Chapter 28 #2
One night, I knew I needed answers. Jaime was keeping secrets, and she wasn’t doing a great job of hiding it. She’d mentioned her shift started late, really late, and I decided to follow her to see what was really going on.
As I watched her disappear into a dingy alleyway, my heart dropped. She went through the back door of a butcher shop—Bocco’s. The closed sign hung in the front window. It didn’t make sense—what kind of waitress job had her entering through the back of a butchery, especially at midnight?
I waited. Hours ticked by, my breath visible in the cold night air. Eight hours later, as dawn broke, Jaime finally stepped out, looking like a ghost of herself. Her shoulders sagged, and her makeup was smudged. She didn’t even see me until I stepped into her path, cornering her by a streetlamp.
“What the hell are you doing, Jaime?” I demanded. “I thought you said you were waitressing!”
She flinched but forced a tight smile. “I am, Theo. You don’t have to worry.”
“Cut the crap,” I snapped. “I’ve been out here for hours, Jaime. This isn’t a restaurant. What’s going on?”
She opened her mouth to lie again, but something in her broke. Her eyes filled with tears, and before I could say anything else, she was crying, her thin frame shaking in the cold. I hailed a cab and wrapped my arm around her shoulders, holding her as close as I could until we reached my apartment.
Once inside, Jaime dropped onto my bed, taking in a deep, shuddering breath. “I needed the money, Theo,” she whispered. “It’s… It’s an underground gambling place. One of the girls from high school told me about it—said it was good money, so I figured…”
I clenched my fists, trying to keep my voice steady. “Underground gambling? Jesus, Jaime. You shouldn’t be anywhere near something like that. It’s dangerous. It’s illegal.”
She looked down, her voice small. “I didn’t know. I just… I needed the money, Theo.”
I sat beside her, taking a steadying breath. “You told me it was waitressing. Nothing shady.”
“It is waitressing,” she said defensively. Then, her expression crumbled. “But the men there… They aren’t nice.”
I felt my jaw tighten as I listened, every instinct telling me to go down there and drag her out of that place for good. But I stayed quiet, waiting for her to finish.
“One of the guys—he offered me a big tip,” she said, her voice barely a whisper, “if I…”
My heart twisted as I looked at her. “If you what, Jaime?”
She hesitated, her gaze dropping to the floor. “If I had sex with him.”
I stood up so quickly the bed frame rattled. “I’m going to kill him!” My voice was a low, dangerous rumble. “I’m going to fucking kill him!”
“No!” She shot up, grabbing my arm, her eyes wide. “Theo, these are powerful men. You don’t want to mess with them, you don’t understand.”
“Who was it, Jaime?” I demanded. “What’s his name?”
She glanced toward the newspaper on my nightstand. Her gaze settled on an article about a recent drug bust, mentioning Special Agent Edward Vaughan-Morris as the arresting officer.
She swallowed hard.
“Him,” she whispered. “It’s him, Theo. We can’t touch him. We can’t touch any of them.”
I shook my head, still trying to process what she was telling me. “Them?”
She looked away, wringing her hands together.
“It’s not just him. There’s a whole group of them.
They’re… They’re handsy, Theo. Nothing that I can’t handle but…
” She peered up at me through clumped up lashes.
“I think they’re working with the cartel.
I overheard them talking.” She shook her head as if realizing she said too much.
“I just want to go home, Theo. Can we drop it? I’m fine. ”
“No, Jaime, you are not fine,” I said firmly, refusing to look away. “They should all be arrested. They’re federal fucking agents working with criminals. That’s messed up! We have to report them.”
She laughed bitterly. “Report them? To who? These guys are cops, Theo, Wall Street guys. One of them’s even a state prosecutor. It doesn’t work that way.” Her voice dropped, her expression dead serious. “Drop it, Theodore. I mean it.”
I ransacked my drawer and pulled out an old tape recorder. “Take this,” I said, handing it to her. “Put it in your pocket or your shirt or your bra. Somewhere they can’t find it. Next time you go to work, just press record. We need evidence, Jaime. If we have that, then we can do something.”
She stared at the tape recorder like it might burn her. “Theo…”
“Just do it, Jaime,” I urged, my voice insistent. “These men deserve to rot in a cell. They can’t keep getting away with this. It’s not… It’s not right.”
She hesitated, but then she took the recorder. I could see the doubt in her eyes, but she tucked it into her bag and promised she’d think about it.
Two nights later, I heard the news.
Jaime’s body was found in an alley. The cops said it was a mugging gone wrong. They told me there was nothing else to look into, just a tragic accident.
There was no tape recorder found among her belongings.