Death, Taxes, and Hot Pink Leg Warmers (2 page)

Why was the IRS involved in a drug and sex-for-money sting? Because the sleazeballs who committed these types of crimes rarely reported their earnings. Tax evasion gave the government attorneys another crime to charge the bad guys with, a chance to add a few years to their sentences, and a backup plan for nailing the scumbags if the other charges fell through.

Working on cases with Nick was fun, though admittedly I found it hard to keep my mind totally on work. At least ten percent of my brain was mentally undressing him at any given time. Good thing I was a smart cookie and could still function reasonably well at ninety percent of my mental capacity.

We checked in with the uniformed officer manning the information desk.

The cop consulted a log and pointed upward. “Second-floor conference room. Lieutenant Menger should be there now.”

We took the stairs up one flight and arrived at the room to find Aaron Menger, the officer from the sex crimes unit, standing at the plate-glass window, looking out at the city that was his beat. Menger had golden-blond hair worn in a short burr cut, making his head look like the soft fluff of a baby chick. The hard look in his ice-blue eyes contrasted sharply with his downy head. He appeared to be in his late thirties, making him the oldest member of our four-person team. Though he had only an average build, I knew from the information we’d been provided that the guy was a triathlete and fourth-degree black belt. Not a man to be trifled with, despite the soft, fuzzy chick head.

“Hi, Tara. Nick.” DEA Agent Christina Marquez was seated in one of the faux-leather chairs. With her tall and curvy build, generous makeup, and shiny black tresses, Christina looked more like America’s Next Top Model than a top-notch DEA agent. But looks could be deceiving. Christina was smart and resourceful, a woman who could not only think on her feet but also bring hardened criminals to their knees. She gestured to my new curls. “Cute do.”

“Thanks.” I enjoyed the carefree curls, though not the verbal jabs from my office mates. Given my mad weapons skills, they’d often referred to me as the Annie Oakley of the IRS. Since the perm, however, they’d expanded the moniker to Little Orphan Annie Oakley. I’d countered by singing, “The guns will come out tomorrow.” Once they’d endured my vocal assault, the teasing had ceased immediately.

Christina and I had worked together on two previous cases and had become friends off the clock, too.

The four of us exchanged handshakes, Aaron’s firm grip nearly crushing my metacarpals. I wasn’t sure if he was showing off or testing my mojo, but when I squeezed back as hard as I could a bemused smile flickered across his lips.

“I told your boss to send me her toughest agents,” Menger said. “I can see she listened.”

It was nice to know the Lobo still had some faith in me. I, on the other hand, didn’t trust myself anymore. I’d been stupid and it had nearly cost me my life.

Who’s to say I wouldn’t screw up again?

And whose life might be at risk next time?

chapter two

The Informant

“Officer Menger?” came a female voice from the doorway.

We turned to find a thin woman waiting in the hall. She stood around five feet seven, with a smooth, wrinkleless face that had been Botoxed into immobility, giving her a porcelain-doll look. Her body was likewise firm and pert. Anything that could be enlarged, liposuctioned, or lifted had been, probably several times over. Even her teeth looked perfect, all white and even.

Despite these obvious cosmetic enhancements, the woman was nonetheless attractive, elegant even. Her champagne-colored hair was swept high into a classy, classic updo and her makeup, though heavy, was of subtle shades. She slipped out of her coat to reveal a sleeveless black dress accented with a gold brooch in the shape of an autumn leaf. Very tasteful.

Given the surgical enhancements, her age was impossible to guess. I’d put her somewhere between forty and four hundred. She might even pass for younger if not for the slightly loose skin on her neck and under her arms. On most women the underarm flaps looked like chicken wings. On this elegant woman they seemed more like skin ruffles.

Menger waved the woman into the conference room. “Hi, Bernice. Thanks for agreeing to meet with the team.”

He introduced the woman to us as Bernice LaBerge. According to the information in the file, Bernice performed at the strip club. Although she wasn’t onstage at the moment, she carried herself with a grace, sensuality, and self-assurance that said she’d have a fantastic stage presence. No wonder she’d been able to continue her exotic dance career into her … what?

Fifties?

Sixties?

Seventies?

As Bernice shook Nick’s hand, her gaze roamed over his face and a smile played about her enhanced lips. “My, my. Don’t you look like Burt Reynolds from back in the day?”

Nick returned the grin. “I’m a big fan of
Smokey and the Bandit
.”

Bernice took a seat at the table. After Menger gave us some brief background information, she filled the rest of us in.

“I was a showgirl at Caesars Palace years ago,” she said. “Long before those conglomerates moved into Las Vegas and built those tacky theme hotels.”

If she told me she’d done vaudeville or worked personally with Shakespeare I wouldn’t have been surprised.

Her voice took on a wistful tone as she continued. “I loved performing in Vegas. But when I tore my Achilles tendon my dance career was over, at least as far as those types of shows went. I’d grown up in Dallas so I moved back here and auditioned at Guys and Dolls. Back then the place was a dinner theater. I was a triple threat so I landed a role in nearly all of their shows.”

My brows scrunched. “A ‘triple threat’? What’s that?”

“Showbiz term,” she explained. “It means I can act, sing, and dance.”

I supposed I was a triple threat, too, though in an entirely different way. I couldn’t act, sing, or dance my way out of a paper bag, but I could handle a pistol, rifle, or shotgun with equal skill.

“I starred in several plays,” Bernice said. “
Death of a Salesman
.
Mary Poppins
. I was even featured as Maria in a production of
The Sound of Music
.”

I’d seen the movie at least a dozen times as a girl. At the reference, my mind instantly brought up the scene in which the Von Trapp children performed their puppet show. Great. Now I’d hear yodeling in my head the rest of the day, while still mentally undressing Nick, of course. It made for a really odd imaginary striptease. If I ever actually saw Nick naked, though, I had a feeling I’d emit some high-pitched yodel-like sounds.
Yodel-ay-hee-hoo!

With the yodeling now going on in my head, my mental faculties were reduced to eighty-five percent, luckily still enough brain power to keep up with the conversation taking place in the conference room.

Bernice went on to tell us that when dinner theater went out of style, the owners of the establishment tried running burlesque shows. That worked well for a while, but then it became clear the way to eke the most money out of the place would be to perform some simple mathematics—add some poles to the stage and subtract some clothing from the girls.

“I’d danced topless in Vegas,” Bernice said, “so stripping wasn’t much of a stretch for me. I was their featured dancer for years. Brought in quite the crowds.”

She was clearly proud of her career accomplishments. I had been proud of mine, too. Until the damned baseball bat, that is. Getting knocked out by a grandmother had been humiliating. Would I ever get over it?

Bernice steepled her long, pink-tipped fingers. “The three men who owned the place back then took good care of us girls. They paid us a generous base wage, provided health insurance, tossed out any customers who got too handsy. We had quite a few good years.”

How many? I wondered. Really, exactly how old was this woman? Forty-seven? Seventy-four?

Bernice’s shoulders hunched slightly with tension. “Everything changed a year ago when the former owners decided to retire and sold out to a guy named Donald Geils.” She pursed her lips as if merely uttering the man’s name left a foul taste in her mouth. “Mr. Geils made a lot of changes. He reduced the dancers’ wage to the legal minimum, canceled our health insurance, and hired a bunch of thugs to work security. He even turned the employee lounge into a VIP room.”

Nick and I exchanged glances. I had an inkling what went on in that VIP room. Very Icky Perverted stuff.

“I’ve never been asked to perform in the VIP room,” Bernice said. “Only a small number of the dancers work the room and it’s by invitation only. The girls are very tight-lipped about what goes on in there.”

Their tight lips might explain why they were chosen to work the room in the first place.

Aaron chimed in now. “We’ve sent undercover agents to the club. So far, none have been granted access to the VIP room.”

“Mr. Geils is very selective about which men he allows in there,” Bernice added. “Only regular customers with a lot of money to throw around are given access. He keeps a couple men from his security team stationed at the door at all times.”

I pushed my brain’s image of a naked Nick aside and mentally filed away this information. “That explains the prostitution, but what about the drugs?”

Bernice’s face clouded over. “As I’m sure you’ve guessed, I’m the most experienced dancer at the club.”

“Most experienced” did sound better than “oldest,” didn’t it? While it seemed sad when people couldn’t accept their advancing age and enjoy what each phase of life had to offer, Bernice obviously enjoyed performing. What was wrong with making the most of it and extending her career as long as possible?

Bernice leaned forward in her seat. “Some of the girls look up to me, ask me for advice. They think of me as their big sister.”

Or their mother. Or maybe even their grandmother.

“A few weeks ago, one of the cocktail waitresses, a girl named Madelyn, went through a rough patch. Maddie attended paralegal school during the day and was hoping to make a better life for herself and her daughter. She’d grown up in less than ideal circumstances and wanted more for her child.”

Admirable goals.

“Her boyfriend abandoned her and their two-year-old daughter and moved in with another woman.” Bernice explained that the errant boyfriend had paid no child support since he’d left. Between household expenses, child-care costs, and tuition, Maddie quickly found herself in dire financial straits. “Maddie had never planned on dancing,” Bernice said, “but she realized it was the quickest way for her to make the money she needed, a means to an end. She planned on quitting the club as soon as she finished school.” With her boyfriend gone, Maddie had to work more hours to make ends meet. “The poor thing became exhausted, came in with bags under her eyes, nearly fell asleep standing up at her pole.”

Bernice went on to tell us that Geils’s henchmen had summoned Maddie to Geils’s office one evening when her performance had been particularly lackluster. “Maddie came out of the office acting like a new woman. She took the stage and spun around that pole like a tornado.”

A knowing look passed between Christina and Menger. Christina cut her eyes to me and Nick. “Crystal meth’ll do that for ya. They don’t call it speed for nothing.”

After that night, Bernice noticed that when Maddie showed up at work, her pupils appeared dilated and she seemed to have an excess of nervous energy. She became agitated and withdrawn and stopped speaking much to her coworkers. “She began working in the VIP room. Not long afterward, I saw her one night and she was acting very strange. She was jittery and paranoid, she even shoved me and accused me of stealing her tips.”

Christina gave a knowing nod. “She was tweaking.”

“Tweaking?” Nick repeated.

I had no idea what the term meant, either. I could define cross-collateralization, debt leveraging, and uniform capitalization, but when it came to street drug lingo my knowledge was sorely lacking.

Christina filled us in. “Tweaking is when a drug user has a bad reaction, freaks out.”

Bernice blinked. “Well, whatever you call it, she got up on stage to dance, twirled around the pole a few times, and collapsed. I held her in my arms until the paramedics took her away. A few days later, when she still hadn’t returned to work, I asked Mr. Geils what had happened to her. He claimed he didn’t know.”

Worried, Bernice had gone to Maddie’s house to see if she could find her. A neighbor told Bernice that Maddie remained in the hospital, undergoing treatment for a methamphetamine overdose.

Bernice’s eyes grew misty. “Her daughter had been taken away by Child Protective Services.”

My heart contracted. “That poor little girl.” She must’ve been so scared and confused.
Suffer the children.

Christina sighed. “People think they can use speed on occasion for an energy boost, but meth isn’t exactly like caffeine or an energy drink.” She explained how the drug affected levels of a brain neurochemical called dopamine. Dopamine acted as the brain’s reward system and was released during pleasurable activities such as sex and eating food. Methamphetamines caused high amounts of dopamine to collect in the brain, resulting in a euphoric rush. The subsequent depression when real life returned reinforced its use, leaving the user craving more. “It’s not a drug that’s easy to walk away from.”

Bernice told us that she went to the hospital to visit Maddie but the girl refused to see her. “That wasn’t like the Maddie I used to know. She and I had been close.” Fortunately for Maddie’s sake, Bernice was persistent. “Eventually I was able to sneak past the nurses’ station and get to her room. Once she saw me, she burst into tears and told me she’d only used the drugs to stay awake on the job. She never intended to get hooked.”

Christina cocked her head. “Did she say she got the drugs from Geils or one of his men?”

“I asked,” Bernice said, “but she wouldn’t tell me where she got the drugs. She wouldn’t tell me what had gone on in the VIP room, either. But one thing was clear. She wanted out.”