The Partnership

by Dustin Stevens

  “A murder investigation,” he said, putting no small amount of edge into his voice.

  “Oh,” the woman said, leaning back a few inches, making it clear she didn’t appreciate the tone, “then I guess getting a warrant shouldn’t be a problem.”

  Out of reflex his hands curled themselves into fists within the pockets of his coat as he took another step forward, increasing the angle so she was forced to look up at him.

  “A person’s rights to search and seizure laws generally no longer apply when they’re the victim.”

  The woman’s jaw dropped a full inch as she stared up at Reed, her hands appearing atop the desk and scrambling toward the keyboard like oversized spiders. She kept her gaze locked on Reed until the found the home row before turning to face the screen and entering a series of commands.

  “Yes,” she said, her voice faltering slightly as she read from the screen, “we have her in building D, apartment 211.”

  Rotating in her seat, she opened a metal cabinet on the wall beside her and selected a key before turning back and extending it across the desk. “Would you like a map?”

  Snatching the single item from her hand, Reed rotated on the ball of his foot and headed toward the door, Billie keeping pace beside him.

  “I think we can find it.”

  Leaving the woman sputtering behind him, no doubt a combination of trying to apologize and wanting to know more details about what happened, Reed stepped out into the cold. Armed with a fresh jolt of acrimony and adrenaline, the wind didn’t seem quite so biting, pushing him to opt against returning to the sedan and instead walking toward his destination.

  From what he could tell, Schollman Square looked to be another of the dozens of homogenous apartment complexes that had sprung up in the greater metro area since Reed first relocated. Almost always three stories tall, their bottom halves were constructed from stone or brick, the top parts giving way to navy blue or hunter green.

  Throughout the grounds were fountains or small waterways employing the same stonework, grassy expanses replaced with new sod each year. The parking lots were filled with a healthy dose of Jetta’s and Acura’s, seeming to indicate that the homes catered to the late-20 to early-30 crowd that Ing had belonged to.

  Oversized letters stood on the front corner pillar of each building as Reed marched away from the superintendent’s office, beginning at A and working their way up.

  By the time they reached D they were both again jogging, this time from anticipation more than the cold, Reed anxious to get inside Ing’s apartment and look around, Billie just glad to be doing something active. Compared to their normal routine of spending hours a night making the rounds and following up on calls, the last few days had been a steady slog of sitting in the car and talking to people, the dog’s discontent fast becoming apparent.

  It was a feeling Reed knew well.

  Upon reaching the fourth building in the queue Reed gave a short two-note whistle, the sound stopping Billie midstride as he turned up the nearest staircase and took the steps two at a time. Despite his head start, he and Billie arrived on the second floor at the same time, checking the closest door to find it labeled 201.

  Stopping his pace just short of a jog, Reed took off down the second floor walkway, ticking the numbers off in his mind before finding what he was looking for near the middle stairs.

  Unlike many of the others they had passed along the corridor there was no holiday wreath present, no mat welcoming them beneath the door. No decorations of any kind were visible in the front windows, a set of white mini blinds having been pulled down, the slats blocking any light from getting in or out.

  From pure habit Reed raised his fist to knock before thinking better of it and fishing the key from his pocket. He jammed it into the lock and twisted it once to the side, the heavy door pushing open with an audible wheeze of the weather stripping surrounding it.

  “Clear,” Reed said, keeping his voice low but his tone unmistakable, issuing a command.

  There was no pause, no moment waiting for recognition to set in, as Billie bolted into the darkened apartment, her nails audible against tile for just a moment before being muffled by carpet.

  Reaching to his side, Reed tapped at the butt of his Glock as he stepped through the door, extending his hand to the wall beside him and flipping the entire bank of light switches upward.

  It took less than a minute for Billie to clear the space, Reed standing just inside the door the entire time, his knees slightly bent, his hand cocked by his hip. Once she presented herself back at his feet, letting him know that the place was empty, he relaxed his stance, reaching down and rubbing behind her ears.

  “Good girl.”

  Having never once met Bethanee Ing, Reed wasn’t sure quite what he expected her apartment to look like, though he was reasonably certain it was some variation of what he now stared at.

  Standing just inside the door, he and Billie were on the edge of the kitchen, a wraparound counter housing a stove, refrigerator, and single basin sink. The far end acted as a barrier between it and the living room, the space long and open, with tan carpeting and a brown couch. Across from it was a TV stand with a flat screen perched above it, a DVD player beneath.

  Where a dining room table would normally be there was instead a desk, the top of it covered with papers and post-its, pens and highlighters of every color strewn about.

  The inside of the apartment was warmer than the outside, but still much cooler than it should have been, as if the thermostat had been lowered by someone not expecting to return anytime soon.

  Wherever Bethanee Ing had been, she was also staying there, not returning home each night.

  Stepping from the kitchen into the living room, Reed paused just long enough to note that there was no laptop on the desk, no stray cords beneath it to indicate that one had been grabbed in a hurry either. For just a moment he paused, his gaze dancing over the myriad scraps of paper lying on the desk, before moving past it.

  There would be plenty of time to return to it soon enough.

  Moving across the room, he passed through an open doorway into a bedroom, the space just as utilitarian as the living room outside. Along the wall was a queen-sized bed, a dresser and a single night stand beside it.

  Nowhere in the entire apartment was there anything that could be considered personal, not a single picture frame or stuffed animal, not even a piece of artwork hanging on the wall.

  Whether that was deliberate or more a statement of the lifestyle Ing led Reed couldn’t be sure, making a note to ask somebody about it should the opportunity arise.

  Blair had stated that Ing never mentioned having family, though Reed couldn’t imagine the girl being a complete orphan. Most everybody seemed to have someone in their life, somebody they considered family through either birth or circumstance.

  Somebody that would care she was gone, that would need to be notified.

  The thought was still in the forefront of Reed’s mind as he exited the bedroom and moved into the last room in the apartment, a small bathroom with a standing shower stall, sink, and toilet. Containing far and away the most personality of anywhere else inside, the counter was lined with vials of various hair and facial products, more than a half dozen types of shampoos and conditioners in the shower.

  Clearly wherever she was staying when she wasn’t at home was the kind of place she couldn’t bring everything with her.

  Deep in thought, processing the state of the apartment, what everything that was or wasn’t present told him, Reed barely heard the sound of knocking. Tucked away inside the bathroom, the sound was low, just a couple quick taps and nothing more. The kind of noise all homes make during the winter, especially with heavy winds.

  Reed dismissed it without thought, returning to his initial analysis of the home when a second sound forced its way into his psyche, pulling him to a stop.

  The sound of hinges squeaking softly.

  Pulse surging through his temples, Reed drew his w
eapon from his hip, his right hand squeezing the grip, his left under it for support. Leaning out to the side, he peered around the door casing toward the front, careful to make no sound against the bathroom tile.

  “Hey, Beth, you here?” a voice called.

  Male, deep, obviously familiar with Ing and her home.

  Inching his way a bit further, Reed glanced to Billie, seeing her coiled body beside him, her teeth bared, ready to spring at a moment’s notice.

  Moving just a few inches further, Reed looked out to see a twenty-something male with a heavy shadow of facial hair standing just inside the door, a black leather jacket covering the zip-up hoodie beneath it. Slung over one shoulder was a black backpack, his hair sticking up at odd angles around his head.

  “Put down the backpack and step out where I can see you, hands raised,” Reed said, keeping his voice low in an attempt not to incite panic as he stepped from the bathroom, his gun aimed at the ground in front of him.

  At the sight of him exiting the bathroom with his weapon drawn, the young man tensed for just a moment before wheeling around, his shoes squeaking against the tile floor as he departed. Flailing an arm out behind him, he caught the edge of the door and swung it closed, the sound reverberating through the apartment.

  “Freeze! Police!” Reed yelled in his wake, the words exploding out of him as he sprinted toward the door and jerked it open. Cold air flooded around him as he rushed across the concrete landing and pressed his waist against the railing, peering down.

  Below him he could see the young man already halfway through the stairwell and heading fast for the ground level, taking the steps two and three at a time.

  Too far away for Reed to ever catch on his own, he did the only thing he could do, raising his face toward the sky and yelling as loud as he could. “Hold!”

  Billie was past him, her dark body little more than a blur, before the word was even finished passing his lips.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Every bit of Reed wanted to take a few extra seconds descending the stairs. He wanted to walk them one at a time, swinging his foot out a few inches in front of him, throwing a little swagger into his gait.

  After the last few days he wanted, needed, to relish the victory, finally having the upper hand on someone hell bent on making his job difficult.

  At the same time, he knew an apartment complex like this, especially given the hour, was bound to be at half capacity, if not more. Judging by the cars and the décor, he would peg the average tenant to be somewhere just south of his own age, meaning they all had cell phones and iPads and scads of other gadgets capable of recording and uploading everything that took place outside.

  There was absolutely nothing he or Billie had done wrong, the man having entered the home of a recent murder victim before fleeing, but that would hardly matter once the video started making the rounds. The court of public opinion would be quick and merciless, prompting a second encounter with Dade and a lot of undue heat on him and Grimes both.

  Given how much he still had left to do on this case, that was a scenario he would rather not deal with.

  Instead he ran down the stairs as fast as he could, leaping over the last few, to find Billie had the young man pinned against one of the stone pillars acting as support for the structure. Pacing back and forth in front of him, she kept her jowls pulled back to reveal her fangs, hair bristling along the length of her spine.

  With his back pressed against the wall, the young man held his pack in one hand, gripping it by the straps as if debating using it as a club.

  Clasping the gun before him, Reed squared the young man up and walked straight toward him, coming to a stop just behind Billie’s path.

  “I would not even try that if I were you,” he said. “That dog is a detective and swinging that bag at her is the same as assaulting me, and you’re in enough shit right now.”

  The young man’s jaw dropped open as he looked at Billie before staring up at Reed.

  “Besides,” Reed added, “unless you’ve got a stick of dynamite in that bag, she’d tear you apart before it even made contact.”

  The threat was probably unnecessary, the look on the young man’s face revealing he was already receding toward acquiescence, but Reed enjoyed adding it just the same.

  And it was the truth.

  Knowing that if he placed the man under arrest he would have to read him his rights, which might prompt him to ask for a lawyer, Reed opted against saying anything as he holstered his weapon and extracted his handcuffs from the opposite hip.

  “Alright,” he said, “here’s how this is going to go. My car is parked clear up by the entrance and I don’t want to stand out here any longer attracting attention, so I’m going to handcuff you and we’re going to go right back upstairs and have a little discussion.”

  The young man looked aghast for a moment, his mouth dropping open, but no words came out.

  Sensing some hesitance, Reed prodded, “Or I can just parade you past all these people and we can drive across town to The Bottoms and have this conversation there.

  “Ever been to The Bottoms?”

  Even though he was well outside the immediate confines of his precinct, he knew that anybody in a twenty mile radius was intimately familiar with the stories of what went down on the streets he routinely patrolled. It seemed to always invoke a certain response from people, especially those that frequented places like Schollman Square, regardless how tough they thought their leather jacket and facial hair made them look.

  After another moment’s consideration, the young man visibly slackened. He brought his hands together before him and said, “Okay, just please call that damn thing off before it hurts somebody.”

  “Down,” Reed commanded, Billie instantly stopping her movement, her teeth disappearing from sight.

  “She,” Reed corrected, stepping past her and grabbing the young man by the shoulder. Without any consideration for being gentle he spun him around, pressing his chest into the pillar as he cuffed the young man’s hands behind him. “Not it, not that thing, she.”

  Pulling him back a few feet, he nudged him toward the stairwell and added, “And to be clear, the only somebody she would have hurt would be you.”

  Chapter Thirty

  It was agreed that physically harming the girls would get them nowhere. Just the sight of the dead body of one of their colleagues on the news had rendered many of them into a state that bordered on catatonic, paralyzing them with fear.

  To counteract that the two had discussed for a while a better way to approach things, eventually coming to a solution that both felt would work, but more importantly both felt reasonably certain they could pull off.

  Arriving with each girl was a packet of information the suppliers on the other side of the Pacific sent along with them. In each one was information about the girls, sometimes encompassing everything from their medical records to their school transcripts, others having little more than a handwritten sheet of paper with a few relevant details and nothing more.

  Included in many of the envelopes were a series of photographs, an idea The Businessman had put together in Louisville. To be used for leverage in the event things went sideways at any point, the photos were of friends and loved ones back home, their intended purpose quite clear.

  Not once since requesting the photos had The Businessman ever had cause to use them, seeing this as perhaps that opportunity.

  It had taken a while for The Muscle to come around on the notion, leaving The Businessman standing in his living room as he retreated to his bedroom for a shirt, remaining back there a long time to consider things in silence. Employing such tactics was not a particular strength of his, in fact going quite the opposite direction and mitigating what was his forte.

  Raw, brutal, physical violence. The kind that could be imposed on a person, used to strike fear into them.

  The sort that was best served by standing over an intended target, fuming with rage, making them believe that harm was
imminent.

  Trying to impart the same sort of terror through a picture would be difficult, something he did not even see as possible, until The Businessman raised a very valid point.

  They were young girls that were already frightened. They didn’t need to scare them any further, they merely needed to coerce them back to doing what they were brought over to do.

  Make the partnership - and the larger enterprise – a lot of money.

  Once it was put into those terms The Muscle had an idea, accepting the stack of photos The Business man had brought for the girls under his charge and dismissing the man back out to his Lexus, sending him off to do whatever it was he did.

  Making a run to a local Wal-Mart, The Muscle had bought a roll of clear Scotch tape and two packages of throwing darts, having everything in place at five o’clock when the girls filed into his home, their second gathering in as many days.

  Several were already dressed for the night ahead, fish nets and miniskirts in place, pancake makeup covering their faces. Balancing on platform shoes, they walked unevenly across the cluttered floor of the living room, clumped together just inside the door, nobody saying a word as they stood and waited.

  Having not been told why they were being brought together a second time, it was all The Muscle could do to keep from smiling as he stood and stared at the open terror stretched out before him, the feel of it palpable in the air, so real he could almost taste it.

  This was going to be fun.

  “Yesterday, I showed you girls a video so you’d know what would happen if you tried to run,” The Muscle said, walking slowly across the expanse of the room. Each step he was careful to place down with a little more force than necessary, making sure to be heard.

  “And while I thought we had an understanding, apparently I was mistaken.”

  As he reached one end of the room he stamped both feet down hard before turning to head back in the opposite direction, glowering at the girls before him the entire time.

  “When you were brought here, it was made clear to you that there were certain expectations, right?” he asked. “That you would be required to work for the money that was sent back to your families, correct?”