by Nancy Brophy
“Courtney Shaffer and her best friend Sarah Pickens were looking for a night of adventure before they headed off to college the following week. A limo driver, waiting for his boss, convinced them to try a three-way in the back of the limo. It was all fun and games until the boss showed up. The limo driver scrambled out to explain the situation. The last thing Courtney remembers is the limo motor being turned on. She never saw her friend Sarah again. I’ve checked the records in Clearwater, Florida. Neither girl has been heard from in twenty-seven months.”
More photos changed hands. At the end of the table, Dare posted the pictures on the whiteboard and carefully printed their names and abduction date underneath.
“The third girl was a college student, Missy Harding. She left a campus party about midnight. Two men standing beside a black limo were arguing over a map. She offered to help, and since they were going in the same direction she accepted a ride home.”
“Oh, man,” Ciggy mumbled under his breath, loud enough John heard.
“That’s not the end. At the party she and her boyfriend had a fight, which was why she left the party alone. He was tried, convicted and hanged himself in prison.”
The room was silent while the man absorbed the damage done to both families.
Dare directed their attention back to the situation at hand. “How are they subduing the girls?”
“I’m assuming the limo is rigged with some sort of gas that’s being piped in. Probably activated by a lever from the driver’s seat. None of the girls could remember smelling or hearing anything unusual. Most limos have a window between the driver and the passengers. Closed and properly sealed, anybody in the front seat wouldn’t feel the effects of the gas.”
“How’d they escape?” Ciggy asked.
“Fluke accident. The fact they’re still alive is a damn miracle.”
Twylla jotted notes on a legal pad. Without looking up, she asked, “Do the girls remember anything else?”
“Yeah. All the girls were kept prisoner in large house for two-to-three weeks. Each girl described an attractive bedroom with a private bath.”
“That doesn’t sound much like hostages.”
“Get this, all the girls could identify at least six men by name. Misty thinks they were aliases because they were all Biblical names. No masks were worn and according to each of the girls, each man was polite.”
“Stockholm syndrome?”
“No. The men used an enforcer. So if the girls cried, complained or refused to perform in any way, Herod showed up. The only reprieve from the bedroom was when Herod introduced them to his little torture chamber in the basement.”
“The girls were terrified of Herod until they spent some time in the Middle East where staying alive became their first priority.”
“Could they pinpoint the desert location?”
“No. No one spoke English, at least not to them. They learned through gesturing and pain.”
Frustration ricocheted through the room. “So what is our break-through here? Other than the black limo, do we know anything else?”
“Yes.”
Twylla’s lips curled in a rueful smile. “Finally, some good news.”
Stillwater shook his head. “There is no good news. I requested a computer search in the Fed’s central crime database on how many missing persons involved any mention of a black limo. It came up with four hundred and thirty-seven cases from coast to coast. Then I had them search for the general MO. Young girls, unlikely runaways, no body ever recovered and found an additional thirteen-hundred-seventy-three cases.”
The room remained silent as each tallied the numbers.
“Ciggy, look for a pattern in the location sites. The rest of us need to categorize the different MOs and look for similarities other than a black limo.”
His phone rang. He glanced at the screen - Skeet Monaghan, public face of the FBPA. “Stillwater.”
“A call came for the FBI. They think the case is ours. Armadillo Creek, Texas reported a murder.”
He clicked on the speaker, so the team could hear the call. “A murder?”
His disembodied voice echoed in the room. “One witness indicated a black limo was involved.”
Ciggy frowned. “Are our guys escalating? Or is this a coincidence?”
“Coincidence? Since when do we believe in coincidence?” Skeet asked. Without waiting for an agreement, he added. “Two things. One, Armadillo Creek hasn’t invited help and two, the sheriff’s office discounts the witness.”
The first didn’t bother John. The advantage of not-being FBI meant they didn’t need to be invited in. An unreliable witness could be tantamount to wasted effort. “Why?”
“No idea. Do you want me to tell them we’ll check it out?”
“Yeah.” Every person in the room glanced at their watch.
No doubt Skeet was doing the same thing. “I can meet you at the plane in forty-five minutes.”
John shook his head. “No. Doesn’t seem solid enough. Lassiter and I’ll go down
surprised to see his partner wince. What was his problem?
To Ciggy, he said, “Find out what you can. Get us a complete workup.”
Ciggy gathered his notes and rose to hit the banks of computers in his office. “Armadillo Creek, Texas. Never heard of it.”
“Me, either. Find that out first.” Both men walked toward the door. As he passed Lassiter, he said. “Wheels up in thirty minutes.” Automatically, he buttoned the collar on his shirt and tightened his tie. Time to go to work.
Chapter Four
D’Sean and John unbuckled their seatbelts at Shepherd Air Force Base in Wichita Falls and stepped out onto the stairs leading down to the tarmac. Despite the overcast sky, the heat wave hit them like a blast furnace.
D’Sean reached for a handkerchief to wipe his brow. “Hot and muggy. Perfect.”
“We’ve got a rental car waiting. Make sure we’ve got a map. Armadillo Creek is over an hour from here.”
“Only a idiot would choose Texas in the summer.” D’Sean grumbled as they headed for the hanger. John ignored his traveling companion as he mentally sorted the jarring issues that Ciggy had compiled.
Lanny Cutbirth was the Sheriff of record in Armadillo Creek, but Ciggy’s info was hazy on why he hadn’t signed off on the report. Instead a Deputy Carl Brimmerton had written the summary, which sounded like a report for an eighth grade paper, full of self-bravado, misspelled words, incorrect grammar and disparaging of everyone else’s work.
One hour and twenty-four minutes later D’Sean parked in one of several open slanted spaces in front of the utilitarian red brick sheriff’s office.
“This country’s so flat, I’ll bet you could see to the black hills of South Dakota if it weren’t for the curvature of the earth.”
Something bothered D’Sean. He could grouse with the best of them, but his nose was out-of-joint over this situation. John opened his mouth to ask, but the other man was already out of the car.
The wind had picked up. Two large tumbleweeds blew across the road and disappeared down an alley.
Death marched this way. Automatically, he searched the sky for carrion crows. One always accompanied the other. Some members of his team referred to his beliefs as Indian folklore, but John’s survival had depended more times than not on being able to read the earth, the water and the sky.
The clanging beat of metal against metal had him scanning the tops of buildings behind him. Flags, representing both state and country snapped in the wind while the steel cable beat repetitively against the metal pole.
He sniffed the air. They’d driven ninety miles, southwest, only to bring the gray skies with them. The dampness in the air predicted rain wouldn’t be far behind. In this part of the country a thunderstorm brought lightening as well.
Police sirens screamed in the distance. John raised an eyebrow. “Maybe it’s more of a hotbed than we expected.”
“Or maybe it’s lunchtime.” D’Sean straightened his jacket
and adjusted his shoulder holster.
Before the men had walked the fifteen feet to the Sheriff’s door, a patrol car rounded the corner, lights flashing, sirens running full blast, and whipped into the vacant spot in front of them. The door to the office jerked open and a mid-thirties woman in painted-on jeans and a sparkly silver halter-top bounded onto the sidewalk. Her welcoming grin would have warmed half the Lone Star State.
Two young deputies leaped out of the car almost simultaneously. “We got ‘em, Tillie.”
“Knew you would.” The woman punched her fist in the air in a personal victory sign. “A murder on Friday night, an arrest on Monday afternoon. For sure the town council will appoint one of you sheriff now.”
John and D’Sean exchanged a look. “Armadillo Creek has no sheriff?” John asked.
The woman turned. Her eyes, ringed with black eyeliner, widened. After a quick inspection, she tugged on her top, stretching it across her ample chest and tossed her hair. “We did. We had a good sheriff until that gypsy bitch had him run off.” Her twang confirmed she was native born.
“We’re with the FBI and have some questions.”
Evidently law enforcement men appealed to her, because she gave them a wide flirty smile.
Each deputy shoved a handcuffed young man toward the door.
Both heard John’s words and stopped mid-step. “We made the collar. You can’t claim ‘em.”
“We have no intention of interfering.” John wasn’t sure if it was D’Sean’s deep, calm voice or authoritative words but the volatile situation defused as hostile expressions of the younger men eased.
The taller uniform assumed charge. “Bobby Joe, put ‘em in cell three.” If the prisoners had slept in two days, they didn’t look it. The involuntary twitching, dark circles, and darting eyes screamed meth tweakers.
With his rust-colored scrub-pad hair and flushed complexion the shorter of the two, Bobby Joe looked like a teenage boy scout. Not that the others looked much older.
A car drove past and the driver laid on the horn. Several girlish screams of awe intermixed with giggles were aimed at the appreciative deputies who grinned and waved.
Nothing was going to get done standing on the street. The deputies were too wrapped up in enjoying their fifteen minutes of fame to move the situation along. John pushed passed the group and held open the door, so the deputies and their prisoners could enter.
The small receptionist area served as the hub of a wheel.
“Name’s Carl Brimmerton, with two Ms.” Carl gestured toward the right hallway, while Bobby Joe and his prisoners headed down the left. “C’mon down to my office and we’ll talk. Bobby Joe’ll join us soon as he’s done booking ‘em. This here’s, Tillie, our receptionist and dispatcher. She knows every code number by heart.”
John and D’Sean nodded. The woman beamed, showing a smear of bright pink lipstick across her teeth.
“So what happened to the former Sheriff?” John asked when seated in the ten-by-ten paneled office.
Carl leaned back in his chair, lacing his fingers across his flat belly. If a skinny man could look more pompous, John didn’t know how. Even if he hadn’t recognized the man’s name, he’d identified the author of the report.
“Lanny Cutbirth was a fine man. A man’s man, if you catch my drift. Anyway, his wife got a hair up her butt and hired those lyin’, thievin’ gypsies to follow him around. Cause she suspected he was cheatin’ on her.”
John and D’Sean nodded at the same time. John inhaled deeply, forcing his impatience down. He needed this information but wanted it in a concise format. The editorial BS and country-fried version of the facts wasted his time.
“Well, he was a man. Of course, he dipped his wick here and there. His wife should’ve expected it.”
In order to speed the story along, John interjected. “So the gypsies found out, told the wife and she divorced him. How’d he lose his job?”
Carl frowned and huffed out his reply. “Well, that was the thing, see. Turns out he was doing Marianne Parsons. Now Marianne’s a fine looking woman.” His hands curled to imitate holding two large imaginary cantaloupes at chest height.
John steeled his expression to show no reaction - doubly glad he hadn’t brought Twylla with him. Twylla’s tolerance for sexist’s comments was non-existent. John only endured it to get to the end so he could leave.
“I’m sure either one of you would’ve done the same thing. But at the time, Marianne was a suspect in an arson case. Seems she burned her grocery store down for the insurance money. That looked bad and the town council felt they had no other choice but to fire him. Of course there was the rumor that Mayor Avery was soft on Marianne himself. So now they’re looking for a new sheriff, but no one wants the job.”
“But both you and Bobby Joe want it,” D’Sean added, picking up the slack when John bit his tongue to keep from taking the deputy apart.
“Well, yeah, of course.”
“Tell us about the murder on Friday.”
“This is why you’re here? About the report I filed?” He puffed his chest. “Actually the murder took place Saturday mornin’. Real early. We found the girl naked in the backseat of her car suffocated to death. Coroner said she’d had sex post mortem. That means after she died.”
D’Sean curled a fist around the arm of his chair so firmly his knuckles were white.
“How’d you figure out who did it?”
“That was my idea.” The young deputy grinned proud of his accomplishment. “The service station across the street has security cameras. We ran them backwards till we saw them two felons running from the scene of the crime. So we went out and picked ‘em up this morning.”
“How did you know where to find them?”
“Hell, we all went to high school together. I don’t know why they would’ve killed Ellie though. She was a nice girl.”
D’Sean and John exchanged a look. Their partnership had been forged in fire. Without a word, John knew his friend’s next move would be to get away before he leaned over the desk snatched the deputy from his chair and explained which side of the bread the butter was on.
Heading off Carl’s trip down memory lane, D’Sean stood. “Got the video tapes here?”
“Yeah, ask Tillie.” Carl jerked his head in the direction of the dispatcher’s desk.
When D’Sean opened the door to escape the deputy, John rose also. “I need to ask the prisoners a couple of questions while he’s looking at the tapes.”
Somehow John had crossed the line of friendliness because the deputy’s eyes narrowed and he leaned forward. “’Bout what?”
“Black limo.”
The deputy slammed his hand against the wooden desk, producing a loud smacking sound as he leapt to his feet. “I stated in the report she’s an unreliable witness. Un-re-lie-a-bull. She called you, didn’t she? I knew it.”
“Who?”
“I’ll bet she thinks she’s going over my head.” He paced around the desk, before yelling, “Bobby Joe, get in here.”
Bobby Joe stuck his head in the door. “Wha…?”
“FBI wants to know about the black limo. What exactly did that bitch say?”
Bobby Joe blinked a couple of times. “She said the guys in the limo were responsible for Ellie’s death. Only Fred and Charlie don’t own no black limo.”
John raised his voice. “Who said this?”
Both the deputies looked surprised; whether it was by his question or the fact he was still in the room was difficult to determine.
“The gypsy bitch,” Bobby Joe said.
“Does the gypsy bitch have a name?”
In unison both men nodded. “E-Z Romney.”
The derogatory joke, which did not take a rocket scientist to figure out, had the deputies snickering like Beavis and Butthead, followed by a round of high-fiving. John grit his teeth annoyed to have to pry each piece of information out of them.
“Her real name?” Oh, yeah, these guys were the pride of Ar
madillo Creek.
Bobby Joe shrugged. “Cezi Romney.”
“What kind of name is Cezi? Does it stand for something?”
“Thieving gypsy,” Carl chimed in much to Bobby Joe’s amusement.
“Where will I find her?”
The deputies exchanged a suspicious look. Finally Carl shrugged and cleared his throat. “The gypsies live in a compound outside of town. Follow farm road 82 past the Quick Stop and Sabrina’s Dress Shop. About five miles south.”
John jotted down the directions.
Bobby Joe sneezed and wiped his tan uniform sleeve across his nose. “But at this time of day she’ll be at work over on Marshall Street, past the Parsons’ Grocery Store that burned down last year. You’ll know it when you see the yellow dog out front.”
A yellow dog? What the hell kind of directions were these? John tried another tactic. “What’s the name of the company?” He’d Google it.
“All Seeing Eye. Her father and uncle own it. They’re PIs. She’s the one who called, but they’ll all be involved. You don’t see one without another.”
Bobby Joe’s head bobbled in agreement. “They’re thick as fleas on a barnyard dog.”
John’s patience at an end, he lowered his voice and enunciated each word. “What does this woman do?”
Judging by the startled look that crossed Carl’s face, John was finally getting through to him. “Cause trouble.”
Bobby Joe laughed, oblivious to the undercurrents. “Always has.”
In order to avoid another high school reminiscing drama, he cut them off. “I need to talk to the prisoners.”
