George said he was going to retain Bard Epson who Luke knew was a solid attorney. He was licensed to practice law in a few states across the south and had won several major homicide cases for defendants in the last year in Memphis and New Orleans.
Luke had never been cross-examined by him in court or saw him in action, but his reputation was well-known. Luke found it telling that George didn’t just call someone from his own firm or his father-in-law for that matter and instead hired out of his circle. George was threatening to get the best of the best. It was clear he wasn’t going to be cooperating or making another statement anytime soon.
Luke knew to arrest George they would need more than speculation. They would need some hard evidence linking him to one or more of the crimes. They just didn’t have it and so they had to let George go. Little Rock Police Department had already served a subpoena to search his home, but they would need to again. They hadn’t been searching for connections to other women when they first searched. Luke knew he would have to get other subpoenas too. They might even put a GPS tracking device on George’s Chevy Tahoe to track his every move.
If Bard Epson was involved, he’d have to connect with Cooper and Riley. Luke wondered how this attorney’s involvement would affect Riley and Cooper’s ability to share information. Typically, when the attorney hires a private investigator any evidence they find falls under work product, and it would be unethical to share with the cops. But from what Luke understood, they were retained by George himself and so their cooperation walked a fine line at best.
As Luke sat at his desk, entertaining a fantasy of arresting and seeing George Brewer prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, his partner came up behind him and slapped a manila folder in front of him, startling him out of his dream world.
Luke eyed the folder and then looked up to Tyler for explanation.
“We got a match on prints on the first woman. She’s in the system,” Tyler said with a big beaming smile.
Tyler picked up the folder and gave Luke the details. “Her name is Shannon McCarty, age thirty-eight. She lives in Little Rock. She was arrested on four separate occasions in New Orleans for prostitution over the last five years. Her father is our congressman.”
Tyler went on to give Luke her address, background and conviction history.
Confused, Luke asked, “A hooker and a politician’s daughter? She didn’t look like a hooker.”
“She’s not a hooker. She’s a high-end call girl. Madame and all,” Tyler explained. “I called the New Orleans police department and talked to vice. They are familiar with her. Shannon worked for Madame Breaux. Breaux is known to the locals, been running her business for close to forty years. Her big mansion is in the Garden District. It’s been in her family for generations. She caters to all the politicians and business clientele visiting the city. Detective I talked to said they all just look the other way. Some state senators are in her pocket. They can’t touch her. They make arrests once in a while, but both the girls and the clients plead out and get right back at it.”
“She lives here in Little Rock?” Luke asked, skimming through the file trying to fit all the pieces of the puzzle together.
“She must travel. From what the cop I talked to said, her girls are all over the south. Smart girls. Vanderbilt girls. Society girls. Apparently, she’s not the only politician’s kid working for Breaux.”
“Anyone know she’s missing?”
“Not that I’m aware of. I put a call into Breaux. Let’s see if she calls back. No one else listed at Shannon’s residence and no home phone listed either. She probably just has a cellphone. Her mom died when she was young and her father resides mostly in D.C. He’s not back here in Little Rock too often.”
“So, what’s a high-end call girl working in New Orleans doing floating dead in the Arkansas River?”
CHAPTER 31
LUKE AND TYLER JUMPED at the sound of the ringing desk phone. Luke picked it up and heard a soft-voiced woman’s New Orleans accent on the other end of the line.
“Detective, this is Ms. Breaux. Someone from your office called about Shannon McCarty.”
“Yes, how do you know her?”
“She works for me,” Breaux paused. When Luke didn’t say anything, she continued her voice stronger and more direct. “Let’s not play games, Detective. You and I both know you already know about my business and what Shannon does for me.”
Luke appreciated her candor and met her with the same.
“I’m sorry to inform you of this, but yesterday morning, Shannon was found deceased in the Arkansas River. It hasn’t officially been ruled a homicide, but we are fairly sure it was not accidental. Was she working in Little Rock?”
Several seconds passed before Breaux answered. When she did, she said, “No, she only took clients here a couple times a month. She missed an appointment two nights ago here at a local hotel with one of her regular clients. She would have been paid eight thousand for the night. She never showed up, which is unacceptable for my girls. She’d never done it before so I assumed something was amiss. I’ve been trying to locate her since.”
“Before that, when was the last you had contact with her?”
“Tuesday of last week she came to collect her pay. Shannon said she was going to visit her brother in Baton Rouge but was to return by Sunday for her Monday evening client. Her brother was my first call. It seems she never arrived in Baton Rouge. He hasn’t heard from her. Obviously, I can’t call her father, although I’m sure he was aware. After her mother died, Shannon didn’t have much of a relationship with him, just her brother.”
“Does she ever take clients outside of your business?” Luke asked, straining at the word business. He hated prostitution as much as he hated drug dealers. Both crimes preyed off the weak. High-end or not, Luke knew many of the girls suffered from childhood issues.
“Not if she wanted to keep her job. To be candid with you, I run the business of my mother and my grandmother. It’s a legitimate business that has no reason to be illegal, but it is. My girls are educated, sophisticated, and cater to some very wealthy and powerful clients. Shannon has worked for me since she was in college. When she graduated with a social work degree, she realized she made more money with me than she could ever as a social worker. Shannon was a smart girl. She wouldn’t do anything risky. If someone killed her as you said, it was someone she knew and knew for a long time. Someone she trusted.”
“Would you be willing to hand over Shannon’s client list?”
“Not on your life,” Breaux responded with a short incredulous snort.
“If it’s someone she trusted and your other girls take over her client list, it could be someone on that list. We have two other women we found in the river not far from where we found Shannon. Do you have any other women missing?”
“No, all accounted for and interviewed. No one has seen or heard from Shannon. I will allow you to interview them if you send a detective down here. We’ll be very kind to him, I assure you. Maybe you might want to pay us a visit yourself. Men quite enjoy the variety of what we have to offer.”
“You do realize you’re soliciting a cop?” Luke shook his head at her brazenness, but if the locals couldn’t fight her, there wasn’t much he was going to do out of his jurisdiction.
“You are also just a man, with needs,” she said seductively, stressing the last part.
Luke ignored it. After that, he rushed her off the phone but not before getting Shannon’s brother’s contact information. It would be his first call, and hopefully, her brother could notify the father. That was not a call Luke wanted to make.
He’d check to see if a local New Orleans cop could handle some interviews. Luke didn’t think it would do any good to send a detective all the way there. Breaux was also going to send Luke a recent photo they could use to put out to the media. Maybe friends or someone could help start filling in the timeline of Shannon’s last days.
CHAPTER 32
COOPER AND I DECI
DED to go our separate ways for the rest of the day. He wanted to interview Maime’s parents, and given it was obvious that Maime’s father didn’t like me, we figured Cooper would have better luck on his own. Cooper was more intrigued than I was about the potential negative press that could befall the law firm. I just thought it was typical rich people nonsense. Cooper said he was going to dig a little more with the LaRues and see what he could find. Then he had a surveillance case.
I was on my own for the rest of the night, which I really didn’t mind. I liked Cooper, but sometimes his slow southern pace drove me a little insane. Not to mention, he was such a stickler for the rules. Unfortunately, other than Maime’s coworkers, who we planned to talk to first thing tomorrow morning, the only people we had left to interview were Maime’s friends.
I stood in the road outside of my house, next to my Jeep, and scanned the list of names. I wanted to start first with the people who I knew absolutely hated me.
I took off and drove through the Heights and Hillcrest neighborhoods where they all lived. I didn’t get very far though. The first six houses I went to, I was met with disgust, cursing and slammed doors. They all remembered me and not one of the women was willing to speak to me, even though technically I was hired to find Maime. They assumed I was there only to protect George and to steal him back. Nothing could be further from the truth, but I understood how they felt. Besides, back in the day, they had only ever heard one side of the story. To them, I was the woman trying to steal Maime’s boyfriend. I’d probably hate me too.
The thing is, I never bothered to defend myself back then. I never told them I was just as duped as Maime. I don’t think it would have mattered. I didn’t really think they would have listened. Truthfully, and I hate to admit it, there was some sick twisted part of me that wanted to protect George even then. If I stayed the bad guy, George looked innocent. Let them think it was me contacting him, hitting on him and trying to lure him away. People only see what they want to believe anyway. I hated myself a little bit for that.
I couldn’t blame those girls. I would have had the same response if this had been about Emma. I protect the people I care about. Right now, I had a job to do and it wasn’t getting done.
Frustrated, I looked over the list again. There was one last name. Gina Young. She was Maime’s roommate when all of it went down between the three of us. She was one of the women who called me, but she never seemed quite as angry as the rest. Gina was also with all of the girls on Friday when Maime didn’t show up. I was hoping she might be my best chance at some information. She was married now, and I knew from Emma, she had a son close to Emma’s daughter’s age.
Gina lived only a couple of blocks away from me. She was standing in the doorway as I pulled up. My guess is one woman called the next, and they were all alerted I was on my way. I apprehensively approached but was pleasantly surprised that she greeted me warmly and invited me in.
“Sorry, the place is a wreck. My son Joshua is on a rampage today. Everything is torn apart,” Gina said, showing me into the living room. “Can I get you something to drink?”
“No, thank you,” I said as we were both seated on the couch. “Thanks for speaking to me. I know this is probably a little awkward. The others wouldn’t even speak to me other than to cuss me out and slam the door in my face.”
Gina shrugged sheepishly, folded her hands in her lap and said, “I’m a traitor, I guess, but you might have suspected that. I lived with Maime. I love her like a sister, and like a sister, I know her faults. A relationship is never all one-sided. George and Maime had problems from the start. You, you were just a symptom.”
I don’t know why but for the first time I felt compelled to tell someone in Maime’s life the truth. Maybe finally I wanted to defend myself or maybe I really did want her to feel more at ease.
“Just so you know, I never knew about Maime until that day she found the email. George never told me, and once I knew, we broke it off. We might have called each other from time to time or kept in touch but nothing ever happened. I couldn’t be someone’s mistress. I don’t share well.”
“I suspected, but Maime just wouldn’t hear of it. It was easier to blame you than him.” She stopped and then went on, “But you aren’t here to rehash old news. How can I help find her?”
“Just tell me what you know, anything and everything. Start as far back as you have to. We don’t know at this point what detail could lead to finding her. Walk me right up to the night she didn’t show, and how you came to know she was missing.”
Gina leaned back on the couch and crossed her legs. She seemed to think for a few moments and said thoughtfully, “I know I’m supposed to think it but I just can’t believe George killed her. My husband Mike and I have spent a lot of time with George and Maime. I just can’t believe it and neither can he. I’m glad there’s someone who thinks there might be another possibility. The more time they spend on George, the less they are looking for Maime.”
I leaned toward her, shifting in my seat, surprised I wasn’t the only one who thought that way. To hear it from Gina gave me a tiny glimmer of hope.
Gina continued over the next hour to fill me in completely on George and Maime’s relationship and everything she knew about Maime. Most of it was mundane and routine, the things you expect to hear about someone’s life. I wasn’t prepared for the bomb she was about to drop though.
“No one knows this. I didn’t tell the detectives yet either. When I first heard she was missing, I was worried Maime had just run away. I didn’t want to create any more of a mess for her to come back to. With so much time passing, I’m worried. Maime doesn’t even know I know. She was having an affair with Dean. It started back when she and George were dating.”
I started to interject, but she held her hand up to stop me and continued.
“I don’t know how they hid it this long. Also, last year, Maime developed quite the prescription drug habit. Dean tried to get her to rehab. When she wouldn’t, he broke it off or at least that’s what I’ve come to understand. I don’t know if the affair or the drugs have anything to do with her disappearance, but it’s something no one is looking into because they don’t know.”
Not even giving me a chance to speak, she got up, walked into the kitchen and came back with a slip of paper with an address on it. “That’s where her dealer lived the last I knew. I followed her once. This is going back about three months. He might still be there. Be careful, it’s a rough part of town.”
CHAPTER 33
I KNEW I SHOULD have immediately called Luke about what Gina just told me, but my mind was reeling. I left Gina’s, got in my Jeep, and drove directly to Dean’s house. I wanted to confront Dean myself. Then call him out for being such an idiot. He told us Maime had a wandering eye. He would know best. He was screwing her.
I’ve done some terrible things in my life, but I don’t know how someone could claim to be someone’s best friend, be as close as brothers, and then screw his wife. I just didn’t get it. I had no reason to believe that Gina was lying. She was believable and had no reason to lie.
I just couldn’t wrap my head around Maime being addicted to drugs though. She never seemed all that stable, but I never suspected a drug habit. I wondered how it factored in. Where was she? It’s like she just vanished. It was really starting to freak me out.
I handle crime all the time but rarely is the victim someone I know. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I wondered if I willed this to happen. Back when I was in the middle of all of it with George, I think I must have prayed night after night for Maime to get lost, to get out of George’s life.
I bet Maime’s drug habit was one of the reasons her father is so worried about his reputation. Dean mentioned negatives. That had to be one. That and screwing her behind everyone’s back.
Given the possibility of drug addiction, Maime could be anywhere. She could be off on a binge. Or overdosed somewhere. Even taken off to get herself clean. I wondered if George knew about the drug
s and which prescription drugs exactly. How could he not know? He lived with her.
The affair with Dean and a drug-addicted wife certainly gave George more motive. Not that he needed any. It was one thing to have an affair and want his freedom. It’s another as a man to know your wife was involved with someone else. I had to guess that he didn’t know. Otherwise, how could he still be so close and trusting of Dean?
I slammed my car into park in front of Dean’s house and made my way to his front door. I pounded on the door several times and waited. No one answered. I stepped back off the porch and looked for any sign of life coming from the house. There was none. The garage didn’t have windows so there was no telling if his car was there or not. I walked down the driveway and punched his number into my cellphone, hit send and listened to the phone ring. No answer. I didn’t leave a message. I didn’t want to tip him off. This required a face-to-face meeting.
I stood at the curb at the end of his driveway, watching his house for several more minutes, trying to determine my next move. He could be any number of places. I’d probably just waste my time driving around. I was too amped up to just go back home and wait.
I could at least try a few of the local spots and see if Dean was there. I wanted to call George, but that would have to wait. I didn’t trust myself enough yet not to let on what I knew. I needed a plan for testing George on how much he knew. I was mentally walking though the questions I needed to ask George when my cellphone began to ring. I picked up on the third ring.
“Ma, what’s up? I’m kind of in the middle of stuff here,” I said more impatiently than I meant to sound.
“You’re alive? I’m sitting here watching the news about what’s happening in that horrible place. Three dead women pulled from the river. Missing women. Is this why you’re down there? To stir up trouble? You could have at least called your mother and told her you weren’t dead,” my mother Karen squawked into the phone, not kidding in the slightest.
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