Dark Carnival Murders (13 page)

Morning, Penny was already
out of bed, I didn’t hear anything from the kitchen so I figured
Angelo was busy with his mother and Gino. Then I figured Penny
would be back to her bowl of oatmeal and I would be toasting slices
of bread. We shouldn’t get used to Angelo’s cooking, he may move
any day now. I thought about fronting the money so Angelo could
open his restaurant, but I’d hate to lose him as a bodyguard. I’d
ask him about it to see how he felt.

I got up and went to my
bathroom and readied my body for the day. I was shaved, showered,
groomed and dressed to go out and fight crime. Penny was now
banging pans and I went out to see what she was up to.
Surprisingly, she cooked up pancakes for us.

"Well, I see Angelo has
rubbed off on you."

She smiled and put the
dish in front of me. We ate and it wasn’t half bad, then I
collected the plates and we kissed at the door to go to our
jobs.

"Are you going to see
Francis today?" I asked as we walked to our vehicles.

"Later, she’s spending
time with Angelo this morning, they are sightseeing."

"Good, I’ll see you
later."

I came through the back
door of the office setting off the cowbell and waved to the camera.
I went to my office and sat checking my email, nothing again. I was
offended that no one even cared enough to send me spam.

Lacey came to the door and
said, "Talked to Mac this morning, it’s good you guys are going to
get the boys back."

"I’m just hoping all goes
well. Any messages for me?"

"Nope, nobody cares enough
to leave you messages."

"Thanks for the ray of
sunshine, go do some work to earn your raise."

She laughed and went
off.

I picked up the phone to
call the Walkers and the Feltons, being cautious about what I was
going to tell them. They both responded well and I gave them some
hope. I sat back as my cell phone buzzed, caller ID said it was
Lynn.

"I hope you don’t have any
bad news," I said.

"Well, not for the boys,
but there was another jewelry store hit last night. Same M.O., door
unlocked, no alarm."

"Dark is spreading his men
out. I thought robbery was going to watch the stores?"

"We couldn’t watch all of
them, Vegas just has too many, they happened to hit one we didn’t
have eyes on. I don’t know if they knew we were watching or just
lucky. Heard from Buck yet?"

"No, I’m just waiting,
hopefully they’ll find out something."

Earl walked in and I
signaled him to sit. "Where are you?" I asked Lynn.

"I’m at the jewelry store
trying to get any connection to Dark. Robbery is cooperating in
this since we have a common connection. Why don’t you stop by and
do some snooping. It’s near the corner of Tropicana and Decatur,
watch for all the black and whites. "

"We’ll do
that."

We?" she said
cautiously.

"Yeah, Earl just came
in."

"Oh goody, we really need
him this morning," she laughed and hung up, I put my phone back in
my pocket.

"What?" Earl asked. "You
were talking about me."

"It’s nothing really,
she’s happy you are on the case."

"That’s not what she
really said is it?"

"Earl she likes you, even
if you annoy her."

"I do no such thing, do
I?," Earl said with indignation.

"Yesterday you suggested
she become a stripper, she’s a sensitive person right now since
she’s pregnant."

"Oh yeah, I forgot about
that. I’ll try to be more understanding."

"Shall we go check out
another robbery of a jewelry store?"

"Again? Boy, Dark must
need the money."

I went out to the lobby
and told Lacey we were leaving and she said, "About
time."

I just ignored her and led
Earl out to the van. We arrived at the store and found Lynn
standing with a couple suits. I presumed they were
official.

We came up and Lynn
introduced them, they were from robbery division. "Jim we have
another problem, the store owner says one of his employees was in
the store all night doing inventory, now she’s missing."

"Think she was taken by
Dark’s men or was she in on it?"

"Don’t really know at this
point, but she’s a lifelong resident of Vegas, so I doubt she was
in on it. Just in the wrong place at the wrong time. I have Warren
running her through the system to see. Her name is Delinda Niles,
lives in North Vegas."

"So was this place robbed
the same as the last?" Earl asked.

"Yep, back door unlocked
and the alarm shut down. Owner is blaming Delinda for leaving the
door unlocked, but I told him it was a stretch to think that
someone just happened to come by at that time to rob the place.
Besides, one woman in the building alone at night, I’d be sure she
would have had the doors locked."

~~*~~

"Damn it Ned, did you have
to bring her back here?" Dark was scowling.

"I just thought she could
be sold to the Arabs, she’s not bad looking. Besides she saw us
after Benny opened the back door."

"Our sales to the foreign
buyers is over for now, we can’t take her on the road with us. Just
dispose of her, and do it quickly, we don’t need any more
prisoners."

"Okay boss, it’ll be done.
The desert here is so nice and big, they won’t find her for a long
while."

He left the trailer, Dark
looked to Skeeter, "Is the auction going to go on as
planned?"

"Yep, it’s all arranged
and everyone knows where to meet."

*

Chapter 18

The CSI supervisor, Larry
Wayne, came over to Lynn and said, "Same as the other store, we got
nothing, and the store’s security tapes are all missing. We did
find one camera that I think they missed outside, from across the
street at a party store. I have my men over getting the tapes from
them; maybe we’ll have something to show."

"Thanks Larry, keep me
informed if any of Dark’s men show up on it." Larry agreed and went
back into the jewelry store.

"Are you taking lead on
this?" asked Ted Dresher, a detective from robbery, who was
standing by listening.

"I’m sorry Ted, no, I’m
just hoping to gather as much evidence on this crew to put them
away for way too many crimes, but you have the scene, it’s yours,
but keep it under wraps until tomorrow." He agreed and went back to
his men.

"If this Delinda turns up
murdered, then it goes to homicide, so you may have an official
stance on it," I offered.

"Not that I’m hoping for
murder, but I’m in a gray area here. Weber is letting me take the
case because he wants to see the boys returned and just about all
the other department caseloads are heavy. Luckily there have been
no murders in the city for a few days, freeing me up," she said
with a grim smile.

"I guess my murder curse
is taking a vacation," I laughed.

Lynn’s cell phone rang and
she answered, listened for a long pause and thanked the person on
the other end. "That was Warren, he was running the check on Niles
back in the squad room and a report came in, he took it since he
was the only one in homicide, it seems they already found Niles,
dead in the desert."

"How did they find her out
there, it’s a big desert?" Earl asked.

"It seems that two hikers
were exploring for rocks out off the highway towards Boulder City
when they saw a truck pull into the desert. Two men got out and
pulled what looked like a woman from the back of the truck and put
a bullet in her head. They drove off and the hikers went to the
woman, she was dead of course. They called police and it came back
to Warren in the precinct. It’s now homicide, Dark is digging in
deeper."

"When we get the boys
back, you’re going to have a ball nabbing Dark aren’t
you?"

"Bet your sweet bippy, his
ass is going to be mine. Him and that whole damn carnival. I’ll
have all of our SWAT and backup to arrest the entire bunch of them.
They don’t come into Las Vegas and do this crap on my
watch."

~~*~~

Buck and Mac were back at
the round-up and sweating in the heat, worse now today, it had
climbed to over 110 degrees. Skeeter came up and said, "Good work
last night, the women were prime beef for our investors, Dark was
happy."

"Glad to oblige, we do our
best," Buck replied.

"You still wanting to go
with us tonight for the auction?"

"Sure, if we aren’t going
to get in the way."

"Oh no, you won’t. We need
extra men to help control the buyers; they get a little surly at
times. They are a mean bunch. The two of you big men can keep them
in their place."

"I love a good fight if it
comes down to it."

"Hopefully not, just watch
the men and if one of them gets a little heated, cool him down.
When it comes to young boys, these perverts can get
snarly."

"I’m sure Mac and I can
handle it. Where’s this all taking place?"

"I can’t say right now,
but we’ll lead you there when it’s time. The auction is taking
place before we close down so you’ll need someone to fill in for
you. I’ll arrange it, later." He turned and went off.

Buck was disappointed that
Skeeter didn’t tell him the location. He had the GPS tracker that
Dave hid on him this morning after the jet plane incident, so he
was prepared.

~~*~~

We took the half hour
drive down to the area where the woman’s body was found. The two
hikers were sitting on the tailgate of their old army jeep that
they brought over to the crime scene after they called the
police.

"Did you get a look at the
men?" Lynn asked them.

"Sorry, we were too far
away to get a good look, they weren’t very big though, kind of
skinny and small looking. The woman was bigger than both of them
but she was tied up."

"How about the
truck?"

"It was a late model Ford
pickup, it had a high cap covering the bed, like they used it to
haul big things. It was blue and not very clean looking, well used
I’d say. There was some kind of lettering on the front door,
couldn’t make it out. It was colorful though, with fancy
lettering."

"Could it have said, Jacob
Dark’s Traveling Carnival and Wonder Show?" I asked.

"That’s a mouthful, but it
could have been. There was about the same number of words that you
just said. It was kind of like carnival lettering, you know,
fancy."

"Thanks, sorry to disturb
your rock hunting, especially with a murder. Detective Warren will
take your statements and you can go. We may need you again to
identify the truck if we find it." Lynn turned to me and said,
"I’ll just bet I know where that truck is."

~~*~~

Angelo was enjoying the
sightseeing that he and his mother were doing. They had gone up and
down the strip to all the casinos and played a good number of
games. Francis knew the odds were against her betting, but she
enjoyed the action. They had stopped at the McDonald’s on the strip
and were sitting with their food when Angelo’s cell phone rang. The
caller ID came up private but he answered.

"Yeah, Angelo DeMario
here."

"Angelo, it’s Benny Lesloe
from Joisy City, can ya talk?" came the voice on his phone causing
him to stiffen up.

"Yeah Benny whatcha need?"
Francis gave Angelo a look, he just motioned not to
worry.

"I understand that ya was
lookin’ for a creep named Lucius Cole? Whatcha need him
for?""

"I don’t need him, I was
trying to get some info on him. Why you boys need to
know?"

"We got a beef with him,
his crew hit one of our fencing fronts for a ton of jewelry and we
wants it back. You know where the mug is at."

"At this moment, no."
Which was true, at that moment Angelo didn’t know where Cole, AKA
Dark, was at specifically. He didn’t want to lie to the one
friendly Mafia family that the Travianos dealt with. "Tell ya what
Benny, I’ll nose around out here and see what I can find, hows that
with ya?"

"Good wit me Angelo, hows
life with ya?"

"I’m sitting her with my
mother having burgers and fries on the Vegas Strip. Isn’t that
nifty?"

"Sounds real nice, say hi
to Francis for me, talk later." He hung up and Angelo put his cell
away.

"What did that lowlife
want?" Francis asked.

"It’s the case my friends
are on, the carnival man, they have a beef with him. I’m going to
have to talk to Jim before I let Benny know where the creep
is."

"Well if it’s the man who
kidnapped the children, let Benny know, that should take care of
the creep."