Lost in the Darkness (Crusaders of the Lost Book 1)

by William Mark

  A tiny voice spoke through the ear bud in Curt’s ear.

  “Hurry it up. Alexis just sent me a text that the Vail detectives just got off the elevator.” There was a tinge of panic in Rachel’s voice.

  Senator Thomas Pittman was talking to a few fellow legislators and an old colleague who still sat on the City Council. They were rehashing old times and memorable events in past charities. As Pittman downed the rest of his champagne, he felt a presence behind him. The odd look on the Congressman who stood in front of him confirmed this. Pittman turned as he finished the drink to see Curtis Walker standing behind him, a deadpan look on his face.

  His stare gave Pittman the uneasy feeling of being exposed, like he could read his innermost thoughts and secrets. Curt’s expression was unwavering and caused a stir within the small circle of constituents. Curt was a sight. He was a disheveled mess with an old, worn-out trench coat hanging loose off his body, coupled with distant eyes, and a betrayed look on his face. It gave him the appearance of walking off the street and into the black tie event.

  “Curtis! How are you?” Pittman said jovially but secretly met Curt with glaring eyes of contempt.

  “I’m fine, Senator. How are you doing?” Curt replied sarcastically.

  Pittman handed his empty glass off to someone standing behind him and then excused himself to deal with the man in the trench coat.

  With a hidden hiss in his tone, Pittman softly said, “Can we talk over here, please?” Pittman grabbed Curt’s arm and pulled him away from the small crowd.

  “Sure.”

  Being a career politician, Pittman quickly explained that the man was a dejected member of his staff who was recently let go and that he needed to deal with something before it got out of hand. He was met with understanding nods.

  Once in a private huddle, Pittman said with feigned sincerity, “What are you doing here, Curtis?” There was a slight panic in Pittman’s voice, but he was much too cautious to let on that he was concerned. He was holding onto the hope that Curt didn’t know just how deep his secret ran.

  “Oh, I was just in the neighborhood. Thought I’d stop in and say hi.” The sarcasm was still thick and obvious.

  “Well, if I’d known that you wanted to come, I would’ve gotten you and Tracy a ticket.”

  “Oh, you’ve done more than enough for my family, Thomas.” The deadpan look returned.

  Pittman’s perpetual smile faded as he realized he had been found out and that Curtis Walker had somehow uncovered the carefully hidden truth. He had ways to deal with this, and he would never let someone like Curtis Walker get over on him. He maintained the façade and made a quick head nod over Curtis’ shoulder, as if anticipating this confrontation. Pittman believed in luck but knew he had to make luck work in his favor and sometimes even create his own brand of luck.

  Curt turned and saw two men making their way through the crowd. His first thought was that they were goons ready to remove him and “make him disappear.” But as the two men got closer, he immediately pegged them as cops, but not local.

  “Curtis Walker?” one of the men said in a deep, raspy voice.

  “Yes?”

  “I’m Detective Edgar Rankin. I’d like to talk to you about an incident that happened a few weeks ago in Vail, Colorado.”

  Curt didn’t react. He slowly looked back at Pittman who had a smug look on his face. He turned and saw a few uniformed officers from TPD standing by the entrances of the ballroom, a contingency plan if he didn’t want to go willingly. Finally, he turned back to Rankin and his fellow detective as they were anticipating the worst. Curt noticed Rankin had his hand hiked back and poised to draw his weapon. There was a subtle but palpable tension that came over the room. Pittman and Curt were at the epicenter.

  “Sure, I assume we’re going back to TPD and not Vail, right?”

  “Of course. We’ve been in contact with your Sergeant Polk. He’s expecting us.”

  Rankin reached up and escorted Curt from the center of the room and through the crowd which drew looks and created murmurs of speculation. Pittman watched as Curt was led away. His smug face appeared strong with his satisfaction and control over the situation. Curt looked back at Pittman with a pathetic look of betrayal and defeat. Pittman only smirked back, knowing his exposure would not come to light, and his dark secret would remain hidden and just that…a dark secret.

  “Thanks for the tip, Senator,” the junior detective leaned in and said to Pittman.

  “No problem detective. I’ve always been a sounding board for justice, and that includes cops who cross the line. It’s sad when that happens, but we’re all held accountable for our actions. Do what you must.”

  “Yes, sir.” The junior detective caught up with Rankin to help escort their suspect out of the venue. Pittman smiled arrogantly. A waiter passed by with a tray full of champagne glasses. He reached up and took another while Curt was walked out of the banquet room and toward the elevators.

  ***

  Alexis Vanderhill stood by in the opposite corner and watched helplessly as Curt was escorted away by the Vail detectives. She fought the urge to intervene, but she restrained herself, knowing it would not do any good. As Curt disappeared through the doors of the banquet hall, the hushed murmurs grew into a staccato of loud conversation with a few laughs and high-pitched squeals. These types of events were necessary but were also a huge annoyance as the self-involved people who attended rarely got behind the reason of need. It was used for social interaction and was gaining popularity among the “In Crowd.” Sometimes, she was appalled by the misguided elite of society.

  “What the hell is going on, Alexis?” Tony Mason decided to catch the elevator after passing Rankin outside. He walked into the banquet room and saw the exchange with Walker and the detectives. He was left wondering if he’d been had since he knew that Curt was a player on her team.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, I thought this was about Pittman, not Walker. If you lied to me, so help me—“

  “Relax Tony. You get ugly when you whine.” Alexis turned and looked at Mason and gave him a smile.

  Mason saw it and the deviousness that came with it. He caught on quickly and looked back through the crowd at Pittman, who was now the center of attention.

  “Plus, who’s in control isn’t always obvious.” Alexis walked away from Mason, leaving him standing alone.

  Mason grabbed a flute of champagne from a passing waiter. He tipped it up, emptying it in one gulp. Pondering the events that he had just witnessed, coupled with what he already knew of Alexis Vanderhill, he concluded that he would never want to be on her bad side. “I guess not!”

  Chapter 46

  The small monitor room on the side of the Criminal Investigations Division was crammed full of onlookers. Most were members of TPD’s Command staff along with Sergeant Polk, who all watched the lengthy interview between Curtis Walker and the two detectives from Vail. Each listened intently about the hardship Walker had endured after his son went missing. Most of the department had had no clue of his whereabouts for the past two years. Many had assumed that he had fallen into a life-numbing cocoon of alcoholism and self-blame. So, they were astounded that he had actually been wandering around the country in search of his lost child…literally leaving no stone unturned.

  After two and a half hours, Detective Rankin and his partner walked out of the interview room. He had all he needed from the Tallahassee detective and desperately craved a cigarette. Polk explained that the building was smoke-free and escorted them down to the parking garage underneath the Crystal Palace so Rankin could smoke.

  “So…what do you think?” Rankin asked of Polk as they waited for the elevator.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Walker is your guy. Is he being honest?”

  Polk didn’t want to air any type of laundry to an outsider, but given the circumstances, he wanted to provide honest feedback.

  “I think he is. But there’s something he�
�s holding back. Putting two-and-two together from your interview, sounds like everything’s pretty consistent with what you have on scene, right?”

  “Yes, it matches, but he’s lying about what led up to the shooting.”

  “What do you mean? What do you have that says he’s lying?”

  “The woman….”

  Rankin exited the elevator on the bottom floor and quickly lit his cigarette. He took a long drag as if it were air, and he was drowning.

  “What woman? The one he rescued from the traffickers?”

  “Yes, he didn’t acknowledge knowing her. He says he was there following Cauldress who he overheard talking about the prostitutes, and then this woman was just there in a random coincidence. I’m not buying that crap.”

  “Okay, what you got?”

  “Just the evidence on scene. We got her blood, and it’s just a matter of time until she turns up. It just doesn’t look good for your guy to be holding back.” Rankin had sent off the blood from the upstairs bedroom and found it didn’t match any of the trafficking victims. According to the lab, it belonged to a female donor. This corroborated the women’s story of the heroine helping them escape.

  “So, he’s truthful with the actual shooting and what happened but not necessarily what led him to be at the house.”

  “Right?”

  “Why would he lie about how he got there but tell the truth about the shooting? I mean, that doesn’t really make sense. I get what you’re saying though; I’m just not sure what you’re looking for. Are you saying Curt and this woman conspired somehow, to kill Cauldress and the traffickers? Did you talk to the girls?”

  “Yeah, they said both just showed up, helped them out of the window, and then the shooting happened.”

  “Kind of backs up their story, huh?”

  “Kind of.”

  “You think they were working together for some unknown reason, but you’re still good with how the shooting went down?”

  “Yeah, but it still bothers me. Loose ends and all.”

  “Still sounds like your case is proven,” Polk concluded.

  “Yeah,” Rankin said, followed by a moment in silent thought. “Yeah, looks that way.”

  “Where are you at with Walker? You gonna charge him?”

  “Leaning towards it. I’ve got a lot of problems with what he’s saying. I’m going to run this by my people back in Vail first. Sounds like a righteous shoot despite some of the lies, but I’m stuck on the fact that he hauled ass from Colorado after the shooting. He had time to stage the scene to fit his story of self-defense, because any good cop knows it’s better to stick around and at least not say anything rather than running. As you know, running equates to guilt in police work.”

  “Yeah, that seems to be universal.”

  “I guess we wait and see,” Rankin said, as he tossed down his cigarette and stamped it out with a twist of his foot.

  ***

  Curt sat alone in the interview room while his fate was being settled outside. He gave the detectives everything they needed, short of the real reason for being at the chalet. He owed Alexis Vanderhill that much. He thought about his son at home. He’d been gone all day, chasing the leads about who was behind Josh’s kidnapping, and he wanted to get home to see him.

  Rankin explained that he was going to contact his agency and give them an update. They would decide whether to arrest Curt later. It was late, and the two Vail detectives left the station in search of food and a hotel while waiting for their superiors to make a decision. Polk agreed to remain behind with their suspect.

  “Sergeant Polk, may I have a minute please?” Curt said to the empty room. He knew he was still being watched from the monitor room.

  Polk looked around the room to the Command Staff members who looked back expectantly at the sergeant. He had no idea what his detective wanted. He slowly got up and went to the interview room to see what he wanted.

  “Hey Curt, what’s up?”

  “I need to tell you something but not with it rolling.” Curt was referring to the video recording equipment in the room.

  Sgt. Polk grew leery but could sense the honesty behind the request. He’d known Curtis Walker for a long time, and even though he’d been through some tough times in the last three years, Polk saw the same man he knew. He nodded and requested a minute to shoo away the Command Staff.

  “No, I want the Captain and Chief to join us too.”

  “Okay….” he said skeptically.

  A few minutes later, the video recorder was turned off and Curt sat across from Polk, the Captain over investigations, and the Chief.

  “What I’m about to tell you cannot leave this room, at least not yet. Can you all agree to that?”

  “If you lied to those detectives and want to confess to us, you have no confidentiality here, son!” the Chief said.

  “No sir, I didn’t lie to them. I gave them everything they need to know. This is about something else. This is about the disappearance of my son and who’s responsible.”

  “Yeah, we know. Those guys from Valdosta.”

  “No, there’s another.”

  Chapter 47

  It all started with a look. Standing outside of the Walker home while a crowd of reporters watched like spectators, Rachel Goodwin noticed the sharply dressed Senator give the younger and more impressionable Beth Young a flirtatious look as he walked by. At least twenty years her senior, it was a lingering look of instant desire, but Rachel read the look as more lascivious and criminal. It stayed with her the whole time she was visiting with Curt, distracting her. It nagged at her. The only time she ignored it was when Tracy Walker walked into the room causing distress, given the moment she had shared with Curt.

  After leaving the house, Rachel couldn’t let the Senator’s look go. She tasked out assignments to the team and asked them to research Pittman, knowing she couldn’t go to Curtis with this hunch. She didn’t want to be wrong about Pittman and have it cause embarrassment. A false accusation of any kind against a person such as Thomas Pittman could be fatal for the existence of the team.

  “Uh, the Senator?” Louis asked skeptically.

  “Yeah, something’s not right about him.”

  “Like what?” Beth asked, obviously seeing what she wanted from the charming man.

  “I’m not sure. Just take a look and see if anything catches your eye.”

  Rachel spent most of the day looking at Pittman’s profile and trying to learn about him. It was all cookie-cutter stuff that sounded good and nothing that interested her. He was born to and raised in the panhandle of Florida by wealthy parents He went to the University of West Florida for his undergraduate studies and the University of Florida for his master’s degree in political science. He moved to Tallahassee and got his law degree from FSU and worked for the State Attorney’s Office for several years as a prosecutor before moving into the political arena. He ran for and was elected as a City Councilman at the age of thirty-one and served on the Council for ten years. He was pro tem Mayor for a short term before winning his district for State Senator and moving back home to the panhandle. He still kept an office in Tallahassee to use during session.

  She focused on his time in Tallahassee and read more about the oversight committee. Pittman joined the committee a year before Joshua went missing, and he stepped down about six months later to focus on his Senatorial campaign.

  Rachel was getting stonewalled by the drab information she found on the internet. It frustrated her because she saw something in Pittman outside of Curt’s house. If she failed to validate the feeling, to her that meant she was not capable of leading this team as effectively as Curt. She had seen firsthand his ability to see the darkness within one’s soul. She moved through life as guarded as she could, but he managed to read her like an open book on the night of the shooting as they shared their innermost secrets and a kiss. She wanted the same ability, and this was her first test. Not having it was deflating and a waste of time.

  “Hey,
wanna see something weird?” Louis said, breaking Rachel away from her frustrations.

  “Sure.”

  “I was watching some of the news coverage on Josh’s story, and look what I found.”

  Louis rolled his chair away from his little workstation in the back of the van and twisted the monitor around so that Rachel could see it from the captain’s chair. Melinda looked on from the driver’s seat.

  The footage was from earlier that morning and showed Tracy slowly pulling out of the driveway with Josh in the front seat. The reporters were trying to obtain a sound bite from the mother of the missing child, but she politely smiled and said, “Sorry, no comment.” The footage continued and the reporter looked back at the camera and finished the news report. The total clip was about twenty seconds and unsensational to say the least.

  “Okay, so? Tracy had no comment. I don’t blame her.”

  “No kidding. That’s not it. Did you see past her car?”

  “No, play it again.”

  Louis reloaded the video and hit play. Beth Young stopped what she was doing and watched the computer screen over Rachel’s shoulder.

  As Tracy’s car pulled slowly from the driveway, she addressed the reporters and drove off. As she did, Rachel caught what Louis pegged as “weird.” It was a Lincoln Town Car parked off to the side. Sitting behind the wheel was the shadowy figure of a man.

  “What time did we get to the house?”

  “A little after 10:30 a.m.,” Louis answered.

  “And this was….”

  “Shot at 9:50 a.m., aired at the ten o’clock hour.”