Skin Deep (11 page)

“Alright, alright,” Marcus said, his demeanor shifting into a nervous smile. “So Danny likes to party a little. It’s Friday night, baby. What’s the harm?”

“The harm is that this is enough heroin and pharmaceuticals for you to ‘party’ with ten of your closest friends.” She lifted the drugs to punctuate her point. “Between the possession and the solicitation, you’re not looking at being bounced after a night in the tank, Danny.”

Marcus froze, his pulse going ballistic against Kellan’s grasp on his wrists. “Oh come on, beautiful. You and your partner here don’t really want to wreck your night bringing me in, do you? Can’t we work something out?”

“Hmm.” Isabella’s shoulder rose and fell. “Like the kind of ‘bargain’ you were just trying to sell me a minute ago? I don’t think so.”

“Wait, wait, wait!” Panic bled through the words, Marcus’s stare wild as he threw it over their out-of-the-way spot on the footpath. “Whatever you need, I’m sure I can get it for you. Cash, party favors. Danny’s good for that.”

Moreno paused. “Now that you mention it, I might be open to taking some information off your hands.”

“Information?” Marcus asked warily, and Isabella tipped her head toward the bench a few paces away.

“Mmm hmm,” she said, waiting until Kellan had not-so-politely guided Marcus over to the bench and zip-tied the guy’s wrist to the arm rest per the plan before continuing. “Word is you’ve been running with a big guy lately. Like a wrestler. He deals in girls and high-end parties. Ring any bells?”

“Nope. No way. Danny Marcus can get you paid or he can get you high, but he doesn’t give up information like a little bitch,” Marcus auto-responded, and screw this. They needed answers before this scenario went tango uniform.

Kellan stepped in, close enough to make Marcus shrink against the back of the bench. “I think you know exactly what we’re talking about, just like I know you aren’t going to get another chance to start sharing before Detective Moreno hauls your sorry ass out of this park with your hands zip tied behind you in front of God and everyone else. Then they’ll all think you’re a little bitch no matter what, and that word’s gonna travel fast. You really like your odds here?”

After a second, Marcus bit out a curse, dropping his voice to a whisper even though the path still remained dark and quiet in either direction. “You don’t get it, man.”

“Explain it to me,” Moreno said, reclaiming Marcus’s attention as she moved back into the halo of golden light being cast down from overhead.

Miraculously, he did. “Operations like the one you’re after are on a whole different food chain than this nickel and dime shit. Guys like Rampage are bad enough. But his boss? That dude is fucking
scary
, yo. You cross a guy like that, you end up in the dirt.”

Kellan’s heart beat a steady rhythm of bad things against his ribs as Isabella moved within a foot of Marcus’s dance space. “All I need is a little chatter, Danny,” she said, her stare never leaving his. “You and me, we’re just having a conversation. Nobody’s crossing anyone else, and nobody’s going to know we talked. I swear it.”

Whether it was her dead-serious tone or the look in her eyes that matched, Kellan would never know, but something pushed Danny to say, “There are these parties in one of the penthouse apartment suites at the Metropolitan, you know, over on the south side? Real lush, like Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous, only more tricked out. It’s exclusive invite only. I had to introduce Rampage to a dozen fucking girls before he’d even think about name dropping me to his boss so I could get in to play, and I still have to pay my way in with merchandise for his guests.”

“Whose does the penthouse belong to?” Moreno asked, but Marcus just huffed out a breath, twisting his hand to not-so-subtly test the strength of the zip tie keeping him anchored to the park bench.

“Beats me. I didn’t ask to see the deed.”

Kellan had closed half the space between his body and the bench before he’d even processed his brain’s command to move. “Marcus—”

Danny’s shoulders slumped into his two-sizes-too-big T-shirt, and he finally called no joy. “Look, I don’t know whose place it is. But the place is full of fancy art shit and there’s more security than most border patrols, so if I had to guess, I’d say it’s Casa de Boss Man. Goes by Mr. DuPree. And before you ask, no, I don’t know his first name.”

Moreno slid a glance at Kellan, stepping forward at the exact moment he orbited back to give the area around them a spot check.

“Sounds like Mr. DuPree knows how to throw a hell of a get-together. Bet he offers his guests some nice party favors to keep them entertained.” Isabella’s words emerged on a thin, soft breath, but they managed to send a pang through Kellan’s gut all the same.

The sensation grew teeth at Marcus’s nod. “Liquor, pharmaceuticals, women. Public or private, one-on-one or four-on-one, it doesn’t matter. There aren’t a whole lot of house rules, but you fuck in public, DuPree gets to watch. Bonus points for banging your girl around while you do it. I don’t know that from firsthand experience,” he added, jerking back against the bench slats again as Kellan’s fingers cranked into hot fists on a step forward. “He just makes it real clear for everybody across the board. Watching is his thing. I told you, he’s goddamn creepy.”

Jesus
. “I’m guessing these women aren’t there by choice,” Kellan said, the thought souring as it crossed his lips.

Marcus shrugged, although the flicker of unease traveling through his stare canceled out the nonchalance. “I’m not dumb enough to ask any questions. They get tricked out five, maybe six times a night, and some of the guests can get kind of rough. But none of the girls ever try running for the door. I’m sure they get paid for their trouble.”

“And I’m sure that’s what you tell yourself so you can sleep at night,” Moreno said, her stare turning subarctic.

Indignation straightened Marcus’s spine. “Hey, I don’t smack my ladies around unless they like it that way. I’m a lover, not a fighter.”

Yup. There went the last thread of Kellan’s already flimsy tolerance. “No, you’re a jackass who deals heroin and pays for sex with women who are being turned out, most likely against their will.”

Before Marcus could work up a protest or a response of any kind, Isabella said, “But you’re going to start making up for the error of your ways. Right now.”

“How’s that?” Marcus asked, echoing the question in Kellan’s brain. But then the look on her face registered, mouth set and eyes glittering with a brand of determination Kellan was beginning to know all too well, and his blood turned to liquid ice in his veins.

“Because, Danny. I’m going to be your date to the next party Mr. DuPree hosts.”

“
G
od dammit
, Moreno. Are you out of your fucking mind?”

Isabella scanned the street in front of her, trying like hell and failing just as badly to trap her response between her teeth. “Perfectly sane,” she said, inhaling for a count of three clack-clack-clacks of her boots over the broken pavement of Atlantic Boulevard before adding, “As I’ve told you, what? Four? No, five times now.”

Kellan’s dark and broody scowl marked him as highly doubtful of her self-assessment, not to mention highly pissed off at her new plan. “You can tell me until you’re purple. I’m not going to believe you unless you change your mind about going to this party. How do you even know Marcus will hold up his end of the deal?”

She waited until they’d reached the Mustang and both slid into their respective seats before answering, but somehow, the pause did nothing to slow her irritation. “First of all, I know Marcus will show because I told him that if he doesn’t, I’m going to make an anonymous nine-one-one call that will lead a veritable platoon of law enforcement officials to that penthouse, and I’ll make sure every last one of the people arrested for drug possession knows he was behind the tip-off. A fact you well know because you were standing right next to me when I said it. Secondly”—she paused again, this time to spear him with a don’t-mess-with-my-plan stare—“I’d be out of my fucking mind
not
to go to this party, Walker. It’s the only way I’m going to be able to prove there’s something illegal going on with these women and get the FBI to open an investigation.”

“It’s also dangerous as hell,” he said, jamming a hand through his hair hard enough to make the dark edges stick up. “Going to this party with Marcus isn’t just doing a little rogue investigating. Shit, fishing for the intel to open a formal investigation practically
is
its own investigation, only there won’t be any other cops there to back you up. You have to tell Sinclair. Or at least tell Hollister.”

Now they were back at this again. Stellar. “No. There’s no way I can tell either of them. Not when I’m this close.”

“You really
are
out of your mind! You’re willing to have the cops go in like gangbusters if Marcus doesn’t show, but you won’t tell your partner or your boss about the potential to break this case?”

Isabella swung against the driver’s seat to face him full-on. “I used that threat with Marcus because I know it’ll work, not because I want to actually have to follow through.” It was a calculated risk, to be sure, but with the way the scumbag had responded to the leverage she’d used to get him to talk in the first place, her gut said he was too scared of the consequences to call her bluff.

“Fine,” Kellan said, turning to match her squared shoulders and lifted chin. “Even if Marcus does show, you still need to tell your partner.”

A fresh pulse of frustration heated her veins. Damn it, letting Walker come with her had been a mistake from the get. It was time to end this back and forth, once and for all.

“I can’t. I might have a foot in the door with this party, but everything Marcus gave up is still hearsay from a drug dealer. Unless I’ve got a credible witness, forensic evidence of a crime being committed, or a victim willing to make a statement, there isn’t enough for an investigation. Hollister and Sinclair both know this. Sinclair already flat-out said no, and I can’t risk Hollister going over my head if I confide in him. I can’t go to either of them, no matter how much I want to or how badly they hate guys who do this to women too. Not without one of those three things.”

Walker’s arms knotted over his chest. “And which one are you looking to find at this party, exactly?”

The images from the photographs flashed up from where they’d been burned into her memory, but she kept her voice steady and sure. “A victim.”

“You think you can convince one of these girls to come forward and make a statement against this DuPree guy?” he asked, and at least the surprise in his voice was a step up from the attitude he’d been sporting a minute ago.

“In this case, a victim’s statement will carry more weight than anything else. If my gut is right, these women are being held against their will and forced into prostitution, and some of them might not even be eighteen. I don’t know if I can convince anyone to come forward.” Isabella paused, adding a silent
please, please, please
to her words before continuing out loud. “But this party is the only shot I’m going to get at a face to face with these girls, and a statement is the only shot I’m going to get at Peterson starting a formal investigation with the FBI. I have to do my best to try.”

Kellan exhaled, long and low. “You do know this is crazy.”

“It might be,” she agreed, because as determined as she was, she also wasn’t stupid. It
was
risky. “But I’m still going.”

“Fine, but I’m not leaving your side all night.”

Isabella’s chin jerked up, her heart pinballing against her breastbone as she stared across the front seat at him. “That’ll be a neat trick since you’re going to be across town in your apartment.”

“The fuck I will,” Walker bit out, his dark and dangerous attitude winging back in all its glory. “If you won’t listen to reason and rely on your unit, fine. Then you are stuck with the alternative. I’m going with you to that party on Friday night. If Marcus can get you in, he can get me in too.”

In theory, that might not be untrue. But getting Marcus to agree to escort her to the penthouse had taken a boatload of expertly applied pressure as it was. If she altered the parameters to add Walker to the mix, Marcus would surely balk. Even if by some miracle he didn’t, the last thing she needed when she was trying to get one of these girls to talk to her was an overly nervous drug dealer on one arm and an overly furious firefighter on the other.

“No, you’re not,” she said, mind made up. “I’ll have enough to worry about without having to keep track of you.”

“We’ve been over this, Moreno. I can keep track of myself just fine. Plus, I can help you get what you need. You’ve gotta admit, we did okay having each other’s backs and giving Marcus the good cop, bad cop treatment.”

Oh, it was official. Walker’s faculties were on a complete walkabout. “How about good cop, you’re
not
a cop?” Isabella said, anger and heat and dread uncurling like streamers in her belly. “I shouldn’t have even taken you with me tonight.”

“But you did.” He leaned over the console, his mouth only a few inches from hers as his voice dropped to one notch above a whisper. “You did. And whether you like it or not, now you’re stuck with me having your back.”

Isabella drew a surprised breath at the same moment Kellan exhaled, warming the slight space between them. There was something odd and unexpectedly intimate about breathing him into her body, and for a hot, impulsive second, she wanted nothing more than to close the distance to discover if that ridiculously sexy mouth of his tasted as good as it looked. A tilt of her chin would get her halfway there, a small push forward doing the rest to put her lips on Walker’s to answer the curiosity rising up in her chest like a tide. Isabella knew he’d let her. The way he’d just shuttered his focus from her eyes to her mouth said so, and oh God—oh
God
—for as crazy as Walker drove her, how the hell could she want him so badly at the same time?

Whether you like it or not, now you’re stuck with me having your back…stuck with me…

“No.” Isabella jerked back, cursing her idiot impulses with all her might. Was she insane, letting him get so close even for a second? “No,” she said again, locking her molars into place over the word. “You’re absolutely not going with me.”

Walker gave up a slow blink before his expression hardened back to its sharp angles and unyielding lines. “Isabella—”

She didn’t think. Just spoke. “I heard you, and I get that you think me going to this party is too dangerous for me to do by myself. I really do. But it’s far more dangerous for me to take you with me, so the answer is no. I’m not arguing with you, and I’m not budging,” she added, each slam of her heart hammering her certainty farther into place. “And if that means you tell Hollister, or Sinclair, or hell, your favorite reporter at the
Remington Sun Times
, then I guess I’ll have to live with the fallout. But I am not, under any circumstances, taking you to that party. Are we clear?”

Thump-thump.
Please stand down
. Thump-thump.
Please let me do my job and help these women
. Thump-thump.

Please don’t get close
.

Walker reached for his seatbelt, his stare as cold as his tone as he said, “If you’re so bound and determined to get in over your head with nobody to back you up, then I guess I can’t stop you.”

I
sabella looked
at the five-inch stack of paperwork at her elbow, and seriously, how had all her police reports become a mini Mount Everest in the span of only half a work week?

Maybe because you’re trying to juggle your regular cases with getting prepped for this illegal drugs/forced prostitution/bad-man-doing-very-bad-things party you’re not supposed to be going to in T-minus forty-eight hours, and oh by the way, don’t forget
trying
to forget the galactically furious firefighter you haven’t heard a single peep from since you dropped him off at his car five nights ago
.

Well. At least that explained the size of her backlog.

“Burning the midnight oil, huh Moreno?”

The sound of Sinclair’s voice coming from the entryway to his office bumped Isabella back to the reality of the precinct, and she worked up a smile as she tamped down her thoughts. “Nah. It’s only”—she paused to throw a glance at the clock on the wall beside her, doing her best to keep her surprise to herself, because damn, when had it gotten so late?—“ten-thirty. Plus, you’re still here.”

“That’s because I live here.” He ran a hand over his crew cut with a smile even though Isabella knew he was only thirty percent kidding. Sinclair had been divorced three times over, and his daughter, January, was only five years younger than Isabella herself. He might have an apartment a hop-skip away from the police station, but he was as much of a fixture in the Thirty-Third as the handcuffs and holding cells. Not that she was too far behind.

“Everyone else took off for the Crooked Angel a good three hours ago,” Sinclair continued, leaning one shoulder against the doorframe leading to his office. “You didn’t feel like taking a breather too?”

“And miss out on all this glamour?” She pointed to Mount McPaperwork. “Not a chance.”

“Ah. Well, I got the final report from the fire marshal on that blaze over on Glendale earlier today.”

Isabella’s pulse tripped, but she managed a nice, steady, “Did you?” in reply. Although she’d given the women in the photos no less than a thousand thoughts over the last five days, she’d been meticulous about avoiding mention of the case that wasn’t a case (yet) with Sinclair. The more she kept off the table, the less she had to swerve around.

Not to mention, the less he had to suspect.

“Mmm.” Pushing off the industrial gray doorframe, Sinclair crossed the room and pulled out the spare chair next to her desk. The metal feet scraped over the linoleum as he turned the thing around backwards and sat down, his eyes never leaving her face. “The cause of the fire was bad electrical, just like Bridges said. The fire marshal ruled it an accident and condemned the house, so the insurance adjusters and the property owner will take things from here. Thought you’d want to know.”

Surprise lifted her brows. “And what makes you think that?”

“Because you’ve had the evidence box containing the photos, the rope, and the jewelry under your desk for the last week even though the FBI passed on opening an investigation.”

Well
shit
. Of all the clutter on all the desks in the thousand-square-foot office space allotted to intelligence, her boss just had to have eagle eyes for the one thing she’d hoped no one would notice. God, she was going to have to play this just right in order to reroute Sinclair’s attention.

Isabella pushed back from her desk, her chair sounding off in a geriatric squeal as she threw a haphazard glance at the box in question. “Oh, yeah. Guess I forgot to bring it back downstairs to the evidence locker after I worked up that report for Peterson last week.”

Again, Sinclair’s gaze didn’t move. “You want to try again, only without the bullshit this time?”

She forced herself not to react despite the all-out rampage of her heartbeat in her chest. If she dodged the topic completely now that he’d thrown it front and center, every last one of Sinclair’s red flags would start waving in the wind, and anyway, as much as she didn’t want him to know she’d been doing some personally motivated freelancing, she didn’t want to dodge the
topic
at all.

“Fine. I know Peterson passed, but I still think there’s a case here. Something about these photos…” Isabella dropped her stare to the box again, to the plain, ordinary white cardboard that held the suggestion of terrible things, and something twisted deep inside of her. “I get that there’s only circumstantial evidence to go on right now. But I’m telling you. Someone is hurting these women.”

“We’ve been over this,” Sinclair said, not unkindly. “If there was anything solid to go on, we’d investigate.”

“I know.” For a second, Isabella itched to tell him what she’d learned last Friday night from Carmen and Danny Marcus. She hadn’t been planning on keeping the truth from Sinclair forever anyway—the whole point in trying to turn up a useable lead was so she
could
tell him, and then he could tell Peterson. Sinclair would be pissed that she’d fractured the rules to nail down the intel, she knew. But he’d been pissed at her before, just like she’d worked cases outside of intelligence before. If it got them the proof they needed to help these women, Isabella would take the fallout.

And if she told Sinclair about the party before she got said proof, he just might pull the plug on her recon mission, which meant she had no choice but to ask for forgiveness later than permission in the here and now.