Baldwin nodded. “Toni Robbins had an obsession with this Russian girl. Kept files on her, and newspaper clippings.”
“If that Russian chick’s daddy hadn’t been some kind of big time ambassador, she wouldn’t have had anything on her. Do you know how many Eastern European girls disappear every year that nobody knows about?”
“How many?”
“Too many. The man has clout, and so his daughter gets media attention. Some poor farmer’s or factory worker’s kid goes missing, and you never hear a thing.”
“So why did this one land in your lap? Was she prostituted?”
“Or about to be. Her body was found in a massage parlor that had been busted before for prostitution. But according to the M.E., this girl was in overall too good a shape to have been hooking, and if she was, it hadn’t been for very long.”
“What killed her?”
“Somebody beat the crap out of her. She bled to death internally, after she was raped by half a dozen guys. We figured that whoever took her found out she was too hot a commodity to move, and rather than do the decent thing and let her go, they just disposed of her.”
“What’s your take on this human trafficking issue? I think my vic might’ve thought Petrov was kidnapped for something like that.”
“Well, it’s real, and it’s real ugly. Big money, too. To think that in this day and age, shit like that is still going on blows me away, but—hey. I’m just a halfway decent guy who doesn’t think selling human beings is the way to go, so—”
“How’s the climate here for stuff like that?”
“Like it is in just about any other city. Alive and well. Some of the feds have their eyes on some places around here that they consider hubs. Major international airport, not too far from the southern and western borders, it’s not a bad place to transport bodies in and out of. Some of the sickest shit in the world goes on in these circles, man. One task force in Wisconsin, of all fucking places, found evidence of kids being bought and sold over the Internet like people buy designer purses and computers off eBay. They move them around from city to city, selling and reselling them until they’re all used up. Once that happens, they’re sold overseas for cheap.”
“All for prostitution and pedophiles?”
Goodwin shook his head. “Domestics, factory and farm workers, and yeah, prostitution and porn. I wouldn’t be surprised if our Russian princess showed up in an erotic thriller on DVD or the Internet before too long.”
“Maybe my vic was on to something after all, then. Somebody found out and shut her up.”
“I wouldn’t doubt it, my man. These people don’t mess around, and if she did know, I wouldn’t put it past them to kill her.”
“You got a lead on somebody here in town?”
Dan Goodwin looked defeated. “It’s like trying to grab a handful of wind, Bruce. Just when we think we’ve got it nailed down, it blows up in our faces. But yeah. We think we might be narrowing in on a ring here in town. And who would suspect modern day slavers transporting merchandise through Denver ‘Cornball’ Colorado? But hell, we’re talking a ten-billion-dollar-a-year industry, man. And we both know how well money can keep a secret.”
Resurrection
“Larue! Miss Larue!” Lazarus laughed at the sight of her and held his arms open to welcome her embrace. She was a portly woman, and so short the top of her head pressed against his stomach. She was the color of mud, with a head full of short wiry, silver hair and she had never had teeth as far as he could remember. He didn’t know too many people, but he knew Larue. She squeezed him tight and laughed, happy to see him too.
“Where you been, boy?” She slapped her hand against his chest. “I ain’t seen you ’round in a long time. Almost had me thinking you was dead or in jail or something.”
He was touched by her concern. “Aw, baby. Marry me,” he teased.
“Fool! I’m already married!” she spat back.
“Well, then, where your man?”
Larue laughed. “Hell if I know!”
She was the one who told him to come here and get him something to eat. “Always talking ’bout how hungry you is,” she scolded him, the whole time they walked. “I keep telling you to come on over to The Broadway and get you a bite to eat. Always got a hot meal here. Always.”
“You know my mind ain’t what it should be,” he reminded her. “You know how easily I forget sometimes.”
“Act like you got some manners when you walk in this place, boy.” She patted his arm while they stood in the long line. “These people got tables and napkins and shit. Like they a real restaurant. Even say grace sometimes to bless the food.”
“I don’t know no grace,” he joked.
“Well, if you wanna eat, you gone know her tonight.”
Lazarus and Larue didn’t say another word to each other after they sat down to eat. Damn! This was good. Lazarus tried to take his time to savor this meal. Fried chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy, a biscuit, and a salad—which they could’ve kept and replaced with another piece of chicken or some more of them potatoes as far as he was concerned.
“You folks enjoying the meal tonight?”
Lazarus looked up and saw the brotha with the long hair.
“Yessuh, we shore are,” Larue blurted out, licking her fingers, and swirling her tongue around the edge of her lips. “Ain’t this some good food?” She nudged Lazarus in the arm.
The man smiled at Lazarus, but he didn’t smile back.
“Fool,” Larue whispered loud enough for Nelson to hear. “Say something. Tell him how good this is.”
Lazarus continued eating, and Nelson knew when to leave well enough alone. “I can see you’re both enjoying it. You folks have a nice evening.”
When Nelson was out of earshot, Larue nudged Lazarus again. “What the hell is wrong with you, man? He the one feeding us.”
Lazarus took one last bite then pushed his plate away. He never said a word to Larue, and suddenly got up and walked out.
His memory was sketchy but some things always managed to linger. He never liked that brotha. Lazarus had been to that place before, but damn if he could remember when. And he didn’t really know for sure until he’d seen that spooky-eyed bastard come by the table. Lazarus knew his type. One of those do-good brothas who believed that if he saved the world, it would turn around and save his ass right back.
“Never happen,” he muttered as he walked. “You black like me, man. Still.”
He sucked on his teeth, then used the toothpick he’d picked up on his way out of that place. Where the hell did she come from? Lazarus’ chin dropped at the vision coming towards him. Damn, she was fine. Smiling. Strutting. Shaking her hips. Her eyes locked on his, and as she passed, he smelled her perfume, and it dawned on him, that she was supposed to be dead. He turned around to go after her, but he stumbled and fell. When he looked up, she was gone.
“Did you hurt yourself?” he heard a child ask. Lazarus turned around and saw—
“What the hell?” he blurted out, then scrambled to get to his feet. Her father stood in the distance, calling out to the little girl, but Lazarus couldn’t hear his voice. He saw the child run towards her father and jump into his arms. The man stared at Lazarus one last time, before turning away and disappearing into—the lights.
The driver in the car coming towards him, hit his brake, screeching the tires, and furiously honked his horn. “Are you crazy? Get the hell out of the street!”
In his confusion, Lazarus stumbled to the curb and for the next two days, he wouldn’t even be able to remember his own name.
The Honorable
There was no denying Mayor Shaw’s handsome appearance and charisma. Fatema had never interviewed him personally, but she’d attended enough press conferences featuring the city’s dynamic mayor and his appeal and charm were intoxicating even in a crowded room. So, how come she didn’t like him? Fatema had been turned off by the guy ever since she found out he was running for the position because he re
minded her of a sheet of ice, too slick and too cold. His façade was transparent to her, but he was the darling of the state of Colorado, so he probably could’ve cared less about what she thought of him.
His stark, white shirt created a powerful contrast to the jet, black suit he wore. The mayor wasn’t wearing a tie, which was way too sexy a gesture on his part, as far as she was concerned. And yeah. She could see how Toni could’ve fallen for him, married or not. Toni had always been attracted to men in powerful positions. “Give me a man in a suit anyday,” she’d once slurred over martinis.
“You can put a monkey in a suit,” Fatema shot back. “That don’t mean it ain’t still a monkey.”
Toni had frowned and stared, offended, back at Fatema, and then the two of them clinked glasses, and laughed hysterically.
True to form, the good mayor didn’t know how to say no to an interview. She told his assistant half of the truth—that she wanted him to share his personal thoughts on the death of one of his people. The assistant worked her magic and freed up the mayor’s calendar the very next day, and in the blink of an eye, Fatema found herself sitting across from his massive mahogany desk, quietly shocked and appalled at the way he overtly checked out her legs.
“This office is doing everything in its power to aid the police in their investigation of the tragic loss of Miss Robbins,” he spoke slowly, perfectly pronouncing every syllable and vowel, sounding more like the President of the United States than the mayor of a city in the Midwest. She nodded politely, surmising that this cat’s ego was so big he probably did have his eye on the White House. He’d taken it upon himself to lead this whole conversation from the moment she stepped through the door, reciting a speech he’d probably had written for him and practiced in front of his secretary. The more he spoke, the more angry and resentful she became, envisioning this bastard pumping poor Toni full of himself, then giving her the shake down after she told him to get lost. Now, she was Miss Robbins, a fine and upstanding city employee, whom he regretted never having had the opportunity to meet. Bull!
“You never met her?” she asked quietly, staring him squarely in the eyes.
He smiled smugly. “We may have spoken briefly in passing, but other than that—”
Lucas didn’t like the way she asked the question. Or the way she glared at him when she did. He also couldn’t stop his palms from sweating. Toni was never far from his thoughts. She was like that word or phrase on the tip of his tongue that drove him crazy because he couldn’t shout it out when he needed to most. She left him for all the wrong reasons, and if she’d just been patient—if he’d been more discreet—or just a different type of man altogether, he knew he could’ve been the man she committed herself to. She was the one he wanted. Toni tormented him from the moment they met, a constant reminder of the one thing he couldn’t have that he craved more than almost anything. He met her too late, during his campaign, when the wheels of motion had been set in place for his candidacy for mayor, on the road to his ultimate goal of becoming a senator someday. His life had become an open book and there was no way he could’ve re-written the chapters with her in them, and not risk losing everything he’d worked so hard for all his life. Given time, things between them could’ve been different. Somehow, some way, they could’ve made it work. His indiscretion got the best of him, though. Lucas had an appetite that never seemed to be satisfied. He slipped up once—only once with Toni, and she never forgave him for it.
Fatema Morris was taller than Toni. She was almost as tall as he was, and she was darker than he would’ve preferred, but despite his best efforts, he couldn’t help himself. She was a good-looking woman, thick legs, narrow waist, long, black hair pulled away from her face. He found himself staring at her lips, full and moist, fighting back images of slipping his tongue between them, and then slipping his penis between them. He hated himself for being so weak.
“It will probably surprise you to know this, Mr. Mayor.” She leaned forward slightly, and ran her hand over her bare leg. The thought crossed his mind that she did it on purpose. “But I knew Toni.”
Lucas wasn’t aware that all expression had faded from his face. “Is that so?”
Fatema nodded and smiled. “We went to college together, and she was my maid of honor at my wedding.”
“Oh,” was all he said. Lucas’s heart pounded hard, but he refused to let loose his composure.
“I got the impression from her that the two of you did know each other,” she said, cautiously. “But I don’t know. Maybe I misunderstood her.”
“I think I’d have remembered meeting as beautiful a woman as Miss Robbins. I meet so many people, though, that, we may have met and I just . . . don’t remember.”
Fatema grimaced and noticed that he did, too. To challenge him would be a waste of time. Denial was a river he’d rather drown in then finally admit the truth, and she had no doubt that Lucas played this game of “he said-she said” better than she ever could. His smug attitude made her skin crawl, though, and before she left his office, she wanted him to know that she knew he was lying.
“She told me not long ago that she’d been in love, but that he was married, and after a while, she felt it best to walk away.” The light in his eyes faded, and she knew she’d touched a nerve.
“Sounds personal,” he said quietly.
“Oh, it was. He’d done something to her that really turned her against him. Something she couldn’t stomach.”
“I have another meeting to get to, Miss Morris,” he said, bitterly.
“Of course.” She smiled, and stood to leave. Lucas stood too, and Fatema pretended not to notice his erection. “Well, thank you so much for your time, Mr. Mayor.” She reached out to shake his hand. “I’ll see myself out.”
Lying mothafucka! She thought gritting her teeth as she closed the door behind her. But what did she expect? The man was married. The man was mayor. And the man had been lovers with a woman who’d been murdered. Yep. He made a great politician.
My Kind of Girl
What was this, a fucking tag team? Baldwin had no sooner hung up from speaking to the sister, when the best friend makes a beeline straight for his desk. Fatema plopped a gigantic purse down on the corner of his desk, sat down, folded her arms, crossed her legs, and burned holes in him with those lovely brown eyes of hers.
“I take it you never received any of my messages,” she challenged.
He was the police. Obviously she’d forgotten that small fact somewhere along the line, and felt obligated to speak to him like he was any fool off the street. He’d just had this conversation with Toni Robbins’s sister, and he’d been cool and appeasing and apologetic and reassuring. He couldn’t guarantee that same attitude would carry over in so short a period of time from the last one.
“It’s been nearly a month, detective. Tell me you have a lead. Tell me you have a suspect, a theory, a consensus—something.”
Baldwin cleared his throat, and worked a small, quiet miracle to maintain his composure. “I’ll tell you the same thing I just told her sister, Ms. Morris. We’re working diligently on this case.”
“So, what do you have?” she blurted out.
He stared at her.
Fatema shrugged. “Tell me what you’ve found out so far. Reassure me, Detective Baldwin, that you are working diligently on finding out who killed my friend, so that I can walk out of here knowing that justice will be served and soon.”
Bruce Baldwin worked hard to come across as a much nicer man than he really was. Time in this job had taken its toll, and his patience had worn painfully thin through the years. He didn’t like her tone or her attitude and he almost didn’t give a damn that her best friend had been murdered. Almost. It was that “almost” that kept him from throwing her ass out of his precinct. He didn’t like most people in general, and Ms. Morris had moved up to the top of his list in a very short period of time.
“If I had anything concrete to tell you, I would. But at this point, to do so would jeopardiz
e our investigation, and—”
“Well, let me tell you what I found out during my own investigation, Detective,” she interrupted him. “Toni was having an affair with a city official. A high ranking city official who happens to believe his shit don’t stink and he’s slick enough to get away with fucking around on his wife. A city official whose entire career would go down the toilet if anybody found out, and whose lovely wife would probably financially rape him in the ass and take everything he owns if she ever knew. This same city official had a lot to lose should Toni come forward and reveal this little secret. And I’d bet money that he was probably dancing on tables when he realized that threat had been eliminated. I’m talking about our beloved mayor, detective,” she said, smartly. “Or is the police department buried too far up his royal highness’s ass to consider him a suspect?”
That was it. Baldwin bolted up from his chair, grabbed her purse, and took hold of Fatema’s arm, then pulled her into an interrogation room, despite her loud protests. He slammed the door shut behind them, and threw her purse on the table.
“Sit your ass down!” he growled.
His voice echoed and bounced off the walls. Fatema reluctantly did as she was told.
“What the hell are you doing, fucking with my investigation?”
“I’m trying to find out who killed Toni!”
“No! I’m trying to find out who killed Toni!”
“But—”
“But—I want you to stay out of my way, Ms. Morris!”
“I’m just trying to—”
“I don’t give a damn what you call yourself trying to do! This is my fucking case, and nobody—I mean, no fucking body is going to interfere with my shit! Is that understood?”
Shit. Tears. Where the hell did she pull those from?
Baldwin had never been a match for tears, and he took a deep breath to compose himself. He pulled out the chair across from her and sat down.
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