Walk the Wire (Amos Decker #6)(14)

“That’s so awful, Joe. I’m sorry,” said Jamison.

“So that’s why you don’t arrest escorts?” said Decker.

“All I know is, prostitution is not a victimless crime. And if I can do something to help people who need help, then I will. It’s why I signed up to be a cop. I have no problem putting people away who deserve it, but that’s not all I want to do.”

“How’d you find out about her connection with the Brothers?” said Jamison. “Was that widely known?”

“I’m one of the few people here that know the Brothers well. I’ve been out to the Colony—that’s what they call their collective home—many times. Just part of being a local cop, get to know the people in your community. I’d seen her there, in fact. That’s how I recognized her picture from the website. And I highly doubt anyone from the Brothers would be surfing the web for sex services. So I think her secret was safe with me. And I never told anyone.”

“Including anyone at the Brothers, or else she would have been dismissed, I imagine,” noted Jamison.

He nodded. “Especially not them. She seemed troubled in a way. I didn’t want to add to those troubles.” He paused and added. “And I’ve dealt with a lot of hookers. Most come from shitty backgrounds and situations. Vulnerable and lost. But Cramer didn’t fit that pattern. There was something about her that seemed, well, focused and intent. Like she was on a mission or something. So, to tell the truth, part of me believed there was something else going on with her.”

“Well, since we were called up, we know there was something else going on with her,” observed Jamison.

Decker said, “The killer might have dumped the body right before it was found.”

Jamison and Kelly glanced sharply at Decker and his abrupt segue, but then Kelly nodded. “I thought about that, too. A body lying out there in the open? Well, you wouldn’t expect to see it in such good shape with all the critters we have up here.” He looked at Jamison. “But to kill someone and then cut up the body like that? That’s pretty damn perverted.”

“We don’t usually hunt anybody who’s not,” noted Decker.





FOLLOWING KELLY’S DIRECTIONS, Jamison parked at the curb in front of a four-story brick run-down building that was in an area where no construction cranes and work crews had come to roost. Yet.

They climbed out, and Kelly led them quickly inside because the wind had picked up to a nasty howl and it had started to rain as well.

The landlady’s conjoined apartment and office were on the first floor just off the front entrance. The apartment’s walls were painted a faded green, and the furnishings were old and frayed and looked straight out of the seventies. But the TV parked on one wall was a sixty-inch curved Samsung 4K without a set of rabbit ears in sight.

The landlady’s name was Ida Simms. She was in her seventies, with thinning gray hair tied back in a severe bun. The woman was nearly as wide as she was tall. She greeted them politely, though Decker noted the tremble in her voice and the crumpled tissue clutched in her hand. She had on a large burgundy T-shirt and faded corduroy pants with pale green Crocs below.

They sat in her small front room after declining Simms’s offer of coffee.

She slumped back in her faded recliner and gazed around at them. “Irene, dead? I . . . I can’t believe it.” She shot Decker a terrified look. “And the FBI called in on top of it? I feel like I’m in a movie.”

“That’s perfectly understandable,” said Jamison kindly. “We’re just here to ask you some questions.”

“I’ll tell you whatever I can if it will help you catch whoever did this,” the woman said earnestly. She blew her nose with authority into the tissue.

“When did she move in here?” asked Decker.

“About a month ago.”

“Do you know where she lived before that?”

“I think at the Dawson Towers complex. It’s about a mile from here. Nicer part of town. Pretty luxurious.”

“Dawson?” said Decker. “Like in Caroline Dawson?”

“Yes. She has a condo there, I believe. And her father, Hugh, owns the Towers, along with about three-quarters of the businesses in London. This building here is one of the few he doesn’t own. Probably wouldn’t make enough money for him,” she added dismissively.

“So he’s the local business tycoon?” said Jamison.

“But a man named Stuart McClellan is even richer.”

“How so?” asked Decker.

Kelly answered. “He owns pretty much all of the oil and gas fracking operations in this area.”

“So do the two men get along?” asked Jamison.

It was Kelly again who answered. “They do business together. But I wouldn’t call them best friends.”

Simms said huffily. “They’re men, and rich men to boot, which means they’re in a lifelong pissing contest—pardon my French—to see who’s the bigger dog in the fight.” She shook her head. “Boys never really grow up, don’t care how much cash they have.”

“Did you know Ms. Cramer very well?” asked Jamison.

Simms said, “I guess as well as anyone in the building. She worked as a teacher out at the Brothers’ school.”