Evelyn asked, “Pete told you that?” Amanda nodded. “That seems like a more plausible scenario. Jane screamed like a stuck pig when you kicked her, and that was barely a tap.”
“You didn’t say that at the time.”
“I was scared,” Evelyn admitted. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s all right,” Amanda told her. “Maybe we could ask around and see if any johns are into choking.”
“I know a gal who works undercover downtown. I’ll see what she knows. But even if there is a guy out there who likes choking women—and something tells me there’s more than one—how are we going to find his real name? And if by some miracle we do find his name, how on earth would we link him to Jane?”
Amanda offered, “Pete scraped some skin out from under Jane’s fingernails. He said he could match the blood type against a suspect. See if he’s a secretor or a nonsecretor.”
“Eighty percent of the population has secretor status. Nearly forty percent is type O-positive. That’s hardly narrowing it down.”
“I didn’t know that,” Amanda admitted. Evelyn was much better at statistics than she was. “Let’s go back to the puzzle before we’re both late for work.” Amanda picked up where they’d left off in the timeline. “Next, we met Mr. Blue Suit, aka Hank Bennett, at the morgue. He admits he hasn’t seen his sister in years, which might explain why he couldn’t identify her.”
“Or, he’s just too arrogant to admit that he can’t.”
That seemed far more likely. “I still find it odd that Lucy Bennett didn’t have a record. She’s been on the game at least a year, probably more.”
“Neither does Kitty Treadwell.” Evelyn looked sheepish. “I radioed dispatch on my way here. They ran through all the variations for me. There was no record for a Kitty Treadwell.”
“How about Jane Delray?”
“She had two pick-ups several years ago, but nothing recently.”
“Then her fingerprints are on file.”
Evelyn frowned. “No, they’re not. I asked. A lot of the older records have been purged.”
“That’s convenient.” Amanda updated the information under each girl’s name. “We need to work on Andrew Treadwell. He’s a lawyer. He’s a friend of the mayor’s. What else do we know about him?”
“Jane intimated that he was Kitty’s uncle. She point-blank said that Kitty was rich, that her family was connected.”
Amanda said, “That article in the newspaper listed Andrew Treadwell as having only one daughter.”
“He’s one of the top lawyers in the city. He’s politically powerful. If he has a daughter who’s been pimped out on the streets by a black man, do you really think that’s something he’d advertise? He’d more likely use his money and influence to keep her hidden away.”
“You’re right,” Amanda allowed. She stared down at the diagram. “Don’t you think it’s odd that Lucy and Kitty are both out on the street and one of them has a brother working for the other’s uncle?”
“Maybe they met at a self-help group.” Evelyn smiled. “Whores Anonymous.”
Amanda rolled her eyes at the joke. “Are we still assuming that Andrew Treadwell is the one who sent Hank Bennett to talk to Hodge last Monday?”
“I am. Are you?”
Amanda nodded again. “Which may support your theory that Andrew Treadwell doesn’t want it to get out that he’s related to Kitty. We could be looking at it wrong. Who does Treadwell want to hide the relationship from if not his buddies at City Hall?”
“Bennett is quite a piece of work,” Evelyn mumbled. “He’s one of the most arrogant asses I’ve met. And that’s saying a lot considering the guys we work with.”
Amanda tried to recall Hank Bennett’s terse answers to their questions outside the morgue. She should’ve written them down. “Bennett said he sent his sister a letter at the Union Mission. Do you remember him saying when?”
“Yes. He mailed the letter to the Mission when his father passed away last year—this time last year. Which reminds me: Jane said Lucy has been missing for about a year.”
Amanda wrote down this information under Lucy’s name. “When you asked Bennett if he knew the name Kitty Treadwell, he told us to watch where we put our noses.”
“Trask,” Evelyn remembered. “That was the man he talked with at the Union Mission.”
“He said Trask or Trent,” Amanda corrected. The exchange stuck in her head because her mother’s maiden name was Trent.
“We have to call him something for now,” Evelyn pointed out.
“Trask,” Amanda suggested.
“Okay, Trask told Bennett that he gave the letter to Lucy, which means he must know Lucy. If he works at the Union Mission, he might know all of our girls. Oh, Amanda—” She sounded devastated. “Why didn’t we think to go to the Union Mission in the first place? All the hookers go there when they need a break. It’s their Acapulco.”
“The mission is just up the street,” Amanda reminded her. “We can still talk to Trask, see if he remembers anything about Lucy—or Jane.”
“If we’re lucky, they’ll tell us Lucy’s alive and well and on such-and-such corner, and why are people saying she’s been murdered.” Evelyn looked at her watch. “I have to check in at Model City, but I could meet you there in half an hour.”
“That should give me enough time to call the Housing Authority and figure out what I’m going to do with Peterson.”
“I’m sure Vanessa won’t mind taking him.”
Amanda tucked her pen back in her purse. “I feel that’s a bad situation brewing.”
“Maybe. Listen, I’ll try to question Hodge again, but I doubt that’ll get me anywhere.” She scooped up the pieces of construction paper and stacked them together. “I just have such a bad feeling about all of this.”
“What do you mean?”
“I think Lucy Bennett’s dead either way.”
“Possibly, but it could be drugs, not malfeasance.”
“Have you read about all those girls in Texas who disappeared around the I-45 corridor?”
“What?”
“A dozen or more,” Evelyn told her. “They’re not even sure where the bodies are.”
“Where do you hear these things?”
There was no shame in her smile. “
Amanda sighed as she watched Evelyn climb into her station wagon. “I’ll see you at the mission.”
“Deal.” Evelyn slowly pulled out of the parking space. “And I wouldn’t worry too much about Vanessa,” she called through the open window. “Who do you think told me about the guy behind the counter at the Plaza Pharmacy?”
“Mandy!” Vanessa called as soon as she walked into the station.
Amanda pushed her way through the crowd. The station was full. Roll call was a few minutes off. Amanda glanced into the sergeant’s office, but it was empty.
“Hurry!” Vanessa was sitting in back again, practically bouncing in her chair. She was wearing slacks and a flowery blouse. Her gun was holstered on her hip. She was dressed in men’s shoes. Amanda was beginning to wonder if she was worried about the wrong sex where Vanessa was concerned. At least she was still wearing a bra.
“Lookit what I got.” Vanessa held up a credit card as if it was a bar of gold. Amanda recognized the logo of the Franklin Simon department store. And then her jaw dropped at the punch-typed gold letters spelling out VANESSA LIVINGSTON underneath.
“How did you …” Amanda sank down in her chair. She was almost afraid to touch the card. Then she did. “Is it real?”
“Yep.” Vanessa beamed.
Amanda could not stop staring at the card. “Is this a joke?” She glanced around to see if anyone was watching. No one seemed to care. “How did you get this?”
