Authors: Heather Lowell
Los Angeles, California
Thursday afternoon, March 4
E
d Flynn leaned back in his chair at the police substation, saying nothing as he listened to the story Tessa was telling. Then he cut a hard glance at Luke Novak. He figured, since they knew each other fairly well from previous police operations, that he could speak his mind.
“You took Tessa to a flophouse in Gardena to see a junkie whore?”
“She did a great job. And I couldn’t exactly leave her in the car,” Luke pointed out.
“Drop it, Ed.” Tessa snapped her leather notebook closed. “I’m learning more with Luke than I have since I did the two week ride-along with you.”
“Just wanted to make sure he was watching my girl’s ass,” Ed said.
Luke fought hard against an inappropriate grin. If Ed had any idea of how he had been watching Tessa’s ass—literally as well as figuratively—he figured the veteran cop would take him out in the desert somewhere and shoot him. “I watched her back. And she did a good job of guarding mine,
too. Except for a minor cockroach incident, she was unshakable. You should be very proud.”
“Okay, can we get back to the case?” Tessa asked, sure her pale cheeks were flushed at both the compliments and the underlying testosterone communication thing going on between Ed and Luke.
“What do you want to do next?” Luke asked. “We have a good idea that Kelly was kidnapped or at least threatened into leaving the shelter, and all roads lead to the entrance of Club Red.”
“Why don’t we go there and get her back?” Tessa asked. “A preemptive strike would take them by surprise.”
Ed shook his head. “If we go in without backup, without a warrant, we won’t be able to look for Kelly.”
“She’ll come with me,” Tessa insisted.
“What if she doesn’t? What if she’s been locked away, or if she’s being kept somewhere else?” Luke asked. “You could tip off the club ownership, and they could make Kelly disappear permanently. She would become a liability to them.”
“So we conduct a raid,” Tessa said.
“Not with the information you have so far, and you know it. We can’t even say for sure if Kelly is there,” Luke pointed out.
“And even if you did find Kelly and talk to her, it’s possible that she’s being coerced or manipulated,” Ed pointed out. “If she is, and if she refuses to go with us, that would be the end of the matter. We’d have little recourse to get a warrant and go back for her at a later date unless we got some compelling evidence.”
Tessa made a frustrated noise. “So how
do
we go after her?”
“We’ve got to focus on the other crimes involved—ones where we can gather incontrovertible proof and use that as leverage on the Club Red folks,” Ed said. “Stuff like credit card fraud, Mafia connections, sports betting. That way, we
can make a bust and pull Kelly out of there whether she wants to go or not.”
Tessa looked briefly to Luke for confirmation, giving Ed a start. He wasn’t used to her looking to someone else, but was pleased to see that Luke had gained her trust to that extent.
She thought about it. “We know there are at least several criminal activities going on at Club Red. We can try to focus on those as a way of getting to Kelly. For a day or two, anyway. I’m not comfortable leaving her there for much longer than that.”
“From everything you’ve discovered, it seems like the club has made a big investment in Kelly. It would be foolish to hurt her and risk that,” Ed said.
“He’s right,” Luke said. “Listen, if it looks like Kelly is in imminent danger, we’ll go to Plan B,” Luke said.
“Which is?” Tessa asked.
“Fighting fire with fire. We take Kelly back ourselves. No cops, no warrants, and no evidence we were responsible.”
Tessa closed her eyes as she thought of how that would play with the D.A. “We wouldn’t be able to build a case against the people holding Kelly if we did that,” she pointed out.
Luke looked at her steadily, saying nothing.
She turned to Ed, who held up his hands in mock surrender. “Don’t look at me, kid. I can’t help you there. It’s your case, and you have to decide how far out on a limb you’re willing to go to get Kelly back. At this point, I can’t even tell whether she’s there against her will or not, so my hands are tied.”
“Then let’s work strengthening our case and untying your hands,” she said. “So we don’t ever need to implement Plan B. Kelly struck me as a survivor. I hope she can hold out for a little while where she is.”
Unless something has already happened to her.
Tessa physically shook off that thought and began to plan the next step in her evolving strategy. “Ed, we need to talk to
some of your contacts in Major Crimes and Vice to see if there are any ongoing investigations into Club Red. I find it difficult to believe that they could be up to what Luke is thinking without catching the attention of someone in local law enforcement.”
“Good idea,” said Luke. “I’ll do the same and check with some of my sources at the ATF, FBI, and State Attorney’s Office. We can compare notes.”
“I also want to look further at this Jerry Kravitz,” Ed mused. “How does a washed-out Arena ballplayer put together something like Kelly’s disappearance? There has to be someone else involved. Someone bigger.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of,” Tessa admitted. “I have a feeling Jerry isn’t calling the shots. But I don’t know who could be—I don’t have experience with anything like this.” She gave a short laugh. “Who am I kidding? I know just enough to know I’m out of my league. And I’m clueless about the rules of play where I am right now.”
“You’re doing just fine winging it,” Ed said. “And Luke and I do know what we’re doing.”
Luke stood up. “Besides, rules are overrated.”
“I’m glad,” Tessa said. “Because I’m about to bend some. Do you think it’s possible to send one of your employees into Club Red so we can get an idea of what’s going on behind closed doors? Someone who is off duty and going in purely for his own entertainment?”
“Swiss, you corrupt so beautifully. We’ll send in MacBeth.”
“Didn’t he already talk to both Aiken and Kravitz?” Tessa asked. “I’m afraid they’ll recognize him.”
“I told you, MacBeth is a chameleon. Let me call him and see if he wants to cultivate a taste for gentlemen’s entertainment.”
“How will he get in? The club is invitation only,” Tessa pointed out.
“We did work for the custody case of a last year’s Best
Actor Oscar Winner,” Luke said. “He owes us a big favor. If he’s not a member, he should be able to ask for an invitation and get MacBeth in as well.”
“I never knew he had a custody problem.”
“Like I said, he owes us a big favor. I’ll cash in the chips to get MacBeth inside the club by tomorrow.”
Friday morning, March 5
The next day, Tessa and Luke assembled again. This time, they were joined by MacBeth. The last addition to the team was Veronica Harris, who had stopped by to talk to Ed and stayed to participate in the strategy session.
They moved into an unused conference room at the back of the police substation. Ronnie held out several colors of Dry-Erase markers to Tessa with a long-suffering sigh. “I knew you were going to want to diagram shit, so take these. While you’re drawing, why don’t you bring me up to speed on the players?”
Tessa went to the whiteboard that covered most of one wall. “So far, we’ve got sports figures big and small. There are possible credit card fraud and sports-betting activities in a gentlemen’s club, and a young girl.”
“Pull back a little,” Luke said. “Keep it general—we’ve got several named individuals, a couple types of criminal activity, a location. And rumors—lots of them.”
Ronnie and Ed studied the board as Tessa wrote Luke’s observations, then looked at each other. They had both worked major crimes long enough to understand what else was potentially going on.
“Over all of that, you have a cloud of rumored Mafia involvement,” Ed finally said. “And I think there are probably more activities going on than you’ve got written down.”
“I agree.” MacBeth spoke up, and all eyes turned to him. “From what I saw last night, Club Red is a poorly veiled
brothel. No pimps were running the show, so I imagine the management plays that role.”
Tessa remembered Jasmine’s comments. How she said Kelly was being groomed to provide sexual favors to high-end clients who were paying top dollar for variety and youthful innocence. She looked at Luke.
“Do you believe Kelly was turning tricks?” she asked him.
“I think we can’t ignore that possibility,” Luke said softly.
“That would make it almost impossible to stick rape charges on Sledge Aiken,” Ronnie pointed out apologetically. “You and I understand that even the most jaded prostitute can be raped. But a jury won’t make that distinction.”
“I know, dammit. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about that issue since we talked to Ed yesterday,” Tessa said. “It kills me to say it, but we may not be able to prosecute the sex crimes against Kelly at all. So I’ve decided we should go after the people involved for their other crimes, and we’ll have to be satisfied with whatever convictions we get. Jail time is jail time. When all is said and done, I’ll do everything I can to help Kelly seek restitution in civil court.”
Luke nodded approvingly. “We shift gears and focus on the drugs, financial crimes, the manipulation and potential kidnapping of a middle-class kid who could be anyone’s daughter. These are things that will play to a jury, regardless of Kelly’s level of complicity. And that way, no defense attorney will be able to put the victim on trial and manipulate the jury’s moral indignation about rebellious youth in America. Good move, Counselor.”
“Thanks. I’ve got several other tricks up my sleeve. I filed a missing person’s report this morning and indicated that foul play may be involved. Ed and Ronnie, you’re going to catch this one as well. So now I’ve got a couple of days to put my arguments together, and this diagram of our case is going to play an integral role.”
“So let’s finish it.” Luke stepped up to the board next to
her and picked up a marker. “We have Kelly, Sledge, and Jerry. Off to the side, we have Street and Jasmine. What is the common thread for all of these individuals?”
“Entertainment—nightclubs, sports, stripping. Kelly working in a restaurant,” Tessa replied distractedly. When she breathed in, the air was laced with the chemical scent of the markers and the musky undertones of Luke’s aftershave.
“And the Mafia has been mentioned in connection with all of them at one time or another,” Ronnie pointed out.
“Those are just rumors. We need to get something concrete—and fast,” Tessa said, pulling her attention back to the board.
“So where do we start digging?” Ronnie asked her.
“The club,” she replied immediately.
“That’s the answer I was looking for,” Luke said. He wrote down
Club Red
and drew a box around it. “All of the individuals have a connection to this place. It’s the only physical location we can link all of them to, so it’s logical to assume that we’ll find what we need starting there. In effect, it’s our main crime scene.”
Tessa passed a pen to MacBeth. “What did you find there last night, and where does it fit on the diagram?”
MacBeth took the marker and drew two more boxes under criminal activities.
Prostitution/Illegal sex acts. Sports betting
.
“Most of the lap dances and interaction with the strippers cross the line into illegal. There’s touching, full nudity, and a private booth where I’m pretty sure clients were getting sexual services. The VIP clients who came in were all escorted to an upstairs room, one I couldn’t get into. I heard they were placing bets on college hoops up there.”
“Okay, what else?” Luke asked.
MacBeth hesitated. “Just a feeling. When I arrived, I was taken to the lounge area by three pretty hostesses. Two of them looked very young, and they were all sweet and giggly. Not like you’d expect professionals to act. I struck up a conversation
about them with the bartender, asked if the girls were available. He said no, they were being trained.”
“That’s what Jasmine said about Kelly,” Tessa murmured.
“Yeah. And when I said to the bartender that a few of the girls looked like jailbait, he tells me that’s the way some of the big customers like them. Most of the young ladies weren’t for the regular customers, he said. They were being trained for the more exclusive guests.”
“How the hell do they find their girls?” Tessa asked in frustration. “Is this really something these kids want to be when they grow up?”
“No,” Luke said suddenly. “They’re probably like Kelly—they want something very badly. They’ll probably do anything for the person who says he can help.”
“She wanted to work in show business,” Tessa said, as understanding dawned.
“Exactly. That’s probably the hook that the Club Red people use to get these girls in the door,” Luke said. “The lure of all the famous club members who hang out there every evening. The exclusive, invitation-only atmosphere. Maybe the management even holds out the potential of making some celebrity connections.”
“But how do they first meet the girls—how did they meet Kelly?” Tessa drew a large question mark above the word
Scam
on the board next to Club Red.
“I don’t know, this all is just a theory about what’s going on,” Luke said. “But we need to find out one way or the other. Once we do, a lot of other pieces are probably going to fall into place. At least we now have a motive for these people to kidnap Kelly. Maybe this will light a fire with Missing Persons.”
“Not if they write her off as a prostitute,” Ronnie pointed out.
“I know she wasn’t turning tricks. I’ll just have to prove it,” Tessa said.
“We will,” Luke assured her, but he exchanged a serious look with MacBeth behind Tessa’s back.
Los Angeles, California
Friday afternoon, March 5
A
fter their meeting with Ed and the others, Tessa returned to Novak International’s offices with Luke to work for the remainder of the day. She wanted to be able to follow the telephone conversations Luke was going to have with his law enforcement contacts, but also had work of her own to do. Carmen had agreed to transfer most of Tessa’s active cases to other prosecutors, in order to free up more time to investigate the charges against Sledge Aiken.
Tessa still had some work to do to clear her caseload, but she also wanted to stay close to Luke in case he was able to turn up a useful contact. She decided to log into the D.A.’s secure network from Novak International and do both.
Seated at a makeshift desk in the corner of Luke’s spacious office, Tessa made her way steadily through the backlog of e-mails from the last few days. Across the room, she could hear Luke start on a series of phone calls, asking old colleagues and contacts for information on who to talk to in the various agencies they had targeted. Ed and Ronnie were doing the same thing with the various departments inside
the LAPD, so Tessa was able to focus on the pile of motions and documents that had been filed in the other cases on her roster.
She wrote a detailed summary of what had been done to date and what her planned strategy had been, and passed each of the cases on to a different coworker inside the D.A.’s Office. She also sent a brief, less-than-informative update to Carmen on the status of Kelly’s case. She didn’t want to deal with too many questions she couldn’t answer yet.
All she could tell Carmen was that the judge had refused the order of protection against Sledge Aiken and that he wasn’t interested in hearing any more about the case until Tessa had sufficient evidence to file charges.
She finished in under two hours, and by her eavesdropping knew that Luke had yet to come up with a solid contact at the ATF or US Attorney’s Office. He was having better luck with the FBI, since he had cultivated several contacts there when he was still with the sheriff’s department.
As he chatted and caught up with former colleagues, all in an effort to generate new contacts, she thought about Kelly.
Tessa wondered what the girl was doing and if she knew how hard they were looking for her. And if she had truly set out to sell her body in order to get a recording contract.
It was impossible not to consider the degree of Kelly’s involvement in activities like stripping and prostitution. Tessa considered herself a good judge of people, and she felt certain that Kelly was telling the truth about being raped. But the circumstances and events leading up to the attack were still a big question mark in the logical part of Tessa’s mind.
Even if the irrational, emotional part of her refused to accept the possibility that Kelly was involved in the adult entertainment or sex industry.
She considered the odds that Kelly had been tricked. The teenager had been so transparent in her desire to get a recording contract in LA. And despite all that had happened, Kelly had an innately trusting nature. Look at how she’d
opened up to Tessa after meeting her and Roscoe in a city park. Tessa hated to imagine how someone more cynical and experienced could have taken advantage of Kelly’s naïveté. But would that have been enough to get a girl like Kelly into prostitution?
On a whim, she opened an Internet browser on the computer and went to a favorite search engine. She typed in the words
California
and
teenage
and
prostitution
, then sat back with a gasp at the number of hits she received.
There were over thirty thousand of them. Page after page of links containing those keywords, an emotionless cataloging of the exploitation of young girls.
“What is it?” Luke asked as he approached her desk.
“Look at this,” she said. “I was just doing some research on the prostitution angle and came up with tens of thousands of hits on the Internet.”
Luke stood behind her and looked at the monitor. She felt his breath against her cheek as he reached for the mouse and scrolled through several screens of data. She held her breath until he stepped back and sat on the desk to her right.
“What are you thinking, that maybe Kelly got mixed up in some kind of organized prostitution ring being run out of Club Red?”
“I don’t know if I’d go that far. But consider the profile of the teenage prostitute: young, blond, from the Midwest, and wanting to make it big somewhere like LA or New York.”
Luke rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “She’d be ripe for exploitation.”
“And that would explain a lot of things we’ve questioned—like why she was staying with Jerry Kravitz and why she wasn’t being truthful with us about her background. My God, Luke. What if she’s a minor?”
“Then she’d be a high-ticket commodity and exactly the type of girl to be recruited into this industry. And remember, Sledge Aiken told MacBeth that whatever he’d gotten from Kelly had been bought and paid for.”
“Look at her face,” Tessa said, pulling out the Polaroid of Kelly she kept in the file. “She hardly looks eighteen. The more I think about it, the more I feel we should contact the Center for Missing and Exploited Children, see if Kelly is perhaps a minor who has been listed as missing. Maybe she’s even a runaway.”
“Good idea. I’ll put MacBeth on it as well, checking law enforcement databases nationally. If Kelly is a minor, it will give us some leverage to use on Jerry and his buddies.”
“Were any of your contacts able to come up with information on Club Red?” Tessa asked.
“I’ve still got lots of work to do,” Luke said. “From the little bit of information I have, I’d say Club Red is quite a profitable operation—yet at the same time the activities are very straightforward. You might even say it’s brilliant in its simplicity.”
“What do you mean?”
“Club Red’s activities are highly diversified. We figure the club pulls in millions of dollars a year, but if you break the activities down into categories, no single one of them contributes to a majority of the profits. It’s more like a little here, a little there, if that makes sense.”
“Highly diversified. Sounds like an MBA business plan,” Tessa joked.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, good business advice will tell you not to be overexposed in any one sector, because of market fluctuations and sector instability. In the case of Club Red, you could consider law enforcement interest and criminal prosecution kind of like a negative market variable—something that would adversely affect the bottom line of the business.”
“So whoever is running the club would have to be careful not to be too successful at any particular activity; otherwise, they would draw the attention of the police or the FBI,” Luke said musingly.
“I wonder if the guy who runs Club Red has a business
background,” Tessa said. “What have you been able to learn about him?”
“Ricky Hedges is the owner of the club, and he’s supposedly involved in every aspect of the operation. Nothing gets served that Ricky hasn’t tried first, no girl performs without auditioning for him first. He even picked out paint, flooring, and fabrics when the club was being built.”
“So you would think he’d know about activities of people like Jerry and Sledge going on in his own club.”
“You would,” Luke agreed. “I’m going to have MacBeth do a little more in-depth research on Ricky. There’s not much available on him on the surface, and he’s got no record of criminal activity in the state of California.”
“But he might in another state,” Tessa guessed.
“It’s worth a shot.”
Club Red
Hollywood, California
Club Red’s gated and patrolled parking lot was full, and patrons could hear the music blasting long before they passed the third security checkpoint guarding the entrance of the building. Friday was one of the biggest nights of the week, especially with college basketball gearing up in preparation for March Madness and the NCAA championships.
Well-dressed members waited in line behind red velvet ropes at the final security check as they were politely searched for items like cameras, recording devices, or even cell phones with Internet and photographic capabilities. Any item that didn’t pass the stringent privacy rules was traded for a claim check and stashed in a line of locked boxes just inside the entrance. Patrons who requested one were given a global satellite phone for use—free of charge—during their time inside Club Red.
Ricky Hedges made his way through the crowded foyer,
where patrons milled around with drinks in hand, watching sports action on the projection TVs. He greeted several well-known professional baseball and football players who were making their way back to the VIP lounge and the exclusive entertainment that awaited them there.
After straightening his trademark herringbone jacket and his thinning ponytail, Ricky paused at the edge of the foyer. He briefly spoke to one of the bouncers and asked that a stripper who had been learning the art of belly dancing be sent back to the VIP room to warm up the small crowd.
Ricky was always looking for interesting new ways to ensure that his guests had a good time.
Unfortunately, some of those innovations had backfired, leaving him to take care of the fallout. That was one of the many tasks on his list of things to do for the night, so he headed upstairs to the business offices to take care of it.
When Ricky entered his office, Jerry and the girl were already waiting. He looked over the cause of so much trouble, as if trying to evaluate whether she was worth it. She was stunning, without a doubt. Long platinum blond hair, with too many highlights and shades to be artificial. Her eyes were powder blue and fringed by full, dark lashes. Her frame was short—the only drawback—but she was curvy enough that most customers would happily overlook it.
Besides, she would be the perfect size for some of the Asian high rollers he was trying to attract to the club.
All in all, she looked like she would be worth the effort it would take to clean up the mess and salvage the situation with Sledge Aiken. Ricky didn’t let those thoughts show as he took a seat behind the old-fashioned cherrywood desk. Without a word, he opened an expensive humidor and began to prepare an illegally imported Cuban cigar.
Kelly sat in a chair and looked down at her intertwined fingers. The knuckles were white from the pressure of holding her hands together, and she could hear the sound of her
pulse over everything else in the room. She jolted slightly when Jerry spoke from beside her.
“There was no need to involve yourself here, Ricky. I’ve got the situation under control.” Jerry crossed the ankle of one leg over the knee of the other and tried for a casual and disinterested pose. In reality, his cushy relationship with Club Red was on the line—and he knew it.
“Was it under control when this brat ran away from your house and talked to the police?” Ricky asked calmly. He raised an eyebrow and took a puff off the cigar, before blowing the cloying smoke across the desk at Jerry. “When she brought charges against one of our best customers?”
Jerry shifted defensively, pulling his thinning bangs down over his forehead in an unattractive habit that served to draw attention to his receding hairline. “No charges were ever filed, the police just investigated because it was procedure. Aiken’s lawyer put their case into a tailspin, and the police aren’t even supposed to speak to him directly again. Now that Kelly’s back with us, it will all go away.”
“That’s assuming you can keep her here this time,” Ricky said with a puff. “I understand she ran away even after you tried, ah, physical persuasion. So if smacking her around doesn’t work, what are you going to do differently this time?”
“She’s a smart girl. She can be reasoned with—watch how I handle her.”
Ricky watched impassively as Jerry reached out and grabbed a fistful of Kelly’s blond hair and lifted her head to meet his eyes.
“We haven’t really had a chance to talk since you came back, Kelly. But I want to tell you how much you’re going to regret not being nicer to me—or to Sledge. He’s a stupid fuck, but he can be manipulated. He’s got fabulous connections, and if you give him what he wants, he can be a very generous man.”
Kelly’s stomach lurched from the combination of cigar smoke and the memory of Sledge’s brand of generosity.
“That’s right—you really blew that one,” Jerry continued, misunderstanding her expression. “One of his old college buddies is a record executive. Didn’t I tell you I’d hook you up? But you had to play the frigid bitch and piss Aiken off when you cried rape. And after I’d broken you in so nicely for him,” he sneered.
Kelly’s face turned white at his words. When she’d been introduced to Jerry by a girl she’d met at the bus station, he’d offered to let her stay with him while she was finding her way around LA. Soon after, he’d begun to pay special attention to her. She had thought that he’d been interested in her as a girlfriend.
She’d been grateful, flattered, and completely out of her league. It had taken Jerry weeks of friendly flirtation, candlelit dinners, and overt seduction that focused on all she owed him to finally get Kelly into bed. She’d thought it was the beginning of her first serious relationship.
Until the next night, when Jerry had sent her out on a date with Sledge Aiken.
Set her up.
The knowledge that she had been betrayed so absolutely sat in her stomach like a lead weight. In a state of shock that made the moment seem surreal, she wondered what she’d done to deserve something like this. Then Jerry began speaking again.
“When Mindy brought you to my place from the LA Greyhound station, I saw something special. I could have made you a star at Club Red, which would have opened other doors for you. Now I’m thinking you don’t deserve anything that good. Unless you give me a reason not to, I’m going to have to make other plans for you.”
Kelly swallowed against the dryness in her throat. “Like sending me home?”
“Hell, no. You know too much for that, and you owe me. I was thinking about Tijuana.”