Easy Innocence (24 page)

She started to fill out the form. She typed in her e-mail address, entered “Everready” as a user name, and chose a numeric password. She said she was looking for a sixteen year old blonde, and that she was available any weekday after four. She was about to enter the information when she paused, her finger on the enter key.

She had no idea what she was signing up for, no idea if it would get her closer to Derek Janowitz’s operation. She wasn’t even sure he used the Internet to get johns. The fact that it asked for a zip code made her think the site was part of a national consortium or partnership, but for all she knew she might have stumbled onto a mob-run operation. It could be dangerous to give them her email address. She deleted her entries, wrote down the IP address, and clicked off

She started to pace around the apartment. When you were puzzling out a case, O’Malley used to say, change your environment. Get up, take a walk, go work out. He claimed it restored the right-brain left-brain balance, made it easier to receive new input.

She went to the window and opened it. Spits of water clung to the glass, and the streets had that pleasant but sandy wet asphalt smell. It must have rained earlier. The wind was whipping the leaves. Her favorite part of autumn, the sweet part, was coming to a close; the harsh winds of November would soon strip the trees, leaving nothing but bare, gnarled branches.

Directly across the street from her was a two-story bungalow. Three little kids lived there. A tricycle and wagon lay on the front lawn. A modest embankment edged the back. The kids’ mother must have been too tired or too frazzled to bring the toys inside tonight. Georgia hoped no one would steal them. She liked the kids, thought they were cute. But the thought of having her own family filled her with dread. What would she do when they became teenagers? How would she keep them from turning into Sara Longs?

She closed the window. She just couldn’t see herself as a mother. When she tried, the picture went all snowy and gray, like a TV station that’s signed off for the night.

GEORGIA REACHED
Kelly Saturday morning. He sounded like he was still high from his adventures of the previous day.

“So, what did you think?”

“You said you weren’t going to play Ramsey. That it could be dangerous.”

“I rethought it. And hey, it worked.”

“Temporarily. They’re still moving ahead with the case.”

“They’re just trying to save face. Public opinion is swinging our way. They know it’s not a slam dunk anymore.”

“What about Cam Jordan?” Georgia asked.

“What about him?”

“Given Ramsey’s recusal, and the fact that people are taking note of it, wouldn’t this be a good time to try again to get him released on bond?”

“Already done.”

“Really?”

I filed another motion for a bail reduction hearing. It’s on Tuesday.”

***

This time the hearing was perfunctory and short. The news had been full of stories about Jeff Ramsey and his political future over the weekend; public opinion was running high. Both newspapers ran editorials disparaging Ramsey’s behavior, radio and TV commentary followed suit, and the political blogs kept the issue front and center. Reporters staked out in front of his house. There was a shot of Monica coming out the front door with her face averted—her father must have warned her about the cameras.

Despite earnest arguments by a senior assistant State’s Attorney, the judge entered a decision to release Cam Jordan on bond. Georgia drove his sister over to Cook County jail. Cam Jordan emerged a few hours later, looking pale and thin. Georgia, who gave them a ride back to Ruth Jordan’s house, felt optimistic. Although it wasn’t over—the legal process would go forward—for the first time since taking Cam’s case, something had gone right. She was serving the cause of justice.

Back in her apartment, she brewed a pot of coffee and sat in the kitchen. Afternoon sun glittered through the leaves, splashing shifting patterns of light and shadow across the table. She was staring at them, sipping her coffee, when an idea occurred to her.

She went to her computer and connected to Craig’s List. Accessing the Chicago page, she clicked on “Erotic” services. A warning about adult content popped up, along with a plea for safe sex and an admonition that users must be over 18.

When she clicked again, she was taken to a succession of messages, all offering sexual services of one kind or another. Page after page, in groups of 100, contained come-ons, ads, and photos of women, many in lewd poses. Georgia scanned them, paying close attention to pictures of blondes. She didn’t expect to see a picture of Sara, not really. Still, she had to check.

An hour later, she’d found nothing. No face even remotely familiar. She took that as a good sign. Then she pulled out a list of the prostitution websites she’d visited with Pete. She’d written down over thirty URLs. She went back to the computer and clicked over to WHOIS, a database of websites created by the largest domain registration service on the Net. WHOIS catalogued who owned each site, and provided both an administrative and technical contact.

One by one Georgia typed in the URLs from her list. Most were registered to corporations, which, when she cross-referenced them on Google, turned out to be hosting websites. The contacts led back to the web host’s customer service department. She wasn’t surprised—web hosts were as sensitive to privacy issues as everyone else and usually honored their customers’ request for anonymity. If she was still on the force, she might have been able to get a subpoena to break through. Unfortunately, she wasn’t.

After checking twenty websites, she became frustrated. Some of the sites, although they featured American girls, were registered in countries like Russia or Poland. Others were in Barbados, even the Sudan. She’d only found the names of two individuals: one was in Toronto, the other in Santa Monica. Derek might have been connected to them—geography has no meaning on the Internet—but she had no way to verify it.

Only ten websites were left on her list. She typed in nine more URL’s. Nothing. She sighed. It’d seemed like a good idea an hour ago. She plugged in the last URL and watched green bars march across the bottom of the screen, followed by the jump to a new page. Nothing.

She got up. Her back ached, and she had a headache from too much time hunched over the monitor. If Janowitz did run a prostitution website, he must have known enough to cloak himself in cyberspace. She’d wasted almost an entire afternoon.

She was back in the kitchen staring out the window when she heard the chirp of an incoming email. She went back to retrieve it. The message was from her Florida contact, and it contained an attachment. The cell phone records. She’d almost forgotten.

She clicked on the attachment. At the top of the page was 847-555-4586, Derek’s cell number, followed by the dates she’d requested, and a list of at least three hundred calls. She scrolled down. Derek received almost forty calls a day. Most of the calls were preceded by 847, the area code for the North Shore. That made sense. But there were a few 773’s, 312s, and two she didn’t recognize.

She went back to the top of the list. If Derek had a partner, she reasoned, the partner’s number would show up more than once or twice. She reviewed the log carefully. Six or seven numbers popped up frequently. Of those, two numbers recurred more than the others. Both had an 847 area code. She reached for the phone and punched in the first number. The phone rang once. A tingle ran up her spine. It rang again. Then it clicked. “The number you are trying to reach is not in service at this time.”

Was that Sara’s cell? Had it been disconnected now that she was dead? She ended the call. Then she dialed the other number. She closed her eyes, waiting for the call to connect. It rang once. Again. A third time. Then it went to voice mail. She held her breath.

“This is Lauren. Leave a number and I’ll call you back.”

***

Lauren leaned over, picked her Cole Haan purse off the floor, and put it in her lap. She was in History class, and you weren’t supposed to have your cell on in school. She kept hers on vibrate so the teachers wouldn’t notice.

In fact, she had two phones: one for business and one for her personal use. Her parents didn’t know about the business phone, and she intended to keep it that way. She looked inside the bag. The call had come in on her personal cell, but the number was blocked. That bothered her. No one she knew had any reason to block their number when they called her. Did someone have the numbers mixed up? Doubtful. Derek and Sara were the only ones who called both numbers, and they were both dead.

Maybe it was Heather, playing another of her investigative reporter games.

She and Claire both—although how could you get mad at Claire?— still called or text messaged her six times a day with stupid questions like “what do you think of Alicia’s nose ring?”; “Will you pick me up on Saturday?” “Did you see what Cash was wearing?”

Lauren had been like that, but moved on when she started the business. So did Sara. They’d put immature games behind them.

Which made it awkward when the girls still peppered them with questions. They’d kept the business a secret, but it hadn’t been easy. That’s why Sara was always asking questions about who knew what about whom. Lauren had warned her to be careful, not to push it, but Sara was stubborn. Part of it was that she wanted to be liked—doesn’t everyone?—but that wasn’t what drove her. Some girls, Heather for example, equated power with beauty or information. Not Sara. For her it was simple. She craved the things money could buy. She’d been clear about that from the start. But she didn’t want the slightest whiff of attention focused on the business.

The funny thing was that when you stopped to think about it, Sara was probably better suited to the profession than Lauren. Money wasn’t important to Lauren; she’d grown up with it. Sara hadn’t. In fact, Lauren had been meaning to talk to Sara about the amount of time she spent turning tricks. She never said no, and there were times she should have. But they’d drifted apart recently, and their friendship had become strained. Lauren wasn’t sure why.

Now she stared at the blackboard, only dimly aware of the discussion about the Monroe Doctrine. The PI knew Sara came to the Forest Preserve to talk to Lauren. Sara’s mother told her. Lauren figured Sara was concerned that someone might have discovered the business. But what if she was wrong? What if something else was on Sara’s mind? Maybe Sara came to the Forest Preserve to tell Lauren she was sorry they’d grown apart. That she wanted to get close again. A pang of regret shot through Lauren. Maybe if she had, things would have turned out differently.

No. That was retarded. It wouldn’t make any difference now. Lauren crammed the phone back in her bag and tried to pay attention in class. If the person who called wanted her badly enough, they’d try again.

***

But no one did, and by that night, she forgot about it. She was busy working the website; it was almost the middle of the week; requests were heating up. Usually she didn’t mind. She liked the online side of the business. Working online made it seem more remote. Cleaner. Derek had set everything up. He’d even created a simple file sharing system for notes and records. She could match up a customer and a girl in less than five minutes.

She opened the incoming messages. Two requests for the next afternoon. She started to check the girls’ schedules to see who was available, then stopped. First Sara was killed. After her, Derek. Was there a connection? Could the PI be onto something? Maybe the crazy guy in the Forest Preserve didn’t do it. Lauren couldn’t see how—the cops were sure he did. But maybe—somehow—it was somebody else. Someone in the business. Did Sara stiff someone? Did Derek? She didn’t know, and not knowing made her anxious.

What if someone wanted them out of the way? She remembered warning Derek not to get too big. That they were inviting trouble. Bigger fish might swallow them up. As usual, he didn’t listen, and now he was dead. Not even a month after Sara. Could Sara’s death be a warning? A warning Derek didn’t any pay attention to? Was it possible they might come after her now?

A knot of fear tightened her stomach. She hadn’t counted on anything like this happening when she started the business. She’d wanted to keep it local. Small. But then Derek got involved, and suddenly they were running a dozen girls up and down the North Shore. Without Derek, though, it was too much. She couldn’t do it alone. Especially if someone had it in for her.

Maybe she should scale back the business. Keep a low profile. Stay out of trouble. At least until things settled down. Sure. That’s what she would do. She’d email her clients. Tell them they would be on a reduced schedule—a few girls were on vacation. Yes. That sounded good. They’d be back in a few weeks, tanned and rested and hotter than ever.

She sent the email to her client list, then plugged her iPod into her computer, and downloaded some Ashlee Simpson. She could hear her mother puttering around in the kitchen. She was on the phone, as usual. Lauren remembered a book—by Dean Koontz, maybe—where people actually melded with their computers. Sentient machines swallowed up the humans—body part by body part—in a morbid, kinky attack. The result was a monster half human, half computer. She imagined a phone growing out of her mother’s ear. Knowing her mother, she’d see it as some kind of achievement, something to lord over the rest of the world.

Lauren transferred the music to her iPod. Usually she could figure out who her mother was talking to by her tone. If it was cold and hostile, her mother was talking to her father. If she was cool and patronizing, to a repairman or a store employee. But occasionally, there was a soft, honeyed tone. Lauren didn’t want to know who that was.

She was lying on her bed, just starting to relax, when her business cell chirped. She considered ignoring it. She didn’t want to do any business tonight. But the ring-tone, ironically cheerful and upbeat, persisted. Reluctantly, she rolled over and grabbed it.

“Yeah?” Derek always told her not to identify herself. As if she didn’t know.