologetic what are you gonna do sort of smile and then leaned in closer to Mackenzie. “Agent White, I don’t know what you’re talking about but I can assure you this is neither the time nor the place.”

  “Oh, I’m sure this room full of consenting adults is fully capable of banging one another without you looking over them,” she said. “Besides…if you can produce evidence that Chino Castillo either emailed or called you, I’ll leave. More than that, I’ll apologize to your friends here and let them know the mistake was mine.”

  She read his face as his eyes darted back and forth, looking for a way out of it. When he finally replied, it was the final bit of intangible proof she needed of guilt.

  “And if I don’t?” he asked.

  “Then you’ll be escorted off the premises in FBI custody. If you don’t make too much of a scene, I’ll maybe even give you the dignity of not having to wear cuffs in front of your horny masses.”

  “I don’t have the evidence on me.”

  “Neither did Chino Castillo,” she countered. “The only difference is that I looked through his phone and he was more than willing to have me go through his phone records for proof. He encouraged it, in fact. So…I need that proof.”

  “I. Don’t. Have. It.”

  Mackenzie had to bite back a grin. She almost felt bad about how easily she had gotten under his skin. She glanced back at Ellington and saw that he was standing in the back of the room with the skinny doorman.

  “Then I’m going to have to ask you to come with us,” she said.

  “That’s not going to happen,” he said. He was still whispering, but he was growing more and more agitated.

  “If you don’t step down off of this stage right now, I’m going to have to escort you myself. And then what would all of these eager women think? Seeing you manhandled by a mere little woman?”

  “You wouldn’t da—”

  He wasn’t able to finish getting out the word dare. Mackenzie quickly grabbed his left arm and swung out lightly. When he lost his footing, she then pulled him to her and twisted the arm up. The whole move took less than two seconds. When it was over, Samuel was on the ground with Mackenzie kneeling on top of him, a knee on his back.

  A few people came rushing forward to assist their guru.

  From the back, Ellington roared out: “FBI! Anyone else moves another step towards my partner and you can spend some time with your fearless leader here in the back of our car on the way to an interrogation room.”

  Everyone stopped right away, giving curious and concerned glances all around the room.

  Mackenzie hauled Samuel back to his feet and instantly started to push him forward. Mackenzie saw looks of shock and sadness on some of their faces and actually felt bad for them. What sort of lies had Samuel told them? How, exactly, had he manipulated them?

  Maybe they enjoy it, she thought as she pushed him through the crowd, toward the back of the room. And maybe Samuel knew that…and exploited it.

  Whatever the reason, she led him out of the building in absolute silence as the stunned people in attendance looked on.

  ***

  As the day wound down closer to midnight, Samuel was placed in an interrogation room. While Mackenzie and Ellington worked out the details of their visit to Tidal Hills with Rodriguez and others on his force, a small team was tasked with looking into Samuel’s background.

  As it turned out, there was quite a lot to report. Several pages of information were handed to Mackenzie as she and Ellington fueled up on a late-night cup of coffee. They looked over them together as she started to feel the first signs of tiredness sweeping over her. She was more than accustomed to working long days and had learned to fight it off for a while. She knew that, if need be, she could go another six to eight hours without needing to crash for a bit.

  The brief report they had been handed told a quick yet rather lewd story. The man labeling himself as a “guru” was Samuel Netti. He was fifty-three years old and had been a resident of Miami or surrounding areas for twenty years or so. Beforehand, he had lived in Houston, Texas, where he had started to amass a rocky record. He’d been arrested twice for being caught with prostitutes. He also had a single domestic charge against him, filed by a woman he had been engaged to for a period of four months.

  He then came to Miami, where he had been audited by the IRS (and come out clean in the end) and had been the subject of speculation in a case involving a small prostitution ring. All of the women questioned, however, gave enough evidence to clear him. Whispers of his involvement in an exclusive spa or club of some kind had been passed around the city but not taken seriously.

  “Sounds like a classy guy,” Ellington said, standing up from the table. He downed his coffee and rolled his head on his neck, loosening up the muscles.

  “Yeah,” Mackenzie said. “A real winner.”

  They left the break room and informed Rodriguez that they were ready to question Samuel Netti. Rodriguez, who also looked very tired, walked with them to the room and gave them full control.

  “I’ll be watching with a few of my men,” he said. “Let us know what we can do to help.”

  When he was out of earshot and heading into the observation room, Ellington said: “You want good cop or bad cop?”

  “Both,” she said, and walked inside.

  Samuel looked up at them with disdain. The fear and uncertainty was no longer in his eyes. He had apparently accepted his position and was going to try his best to remain calm.

  Good, she thought. I’d like to be out of his presence as soon as possible.

  She typically did not like to lie to suspects; she felt it weakened her argument, particularly if the suspect was able to trip her up. Still, in this case, she felt certain that Samuel had lied to them and, consequently, Chino Castillo had told them the truth.

  “Here’s the deal,” she said. “The phone records are in. There have been absolutely zero calls made from Chino Castillo’s phone to your cell phone. The emails seem to check out, too. So tell me why you lied to us about him.”

  The worry that flashed across his face told Mackenzie that her suspicions were dead on. Samuel sighed and looked at both of them with a resigned expression.

  “Because I wanted you out of my hair,” he said. “I figured you were just another couple of cops that had found out about what we do at Tidal Hills and were looking into it.”

  “That’s called feeling guilty,” Mackenzie said. “That and your sordid past in Houston would keep you paranoid, I suppose. But one would think it would also cause you to be smart enough to not lie to federal agents. Also, even when you learned why we were really there, you decided to lie. Why is that? Did you have something against Chino Castillo?”

  “Of course I did. He came in twice, got an eyeful, and then left. I have a very strong no-voyeur policy. And that’s what he was doing. Fortunately, that is the only time such a thing has ever occurred at Tidal Hills. Having him out there, having seen what goes on inside…it makes me very uncomfortable.”

  “And what does go on inside?” Ellington asked. “From what Castillo tells us, there’s very little spirituality taking place and a whole lot of fucking.”

  Samuel actually looked as if someone had reached out and slapped him hard across the face. The obscenity had apparently taken him by complete surprise, nearly disgusting him.

  “That’s not true. It’s—”

  No, I think it is,” Mackenzie said. “And while it makes me sick, there’s technically nothing illegal about it. Of course, I have no idea how you spend the money people pay you for fees or anything like that. Although, I’m sure that might be worth looking into.”

  “Look, what do you want from me?” Samuel asked.

  “I need to know about the Kurtzes,” Mackenzie said.

  “In that regard, I was not lying. They were not with me for very long and when they left, it was amicable. No hos
tility. From what I remember, they were very nice. Quite kind and funny from what I remember.”

  “And no bad vibes with anyone else?” Mackenzie asked.

  “No. If they did, it happened behind the scenes and I never knew about it.”

  Mackenzie had been pacing up until now. She finally took a seat in front of the same table Samuel was sitting at.

  “You sure about that?” Mackenzie asked, even though she was pretty sure he was telling the truth. “It seems to me that a man as popular as you within such a small circle would hear just about everything.”

  “Yes, I swear it,” Samuel said. She could hear the pleading in his voice. He was apparently sensing that she and Ellington were already running low on avenues to use in their interrogation.

  “What about the auditions?” Mackenzie asked. “Have you ever allowed a woman to audition for a spot in your little club?”

  “Audition?”

  Mackenzie got back to her feet. She knew the path she was headed down had nothing to do with the case. But God, she hated this man.

  “You knowingly lied when an FBI agent asked you a question,” she said. “There are criminal charges attached to that. Usually you can get off with a fine or slap on the wrist. But with your preexisting record—”

  “Look. I don’t know anything else about these Kurtzes,” he said. “I swear. If you want, I can ask some of the other members but I honestly don’t know.”

  She looked at him, trying to tell if he was being honest. She was pretty sure he was but she also felt her resentment and anger toward him rising up like flames in her heart. She turned her back on him and started for the door.

  “You good?” Ellington asked as she passed him.

  “Just need a second,” she said.

  Without another word or any explanation, she left the interrogation room. She stood between the doors of the interrogation room and the observation room, leaning back against the cinderblock wall.