Green Light (Sam Archer 7) (11 page)

Archer
nodded then looked around him and frowned, realising they were
heading for Brooklyn, not the Bureau or his apartment.

‘
Where are we going?’

‘
Somewhere we can get some real information,’ Hendricks said.
‘Cypress Hills.’

He
glanced at Archer as they entered Brooklyn, heading for one of the
most dangerous neighbourhoods in the city.

‘
Let’s find out what’s really going on here,’ he
said.

ELEVEN

In the sitting room of Karen Casey’s apartment on East
19
^th
Street, Shepherd and a blonde thirty year old social worker
named Theresa Palmer waited as the distressed woman recovered from
the bout of tears triggered by their arrival several minutes
ago.

Marquez
had called Shepherd when he was on his way to the Hendricks’ for
dinner, telling him that she and Josh had found Arch. Apparently
he’d been dumped in Rikers having been arrested after visiting
Karen Casey, and she and Josh were on their way to pull him out.
After a few seconds of stunned silence, having not even realised
that Archer was missing, Shepherd had swung his car round and come
straight here to speak with Leann’s mother, wanting to see if Karen
could shed any light on why his detective had been arrested as he
left her place and telling Marquez to let him know the moment they
got Archer out.

As Shepherd had arrived outside the building another car had
pulled up and Theresa Palmer had stepped out, just as surprised to
see him as he was her. Palmer was from the Polaris Project, the
biggest anti-human trafficking organisation in the United States,
and had been brought in by the 114
^th
after it became apparent that
Leann Casey had been an escort. Palmer’s role required her to
counsel the families of those caught up in the sex-trade as well as
the victims and Karen Casey had been on her visit list since her
daughter had been murdered. Shepherd had been part of the NYPD for
sixteen years but apart from his early days in a squad car with
Hendricks when they’d arrested a few hookers and pimps, his work
since, especially in the Counter-Terrorism Bureau, hadn’t involved
the sex trade so he was glad she was here, feeling somewhat out of
his depth in this unfamiliar territory.

The pair
had been let in, walked up together and had now been sitting with
the distraught woman for several minutes. Palmer was beside Karen
on the couch, a hand resting against her back, murmuring words of
comfort. As he waited patiently for Karen’s tears to pass, Shepherd
glanced at the social worker, even more grateful she was here right
now. Green eyed, attractive if in a slightly hard way and with
shoulder length blonde hair, Palmer looked just what she was, a
competent professional, dressed in a smart, well-tailored grey work
suit with a white shirt and black court shoes. He guessed she had
to be pretty tough to be involved in this kind of work.

Beside
her, Karen would have been a head-turner herself once but Shepherd
guessed life hadn’t been kind to her. She looked run-down, which
wasn’t surprising considering her daughter had been murdered a
month ago. He could relate to that; he knew how it felt to lose a
child. Unlike her daughter, she didn’t have a police record for him
to check, but the interviewing detectives from Homicide had noted
down a few of her details in the file. She’d been born in a small
town in Pennsylvania, was unemployed, divorced and the mother of
one child, Leann, her ex-husband Marcus proving hard to trace,
various Pennsylvania Police Departments still working on finding
him to inform him of his daughter’s death.

Glancing
around, Shepherd guessed she didn’t have much money to spare but
her place was comfortable enough and well-furnished, if slightly
worn and faded, a bit like its owner. As the woman began to compose
herself, Shepherd’s attention settled on a photo of Leann to his
right, the shot taken when she must have been around fifteen or
sixteen. Sitting alone in a back-yard, the girl looked slightly
strained in the picture although that wasn’t surprising considering
Homicide’s notes recorded that Karen’s ex-husband had been an
abusive alcoholic. She looked like a nice, sweet young woman, very
pretty even then, someone whose life could have been very different
under altered circumstances.

Palmer
broke the silence, bringing Shepherd’s attention back to the two
women.

‘
We’re very sorry if our being here upsets you,’ she told
Karen. ‘But believe me, we’re both here to help.’

‘
It just brings everything back,’ Karen sniffed. ‘I thought
you’d found my girl’s murderers.’

‘
We need to make sure,’ Shepherd said. ‘For your sake, ours and
Leann’s.’

‘
That’s the second time I’ve heard that bullshit tonight,’ she
fired back angrily, frustration getting the better of her. ‘Are you
saying now those two men may not have killed her? That it was
someone else?’

‘
That’s why I’m here.’

Agitated, Karen stubbed out the cigarette she’d lit only a
few minutes ago in an ashtray then reached for the pack and pulled
another, sparking it then taking a long draw, the embers glowing
and crackling as she sucked the nicotine deep into her
lungs.

‘
The file says you’re both from Pennsylvania,’ Palmer
said.

Karen
nodded. ‘Johnstown.’

‘
When did you come here?’ Shepherd asked.

‘
End of last year.’

‘
Why?’

‘
Leann’s father started to knock her around. Piece of shit
always drank a lot but then he lost his job and started spending
his unemployment on Southern Comfort.’

She took
another draw on the cigarette.

‘
He used to smack me about sometimes, but when he started on
Leann I knew we had to get out, so I packed our bags and we left
one morning while he was still out cold from the previous night.
Haven’t seen or heard from him since.’

‘
So why New York?’ Shepherd asked. ‘Why not Pittsburgh or
Philly? They’re closer.’

She
motioned to the apartment around them, keeping the cigarette
trapped between her fore and middle finger. ‘Friend of my mother’s
had this place and said we could crash here. Her man died a long
time ago and she said we could move in with her seeing as we had
nowhere else to go; I think she wanted the company. When she died,
I found she’d left the place to me. Thank God.’

‘
Did you know what Leann did for a living?’ Palmer suddenly
asked.

Karen
took another deep drag on the Marlboro, not making eye contact with
either of them.

‘
Life’s tough, you know?’ she said. ‘It was bad in Johnstown
but here it was worse. This is an expensive city but at least we
had a roof over our heads. And my girl wasn’t just some cheap
street trash; she had class. She was high-end.’

She
closed her eyes.

‘
I got sick and couldn’t work. I don’t know how she got into
it. But she said I didn’t need to try and get a job, that she’d
take care of it, wanting me to have an easier life. She wouldn’t
tell me where she got her money but deep down I had a feeling. Then
she got busted and I knew for sure; had to watch my little girl do
ninety days inside, amongst murderers and gang members. I brought
her here so I felt like I was responsible, you know?’

She
sniffed again, taking another drag on her cigarette.

‘
When she got out of the joint in May, she talked about moving
on, going to college then get a job. She checked herself into rehab
to start the process off. She knew she couldn’t do shit if she was
addicted.’

She
paused, her voice starting to shake.

‘
She did it too. She beat it. Then she was killed the day she
left the facility.’

‘
When was the last time you spoke to her?’ Shepherd
asked.

‘
That day. She called me when she got out of rehab.’

‘
How long before it happened?’

‘
A couple hours. She sounded great; upbeat. She said she was
leaving town for a while and didn’t know when she’d be back but
would keep sending me money. I hadn’t heard her sound that good in
years.’

‘
Do you know where she was going?’

‘
No, but then she didn’t either. She said she wanted to make a
fresh start. Said she’d get a job some place, a proper gig,
somewhere where no-one knew her history.’

‘
Did Leann ever mention a pimp?’ Shepherd asked.

‘
Sometimes. Why?’

‘
I’d like to talk to him.’

‘
Too late for that. He’s dead. Someone wasted him up in the
Bronx a year ago.’

‘
What about since then?’ Shepherd asked, looking at the file.
‘Did she have someone new running her?’

‘
Not that I know of,’ she said.

Shepherd
looked back up at the woman.

‘
I lost a child too,’ he told her. ‘He died last
year.’

Suspicious, Karen looked at him. ‘How?’

‘
He was shot. Like Leann.’

‘
How old was he?’

‘
Her age. Nineteen.’

‘
Did you catch who did it?’

‘
I already knew who he was. And it was an accident; I had to
let it go.’

‘
You forgave him?’ she asked.

‘
Not yet.’ He paused. ‘But I’m working on it every
day.’

He kept
looking at her.

‘
But what happened to Leann wasn’t an accident. For her sake, I
want to make sure we got the right guys. But I can’t do my job if
you don’t tell me everything you know.’

‘
I’ve told you what I know.’

‘
Who are Carlos and Alex? Her pimps maybe?’

Caught
completely off-guard, Karen Casey’s eyes widened. ‘How the hell do
you know that?’

Shepherd
gestured at the table between them. Karen’s eyes flicked down.
There was a paper napkin there with the names scribbled roughly on
it in ballpoint pen.

Carlos
and
Alex
were at the top.

‘
Shit, man,’ she said, as Shepherd reached forward and picked
it up. ‘You’re good.’

He
focused on the names, then glanced back at Karen Casey. ‘What
happened? Did they threaten you?’

She
didn’t reply for a long moment, taking a drag instead.

‘
The night after Leann died, I got a phone call saying that if
I told the cops who she worked for, they’d both come here. They
knew where I lived.’

Shepherd
stayed quiet for a moment; he looked at the napkin.

Carlos
.

Alex.

‘
Did Leann ever tell you their surnames?’ he asked.

She
shook her head. ‘Leann wasn’t a big talker.’

Besides
the two men’s names, Shepherd saw eleven others were scribbled
underneath, all female, and he recognised a couple of them
immediately.

‘
These are Leann’s associates,’ he asked. ‘Other girls she
worked with. All high-class escorts.’

Karen
nodded. ‘I figured it wouldn’t hurt to warn them. They might be in
danger too so I copied down their names off Leann’s phone. Felt as
if I was doing something useful. Something to help. She’d have
wanted that.’

Shepherd
glanced at Palmer, who nodded, looking at the list.

‘
That’s the group,’ she said. ‘I spoke to most of them but they
wouldn’t tell me anything.’

‘
They probably got the same phone call I did. Leann going to
rehab will have cost Carlos and Alex a ton of money. She was one of
their best earners, I think.’

Shepherd
looked at the list. ‘I’d like to talk to some of these women
myself.’

‘
They might not be easy to find. Once your guy Archer stopped
by saying he thought the killers might still be out there, I called
around to warn them they might be in danger.’

Looking
at the list, Shepherd showed it to Palmer, who reached into her
pocket and withdrew her cell.

‘
I spoke with several of these women fairly recently,’ she
said. ‘They each gave me a contact number.’

‘
It’s worth a shot,’ Shepherd said.

Karen
shrugged. ‘They’re scared. Even if they pick up, they might not
want to talk to you.’

‘
We’re here to help them,’ Shepherd said. ‘You can trust
us.’

Karen
took another drag, seemingly unconvinced, Carlos’ and Alex’s threat
no doubt ringing in her ears. Beside her, Palmer scrolled through
her phone then called a number, putting the phone on speaker as
Shepherd and Karen sat there in silence.

‘
Cece Mills,’ Palmer said. ‘Twenty three years old, from
Rochester, NY.’

The call rang through, Cece not answering, the monotonous
repetitive rings echoing around the apartment. Glancing at Karen,
Palmer selected another number and called it, tapping a name on the
list,
Zoe Cross
.