by Hugh Macnab
As I pass Dan’s cubicle, I give him a thumbs up and keep going. I know that will be enough for him.
Back on home turf, I’m already feeling more like my old self.
I log on and check the daily incident reports. The most significant is the clearing of the Project. It makes gripping reading. They’ve formed a team of volunteers to help identify all one-hundred-thirty-four people and research their backgrounds. The Sheriff has agreed to pay overtime for the work. For that, he’s gone up in my estimation. I’m hoping the County will be equally supportive with helping these people get re-established afterwards.
I open the folder I’ve created with the details of the nine people who own the cells in Pamela Wilson’s safe. I have already developed background on three of them, there are still six to go. But I can’t face it right there and then. I close the folder and call a cab. I’ll take the folder with me and do the work at home.
23
I feel more alive after a shower. I put on clean knickers and a Blades shirt with a large gator on the front. Knock back a few pain killers and make myself a cheese sandwich. Along with a bag of Ruffles and a Corona, I’m all set. My intention is to eat, then research the remaining six names on Pamela Wilson’s list. I end up falling asleep on my beanbag.
I must have been exhausted because Alexa wakes me up for a second time with Agalloch. This time, I only vaguely heard the initial sounds, and slowly drag myself out of the deepest sleep I can remember.
As soon as I’m able, I tell Alexa to play something more soothing, and she switches to classical piano. I’ve no idea what the music is, but it’s quieter and that’s just fine with me.
As I stand, I feel like my body has been through a meat-grinder. Stiff and achy all over. I try a few stretches, but know that only one thing is going to help - another shower. At least afterwards, I will be sparkly clean … and sore all over.
I underestimate the effect of the second shower. When I step out, I feel almost normal apart from my sore butt.
After drying off, I apply the deodorant-for-men I use. Much stronger and lasts longer. Dress in a red cotton top and white chinos. Then refill the coffee pot and switch it on.
While the coffee is brewing, I put two bagels in the toaster then a pillow on one of my breakfast bar stools and sit. I open the folder I brought home with me the night before. There’s that little niggling detective voice in the back of my mind again. I know I’m missing something. Something obvious.
I spread out the details of the three people I’ve already started building backgrounds for and look them over. Wade Dooley, Christiana Lover and Denis Meaker. What is bothering me?
One man is married, but one is single as is the woman. They’re born all over the place. New Orleans, Kentucky and Cincinnati. All are in their fifties, but I can’t see how that similarity can help me. They work not only for different companies, but different industries.
And that’s when it hits me. Pamela Wilson had flitted from job to job across all kinds of companies. I look her file up and check. Insurance company, Sears, Costco, Walmart, I-4-U and Bank of America. I know there are others, but this is as far as I’ve gone. I see what I’m looking for immediately.
Bank of America - Wade Dooley and Pamela
Costco - Christiana Lover and Pamela
I-4-U - Denis Meaker and Pamela.
She’s been moving around and using her employment to target clients. But not only that. She’s targeting highly placed individuals. Wade Dooley was a Senior Financial Investment Executive with the bank. Christiana Lover was the Human Resource director for Costco South East division, and Denis Meaker was the founder and major share-holder of his own eye-care company I-4-U.
I’m now sure if I look through the careers of each of the other names, I’ll find Pamela Wilson had worked in the same place.
I head for the coffeepot and pour my first cup of the day. My bagels are cold, I press the toaster a second time and return to the breakfast bar. I have one last check to make. I need to check the order of the cell phones against the order in which Pamela worked at the various establishments. I have all the information, I just need to lay it out.
The order of the cell phones implies that the most recent target had been Wade Dooley, then Christiana before that and Denis Meaker before that. I also remember that the most recent cell of all is the Galaxy S8, but I have to ignore that for the time being.
Looking back through Pamela’s employment history, most recently she was with Bank of America working in administration in the investment branch. Dooley’s responsibility. Before that she was in payroll in the Human Resource department of Costco where Christiana Lover worked.
I’m on a roll now. Her previous job to that had been to work in administration at I-4-U. Denis Meaker’s start-up company.
I get her game. She would take a new position. Seek an interested party. Target only high-wealth clients, then invite them to have fun. The only thing now missing is that I’ve no idea how she would find people interested in being dominated. Perhaps I can ask Luisa del Roy the next time I see her?
Another issue with my theory is I still can’t figure how she used their own cell phones to take a video of the action, then managed to lock it in her safe without them stopping her. I can probably understand why someone who liked what she could do for them might want a video to remember the action by. I’d learnt a lot about that when I visited Tommy Hawk at the legal brothel on the Seminole reservation last year. This video stuff is big business.
I also understand why they wouldn’t want Pamela to take the video on her cell. Too risky. So if they wanted one, it would have to be on their own. One thing I’m getting about Pamela Wilson, is that she was no amateur. She would have known this and so probably offered to use their own cells. That would have sounded reassuring.
But how did she keep them?
If I’m to figure this one out, I need to watch one of the videos again. I’ll have to do it in a conference room or else if word gets out what I’m doing, the whole department will gather round to help me.
I spread peanut butter on the bagels, pour a second coffee and head for the beanbag to think. Not about the case, but about me.
I start recalling my conversation with Luisa del Roy from the day before. The first memory that comes to mind is when she had told me there probably isn’t actually very much wrong. Just that one short phrase has me so jammed up. It implies the exact opposite of how I feel. Yet, she’s a very experienced professional. And, dare I say, someone I already trust. Something I rarely do so easily. It makes little sense.
I shot an innocent two-year-old, who died instantly. Sacrificed motherhood for my career. Ran away from a man I really like. Terminated an unborn child. Denied the father involvement in the decision and now am responsible for getting my cousin killed. I feel guilty as hell about everything. How can there not be much wrong?
Then she explained how I’m fighting battles on two fronts at the same time. I get that. She’s spot on there. I feel like the classic swan gliding smoothly across the lake, but with its feet working like crazy underneath the surface. But if I stop paddling like fuck, either I won’t get anywhere, or more likely I’ll sink under the weight of the burden I carry. Surely it’s better to keep going?
Then I recall having watched a series on Netflix about the Second World War, and the mistakes that Adolf Hitler made. The worst by far was to attack on two fronts. Europe and Russia. He was fucked as soon as he headed East. It just took time, but that one poor decision cost him the war.
If I’m to avoid losing, I wonder what I need to concentrate on?
Luisa said that the present was a war worth fighting. It was my real present-day existence. The past was just that, and no longer worth my time or effort. She’s right of course. I agree with her. But how can I do that when I think about the past all the time? When I see the young girl’s face if I pull my Glock? When Bossy-boots haunts my dreams? And now I can add how Joey accused me of forgetting him, and I know that’s the truth.
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Del Roy has said this is where she’s going to help. She told me about a technique that would allow me to process these thoughts from my past and calm them down. Then, once I’ve dealt with them, I’ll be more able to live in the present, not the past. I like the sound of that and am astonished to find I’m actually looking forward to the second session in a week’s time.
24
For once, when I get to the office, I actually do what I intend to do. I grab a laptop and head into the small conference room to watch some of Pamela’s dominatrix performances. I have nine to choose from, yet don’t hesitate. I load up Christiana Lover’s. I don’t know if this is just curiosity to see a woman subjected to a dominatrix - something that has surprised me. Or whether there is some deeper, more personal interest. Regardless, when the video starts Christiana is already wearing her black minimalist underwear. I don’t know if she would wear knickers like this all the time, but just looking at them makes my butt even more painful. They must be so uncomfortable.
I watch as Pamela, dressed in her black faux-leather outfit, performs her various tasks - apparently on demand. Within thirty seconds I’ve already decided no-one will ever do any of this to me. But Christiana - apparently loves it. Well, I assume she’s loving it. Most of it looks painful to me. She keeps asking for more, or for something to be harder.
The more I watch, the more ashamed I feel for both of them. Irrational, I know, but I feel embarrassed just watching this. Embarrassed that a woman would want this, when there are thousands of women suffering physical and sexual abuse every day who don’t want it, and can’t stop it. Pamela herself, for instance. Then I realize that what happened to Pamela with my fellow detective and his gym buddies, happened recently, long after she retired from her dominatrix business.
As I half-watch, I disassociate, allowing my mind to think of other things I would have to do that day. Only when Christiana is naked and Pamela cuffing her to the bed-rails, do I start to pay full attention once again.
After that, it’s more of the same, and again I lose interest. But one thing I do notice, is that when the video stops, Christiana is still cuffed to the bed.
I play the Wade Dooley recording, but fast-forward through to near the end. Again, he also remains cuffed when the recording stops.
So, now I have at least partially answered how Pamela manages to get their cells locked into her safe. She puts them in and locks them away, before releasing her clients.
But, if I were one of them, I would be livid when she finally set me free. I can’t see them just happily walking off into the night.
So there’s only one possible conclusion I can come to. She had an accomplice. Someone she called at the end of each session, who would protect her as the client dressed and left. A man. A big muscular man, would be my guess. I need to find him.
I have everything I need from the videos for the time being, so close the laptop and return to my cubicle. The next step is to get hold of Pamela’s cell phone records. She would have had to call this man and there should be a record. I send the request to her provider, hoping that she wasn’t a huge cell-phone user.
Most of the providers are quick to respond, and she was with T-Mobile. I’m fairly confident I’ll have the information back the following day.
Only after I’ve done that, do I notice a couple of message slips. One is from my mama, the other from one of Jerry’s guys. Both want me to call.
I call Mama first. She wants to let me know the greater family are having a ceremony for the passing of Joey’s spirit that night at seven. I tell her I’ll be there. I owe him that, at least. There goes that guilt again.
Next, I call Mike Gibson, Jerry’s right-hand man in Narcotics. He tells me he’s attending some to the postmortems from the Project and thinks it might be worthwhile my stopping by. He doesn’t say why. Intrigued, I tell him I’ll be right there.
Down in the morgue, there are three of Jerry’s guys watching what’s happening, and I think that a little strange. I mean, sad as this whole thing is, why the sudden interest in the deaths of these poor people?
Mike thanks me for coming down and suggests we go to Arnie Collins’ office. I shrug, still not sure why I’m there, but follow him anyway. On the way, he gives me an update on Jerry. The splintered floorboards have made a mess of his thighs and stomach, but most of the wounds are superficial. They’re expecting him back in a few days’ time. Until then, he has been asked to run the show.
When we reach Arnie’s office, I’m surprised to find him there. I’d thought with all the bodies we had discovered he would be up to his elbows, but here he is.
He has his stern look on, so my guilt fires-up, and I start frantically thinking about what I might have done that would earn his wrath. Other than my involvement in sending him more dead bodies, I can’t think of anything. I’m in the clear.
‘Thanks for coming, Sammy.’
Shit. Not detective. This is personal. I’m not ready for that.
‘I guess what I’m about to tell you will also affect your cousin, Joey Still Water.’
Now he has my undivided attention.
‘We’re not finished the work on all the victims from the Project, but we can draw some preliminary conclusions and I want you to hear them from me, rather than by reading a report.’
He clears his throat. Whatever’s bothering him is already bothering me, too. I’m tense.
‘Each of the victims had extremely high levels of drugs in their systems.’
So far, so good. No surprise there.
‘But what we have found is that all the early toxicology results are different.’
This confuses me. I ask why that’s significant.
‘Because they all lived in the same place. Got their drugs from the same suppliers. They should have similar results.’
‘So you’re saying there was more than one supplier?’
‘No. I’m saying that someone was cutting the drugs with different strengths, using over-the-counter meds to produce different results.’
‘I’m sorry, Arnie. I’m not following you.’
‘Someone was experimenting on them, Sammy. Testing what they could produce and also what they could get away with. The Project was nothing but a laboratory. Using people that no-one would miss, to trial their products.’
I’m speechless. I guess Mike has already been told, but he’s still pretty shaken up. He’s the first to speak.
‘We have to find who’s responsible for this, Sammy. If you want looped in, it’s fine with me, if you okay it with your sergeant.’
‘I’m in, Mike. My sergeant will be too. Whatever you guys need on this one. You’ll have our full support.’
‘Thanks, Sammy. We’ll be meeting later in the day. I’ll let you know when.’
Back upstairs, the conversation with Dan goes much as I predict. It upsets him, just as it has the rest of us. This needs a joint task-force approach, and he doesn’t care who heads it up. Homicide or Narcotics.
He tells me he’ll update the Sheriff on the status of finding Mark Jason’s killer and this joint task-force effort at the same time. Then repeats how sorry he is that my cousin had been caught up in all of this. I thank him and return to my cubicle, feeling as low as I have for a while. I can’t imagine the suffering these poor people were being put through. Not only had their lives fallen apart, but they had lost everything, become junkies, and then turned into lab-rats for some asshole dealer. Probably Chico Vegas.
A new message on my desk tells me that Forensics have received the last cell phone back from their external consultants. I can collect it whenever I have time.
It seems like now is as good as any, so off I go, questioning how far I walk in this building every day. Wondering whether the information this new device reveals will fit into my understanding of Pamela Wilson’s retirement scheme.
I should have known it wouldn’t be so easy.
25
I bring the Galaxy S8 back down to the small conference
room in Homicide and enter the 0000 code, set up to allow me easy access. It’s a little different to operate from my own cell, so it takes me a while to figure it out, but eventually I find the video and play it.
This time, Pamela’s guest is a young girl. To my eyes, she looks about sixteen with an as-yet to develop body. I’m not sure of the legality of what I’m about to witness, but I see a new aspect of Pamela Wilson. And I don’t like it. Her morality, or lack of it. Anyone with a sense of decency would have refused to do what I’m now witnessing.