Decker seemed taken aback by this. “Okay, that is odd. Most hookers have evidence of cash flow somewhere.”
“She show any signs of drug use?” asked Jamison. “The coroner couldn’t find any trace of it in her system.”
“Nothing that I observed, and I know what to look for.”
“So why’d you pick her out of all the escorts out there to have a ‘come to Jesus’ talk?” asked Decker.
“She wasn’t the only one I had that chat with,” replied Kelly.
“Who else?” asked Jamison.
He restlessly tapped his fingers against the window. “Look, in the interest of full disclosure, my sister had some of those same issues. Only she got trapped on drugs, and hooking was the only way out, or so she thought. She overdosed and they couldn’t bring her back. It was a tragedy all around.”
“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 therewassomething 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.
FOLLOWINGKELLY’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.”