Brooklyn Blue: A Madison Knox Mystery (Book 1) Page 6

  “You mean from me?”

  She nodded and began moving off. I tried to keep up with her as she continued walking and talking. “I’m what you might call between homes right about now, so if you and your friend got a place, I’d like to be your roommate.” She glanced over at me. “I think we’d make a good fit.”

  “How does the idea of living in a cemetery sound to you?”

  She stopped and looked at me. “A cemetery?”

  “The place is called Funk’s Forever Fields. Amy’s a PI and did some work for the owner. There’s supposed to be a caretaker cottage on the grounds with three bedrooms. The rent would be less than a thousand a month. And the neighbors are really quiet.”

  Max’s heavy breasts went up and down as she drew in a breath and exhaled. “It might be a good fit for me, since I tend to communicate with the dead anyway.” Her gaze moved off as she looked across the icy park. “Right now, I’m picking up some new vibrations. They’re coming from that woman over there.”

  I looked in the direction she’d indicated. “I don’t see anyone.”

  “She’s on the bench, working on a makeshift altar. Let’s go have a chat with her.”

  We made our way across the frozen field, the woman Max had mentioned coming into view after we’d gone a few yards. It made me wonder if my new partner did have some strange psychic powers. As we got closer, I saw that the woman was fashioning a wooden cross with some flowers affixed to it.

  Max introduced us, and the woman told us her name was Joanna Ramirez. She then showed her the mug shot of Rod the Bod. “This man’s been going ‘round showin’ off what little God gave him. You seen him ‘round here?”

  The woman brushed a black streamer of hair out of her eyes. She was pretty, and seemed out of place in the deserted, freezing park. “I come here almost every day, but he doesn’t look familiar.”

  My partner lowered her sonorous voice. “What’s the cross for, sweetheart?”

  “My daughter…her name is Maria. She’s been missing for the past week. Do you know anything about the investigation?”

  “Sorry, we just got assigned to this area,” I said. “Tell us what happened.”

  “Maria jogged at the park most days, when the weather was nice. She left home last Tuesday around four, and never came back.” She brushed a tear. “I’ve been so worried. I haven’t slept since she’s been gone.”

  “How old is Maria?”

  There were more tears. “Sixteen. She’s such a good girl.”

  “What do the police say ‘bout what happened?” Max asked.

  She shrugged. “They don’t say anything. Every time I call or go by the precinct, they just say they’re actively working the case, whatever that means.”

  I looked at Max. We both knew it was all too common for missing person cases to get little in the way of real investigation. My guess was that the report had been filed without much in the way of any follow-up.

  Max asked for details, including her daughter’s full name, birthdate, and where she went to school. After getting that information and Joanna Ramirez’s address and phone number, Max glanced at me. She then looked back at the desperate woman. “We’re gonna make it our personal mission to check into your daughter’s case and see what we can find out for you.”

  After breaking down and crying again, Ramirez shook our hands, thanking us for taking an interest in her daughter.

  As we headed back across the park to our cars, I asked Max for her thoughts.

  Max kept her eyes straight ahead. “Somebody took the girl, and he’s still working the area.”

  “How do you know that?”

  She regarded me. “Vibrations. Maria Ramirez is alive, but might not be for long. We need to find her soon, or…” She stopped and glanced back at the girl’s mother. “…or her mama’s gonna spend a lifetime full of grief.”

  We walked on in silence for a couple minutes. I was now convinced that Max really did have some kind of psychic powers. As we got to the car, she looked over at me and said, “There’s something else I should mention.”

  “What’s that?”

  She cut her eyes over to the long shadows descending on the freezing park. “There are other girls that have been taken. Lots of ‘em.”

  ELEVEN

  Maria Ramirez clutched her sides for warmth. It was dark and cold here. She knew that the room where she was being held prisoner was somewhere underground. She’d been blindfolded when she was taken from the park and brought here, but she’d managed to work the covering on her eyes loose when the man named Peter had moved her from the van into the house. The area was unfamiliar to her. All she knew for sure was that the house was in the middle of the block on a dark street.

  She’d spent almost a week locked in the freezing basement, only seeing her captors when they brought her food and water. There were other girls here, most of them brought to the house after she was taken. Maria knew they were locked in the other rooms, also waiting whatever her captors had in mind. When Peter and his friend Danny left the house, Maria had managed to talk to the girls through the floor where the heater vents went up into their rooms.

  She knew from their conversations that Alisha was seventeen and lived a few blocks over from her neighborhood. She was a junior at Chapman High and had a boyfriend named Gabriel. While they were all scared, Alisha seemed to be handling their situation worse than the other girls. She spent most of her time crying.

  The other two girls were Tammy and Christina. They both lived in Queens and said they’d been taken from a neighborhood park. Christina was the youngest, but, to Maria, she seemed the strongest. When they talked, her first words were always that they needed to find a way to escape, even though that seemed impossible. Tammy was quieter than the other girls. Maria thought maybe that was because she’d said her life before being taken was difficult. She had a stepfather who had abused her.

  Maria closed her eyes, thinking about the days she’d spent in the house. She had kept track of time by making a small mark on the wall in the corner of the basement. Eight. That’s how many days it had been. Each day had been agonizing, the cold and dampness of her basement room barely tolerable. There was a single blanket here and a dirty mattress, with a toilet in the corner of the room, but nothing else.

  As the afternoon wore on, Maria wrapped the thin blanket around herself and eventually dozed off. She was asleep, dreaming about seeing her mother again, when a noise somewhere in the house startled her. It was her captors. She moved over to a wall and listened, realizing the men were opening the doors and taking the girls from their rooms. She heard a shuffling sound, then her door opened, and she saw Danny’s smiling face. He was younger than Peter, maybe in his twenties. He had red hair and blue eyes that always seemed fixed on her body when he came into her room. Maria turned away, purposely not looking at him.

  “Get up,” Danny demanded, coming over to her. He grabbed her by the arm, pulling her up and pinning her against the wall. He was at least a foot taller than her, and strong. His eyes bore into her as he added, “Peter wants everyone in the living room.”

  She turned her head away, smelling his rank breath. Then she felt his hand. He was running his fingers over her breasts. She pushed him away. “Don’t.”

  Her captor laughed, continuing to fondle her breasts. “We’ll save it for later. If you’re lucky, we’ll have some time alone before the auction.”

  Auction? What was he talking about?

  Maria did as she was instructed, leaving her room and stumbling up the stairway. Danny pushed her down the hallway to the living room. When she got there, she saw the others—girls that she’d only known by their names and voices. They all looked scared to death.

  The man she knew as Peter told her to take a seat. The sofa and chair were already taken, so Maria went over and sat on the fireplace hearth.

  “Let’s take some time and get to know one another,” Peter said to everyone.

  Maria thought Peter might be in his for
ties. He was tall, with long brown hair that was gray on the sides. Something about the way he’d talked to her after she’d been taken made Maria think maybe he wasn’t interested in girls. It could be that he was gay, but she wasn’t sure. All that she did know for sure was that something bad was about to happen.

  “You first,” Peter said, pointing to a thin girl with mousy brown hair who had her arms wrapped around knees that were pulled up to her chest. “What’s your name?”

  “Tammy,” the girl said softly.

  “How old are you?”

  “Seventeen.”

  “Do you know why you’re here?”

  She shook her head, didn’t look at him.

  “You’re going to sell us,” the girl sitting next to her said. Maria thought she was younger than Tammy, with pretty dark eyes and shoulder length dark hair. The girl went on. “My father is looking…”

  “Shut up!” Peter yelled, taking a step toward her. “What’s your name?”

  “Christina.”

  He bent down to her. “You’re a smart girl, Christina. Now show the others how really smart you can be and keep your mouth shut.”

  “You can’t…”

  Christina’s words were cut off as Peter reached down and slapped her. He then grabbed her by the hair and hit her hard in the face, causing blood to gush from her nose. Maria thought about trying to help her, but she was scared.

  Peter then turned to the girl sitting in a chair across from Maria. “You’re next.”

  “I’m...my...my name is...Alisha,” she said, barely choking out the words.

  When it was Maria’s turn, she did her best to keep her voice even, not looking at Peter or Danny. “My name is Maria. I’m sixteen.”

  Peter had continued staring at Christina as Maria had spoken. The young girl had kept her eyes defiantly fixed on him. Maria had a thought that he might hit her again, but he finally broke eye contact with her.

  “Tomorrow some men are coming,” Peter finally said, turning away from Christina and addressing the group. “They’re going to want to spend some time with each of you. It’s very important that you do exactly as you are told. If you fight back or resist in any way…” His dark eyes moved over to Christina again. “Let’s just say that you will be severely punished.”

  Peter looked over at his companion and continued. “Danny has some clothes for you to wear tomorrow. A woman named Colleen will be coming to make sure you’re dressed and to help you with your hair. I want you all to make a good impression.”

  An icy fear gripped Maria. She hadn’t wanted to believe what Christina had said earlier about them being sold, but now she knew it was true. The horror and disgust that she felt made her sick to her stomach.

  “They’re going to use us for sex,” Maria said, finding the courage to tell Peter what she knew, at the same time locking eyes with him.

  Peter came over to her. He moved a hand down, and Maria thought he might slap her. Instead, he cupped his hand around her cheek.

  “Yes,” Peter said. “The life you once knew is over. You’re now my property, and I’m going to sell you to the highest bidder.”

  TWELVE

  I got home a little after six and got into the shower, trying to unwind after my first day in Precinct Blue. I planned to stop by Amy’s and then go with her to see Dr. Cornelius about expenses for working on finding his brother.

  I wasn’t sure how I was going to survive doing a year in my new assignment, but I decided that working with Max might help ease some of the pain. I didn’t know if we were exactly soul sisters, but I did feel an instant connection to her. I planned to broach the subject of Max becoming our roommate with Amy when I saw her.

  The issue of Joanna Ramirez’s daughter was another matter. I had no idea if Max really did have psychic abilities, but I knew if Ramirez’s daughter been taken, along with other girls, we couldn’t just walk away. We would have to find a way to either be assigned continuing patrols in the park and look for leads, or try to work on finding Maria Ramirez in our spare time.

  I also knew that if Lieutenant Dimwit or anyone else in our new precinct got wind of what we were up to, we’d be suspended and face certain discipline. That said, there are some things that Max and I knew were more important than following policy, and the life of a young girl, or maybe several girls, was at the top of the list.

  I’d just shampooed my hair and was rinsing it when I happened to look down and see a penis in my shower. I gasped in horror and took a step back, nearly losing my balance and falling.

  “What the fuck!” I screamed.

  The shower curtains parted, and I saw my cousin Mojo standing there naked. “Want some company?” he asked, grinning at me. “I’ll wash your back if you wash mine, or maybe something else.”

  I reached over and shoved him with both hands. He fell back, grabbing ahold of the shower curtain as he went down and hit the floor. I came out of the shower, grabbed a towel in one hand, and found my service revolver in my purse with the other.

  I stood over him, drawing a bead and, in the voice of a female Dirty Harry, said, “Give me one reason why I shouldn’t blow your little nuts from here to Chicago, punk.”

  He laughed in that imbecilic way I remembered he had. “I’d prefer you use your lips instead of the gun.”

  I reached down and grabbed him by the arm. “Get up and get dressed, God damn it.”

  I wrapped the towel tighter around myself and went half way up the basement stairs, screaming for my aunt and uncle as Mojo scrambled into his clothes. He was nearly dressed by the time they both came stumbling down the stairway into my basement apartment.

  “What’s going on, dear?” Aunt Lucy said, wide-eyed and looking around the apartment like there might be a burglar lurking there instead of her perverted relative.

  “I see you’ve met Mojo,” Uncle Marvin chimed in. “We let him move in early.”

  I still had the little turd at gunpoint. “This idiot was naked and tried to get in the shower with me. I’m having him arrested.”

  “She came onto me,” Mojo said, tucking his shirt into his pants. “I can’t help it if she wants some of the good stuff.” He did a couple pelvic thrusts.

  My cousin was about five years younger than me and homely, as in I need plastic surgery homely. He had bug eyes, thin lips, no chin, and four, no, make that three good teeth. If he was the last man on the planet, I would happily find another species to procreate with.

  “He had an erection,” I said. “If you can call something that small erect.”

  “Hey, now, this is getting personal,” Mojo said. He looked at my aunt and uncle. “Did you know Madison has really small breasts and her woman-hole looks like one of those plucked Butterball turkeys in the freezer section of the supermarket?”

  I reached over and grabbed his ear. “That’s it, you little shit. You’re going to jail.”

  “Is that really necessary?” Aunt Lucy said, her voice wavering. She looked at Uncle Marvin. “Maybe we should think about Mojo moving out until Maddie’s able to find her own place.”

  My uncle blew out a long breath, his saggy cheeks deflating like a couple flapping, empty bellows. He looked at me. “You sure you two can’t work this out?”

  “No!” I yelled. “This little cretin is a sick, demented pervert.”

  Mojo was having none of it. “She’s just hypersensitive.” He cupped a hand around his mouth, looked at my uncle, and lowered her voice. “It’s also her time of the month.”

  “That’s it,” I said, pulling him toward the stairway.

  “Alright. Enough,” Uncle Marvin said. He looked at his perverted relative. “Get your things and get out. We’ll let you know when it’s safe to come back.”

  Mojo went over to a corner of the room and got a duffle bag. He glanced at me before heading up the stairs. “Let me know when you’re ready to hook up. I’ve learned a few things since the last time.”

  After he was gone, Aunt Lucy said, “Oh, dear. I didn’t r
ealize you and Mojo did the dirty deed.”

  “We didn’t do anything,” I protested. “He’s making stuff up because…” I took a breath, trying to calm myself down. “...he’s not only depraved, he’s crazy. And you’re both crazy if you let him move in here.”

  Uncle Marvin was already headed for the stairway, following his demented nephew into the land of denial. “It’s too late for that,” he said. “I’ve already cashed his rent payment. Let us know when you’re ready to move out.”

  ***

  I was so upset by my encounter with Mojo that I got dressed and left my apartment, grabbing a bite to eat at a local diner instead of eating with my aunt and uncle. The more I thought about their insistence that the pervert move in with them, the more I wondered if there was more to the story. Did Uncle Marvin feel compelled to help out his depraved relative, maybe as payback for some kind of family debt? I decided to ask my aunt about the situation when I calmed down.

  When I stopped by Amy’s place, I found her apartment stacked with boxes. She explained that Stinky was gone, and she had taken the opportunity to pack her belongings.

  Amy then told me, “I made arrangements for us to go by Funk’s Fields tomorrow night and check the place out, but my options are limited. I’ve got to be out of here in three days.”

  I told her about my evening with Mojo, then added, “My aunt and uncle kicked him out until I can get out of there, but I’m going to have to sleep with my gun and barricade my door until I can move. The guy’s crazy.”

  Amy went over and got a jacket out of a cardboard box. Despite her anger over her breakup and her life being in upheaval, with her red hair and rosy cheeks, my friend still reminded me of the school girl I’d once known.

  “I woulda hauled Mojo’s sick ass to jail if it was me,” Amy said, buttoning her coat. “The moron really got in your shower?”

  “And the little bastard had an erection. It was disgusting as hell.”

  “Next time, blow his balls off.”