First Grave on the Right

  I stepped past the meeting of the minds and headed for the coffeemaker. The minds followed, made their coffee, then led the way to a small conference room.

  “Why can’t I smell it?” Barber asked.

  “Excuse me?” I set my coffee on the table and pulled out chairs for them.

  “The coffee. I can’t even smell it.”

  “I tried to smell my niece’s hair,” Elizabeth said, a sadness permeating her voice.

  “I’m not sure,” I said. “Can you smell anything?”

  “Yeah.” Elizabeth tested the air. “But not stuff that’s right in front of me.”

  “You’re picking up scents from the plane you’re on, which technically isn’t this one.”

  “Really?” Barber said. “Because I could have sworn I smelled barbecue a while ago. Do they have barbecues on this side?”

  I chuckled and sat down next to Uncle Bob.

  After twenty minutes of arguing on how to go about taking down Benny Price, I came up with a plan. Benny owned a series of strip clubs called the Patty Cakes Clubs. The name alone was all kinds of disturbing. And according to the file the investigative task force had on him, Benny liked those strippers, though not half so much as he liked himself.

  “I have a plan,” I said, thinking aloud.

  “We already have a task force investigating him,” Ubie said. “If anything, we need to coordinate our efforts with them, take our cues from their investigation.”

  “They’re taking forever. In the meantime, Mark Weir is sitting in jail, Teddy Weir is missing, and we have families who want answers.”

  “What do you want me to do, Charley?”

  “Set up a sting,” I said.

  “A sting?” Garrett asked, his expression incredulous.

  “Just give me a chance. I can get evidence on the man before the sun goes down today.”

  While Garrett practically bucked in his seat, Uncle Bob leaned toward me, interest sparkling in his eyes. “You got something cooking?”

  “Detective,” Garrett said in a scolding tone, “you can’t be serious.”

  Ubie shook himself as if coming out of a trance. “Right. It was just a thought.”

  “But, Uncle Bob,” I said, whining like a child who’d just been told she couldn’t have a pony for her birthday. Or a Porsche.

  “No, he’s right. Besides, your dad will put a contract out on me.”

  “Psh,” I pshed, raking my gaze over him in disappointment. “Can you say wuss?”

  That had to sting. I didn’t psh him often.

  “Charley, you were almost killed today.” Garrett’s silvery gaze glittered with anger. He was so moody. “And yesterday. Oh, right, and the day before. Maybe you should give it a rest?”

  “Maybe you should bite my ass.” I turned back to Uncle Bob. “I can do this, and you know it. I do have a slight advantage over the average Joe.”

  “What did you say?” Garrett asked. “You have a slight advantage over the average psycho? I doubt it.”

  Well, that was just mean.

  “What are you thinking?” Ubie asked, unable to help himself, and my smile shone bright with superiority. Would Garrett never learn?

  “You said that you haven’t been able to get wiretaps in his office, right?” I asked.

  “Right. Not enough evidence.”

  “I can’t believe you’re listening to her,” Garrett said.

  “We’re listening, too,” Barber said. Elizabeth nodded her head in agreement.

  “Thanks, guys. As I was saying,” I continued, glaring at the traitor before turning back to Ubie, “he videotapes all his interviews with the new girls.”

  “Yeah.” Uncle Bob’s brows knitted in thought.

  “And he does all his interviews in his office, right there on a couch he has for just such occasions.”

  “Okay.”

  As I explained my plan to Uncle Bob, Garrett sat boiling under his hot collar. Honestly, the man was going to have a heart attack.

  “That’s a pretty good plan,” Uncle Bob said when I’d finished my spiel, “but can’t you just walk up and whisper something in his ear like you did with Julio Ontiveros? You’re like the horse whisperer, only with bad guys.”

  “That worked for one reason and one reason only.”

  “And that would be?”

  “Julio was not the bad guy.”

  “Oh. Right.”

  “My powers of persuasion are only as strong as the bullshit I have to back it up.”

  “Well, I like it,” Elizabeth said. “And watching Mr. Swopes get spitting mad is entertaining.”

  Barber and I agreed with a snicker.

  “I’m glad you can laugh about all of this, Charley,” Garrett said with a nasty scowl lining his face. “You have no idea what kind of man Price is.”

  “And you do?”

  “I know what kind of man it takes to get involved with something as barbarous as human trafficking.”

  “I get it, Swopes. He’s not the kind of man you take home to meet your stepmom.” I rethought that. “Wait a minute. Maybe my stepmom would like to meet him. Do you think he ships to Istanbul?”

  “Charley,” Uncle Bob said in a warning tone. He knew only too well the stones that made up the foundation of the rocky relationship between my stepmother and I, even telling me once he’d never understood why my dad didn’t do something about it. That one stumped me, too.

  “It was just a thought,” I said defensively.

  While Uncle Bob started negotiations with the investigation task force already assigned to Benny Price, I decided to hunt down Sussman, who’d been MIA for some time now. Garrett stormed off in true Garrett fashion as I checked my phone outside the conference room. He could storm off all he wanted. While he’d retrieved his truck earlier, I had yet to fetch Misery, so he was giving me a ride. The faster he stormed to his truck, the longer he’d have to wait. Which worked for me on several levels.

  I had two texts, both from Cookie, both saying, CALL ME WHEN YOU GET THIS. Must be important.

  “I got ahold of one of the women at Reyes’s high school,” Cookie said when I called her. “She and a friend of hers remember our boy very well.”

  “Nice work.” I loved that woman.

  “They can meet you at Dave’s tonight, if you’d like.”

  “I’d like. What time?”

  “Whenever you can be there. I’m supposed to call them back.”

  “Purrrrrfect,” I purred into the phone, doing my best Catwoman impersonation. “I have to go check on Sussman. He’s MIA. How about an hour from now?”

  “I’ll call them. How are you, by the way? We haven’t had time to talk since your latest near-death experience.”

  “I’m alive,” I said. “Guess I can’t ask for much more than that.”

  “Yes, Charley, you can.”

  After a long pause, I said, “Can I ask for a million dollars, then?”

  “You can ask,” she said before hanging up with a snort. She knew me well enough to figure out I wasn’t going to talk about my latest drama at that time. I’d vent later. And she’d get the brunt of it all. Poor woman.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Sarcasm. Only one of the services offered.

  —T-SHIRT

  Thirty minutes and one eerie ride later—Garrett stewed in his ire over my plan the whole way to my Jeep—I sat outside Sussman’s house, watching him through a second-story window. His back was to me, and I realized he was probably watching his wife.

  Several cars lined the curb in front of his gorgeously decorated three-story abode. People came and went, talking softly. Unlike the movies, however, they were not all dressed in black and they weren’t all crying. Well, some were. But several were laughing at this or that, making animated conversation with their hands, greeting visitors with arms open wide.

  I strode awkwardly to the front door and walked in. Nobody stopped me as I meandered through the crowd to the stairs. Taking them slow, I climbed to the se
cond floor on thick beige carpet and found what looked like the master bedroom.

  The door was slightly ajar, and I could hear sobbing coming from inside. I knocked hesitantly. “Mrs. Sussman?” I said, easing inside.

  Patrick’s gaze landed on me in surprise. He was leaning on a windowsill, watching his wife. Another woman, large and dressed in true mourning attire, sat beside her, an arm wrapped firmly around Mrs. Sussman’s shoulders.

  She raised a viperous glare on me. Uh-oh. Turf war.

  “I’d like to talk to Mrs. Sussman, if it’s okay with her,” I said.

  The woman shook her head. “Now is not a good time.”

  “No, it’s okay, Harriet,” Mrs. Sussman said. She looked up at me, her large brown eyes reddened with sorrow, her blond hair haphazardly brushed back. She was the kind of beautiful that men didn’t notice at first. A soft, honest attractiveness. I had a feeling her smiles were genuine and her laughs were sincere.

  “Mrs. Sussman,” I said, leaning forward to take her hand. “My name is Charlotte Davidson. I’m terribly sorry for your loss.”

  “Thank you.” She sniffed into a tissue. “Did you know my husband?”

  “We’d met only recently, but he was a great person.” I had to explain my presence somehow.

  “Yes, he was.”

  Ignoring the caustic stare of the other woman, I continued, “I’m a private investigator. We were working on a case together, and now I’m working with APD, helping to find out who did this.”

  “I see,” she said in surprise.

  “I hardly think now is the time for this, Ms. Davidson.”

  “Not at all,” Mrs. Sussman said. “This is precisely the time. Do the police know anything yet?”

  “We have some promising leads,” I said evasively. “I just wanted to let you know that we are working very hard to solve this case and that—” I turned back to Sussman. “—you’re all he talked about.”

  The sobs began again, and Harriet went to work consoling her friend. A weak, appreciative smile spread across Sussman’s face.

  After handing her my card and saying good-bye, I gestured for Sussman to meet me outside.

  “That was awkward.”

  We were in front of his house, leaning against Misery, watching the occasional car slide past. The wind had picked up. Its crisp chill gave me goose bumps, and I hugged myself, thankful for the sweater underneath my leather jacket.

  “Sorry,” he said. “I meant to go back with the others. I just…”

  “Don’t worry about it. You have a lot on your plate. I understand.”

  “What have you found out?”

  After I filled him in, he seemed to perk up a little. “You think this is about human trafficking?”

  “We have a semi-solid plan of action if you want in.”

  “Sure do.” Good. He seemed to be doing better. He turned thoughtful a moment, then asked, “In the meantime, can I jump in your body and make out with my wife through you?”

  I fought a grin. “It doesn’t really work that way.”

  “Then can you just make out with my wife and pretend I’m in your body?”

  “No.”

  “I can pay. I have money.”

  “How much we talking?”

  * * *

  I sneaked back into the law offices of Sussman, Ellery & Barber, dumped the flash drives into Barber’s desk, then did another quick search, just in case I missed one. Nora hadn’t been in, which was good. She couldn’t have realized the flash drives were missing and made a mess for me.

  Now on to Reyes’s classmates. Dave’s Diner was a fifties flashback, complete with tin signs and chocolate egg cream sodas, which surprisingly contain neither eggs nor cream. When I walked in, two women sitting in a corner booth waved me over. Wondering how they knew what I’d look like, I strolled to their table.

  “Charley?” one asked. She was big and startlingly pretty with a dark brown bob and wide smile.

  “That’s me. How did you know?”

  The other one smiled, a Latina with curly hair pulled back into a frizzy ponytail and skin to die for. “Your assistant told us that you’d probably be the only girl walking through the door who looked like she could do the name Charley Davidson proud. I’m Louise.”

  I shook Louise’s hand, then the other one’s.

  “I’m Chrystal,” she said. “We just ordered food, if you’re hungry.”

  After sliding into the circular booth, I ordered a burger and a diet soda. “I can’t tell you how thrilled I am that you agreed to meet me.”

  They laughed at some private joke, then took pity on me and explained. “We jump at any chance to talk about Reyes Farrow.”

  “Wow,” I said in surprise, “I do, too. You knew him well?”

  After another sideways glance at Chrystal, Louise said, “Nobody knew Reyes Farrow well.”

  “I don’t know,” Chrystal said, “Amador.”

  “Right. I’d forgotten that he hung out with Amador Sanchez.”

  “Amador Sanchez?” I opened my bag and pulled out the file I had on Reyes. “Amador Sanchez was in prison with him. They were cellmates, in fact. Are you telling me they were friends before they met in prison?”

  “Amador went to prison?” Chrystal asked, surprised.

  “That surprises you?” Louise arched a delicate brow at her friend.

  “Kind of. He was a good guy.” She looked at me then. “Reyes mostly kept to himself until he met Amador. They became friends pretty quick.”

  “Can you tell me about Reyes?” My heart raced with wanting and anticipation. I’d searched for him for so long, only to have him find me instead, to have him turn out to be the Big Bad. How could I not have known?

  Louise studied a napkin she’d folded into a swan. “Every girl on campus was in love with him, but he was so quiet, so … withdrawn.”

  “He was really smart, you know?” Chrystal added. “I’d always taken him for a slacker. He wore a lot of layers.”

  “Hoodies,” Louise said in agreement. “Always had hoodies on with the hood up. He got in trouble for that constantly. But he kept doing it.”

  “Every day in class,” Chrystal said, taking her turn, “he would try to get away with his hood up, and every day in class, the teacher would tell him to put it down.”

  Louise leaned into me, a sparkle in her dark brown eyes. “Now, what you have to understand is that even in the short amount of time that he was there, this became a ritual. Not for him, not for the teachers, but for the girls.”

  “The girls?” I asked.

  “Oh, yeah,” Chrystal said, nodding her head in dreamy remembrance. “There was a moment every day when you could have heard a pin drop. He would raise his hands and push the hood back, and it was like watching heaven reveal itself.”

  I could see it in my head. His beautiful face revealed in such a way as to cause hearts to flutter, blood to rush, and young girls to sigh in choreographed unison.

  After a bit of reminiscent thought, Louise said, “And he was so smart. He was in the same calculus class as our friend Holly, and he always blew the curve. Aced every test.”

  “We had him for English and science. One day, Mr. Stone gave us this assessment,” Chrystal chimed in excitedly, “and Reyes got a hundred, and Mr. Stone accused him of cheating because some of the concepts weren’t even presented until college.”

  “Oh, I remember that. Mr. Stone said there’s no way Reyes got a hundred on it. And Reyes was like, ‘Screw you, I didn’t cheat,’ and Mr. Stone was like, ‘Yes, you did,’ and he took Reyes to the principal.”

  “Suzy worked as an aide that hour, remember?” Chrystal asked Louise. Louise nodded. “Said they went into the office and Mr. Stone got in trouble because the principal said Reyes gets hundreds on everything, and he had no right to accuse him of cheating.”

  “Was he ever given an IQ test?” I asked.

  “Yes,” Louise said. “The principal had him tested, and then these men showed up from some
educational board wanting to talk to him, but Reyes’s family had moved away.”

  Yeah, I was sure they did. Reyes’s father kept them on the move constantly. Dodging the authorities at every turn.

  “I still can’t believe he killed his dad,” Chrystal said.

  “He didn’t,” I said, wondering if my convictions were more wishful thinking than evidence based.

  They looked up at me in surprise. I probably shouldn’t have done it, but I wanted them on my side. On Reyes’s side. I told them about the first night I saw him, about his father beating him senseless, and about the sister he’d left inside.

  I paused when our food arrived, waiting for the server to leave before I continued. “That’s why we’re here. I need to find his sister.” I also explained what happened in prison and the fact that he was in a coma, but neither of them could remember very much about the girl. “She’s really the only one who can stop the state from terminating care. Do you know anyone who might have hung out with her?”

  “Let me make some calls,” Louise said.

  “Me, too. Maybe we can come up with something. How much time do you have?”

  I looked at my watch. “Thirty-seven hours.”

  * * *

  On the way home, I called Cookie and told her to find me one Mr. Amador Sanchez. He seemed to be the only person who might know anything substantial about Reyes. It was late, but there were few things Cookie loved more than hunting down a warm-blooded American for me. Give her a name, and she was like a pit bull with a bone.

  Right after I hung up, my cell rang. It was Chrystal. She and Louise remembered that her cousin, an eighth grader at the time, used to hang out with a girl who hung out with Reyes’s sister on occasion during lunch. Thin, but more than I had five minutes ago. They’d tried to call the cousin but couldn’t get through, so they left a message with my name and phone number.

  After I took down her information and thanked them several thousand times, I ran into a supermarket for the basic essentials of life. Coffee, tortilla chips, and avocados for guacamole. One can never have too much guacamole.

  When I stepped out of my Jeep, I heard my name and spun around to see Julio Ontiveros behind me. He was bigger than I remembered from the station.

  I closed my door and went around to collect my bags. “You look better without your cuffs,” I said over my shoulder.