Life Struggles (Life Stories Book 1) (2 page)

I decided not to worry about her for the moment. “May I come in and ask you some questions?” Detective Flint had apparently dismissed the dustup, and so did I.

That turned into an hour before a team of three others showed up, one in civilian attire, the others in uniforms. Detective Danny parceled out assignments to them while Hartag fumed. Finally she got out of the car and walked up to the house. She was going to be part of this come hell or high water. Well, OK.

One of the uniforms came back carrying Alex's clothes in a plastic bag. He handed it to the guy I finally figured out was the crime scene tech. The uniform e-mailed him a set of photos, and he said thanks.

“Nobody's home next door. House is registered to Luke Dupree, work address is the same as home address. No priors no warrants. I'm assuming it's the artist. I didn't see any signs of a struggle. Front door is locked. A peek in the window showed nothing out of the ordinary. Do you want a warrant?” The uniform was all business. I had never had much contact with the local police, and I was quite impressed.

Hartag stepped up. “That's my department. Officer, I'll need a recorded statement from you and then I'll get a warrant. Please come with me.”

The officer - Wilson? - walked away with Hartag and spoke into a recorder for a while. I looked back at the detective.

“A young man's clothes found outside the house of a gay celebrity, especially under suspicious circumstances, raises some unpleasant possibilities.” He stepped aside and spoke into a radio for a couple of minutes.

Things became a blur. Yes, Dana DeLauder was Alex's mother. The cop offered what sounded like sincere condolences. Everybody had loved Dana. A taxi pulled up and disgorged a thirty-or-so black man who got out keys and went to Luke's front door. That was Marcus, Luke's roommate. He was intercepted by a uniformed officer and escorted to the door.

Whether Marcus had authority for a search turned out to be moot. From the car I heard a printer whine, and Hartag came back with a faxed copy of the warrant. She might have a bad attitude, but it didn't interfere with doing that part of her job well. The detective put me under the supervision of the crime scene guy and went quickly to next door. The crime scene guy took me around the house and asked stupid questions. But, I guess when you're worried about your son, stupid questions are better than stewing.

In short order I could hear a siren, then a police cruiser pulled into Luke's driveway. A uniformed female officer, Luke, and some white guy got out of the cruiser. I tried to get to Luke but the crime scene tech held me back. “So, what kind of underwear does Alex use?”

I was ready to snap at the guy, then realized this might be all that Alex was wearing. We went into his room and inventoried his clothes.

The investigator saw a laptop and asked to go through it. Have at it, of course. When he opened the desk top he saw an icon that grabbed his attention. It was for an online game. He pulled out his own tablet and with a few keystrokes he was into the competition.

I watched as blood and gore filled the screen. The investigator (his avatar's name was ‘Spadely Sammy,’ perhaps a step too cute) navigated to the chat and scrolled down through everything from ten o'clock on. He slowed at noon when two new names popped up. I read over his shoulder.

KINGDORK: last 1 no fite.

PRINCEDARK: nope 2 EZ nuther 1 2morrow?

KINGDORK: OK, but wate 4 my brake @ 12 boss is pissed.

PRINCEDARK: he lookd ridickilus without his cloz

KINGDORK: LOL LMFAO

PRINCEDARK: sending fotos 2 creechur we R leeding this month

KINGDORK: boss here bye

After that it was just guys talking shit. Investigator Samuel (last name, I think) scrolled through that until he got to an entry about 30 minutes ago.

CREECHUR: Nu fotos KO game nu twist no cloz go 2 usual

This was followed by a bunch of LOLs, ROFLs, LMFAOs, and so forth, in the midst of which was a notation that CREECHUR had exited.

“This is disturbing. We know about the Knock Out games connected to this site, they run a competition. All the logons register to a masking site in Bulgaria, and tracing past that is out of our hands. We asked for some help at the federal level, but it looks like they're too busy reading citizen's emails to bother.” The guy was disgusted.

I could see the detective call Luke up to the house. The white guy was standing with the female police officer. Standing too close and comfortably to be a suspect. In fact, standing in a pose that indicated some sort of connection.

Eventually everybody disappeared into Luke's house. The near-hour they spent in there gave me time to think. I'm pretty sure I could find CREECHUR on my own. The police do what the police do. I don't enforce the law, but I do gather information. When they came back Myra Hartag cornered me and I offered to help.

Chapter Three

“Ms.Hartag, I can help the police.”

She was regarding me with a look that said, “Oh, good, another numbskull who thinks he needs to get involved in a police matter.” Then her look shifted to “Stock Speech number 17-D about letting the police do their work, let me quickly personalize this shit in my mind.”

“Mr. McQuade, Ethan, I appreciate your offer to help. The police have dealt with many disappearances before and they know what they are doing. There is no proof of foul play involved in Alexander's disappearance, you know. Yes, it's unusual, but that doesn't mean suspicious. Please let them do their jobs.” She was following protocol, but I was less interested in protocol than in finding my son. Dana's son.

Myra Hartag was an Assistant District Attorney in New Orleans. A fairly new member of the prosecutor's office and about my age (31), she was moderately attractive in a mauve pantsuit. Although, since Dana died, my standards had slipped significantly. “Moderately attractive” included most women with two ears and one nose.

“Ms.Hartag, I agree. I am a journalist with access to confidential sources across a wide variety of groups, not all of which are law-abiding.” I hoped she was actually listening.

“OK, then give their names to the officers and they will take care of it.” Hartag had me pigeon-holed. This pigeon bites.

“You did hear the part about ‘journalist,’ right? Louisiana Revised Statutes Sec 45: 1451-1459.” This pigeon also had done his homework. “You have no grounds to compel me to reveal the identities of confidential sources.”

“Mr. McQuade, do you want to stand on ceremony or do you want your son back?” Miss Empathy had just lost her crown.

“Ms.Hartag, obeying the law is not standing on ceremony. The statute requires that revealing the names must be necessary to protection of the public interest. Neither you nor the police has any idea why I want to contact these sources, let alone what information they might provide about which aspects of this case. Now, please get the lead investigator over here and we'll talk about how to proceed.” Mr. Empathy never had a crown to lose.

“Mr. McQuade, you need to cooperate with the police if you want them to find your son. Quit trying to play lawyer, Mr. McQuade, and just talk to the police.” She knew she had beaten me.

Sometimes things we know don't turn out to be correct. “No. I'm going to call the paper's lawyers now and let them know a prosecutor is trying to get me to reveal confidential sources. Or, you can let me talk to the detective.”

Ms.Hartag was looking angry. Tough shit. Then I remembered she was just trying to do her job. “I'll talk with the chief investigator about how to proceed when he's available. And, if he and you conclude that I can help, I'll do so.”

Hartag seemed somewhat mollified. “Detective, Mr. McQuade has some information for you.” Detective Danny Flint joined us.

“Do you have something you want to tell us?” The “us” evidently included Hartag, and I could see he was trying to humor her.

“Detective, if this involves foul play then someone with ties to illegal activities knows something about it. The police have multiple informants in narcotics, sex trafficking, gangs, vice, contract killings, kidnapping for ransom and a dozen other unpleasant fields. Each of these informants works for a different handler. I have contacts in all of these fields and can cross-reference in my head immediately. Let me give you a hand.” I watched his face soften.

The detective started to explain why this was not a good idea, then stopped himself. Rinse and repeat until he finally caved.

“OK, I've got kids too. But you have to agree to our conditions. First, use the panic button I'll give you to call for help if it turns to shit. It will emit a locator signal and we'll see it on GPS. Second, you'll tell us in advance the illegal activity on which the source can provide information. Third, you'll listen to my briefing on disappearances of kids Alex's age. Fourth, you'll be under surveillance.” He had obviously given this speech more than once.

“One, OK. Two, OK. Three, I can't wait to hear. Four, no. That is tantamount to revealing my sources' identities. If you won't withdraw that one, what do you take in your coffee? I'm not going anywhere.” This pigeon also had resolve.

Flint turned to a uniformed officer. “Greg, get me an M-3 Panic Button, call in the ID to central and register it to me.” Flint then spoke to me. “You do know you may be betting your son's life on your journalistic skills?”

I had already considered this before I offered to help. “I acknowledge that. You've read my columns. Either I can get criminals to open up or I've made up a whole load of shit. I'm confident that I can get my sources to open up.” More resolve.

Hartag actually helped. “I read your column. The police use it sometimes to identify trends in criminal activity, and when they do we usually get results.” Maybe the harridan wasn't a hopeless case.

Flint spoke softly. “You have forty-eight hours and your results come to me and only me. Call me every hour. In the meantime the police will conduct their own investigation, using tools you do not have. Agreed?” I nodded my head. Now it was time to get my ass in gear and try to find Alexander.

But first, the briefing.

“Mr. McQuade – OK, Ethan – Alex's is the tenth unexplained disappearance of men his age in the last thirteen months. Victimology is all over the board. White, black, Asian, Hispanic, and any combination you can imagine. Rich, poor, students, unemployed, the whole gamut. Every part of the city. No common clubs or groups, few common interests, common schools doesn't look promising. No common churches. No common online stuff except porn, but what can you expect out of a guy seventeen to nineteen?

“We've done a complete workup and shipped it off to the FBI's profilers. They're stumped. It can't be coincidence, but we cannot find any pattern. That means we don't have motive. And that means we don't really have a starting place.”

I asked to see the profiles. Danny checked with Ms. Hartag and then made a call. He said it would be a few minutes. I could read them from his laptop but not make copies. I couldn't even make notes. I was welcome to point out patterns that the police and FBI had missed, but I shook my head. Not my specialty, and experts had already done the work.

I spent an hour reading the two-page profiles twice each. Nothing jumped out at me. I had this frustrating feeling that something should, but it didn't. They were all males between seventeen and nineteen. Not a lot to go on.

As I was finishing my reading Danny's phone rang. He took it into another room and came back in a few minutes. “Good news, the first suspect is eliminated. Some dickwad at Luke's made a suggestive remark to Alex this morning and Luke kicked dickward's ass. We tracked down dickwad and our new interrogation consultant broke him. Actually, he talked a female uniformed officer through how to break the guy.

“She put him in an interrogation room with his hands cuffed behind him. She told him he had raped and murdered Alex and when the body was found dickwad would be booked. Other than that, she asked no questions and refused to let the guy say a word. Took two minutes and nine seconds. He demanded that there
not
be a lawyer and that he be allowed to talk right now. Alibi checks out, it's not him.”

Danny looked quizzically at my smile. “Danny, it's the principle of the source's need to impart information. Tell you about it later. And give the consultant a raise. Applying that to police interrogation just had never entered my mind.”

A uniformed officer came over and handed me a small device not unlike a car's keyless entry fob. “Push this button to call for help.” That was the whole instruction.

“Can you go over that again?” The officer looked at me like I was crazy. Then I grinned, and he grinned back. No matter how dismal the situation, without at least some levity it was going to be grim.

Chapter Four

I got in my three-year old baby-shit brown Malibu and drove away. First stop was my mechanic, who put it up on the lift. Sure enough, a tracking device was attached to the frame. He removed it and looked at me with a number of questions in his eyes.

“Bart, you've got my credit card. Please give this to one of your employees who's getting off work and promise him $200 if he'll drive aimlessly around with it for two hours. After two hours put it in a trash bin near the Lake.” This part was easy.

“Ethan, are you doing something illegal?” I used Bart because of his ethics. I could trust the Nigerian immigrant with anything. The flip side is that he would not under any conditions help me do something against the law.

“My son is missing. I have to go talk to confidential informants who may have information. The police can't force me to tell them who the informants are. But, if the police follow me they find out without my telling them. Their lawyer already acknowledged that it was illegal to force me to reveal their names. This is just a technical way to force me to do something against the law.

“Can you help me with this?” I know I sounded pleading, but shit, I
was
pleading.

Bart was indignant. “I don't hold with any illegal shit, even illegal shit done by the police. Saw too much of that back home. Fuck 'em. And, keep your money. I'll give the thing to somebody to take up to Baton Rouge and then attach it underneath a semi at a rest stop.” Bart was indignant, but he was also smiling. And, now, so was I.