Wild Secret

by Tripp Ellis

  Jack ordered coconut shrimp as an appetizer and a Tasty Tube Burger. I went with the mushroom cheeseburger.

  In all the excitement of the morning, I had forgotten to call Crash and give him the bad news. I dialed his number. I figured he’d be out of bed by now, but there was never a guarantee with those guys. They were predominantly night owls.

  Crash’s scratchy voice filtered through the phone when he answered. "Yo, T! What's up?"

  "Not much. Is Faye with you right now?"

  "No, she just left."

  "Did she tell you what happened with the band last night?" I asked gingerly.

  "Yeah, I heard all about the drama."

  “And you’re cool with everything?" I asked, just to make sure he'd been given the full story.

  "Yeah. I'm not thrilled about it. But we were split up at the time. What am I gonna do? She was honest with me about it."

  "Okay, cool. Just FYI, Lip Bomb needs a bass player now."

  He laughed. "Count me out. I’d never hear the end of it if I filled in for her."

  I chuckled. “I understand. I’ll catch you later."

  I breathed a sigh of relief after ending the call. “Well, that went easier than expected.”

  "He's at the point where there’s nothing to deter him,” JD said. He shook his head. “Faye sure does like to start drama, doesn't she?"

  "She has a gift for it."

  We finished up and headed back to the car. We were walking down the sidewalk when Denise called. "Guess who just got arrested for shoplifting."

  “I have no idea.”

  “Jared’s brother, Trevor Landis. Trevor and a buddy skipped school and tried to five-finger a Rolex from the boutique at the Highland Village Mall. He wants to talk to you. Asked for you by name."

  "Really? We’ll be right there."

  I told JD, and we climbed into the Porsche and zipped back to the station.

  40

  “I can give you what you want,” Trevor said, handcuffed in the interrogation room.

  "Start talking," I said.

  "Not until we have a deal." Trevor was a sharp kid.

  "What kind of deal do you want?" I knew exactly what he wanted.

  "I get my little brother to tell you who paid him to swap the license plates on April’s car, and my legal problems go away." He flashed a bright smile.

  "What makes you think I'll take that deal?"

  "I figure you'll do whatever it takes to find out who killed your cop buddy."

  "How do you know your little brother is going to cooperate?"

  "Because I’ll beat his ass if he doesn't."

  I looked at JD. He was all for it.

  "Let me take it to the powers that be. I'm sure we can come to an agreement."

  He flashed a confident smile. "I know that we can.”

  A guard buzzed us out of the interrogation room, and I called Todd McLean, an assistant district attorney, and pitched the deal. We had worked on a few cases previously, and I knew he'd go for it. It was a no-brainer. It didn't take long to have an agreement drafted. Trevor signed on the dotted line. If his little brother gave us information that led to the arrest and conviction of Chuck's killers, Trevor would walk—a fair enough trade.

  I called Trevor's mother and informed her of the situation. She brought Jared up to the station as soon as he got out of school. I escorted them into the conference room and offered them a seat.

  JD and I sat across the table from them, and Sheriff Daniels stood in the corner.

  Jared remained tightlipped and surveyed us with suspicious eyes.

  "Go ahead, Jared,” his mother said. “Tell these gentlemen what they want to know."

  "What's in it for me?"

  "You get your brother out of jail."

  "I will repeat the question. What's in it for me?"

  His mother's face tensed. "You get to make it to your 13th birthday. That's what's in it for you."

  "I want his room."

  She scowled at him.

  "I want his room or no deal."

  "Don't push me, Jared."

  "You gotta give to get."

  The kid drove a hard bargain. I had to give him that.

  "You're about to cross a line," his mother threatened.

  Jared stood firm, folding his arms. He said nothing.

  His mother finally caved. "Fine. You can have his room."

  Jared smiled, "Ain't nobody gonna know I said something, right?"

  "There may be a point in time where you may be required to testify," I said.

  Concern bathed his mother's face. "Meaning everyone would know that my son was the rat? What if these people decide to retaliate?"

  “We can provide protective services, and we can discuss the witness security program,” I said.

  "You mean, go into hiding? Uproot our whole lives?"

  "Trevor is charged with felony theft," Daniels reminded her. "He just had a birthday yesterday, I believe. That makes him an adult. This is the kind of thing that sticks with you for the rest of your life."

  It was a convincing argument. Mrs. Landis wasn't thrilled about the situation. "Go ahead, Jared. Tell them."

  She glared at us.

  "I was riding my bike through the neighborhood. These two dudes rolled up and asked if I wanted to make $50 bucks. I told those creeps to get lost. Random dude offers a kid $50 bucks, he wants his dick sucked.”

  “Jared!”

  “It’s true! But the dude was like, no man, it ain’t like that. All you gotta do is swap these plates out. He pointed to April’s car and gave me the plates. I rode my bike down the street, swapped them out, and gave them April’s. He gave me $50 bucks."

  "What kind of car were they driving?"

  "It was a maroon Yamota with a matte black hood and a bunch of dents. The car was a piece of junk."

  "You get a license plate?"

  He smiled. "I sure did. I got a photographic memory. I'm gifted."

  "If only you'd apply yourself," his mother chided.

  Jared told me the plate number. I asked him to stay put while we looked up the information.

  The vehicle belonged to Kashton Epps.

  I kicked myself for not pursuing the lead sooner when Denise first mentioned him.

  Kashton was no stranger to the inside of a prison. He was 24, with prior charges for drug possession, stolen property, and resisting arrest. Chuck had been the arresting officer on the possession charge, catching him with 2 kilos of cocaine. He shouldn’t have been back on the street.

  Kashton’s face was crinkled with a guilty smirk in his mugshot. He had short brown hair that was receding at the temples. He had a thin brown beard and brown eyes.

  His co-defendant in the possession charge was a guy named Isaac Norwood. They had both gotten off with a fine. Norwood was 23 with a similar background of possession charges, petty theft, and a DUI. He tilted his head back in his mugshot, trying to look like a badass. He had a look on his face as if to say, “This don’t mean nothing to me.”

  Norwood had buzzed reddish-brown hair, a thick neck, and beefy shoulders. He had light eyes and puffy cheeks.

  I printed their mugshots and took the images back to the conference room. “Do these two guys look familiar?"

  Jared studied the images carefully. "Yeah. That's them."

  "You’re sure?"

  "No doubt about it."

  41

  "Coconut County!" I shouted. "We have a warrant."

  Before I could finish the words, Erickson and Faulkner heaved a battering ram against the door. The jam splintered, and the door flung open. Shards of wood scattered, and the inside door handle clanked against the foyer wall, denting the drywall.

  JD tossed in two flash-bang grenades. They bounced across the tile, down the foyer, and clattered into the living room.

  Bam!

  Bam!

  The deafening blasts rattled windows, and flashes like lightning blinded the room.

  I stormed in with my weapon draw
n, advancing down the foyer to the living room.

  The two perps sat on the couch.

  Isaac Norwood reached for an Uzi on the coffee table. It rested amid an array of empty beer bottles and a kilo of cocaine. He had been cutting it with laxative and packaging it into smaller units. A nearby tray contained marijuana, and there was an ashtray full of cigarette butts. The place smelled like a mix of the above substances combined with the acrid smell of the flash-bang grenades.

  A thin haze hung in the air.

  The perps lived in the Windswept Dunes apartments—a trashy little complex on the northeast side of Coconut Key. There were no dunes, and Wind Damaged might have been a more appropriate name.

  Kashton held a video game controller in his hands as he raised them in the air. He’d been playing a first-person shooter on a 65-inch flatscreen display in the living room. The sound filtered from massive speakers.

  The thugs had a lot of nice toys in the crappy apartment. Two fully tricked-out mountain bikes, a Les Paul guitar with a flame maple top and a small practice amp, nice furniture—all paid for with cash, no doubt.

  Isaac’s hand was almost an inch away from the submachine gun when he had a change of heart. Barrels of assault rifles in your face, wielded by angry cops, can have that effect. Isaac leaned away slowly and raised his hands in the air.

  Within moments, we had the suspects face down on the ground, their hands cuffed behind their backs.

  Erickson and Faulkner escorted them out of the apartment and down the steps to a patrol car waiting on the street.

  We searched the apartment and confiscated drugs, machine guns, and fat stacks of cash. There was no doubt in my mind the ballistics from the machine guns would match the bullets that killed Chuck.

  The scumbags were taken to the station, processed, and printed. They were lucky to still be breathing. Cop killers don't get a lot of leniency.

  Between the two of them, I figured Kashton would be the first one to break. He looked like the softer of the two. There was more fear in his eyes. He was thin and twitchy. Isaac was a cool customer. Nothing seemed to phase him. He was disconnected emotionally.

  We let them sit for a long time before entering the interrogation room. JD and I took a seat across from Kashton.

  I sat there with a confident look on my face and stared at the perp for a long moment. "Okay. Here's the deal. Isaac said you were the shooter.”

  Kashton’s eyes rounded, and his face tensed.

  "He admitted to driving the vehicle,” I said. “He's gonna get a considerably lesser sentence."

  I was making the whole thing up.

  Kashton’s nervous eyes flicked about, and his cheeks reddened. I knew I had him. "That's bullshit. He is lying. I drove. He shot."

  “That’s not what he says. Why should I believe you over him?"

  "Because that's the way it went down!!"

  "Tell me why it went down in the first place. A vendetta against Deputy Atwood for your previous arrest?"

  "Man, we were just doing what we were told."

  I exchanged a curious glance with JD.

  "So, who told you to kill Chuck Atwood?"

  42

  What Kashton said didn't surprise me.

  But it did fill me with rage. My stomach twisted, and my hands balled into fists when he said that Stella Turner had ordered the hit on Chuck Atwood.

  Normally, I wouldn’t give much merit to an outlandish claim by a hoodlum. But this wasn’t a normal situation.

  "You're sure about that?" I asked.

  "Positive. She said that Deputy Atwood was starting to cause problems for her.”

  I didn’t need to ask what kind of problems. Chuck had gotten suspicious about Stella's Fund just like we had. Maybe he had damning evidence against the state attorney. Maybe he threatened to expose her. All kinds of scenarios entered my mind. I hated to think it. But what if Chuck had been blackmailing her?

  "This all sounds good," I said. "But nobody's gonna believe you. You’re not credible.”

  "Yeah, they are. I got proof!”

  "What kind of proof?"

  "Let's talk a deal first."

  "Everybody wants a deal," I said in a resigned tone. "Tell me what you got."

  "No. I walk away from this, or you don't get the audio."

  "Audio?"

  "I recorded our conversations with Turner. I’m not stupid. Isaac is the stupid one."

  That was debatable. They were both pretty dumb if you asked me.

  "Let's hear the audio. Where is it?"

  "It's on my phone. I’ll play it for you. But you drop the charges against me first.”

  "What about your buddy?”

  "Fuck him. He ratted me out."

  I loved it when perps turned against each other.

  "Hang tight a minute," I said.

  I left the interrogation room, retrieved his personal belongings, and brought the phone back. It was a brand-new phone with facial recognition. All I had to do was hold it in front of his face.

  The security screen vanished, and I started scrolling through the device, looking in the voice recording app. I clicked a file labeled Stella Turner. It wasn’t the highest quality audio in the world. There was a lot of mic noise and rustling as Kashton surreptitiously recorded the conversation.

  The woman's voice was unmistakable. It was Stella Turner.

  There was a lot of dead space and small talk back and forth between Isaac and Kashton as they waited for Stella to arrive. It sounded like a car pulled up, and the two thugs opened the door and climbed inside. The door slammed with a clunk.

  “You said you needed to talk in person,” Isaac said.

  “I’ve got a job for you,” Stella said. “You do this and your problems go away for a long time. Whenever you get in trouble, I'll make sure it gets taken care of."

  "I'd like a little more intel, so we don't get in trouble in the first place."

  “You pull this off smoothly, you boys will be able to grow your operation. I guarantee it."

  “What do we have to do?”

  “Deputy Atwood needs an early retirement."

  "You want us to kill a cop?"

  "Is that a problem for you?"

  There was a long silence.

  "No," Isaac said.

  "You ever done anything like that before?"

  "You’re honestly asking me to admit a crime to a state attorney?"

  Stella laughed. "You're smarter than you look."

  "When do you want it done?"

  "As soon as possible. It needs to look like gang-related violence. A traffic stop gone bad. Something like that.”

  "We can do that,” Isaac said. “Why do you want him dead?"

  "Don't tell me you need a reason to kill a cop?”

  "Just curiosity."

  “He's a danger to me. And what's dangerous to me is dangerous to you. He knows too much, and he’s asking questions.”

  It was all I needed to hear. "Where was this audio captured?"

  “In her car."

  I texted the recording to my device, then pushed away from the table and started toward the door.

  "Hey, what about my deal?"

  I ignored him and pushed into the hallway. Daniels joined us, having watched from the observation room. His face was tense with anger, his cheeks flush. "I'll get a warrant."

  "She's doing something illegal with the Forward Fund, and Atwood found out about it,” I said.

  "I want her in jail by the end of the day. Do this by the book, no screw-ups. This is going to raise a lot of hell.”

  43

  It was a spectacle—Stella Turner, surrounded by pissed-off deputies on the courthouse steps—priceless.

  “Stella Turner, you're under arrest for conspiracy to commit murder,” I said with glee.

  A look of utter shock and disbelief twisted on her face. "This is outrageous!"

  "Yes. It is."

  JD slapped the cuffs around her wrists, and Faulkner took her by the arm. He
ushered her down the steps toward the patrol car as people gawked. I may have tipped off Paris Delaney. She was there with her crew, filming the whole thing.

  Stella knew enough to keep her mouth shut. She wouldn’t talk, but it was fun to watch her squirm in the interrogation room. We had damning evidence, and I felt certain Stella Turner was going to go away for a long time, and I told her as much.

  After we filled out after-action reports, JD and I headed over to Wetsuit for a celebratory cocktail and dinner. He lifted his glass of whiskey to toast. "One by one, we're gonna clean up this town."

  I laughed. It was a tall order.

  After dinner, we headed to the practice studio. Crash had gotten his cast off. It was his first day back with the band. They ran through their setlist, and Crash was a little rusty on the first song but snapped back into the groove quickly. He was still weak and sore, and he iced his wrist afterward. But he was on the road to a full recovery. Hopefully, things would be getting back to normal.

  Faye attended practice and cheered Crash on. It seemed like they had gotten through their rough patch and were moving forward.

  As usual, we hit Tide Pool afterward and returned to the Avventura for a late-night gathering. There was an awkward moment of tension when Sadie joined us, but the girls stayed amicable. Sadie wasn’t looking to have her back in the band anytime soon, but they were at least on speaking terms.

  “She didn’t sleep with my boyfriend,” Sadie said to me. “I got no real beef with her. I’m just mad about how it all went down.”

  Sadie did her best to convince me to sit in with Lip Bomb. She made a good persuasive argument, and I was happy to let her give it her best shot.

  A call first thing in the morning woke me up. I wiped the sleep from my eyes and grabbed the phone from the nightstand. The sheriff’s annoyed voice filtered through the speaker. "You’re not gonna believe this shit."

  “What happened?"

  “The charges against Stella Turner were dropped."

  "What!?”

  “The audio recording was deemed inadmissible. Florida is a consent state. All parties must consent to the recording. Stella obviously didn't, and since the conversation took place in her car, she had a reasonable expectation of privacy."