Vice Enforcer

by S. A. Stovall

  “You okay?” I ask her.

  The corrections officer nods as she tucks away her Taser. She seems like a tough broad, and when she gives me an I can handle myself look, I believe her.

  “I need to speak to McMillian,” I say. “Is he still here, or was he discharged as well?”

  She takes a seat and types at her computer. “Yeah,” she replies. “He’s here. One moment.” Using the radio mounted to her shirt, she calls up for McMillian and then motions me back to the personnel door.

  Normally visitors have to walk through a metal detector, but cops, detectives, PIs, and attorneys get to walk in without the hassle. It’s nice, because I don’t want to part with any of my weapons, but I’m acutely aware that anyone else we meet will also have their tools.

  “He’ll be in room 2B,” the officer says. “Walk straight down the hall until you reach it.”

  Miles and I are buzzed in through the electronic door and enter a massive hallway devoid of windows. The cheerless gray walls, stagnant air, and narrow space add together to create an anxiety-inducing atmosphere. I hate this place. I’ve only been here for thirty seconds, and all I can think about is leaving.

  “What’s wrong?” Miles mutters under his breath as we walk down the hall.

  “Nothing,” I reply, my gaze locked onto the corrections officers who walk past.

  “Why are we talking to this guy? That wasn’t part of the plan.”

  “I’m already regretting it, but I wanted to speak with him.”

  “Who is he?”

  “Shannon’s father.”

  The information gets Miles quiet. For the rest of the walk, neither of us says a word.

  Room 2B is nothing special. It’s a heavy metal door with a small viewing window, exactly the same as the twenty doors we passed in order to get to it. A corrections officer opens the door as Miles and I get near, and he motions us in with a jerk of his head.

  I enter to find a single circular table and four flimsy plastic chairs in an otherwise drab room. Sitting in one chair, in the farthest corner, is some sad sack with heavy rings under his eyes, wearing the jail uniform—tan scrubs. He sits with a pronounced slouch and doesn’t bother to straighten himself when I draw near.

  There’s a one-way mirror on the opposite side of the room, but I ignore it. I doubt anyone is going to spy on this riveting conversation between a PI and some asshole who shot his wife.

  Once the door shuts, I clear my throat.

  “McMillian?” I ask.

  The man nods. He has Shannon’s unruly brown hair, but his is drenched in a week’s worth of unwashed natural oil.

  “I’m a private investigator with the Michael Shelby Private Investigator Agency.”

  He glances up, a hint of confusion in his features. “I spoke to my attorney,” he mutters. “I’m going to plead guilty. What’re you even investigating?”

  “I just need to ask you a few questions.”

  Again, he nods. Not much fight in the guy as he returns to his slouch, his attention square on the table in front of him.

  “Anyone come to visit you in here lately?” I ask.

  “Visit me?” McMillian narrows his eyes. “Yeah.”

  “Who?”

  “My attorney. Some family. Why?”

  Although I should probably focus all my efforts on figuring out these traffickers, I’ve become curious. “Have you seen your daughter?”

  “Shannon?” No change in his voice. He’s just as melancholy as when I entered. “No.”

  “You planning on telling her what happened?”

  He shrugs. “I hadn’t thought about it.”

  I give Miles a sideways glance. He returns the look with one of bewilderment. I guess Miles hasn’t had to deal with many people who are on the verge of suicidal, but they always have similar tells. Not thinking about the future is one of them.

  “Don’t be a complete piece of shit,” I say. “At least think about her before you do anything else you’ll regret.”

  McMillian jerks his gaze up to meet mine, a flare of hate and life that wasn’t present before. Miles steps in front of me and interjects with “What Pierce is trying to say is—Shannon asks about you all the time! Maybe you should talk to her.”

  “What’re you saying?” McMillian snaps. “You spoke with Shannon?”

  “Yes,” Miles continues, cutting me off before I can say anything. “She asked if you were okay and when she’ll be able to see you again.”

  “She said that?” McMillian whispers, his face twisted as he looks away from me and returns to staring at the table.

  “Maybe you could call her. I think she wants to hear from you more than anything else.”

  “I… don’t know what I would say.”

  “Say you’ve been thinking about her. Say that you want to be a good father.”

  “No kid wants to hear from their jailbird father.”

  “I did,” Miles states, an earnest conviction in his voice. It takes me by surprise. His father—what little I saw of him—is garbage.

  When McMillian remains quiet, Miles continues, “My dad went to jail a few times when I was younger. I wanted to hear from him. I wanted to think he thought of me from time to time. Even if he was in jail.”

  Eh. Kids. They’re like a dog that loves their abusive owners no matter what. I guess kids eventually grow up into resentful adults, unlike animals, but still. It’s sad sometimes to see loving devotion poured onto someone who doesn’t deserve it. Miles’s father sure as fuck didn’t deserve a kid who wanted to hear from him.

  “All right,” McMillian mutters. “I’ll call when I get the chance.”

  Miles relaxes a bit and nods. “I think that’s for the best.”

  For the first time since we entered the room, McMillian straightens his posture and holds his head up, like he finally has something to look forward to. I nudge Miles. There’s nothing left for us here, and I don’t even know what questions I could ask to point us in a new direction. I doubt McMillian is on the target list for people to sell, and it’s not like he’s getting out anytime soon.

  “Thanks for your time,” I say to the guy as I exit the room. The corrections officer enters after to take McMillian back to his cell.

  “So Roslyn isn’t here and we don’t know who took her?” Miles asks as we make the long walk back to the lobby.

  “We have information to sift through,” I say. “And that’s what we’ll do.”

  “SO ANY of these attorneys could be the connection we’re looking for?” Miles asks.

  I took twenty-three pictures, which seems like a small number when I think about it, but when printed out and spread across our bed, it makes for a huge mess. Miles examines each list of visitors on all the inmates I managed to get info on.

  There are a lot of visitors. More than I thought anyone in jail would receive.

  A lot of attorneys. A lot of detectives. A lot of PIs.

  Someone here isn’t an innocent party. How are we supposed to narrow it down? I can see now why Shelby had a hard time.

  “Maybe a law firm is behind it,” I drawl.

  “Well, there are way too many law firms represented here….” Miles pushes a few papers around. “Do you think we’ll find Roslyn?”

  “Not if she disappeared a month ago.”

  “Really?”

  “That’s a long time to not hear from somebody.”

  Miles gets quiet. I don’t know why he keeps thinking about her, but it’s obvious to me he’s been worried about the girl since we spoke to Kimmy and Nash in Noimore. Then again, he’s a good guy. Good guys concern themselves with the safety of others.

  “Can you check on Jayden, Lacy, and Shannon?” Miles asks, his gaze fixed to the pictures. “They should be heading to bed soon.”

  I glance over at the clock. 10:00 p.m. Fuck. That’s later than I thought.

  With a strong exhale, I exit our bedroom and wander to the guest room. Jayden sits, alone, on one of the twin beds. He’s watching
something on a little tablet, and I leave him be. He’s almost a grown-ass adult—he can make his own decisions.

  Lacy and Shannon, on the other hand, are glued at the hip and practically living in that tent outside. I suppose I would too, if I were a preteen girl forced to share a room with Jayden. Hell, I might do it now, as a grown man.

  I slide open the back door and catch the girls talking.

  “—and then that’s when I scuffed up my knee,” Shannon says.

  “I broke my arm once,” Lacy replies. “When I fell off the monkey bars at school.”

  “Hey, do you like going to school? Is it fun? I haven’t been in over a year. I miss it.”

  “Of course. I have friends, and clubs, and excellent teachers.”

  “Must be nice.”

  “Why aren’t you in school?” Lacy asks.

  I walk up to the tent—my socks making little noise across the cement of the patio—and neither girl stops their conversation. Do they even know I’m here? I doubt it.

  Shannon sighs. “My grandmother can’t drive me.”

  “You could take the bus.”

  “She thinks the other kids will bully me because my parents are in jail.”

  The silence that follows stills my voice. A piece of me wants to know how Lacy will respond. She’s so prim and proper—I wouldn’t be surprised to hear her mock the other girl right now.

  “If I tell you something, will you keep it a secret?” Lacy murmurs, so quiet I almost miss it.

  “Yeah, of course.”

  “My father went to jail. More than once.” There’s a pause, but Lacy continues, “Some people made fun of me for it, but not much. If you want, we could pretend to be cousins, and I’ll tell people your parents are fine. They don’t have to know. It’s none of their business anyway.”

  “Really? But….” Shannon fixes her breathing and clears her throat. “But you don’t think I’m a bad person?”

  “Never. It’s not your fault they went to jail.”

  I step away from the tent, confused and uncertain. That’s not where I thought that conversation would go. Instead of revealing my presence, I return to the house and shut the back door. I don’t mind if the girls stay up. It sounds like they should keep talking.

  And for the second time in one day, I’m reminded of Miles’s terrible father. I’m surprised Lacy brought it up, especially when she sounded embarrassed by the fact. Perhaps she’s more like Miles than I thought—maybe I give her too much of a hard time. I respect her more for helping Shannon cope.

  I enter the bedroom to find Miles poring over the pictures. He’s written out his own list and keeps referring to it as he works. He doesn’t even acknowledge my presence as I amble over to the opposite side of the bed.

  “Shannon thinks she’s a bad person because her parents are in jail,” I say aloud, confident the girls outside can’t hear me if I use a normal tone. “That’s an odd thought.”

  “Not so odd,” Miles answers in an absentminded manner.

  “Why do you say that? She’s not the one sitting behind bars.”

  “Maybe it’s genetic.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I mean, the apple never falls far from the tree, right?”

  I force out a single laugh. “You don’t think that.”

  Miles stops what he’s doing and gives me his full attention. For a moment he says nothing, and I stare into his dark eyes to see a world of emotion I didn’t know I was touching upon.

  “You honestly think you’re like your father?” I ask him, trying to hold back the sarcastic laugh. Miles is ten times the man anyone in his family is. How could he possibly doubt? If anyone should be doubting, it should be me—the one with a hard record.

  “I don’t know,” Miles mutters, breaking eye contact with me and staring at the floor. “But sometimes I think I’m… I don’t know. I mean, even after everything you told me about Jeremy, I still…. Well, I enjoyed it, but that’s the part that worries me. I felt like I hurt you, at some level, and I liked it. Maybe that’s the piece of me I got from my father, ya know?”

  What is he even talking about? Is he referring to the other night, on his birthday? He’s worried that he’s treating me like Jeremy and that playing the top is somehow him enjoying hurting others? What kind of bullshit logic is this?

  “You’re nothing like your father,” I state. “Don’t worry about it.”

  “I don’t think it’s that easy.”

  I wave away the comment. “Well I think it is that easy,” I say, my voice heated. “So if you have to listen to someone, listen to me. I’ve seen a lot of evil men in my time. You’re not one of them. End of story. No need to doubt.”

  Miles returns his gaze to mine with a one-sided smile. “You sound confident.”

  “Who’re you gonna believe? Your own self-doubting demons, or a guy who knows sadists when he sees them?”

  Miles chuckles. “All right. Next time I’ll come to you when I start doubting.”

  “Tsk.”

  “But I think I found something. Take a look.”

  I walk around the bed and stand next to him. He’s compiled a list of all the people who visited each inmate. Two names are circled, but he’s crossed one of them out. Miles points to the remaining name—Jorge Rosario.

  “An attorney?” I ask.

  “No. I looked him up. He works for Worldwide Decurion. They’re a criminal analysis firm.”

  “What the fuck is that?”

  “An organization that collects crime statistics and data. They go into jails, prisons, police stations, sheriff’s offices, courtrooms—all manner of criminal sites—and gather up information. How many crimes were committed, what races the victims were, where the crimes took place. Stuff like that.”

  I give Miles a questioning glance. “You think a number-crunching business is behind this?”

  He shrugs. “This guy visited everyone, and it’s not out of the ordinary for him to do so. Even Roslyn. If he’s there to ask questions—like about the families and financial status of the inmates—it seems like he would be figuring out everything he needed to know about his potential victim.”

  Miles throws down his list. “Besides, weren’t you the one who said they go after people with no one to come looking for them? Seems to me they would be the group to figure that out.”

  “So we should look up information on Worldwide Decurion?” I ask.

  “I think that’s our best bet.”

  But do I even want to do that? We’re too late to save Roslyn. What’s the point?

  “Let’s keep going with this,” Miles says. He must know exactly what I’m thinking, because there’s an edge to his voice, like he really wants to continue. “There’s no harm in looking up public information. And maybe we can tell Rhett about it at the Blue Shield Gala.”

  Eh. I forgot about that stupid gala. And I’m not keen on the idea of talking to Rhett, but he wasn’t on Shelby’s list of crooked cops, so I guess it’ll be safe.

  I roll my eyes. “Fine. But we’re not going anywhere to investigate. Got it?”

  “Yeah, of course. We’ll research everything from the safety of our own home.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  “AREN’T YOU worried about your vegetables?” Shannon asks, staring out the glass of the back door and pointing to my garden box. The rain hammers down on it relentlessly.

  I straighten my tie and shrug. “If the damn plants can’t handle a little water, maybe they don’t deserve to live.”

  “That’s mean.”

  “I didn’t plant vegetables to coddle them.”

  Shannon places both her hands on the glass and gaze glued to the darkness of the storm. “No wonder all your gardens die. You’re callous.”

  Yeah, just what I needed—to be judged by a prepubescent girl.

  Miles walks out of the back with Jayden and Lacy in tow. I take a moment to stare as he finishes buttoning his shirt. I’ve always liked him in a suit, but it
doesn’t fit quite right anymore, thanks to Miles’s improved physique. The thing is too tight, but not so taut that he can’t wear it. As long as he stands relaxed, it hugs his body just right.

  “You guys aren’t going to leave us overnight again, are you?” Jayden asks, the whine in his tone an overload of insufferable. “I’m not a fan of old-lady smell.”

  “Hey,” Shannon snaps. “Grammy doesn’t smell that bad.”

  “It’s not like you’re denying she smells, though.”

  Lacy raises a hand and quiets both her friend and brother. “It’s rude to talk about people like that. Ms. Timo is nice to let us stay with her, so we should at least be thankful.”

  Miles fastens a black tie around his neck. “Thank you, Lacy. I appreciate that.”

  She holds her head up and nods, self-congratulatory in her smug smile. Still—she’s the only one with an understanding of the situation. Jayden’s comprehension of the universe seems limited to his own self-absorbed bubble. I’ve known psychopaths with a firmer grip on reality.

  “She has terrible food,” Jayden mutters once Miles is in the kitchen.

  I turn to Lacy and motion her over. She walks up, her lips pursed and her brow furrowed. I’d guess she’s confused, but I think it borders on irritation. “Here,” I say, handing her a hundred from my wallet. “Save Ms. Timo the hassle and get whatever you kids want.”

  She takes the bill with both hands. “You want me to handle it?”

  “You’re the one I trust the most to get the job done.”

  The one sentence transforms Lacy’s whole demeanor. She snaps her gaze to mine, her eyes wide. “Really?” My unabashed approval must go to her head, because she pockets the cash and swishes her long black hair over her shoulder with a flick of her hand. “Well, I am the responsible one. I’ll make sure it’s done, and I’ll keep the receipts.”

  I turn away and smirk, content in my decision. I really did misjudge Lacy. She’s a little more stiff and stern than Miles, but they’re definitely related. They want to do right by the people around them, which is a quality I’ve only recently come to know. Most guys I’ve associated with wanted to get the job done or get as much as possible without much effort, damn the consequences. I’d say Jayden fits into that boat. I’d say I fit into that boat.