Kaylin's Pursuit [The Black Iris Club 1] (Siren Publishing Everlasting Classic)

by Skye Michaels

  “She was up in the club, and I believe she left around eleven o’clock. I’m not sure of the time, but she did say goodnight to me. She also moonlights on the front desk at the club. She’s saving to buy a condo. She was saving,” he amended. He handed the cell phone back to Kaylin. “She would have had to swipe in and out with her security card, both in the elevator and at the front door to the club. Smith will get you the security tapes and key card swipe records.”

  * * * *

  Kaylin looked at Del with a lift to her eyebrow. She was thinking, was this guy going to turn over surveillance records without them having to do the usual dance of getting a warrant?

  “I can see what you’re thinking, Detectives. I’m an attorney although I don’t practice law. I don’t have anything to hide, and if our surveillance records can help you find out who murdered one of my employees, and not incidentally, my friend, I will certainly help you—no warrant necessary.”

  “We’ll need a roster of all the tenants in the building.” Kaylin wanted to strike while the cooperation iron was hot. “We’ll also need copies of all surveillance tape or records for the garage entry, as well as lists of the employees, and any contractors or suppliers who routinely deliver to the building. Since the crime appears to have taken place late last night, those most likely will not be relevant, but we will want to cover all the bases.”

  “My records will be made available. I can get you the list of contractors and suppliers who deliver to the club and a list of the building’s tenants. I’ll see what I can do about lists of employees, contractors, or invitees for tenants. That will probably have to be on Monday. You may need warrants for their records, but I will see what I can do to grease the rails of cooperation there.” Kaylin thought either this guy has something to hide and didn’t want them to know it, or he had nothing to hide. Kaylin’s instincts usually tended to go with the former, but this time it might just be the latter. “Can you tell us where you were last night, Mr. Brown? We don’t have a time of death yet, but an overview of your evening would be helpful.”

  “I was upstairs in the club from about eight o’clock until about one. Then I went into my apartment. It’s on the penthouse floor with the club. I have a private entrance. The key swipe records will confirm that I didn’t leave the penthouse all night until I came down here when Smith rang my apartment.”

  “Were you alone?” For some reason that question made Kaylin uncomfortable.

  Jack Dalton Brown looked directly into her eyes and said, “I’m rarely alone on a Saturday night, Detective. Miss Mikaela Jones was with me all night.” He gave the stunning blonde a warm smile, and she smiled back tentatively. Brown pulled her into his side and gave her a one-armed hug. Clearly this whole situation made her very nervous.

  “Thank you. We will check everything out to clear you as a suspect as quickly as possible.” Or not. Depending on how it all shakes out. “We would like to see the penthouse and your apartment if you don’t mind. The Crime Scene Unit just arrived, and they will begin processing the garage. Hopefully they will locate the crime scene down here.” Kaylin watched as the forty foot state-of-the-art mobile crime scene laboratory rolled into the parking garage. She knew that it was equipped with the latest in Nikon photography equipment, video camcorders, evidence, latent print collection and processing equipment, biohazard protection gear, as well as generators and onboard cell and fax communication equipment. The BSO CSI Detectives were top-notch.

  “Fine. I’ll take you upstairs right now. Smith, please start putting the surveillance tapes, key swipes, and other records the Detectives need together. As I said, Detectives, I have nothing to hide. I would, however, ask for your discretion regarding the names of members of the club and anything you see up there. It is a private club, and the members have an expectation of privacy. Unless one of them proves to be involved…”

  “We’ll do our best, but the case comes first.” Del didn’t look too happy.

  “Of course. I would just appreciate your being mindful of the confidentiality issues. Do you need anything from Mikaela right now, or can she leave? This is very upsetting for her.”

  “She can leave for the time being. We’ll get her statement later this afternoon or tomorrow.” Kaylin turned to Mikaela. “Please leave your contact information with one of the uniformed officers, and we will be in touch with you.”

  * * * *

  Kaylin and Del followed Jack Brown into the elevator that opened from the first floor garage level. He swiped his key card and the elevator zoomed up to the penthouse at warp speed. It was enough to make Kaylin dizzy considering her slight hangover. Brown put his palm to a steel plate on the elevator door and then swiped and palmed again at the carved, mahogany double doors that apparently opened into the club. That is a shit load of security. What’s in there? Fort freakin’ Knox? There was a discreet brass sign next to the double doors that read, “The Black Iris Club - Private.” Why had she never heard of this before?

  Chapter Two

  The foyer of The Black Iris Club, in the penthouse of the JDB Building, Downtown Fort Lauderdale, Florida, Sunday morning, July 6, 2014, 8:15 a.m.

  Kaylin glanced over at Jack Dalton Brown as he manipulated the key card and the palm plate with his long, elegant hands. The man was absolutely gorgeous. She had seen pictures of him in the newspapers and glossy rags from time to time, but they didn’t do him justice. Wow. His body was not overly muscled, but she could see the definition in his arms, his broad shoulders tapering down into lean hips, a gorgeous ass, and long legs. His face was sculpted with a straight, aristocratic nose and strong jaw. His wavy, dark hair was a little too long, and he had a dark morning beard. Obviously, he had just rolled out of bed with the beautiful Mikaela and rushed down to the garage. When he noticed her checking him out from top to bottom, he just grinned at her. How embarrassing, not to mention unprofessional. She did not check out suspects-slash-witnesses like she was ready to eat them with a spoon. She had to get her game face back on before Delaney noticed her preoccupation with Mr. Brown. He would never let her live it down. In fact, he’d be all over it like white on rice.

  Jack Brown pushed open one of the double doors, stepped in, and gestured for them to follow him. They walked into the elegant foyer with its mahogany reception desk. It looked like the reception area of a very high-end law firm or brokerage firm, except for what appeared to be an original Georgia O’Keeffe painting on the wall over the reception desk. The painting was a stunning floral done in black, white, and vivid pink that resembled the petals of a woman’s sex. She guessed that was where the name of the club originated. The painting certainly was evocative of The Black Iris Club. There was an intimate seating area, and the desk was flanked by rows of now still computer screens. Apparently, the entire club was covered by surveillance cameras.

  “I wondered before, Mr. Brown…”

  “Call me Jack.”

  “I wondered, Mr. Brown, why there is so much surveillance and security here.”

  “I think you will understand once we’ve walked through the club, Kaylin.”

  “That would be Detective Gallagher if you don’t mind.”

  He just smiled at her and graciously inclined his head. He seemed to be saying he did mind, and that they would see about that later. A shiver of anticipation that she didn’t understand skittered down her spine. The guy definitely had an edge.

  After swiping his key card again, he led them through another set of double doors into a huge room with dark red walls. The floor-to-ceiling windows were covered with a film that let in light but obviously kept out prying eyes. She couldn’t imagine what prying eyes could be looking in windows on the twentieth floor. She guessed someone in a helicopter could possibly see in. When she glanced around, she was shocked to see the multitude of strange equipment spread out over the room, each separate area lighted by overhead spotlights. It almost looked like gym equipment until she took a closer look and then she gasped. This was kinky sex equipment, or whateve
r. Yikes. In the penthouse of a skyscraper in downtown Fort Lauderdale, and she’d had no idea it was here. Now the painting in the foyer was starting to make sense. I guess he wasn’t kidding about discretion and confidentiality. Holy crap! She looked over at Del who just shrugged his shoulders as if to say he had no idea either.

  “Would you care to explain to us just exactly what goes on here, Mr. Brown?”

  “Yes, I will, but as I said before, I ask for your discretion.” He seemed to gather his thoughts for a moment and then continued. “This is a private club with a very select membership. It caters to people with a certain sexual taste. BDSM to be exact. As you may or may not know, BDSM stands for Bondage and Discipline, Dominance and Submission and Sadomasochism. It is also sometimes referred to as the ‘lifestyle.’”

  Kaylin was trying to appear nonchalant and at ease with this information, but it had come right out of left field and hit her right between the eyes.

  Brown continued. “All such sexual activities are completely consensual and may include Dominance and submission, role-playing, and bondage, etcetera. The players are Doms or Dominants, Masters or Sirs. Their partners are subs or submissives, or slaves, depending on the relationship that has been agreed on between the parties. The sexual activities involved may include spanking and whipping, sensory deprivation, orgasm denial, role-playing, and other consensual activities. The parties negotiate hard limits, or what they are willing to do, beforehand. All parties have to agree on said activities. This is not abuse. All parties must derive sexual pleasure from the agreed activities. We live by the by-words, ‘safe, sane, and consensual.’ The sub has a safe word to halt all activities should he or she become frightened or uncomfortable for any reason or should said activities become too painful. Safe words are never ignored. To do so would result in being immediately dropped from membership in the club.”

  Kaylin noted his rather clinical language and demeanor. Could he possibly be embarrassed as well? No, not likely. This was his club after all. “I see. Well, really, I don’t. How many members are in the club?”

  “We have ten Masters and about thirty other members. Subs come and go at the invitation of the members, and members can also bring in guests. We occasionally have members from other clubs with reciprocal privileges visiting as well. All parties sign confidentiality agreements before coming on the premises. No exceptions.”

  So, that’s why I never heard of this place. Interesting.

  They moved through the room and entered a well-lit hallway from which opened numerous doors. “These are the private rooms. Each is decorated with a different theme for role-playing, or just for use when a member desires privacy not available in the main dungeon.”

  Dungeon? Wow again. They walked through each of the theme rooms, and some of them were pretty outrageous while some were simply elegant. All had a complement of the strange metal equipment she had seen in the dungeon. “I haven’t seen any obvious blood or signs of a struggle, but we will want the crime scene techs to do a run-through.”

  “Can we wait and see if you find the crime scene in the garage before you send your people up here? It might not be necessary, and I would like to limit access to the premises to as few people as possible.”

  Kaylin looked at Del who said, “That’s reasonable. We should know something this morning since they are looking for the crime scene down there right now. If they don’t come up with anything definitive, we’ll have to revisit that possibility.”

  “I appreciate your cooperation, Detectives. Now, let’s go through to my private apartment, and then we can go down to the security office on the second floor and see what Smith has put together for you. I have to say that I am not happy that something like this happened in my building and security did not see it, never mind prevent it. We don’t have all this surveillance for nothing after all.”

  Kaylin had to feel sorry for the unfortunate Smith. It was obvious that Brown was going to rip him a new one, and it wouldn’t be pretty.

  Jack Brown led them to an unobtrusive steel door with another key card reader and another of the palm plates beside it. “This is my private apartment, and access is severely limited. By invitation only.”

  Kaylin’s eyes almost popped when she walked through the door. The apartment on the other side was almost completely open with undraped floor-to-ceiling windows on three sides that looked out over the city. The living area—living room, dining room, and state-of-the-art kitchen with stainless steel commercial appliances—was one big open space with high, industrial ceilings. The floors were covered in gleaming hardwood with colorful scatter rugs. The furniture was upholstered in very light beige leather enhanced with plump colorful throw pillows. There were a few tasteful paintings and sculptures scattered about as well, but for the most part, the apartment was uncluttered and open. Off to one side were several doors that Kaylin supposed went to bedrooms.

  Jack anticipated her. “Those are the master bedroom, two guest rooms, my home office, bathrooms, and a private dungeon for when I don’t want to go next door. There is a butler’s pantry and laundry room off the kitchen. My private pool and deck are beyond the living area.” Kaylin took in the expanse of rooftop with a large lap pool. There were full-size palm trees and flower beds planted with tall, lush grasses and ground cover plants. The deck had a view out over the city, Port Everglades to the south, and the Atlantic Ocean in the distance. It was amazing what you could see from twenty floors up.

  Kaylin loved her cozy little bungalow in Rio Vista, through the tunnel and on the other side of the New River, but this was definitely how the one half of one percent lived. Amazing.

  Del cut into her reverie. “Do you mind if we take a look in the other rooms?”

  Brown shook his head. “Not at all. The cleaning crew that also takes care of the club hasn’t been in yet today to make the bed, etcetera.”

  The other rooms were spotless except for the unmade bed in the master bedroom. The white silk bedspread and decorative pillows were strewn on the floor. While it looked like a good time was had by all, it was in fairly good order. Kaylin found herself blushing as she imagined the gorgeous couple rolling around on that enormous bed that looked out over the city lights and the star-spangled sky. The ocean in the distance would be black as pitch at night, as though the world ended at the shoreline. The whole scene made her temperature rise—that was for sure. When they were done looking around they returned to the club.

  “Do you have a private elevator to access the apartment?” Del didn’t miss a thing.

  “Yes. It’s not obvious, but there is an express elevator behind a door next to my reserved parking spaces in the garage. The access records for that will be included in the package Smith will put together.”

  When they exited the club, Kaylin and Del took note of the reverse procedure of swiping and palming back out of the premises. Security was definitely tight as a tick’s butt.

  “DefCon Security, the security company under contract for the building, has duplicate records of these tapes and the computer records of swipes just in case you were wondering if I had Smith down here wiping any incriminating information while we were upstairs. I believe in covering my bases. You can make your own arrangements to obtain those records.”

  Kaylin made note of the security company’s name and tucked the business card Derek Smith handed her in the pocket of her notebook. Smith took them through the surveillance tapes, showed them the swipe records on the computer, and then handed Del a package with the original tapes, a printout of the swipe records, and tenant roster. Unfortunately, there was nothing definitive on the tapes. They showed Lucy Evans leaving the club, entering the elevator, and entering the garage. She walked to her car where she was accosted by a man of medium height who appeared to be Caucasian and wearing a suit. He had been carrying a gym bag or some kind of black carryall that had a logo on the side that they couldn’t see very well. He kept his face turned away from the cameras as though he knew where they were located. They
appeared to be arguing. They saw Lucy’s head being repeatedly smacked into the concrete wall. When she slumped to the ground, the perpetrator picked her up and tossed her into the Dumpster. He carefully withdrew and went back into the garage elevator and disappeared from view. He reappeared momentarily on the third level but again kept his face turned away from the cameras.

  Everyone was quiet for a few moments as what they had witnessed sunk in. Then Smith said, “I thought you would want the originals. I’ve made duplicates for us here. I’ve also included a list of everyone who has a parking card or key card for the building. You may want to cross-check that against the lists the tenants provide.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Smith. You’ve been very cooperative. Actually, you both have, and we appreciate it.”

  * * * *

  Once they were back in the Jeep Del said, “Well, he sure as shit was Mr. Cooperation. That’s unusual in itself—especially for a lawyer, practicing or not. That’s some place up there. I knew there was a private club on the top floor of that building, but I had no idea it was a sex club.” Del looked bemused.

  “Yeah, it’s definitely interesting. Let’s check to see if there are any complaints on record against the club. Do you want to go back to BSO headquarters and interview the two homeless guys who found the body? Then maybe we can catch some lunch. How about Tap 42? I wouldn’t mind a beer and one of those enormous hamburgers. This is our day off after all.”

  “Sounds like a plan. I wonder what the guests of the city will have to tell us, if they are sober enough to tell us anything.”

  “Well, they’ve been in interview for several hours. They should be sobering up by now. Let’s see.”

  When they walked into the interview room, the steel table was strewn with fast-food wrappers and the smell of body odor was enough to knock them over. Del knew that Kaylin wasn’t quite up to snuff and hoped she could hold it together for the time it would take to talk to the two homeless guys. Not unexpectedly, it turned out that they had seen nothing helpful. There had been no one in the garage when they entered and started combing the Dumpsters for treasure. They had been through a couple of Dumpsters before they found the body and flagged down a BSO cruiser stopped at the traffic light at Broward and Federal. Del and Kaylin let them go with the admonishment to come back in if they remembered anything else.