Dragonfly

There are some, though, who can't seem to stay within the law. My search for women of Asian descent gave me a lot of results of women who'd been convicted of a crime and who listed Tennessee as their home address. Most weren't anywhere close to Nashville either, but the last known residence of two was.

Marsha Nguen was born to Vietnamese parents but because she'd been born in the US, was an American citizen. She'd been arrested four times for prostitution, but that was it. She was also a little tall for the description Clarence had given me, and the arrests were when Marsha was in her twenties. She was thirty-five now, and hadn't been in trouble since she was twenty-four. I didn't think she would have started dealing, and even if she did, eleven years is a long time to be dealing without being arrested for that at least once. She was also too old as well.

Susie Richards was more interesting. Her mother was Chinese American and

both her mother and her father had been killed in a car accident when she was fifteen. Susie grew up in a foster home in Gallatin, and she'd been in trouble a lot. Her rap sheet started with shoplifting and progressed though fifteen arrests and four convictions, the last of which was when she was arrested while crossing the US/Mexican border in California with a hundred grams of cocaine in a hidden compartment in her suitcase.

She was twenty-one at the time, and had been sentenced to three years in the California prison system and had served the whole three years because she couldn't manage to stay out of trouble in prison either. She'd now be twenty-four, so she might seem young to Clarence.

Evidently Susie had either reformed or at least hadn't been caught doing anything illegal since. Maybe she'd changed, but she did have at least one connection to the drug trade, and once in, most people either can't get out or just don't want to because of the money. The other thing that made me take a closer look at her was she was born in Lebanon, Tennessee, and raised in Gallatin, just about an hour away from my desk at the Nashville PD. Since she knew the area, it was probable she'd come back. I decided to have a talk with her foster parents to see if they'd heard from her lately.

Mr. and Mrs. Evans were cordial when I called them and asked about Susie, but they didn't have many good things to say about her. According to Mrs. Evans, Suzie had been a handful and they were glad when she turned eighteen and aged out of the foster care system.

"No matter what I did for that girl, she hated me and my husband. We got Susie out of jail three times before she left, but that didn't seem to matter to her. She'd go right back to shoplifting or getting drunk. Once she left, she never came back."

I asked if they'd heard from her in the past couple of months and Mr. Evans said no and they were happy they hadn't.

"The last we heard from Susie was when she got out of prison in California. She called and asked us for money so she could come back to Gallatin. The last thing we wanted was to have her back here, so I told her she'd have to make it on her own. She called me a bastard then, so I hung up on her. She hasn't called us back so I hope she's still in California."

I didn't tell them why I was interested in Susie, but I did ask where she might go if she came back to the Nashville area. Mrs. Evans said she thought Susie had a boyfriend who lived in Nashville.

"They seemed to be serious for a while when she was seventeen, so maybe she'd come back to see him. I remember his last name because it was the same as my maiden name -- Pena. His first name was...Honey, do you remember his first name?"

Mr. Evans frowned.

"Yeah, his name was Carlos, Carlos Pena. Worthless son of a bitch was ten years older than Susie and kept wanting her to move in with him in his house in Franklin. After she left, I think that's where she went. Wouldn't surprise me if he got her involved with drugs."

"She was into drugs?"

Mr. Evens shook his head.

"She never took any that I ever knew about, but the asshole had a lot of money and he didn't seem to have any type of job. There's only one way I know of to do that, and that's selling drugs. Susie always wanted more money, and if she had a chance to get more without working for it, she'd probably jump at the chance."

Once I got back at my desk, I ran Carlos Pena through NCIC, and decided Mr. Evans was probably half right. Susie wouldn't have come back to live with Carlos because he was in prison for drug trafficking, but it made sense she'd made the connection in Mexico through him. The next morning, I drove to the Turney Center to talk with him.

Carlos didn't have much to say about Susie except that she didn't stay with him for long.

"When her foster parents made her leave, I gave her a place to stay. I wasn't fuckin' her like her foster dad thought. I grew up in a foster home too, so I knew what it was like. When I got thrown out of my foster parent's house, I got hooked up with the wrong people and ended up in drugs. I didn't want that to happen to Susie, but she saw how much money I was making and wanted in.

"I wouldn't let her do anything with drugs, so she hooked up with the guy supplying me. I think she made a couple trips to Mexico with him, because she came back once and showed me this tattoo she said she got in Juarez. It was a dragonfly on her right tit. After she came back that time, she said she was moving in with the guy, and I haven't seen her since."

"What was the guy's name?"

Carlos looked at me and frowned.

"Juan Mendez. Why do you want to know? You can't arrest him and he can't tell you anything 'cause he's dead."

"Oh, what happened to him -- another dealer decided to eliminate his competition?"

Carlos smiled.

"Something like that, or at least that's what I heard in here. Susie decided she didn't like taking the risk and only getting ten percent of the money."

"Susie killed him?"

"That's the word I got. Happened in Mexico a couple months ago. So many people in drugs get killed down there nobody really investigates just one killing, but the word I got from another guy who should know was Susie cut his throat one night."

Well, by then I was pretty sure I knew who "Dragonfly" was. I just had to find her and that wasn't going to be easy unless I could find someone besides Clarence who knew her. Clarence had said she was smart, so she probably wouldn't have used her real name to rent the apartment, but that was pretty common among drug dealers.

No landlord would do much of a background check if there was enough money on the table in front of him, and especially not for a woman. Sure enough, when I ran her name in the phone listings for all the cities and towns within fifty miles, I didn't come up with anything.

Since she had Clarence doing all the heavy lifting for her, I also figured there weren't many people who had actually met her. That's also pretty common among the big drug dealers. They have other people to do the work while they sit back and enjoy the profits. Still, it would surprise you if you know how much information is out on the streets if you pay the right price. That's what I was going to do next -- talk to a couple of our CI's to see if they'd ever heard of a woman who went by the street name Dragonfly.

I found Penny Majors about eight that night standing on the same street corner she always used to pick up johns. I was driving my personal sedan and I was certain Penny would recognize it because she'd seen it several times before. Even though unmarked police cars are supposed to look like any other car, if you're close enough you can see the lights behind the grill. CI's won't talk to you if you're in an unmarked police car because anybody seeing them will spread the word.

When I pulled up to the curb and rolled down the passenger side window, she stuck her head in and smiled.

"Hi Ron. What can I do for you tonight?"

"Get in and I'll tell you."

Penny grinned.

"I have to get paid or my man is gonna be pissed. How much am I gonna make if I get in?"

"It depends upon what you tell me, but it'll at least be twenty. That's still what a blowjob costs, right?"

Penny opened the car door and got in, and once she buckled her seat belt, I drove down the street to the alley behind an abandoned building. I turned on the dome light then so I could see Penny's face. If she was making something up, I'd probably be able to tell from her face.

"Penny, you ever hear of a woman who calls herself Dragonfly? Real name is Susie Richards. She looks Asian and she's pretty small."

Penny thought for a second, then shook her head.

"Nope...at least she's not hooking. I'd know if she was."

"How about a guy named Juan Mendez?"

"Nope, never heard of him either, but Mexicans don't ever come down here. They have their own girls up on eighty-second. Can't see a Mexican hooking up with an Asian anyway. Why do you want to know? You think they're together?"

Word on the street works both ways, so if I'd told Penny why I was looking for Dragonfly and Mendez, every hooker and pimp in the area would know about it before the night was over. If Dragonfly had ears on the street too, she'd know somebody was looking for her by tomorrow morning.

"I don't know if they're together. Her parents just haven't heard from her in a while, and well, she's been in trouble before. They gave me the name Mendez and said he's a drug dealer. Susie had a problem with drugs at one time and she told them Mendez sold her the pills. I thought if she was still hooked on pills, she might either be doing tricks to support her habit or had hooked up with Mendez to get her pills in exchange for sex."

Penny shook her head again.

"I don't hear much about drug dealers cause they all have their own girls too, but I know somebody who might. Out on thirty-first, where it turns into County 7, there's a bar called 'Jason's'. Talk to Mattie. She used to own that little antique shop on my corner and she let me use the restroom if she was open. We got to know each other pretty well over a couple of years.

"She tried to talk me out of doing what I do, but I wouldn't let her. Wish I had now that I'm getting older. She's still trying so we stay in touch. She tends bar at Jasons, and she told me several of her customers have a lot of money to spend and she figured they were selling drugs to get it."

"You think she'll talk to me?"

Penny smiled.

"If you tell her I sent you there, she will. Mattie's almost like a mother to me."

I gave Penny twenty and promised her another twenty if Mattie gave me any information that panned out, then drove her back to her corner.

It was a Wednesday, so I didn't figure there would be many people at Jason's. Some people might stop by after work, but they'd be gone by seven or so. A few real drinkers might be there, but most of the partying would happen on Friday and Saturday nights. When I drove into the parking lot, that proved to be true. There were only half a dozen cars there, and at least a couple had to be employee's cars.

I did take the precaution of taking off my jacket and tie and then rolling up my shirt sleeves. The only people who wear suits anymore are detectives and executives. From the outside, Jason's didn't look like a hangout for CEO's, and I didn't want to advertise that I was a cop to anybody. My service pistol and clip-on holster went in the trunk. I still had my backup Ruger.380 on my ankle but it wouldn't show and my badge went into my hip pocket. I wasn't likely to have use for either, but it pays to be prepared for the worst.

The bar was almost deserted when I went inside, so I didn't have to look for a seat away from everybody else. A woman I assumed was Mattie was drying shot glasses at the other end, and when I sat down, she put down her towel and started down the bar.

I couldn't imagine Mattie working in an antique shop. I never go to antique shops, but I always figured any woman who worked in one would be older and probably pretty plain. Mattie was about my age, and she was anything but plain. She wouldn't make it all the way up to fashion model because she was too old for that and she wasn't built like a pencil, but she probably had to keep telling the guys in the bar she didn't do that sort of thing.

When Mattie asked what I wanted I smiled and asked if she knew a woman named Penny Majors. Mattie's face changed from a smile to a worried look.

"Has something happened to Penny?"

I shook my head.

"No, Penny's fine and she says, 'Hi". She told me you might have some information about a woman I'm looking for."

"So you're a cop."

"Yes, detective actually. I'm looking for an Asian woman named Susie Majors. Sometimes she goes by the name Dragonfly."

Mattie relaxed enough she smiled at me.

"I suppose if Penny sent you, you must be OK. What's this woman done?"

"Nothing that I know of except to stop calling her parents. They filed a missing persons report and I got the job of finding her."

Mattie shook her head.

"I don't remember any woman named Susie or Dragonfly ever coming here."

"Well, she might be with a guy named Carlos Mendez. Ever heard of him?"

"Carlos? Who hasn't? He used to come here all the time. Haven't seen him in a while though. I figured he went back to Mexico. He said he had family there."

"Did he ever bring a woman with him."

Mattie chuckled.

"When didn't he? He always had some young girl on his arm. Don't know why. From what I heard, he wasn't very nice to women."

Mattie's eyes lit up then.

"Now that I think about it...the last time he was here he had this really young Asian girl with him. I remember because it struck me odd. All his other girls were Mexican."

"What did she look like?"

"Well, she was just a little slip of a thing. Couldn't have weighed much more than a hundred pounds if that. Oh, I remember something else now too. She had this tattoo on her boob, wasn't very big, and I wouldn't have seen it if she hadn't leaned over the bar. It looked like a dragonfly to me. Maybe it was her."

I asked Mattie which breast and she said the right one.

"Well, that sounds like my girl. You didn't get a name?"

Mattie shook her head.

"No, but Carlos brought girls in here like you'd take a dog to the park. He'd squeeze their boobs and pat their butts when he was here, but he never introduced any of them. That was another thing that was odd. He didn't touch this girl. I suppose that's because she didn't have much in the way of boobs and her butt was real little. All the other girls he brought here had big boobs and big butts."

"Have you seen her since that time?"

"No, but like I said, I haven't seen Carlos either.

When I got back at my desk the next morning, I added what Mattie had told me to my case file and then read through everything hoping for another lead. The only thing I hadn't yet checked out was where Carlos lived. If he was dead, he wouldn't be there, but maybe a neighbor would have some more information about him.

I found his name in the phone book for Nashville, and when I saw the address, I wasn't really surprised. It was one of the newer apartment complexes that had gone up in the city to accommodate the tech companies that are sprouting up all over Nashville. Software engineers and their managers and directors get paid very well, they want housing that reflects that, and they want to live close to their offices in downtown Nashville. As it happens, drug dealers have a lot of money too, and they like to live in the same type of place so they appear to be legit.

When I checked out the website for the building at that address, I was a little amazed that anybody could afford to live there. A one-bed, one-bath apartment was almost twenty five hundred a month, and if one wanted to go all out with three bedrooms and three baths, it would cost on the near side of twelve thousand a month. That twelve thousand a month was over twice what my gross monthly pay was.

At those prices, I expected some sort of security, and there was a concierge at the desk, a guy about thirty who looked like he could lift a truck with one hand. I figured he was as good a place to start as any.

"Excuse me, I'm Detective Ron Allison of the Nashville Police Department. Do you have a tenant named Carlos Mendez?"

The guy looked me up and down, and then smiled a fake smile.

"Sir, I'm sure you realize we don't give out that kind of information to anybody."

I'd expected to get the runaround, so I was ready to show him I could play hardball if that's what he wanted.

"OK, I'll go get a warrant for your tenant list. I'm sure he lives here, so I think while I'm at it, I'll get a warrant to search his apartment. We have reason to believe Mr. Mendez is involved with one of our suspects in a drug trafficking case. It'll be interesting to see what we can find in his apartment.

"I'll be back in an hour with six patrol cars and a team of forensic techs. My guess is if I call a couple TV stations, they'll be happy to send out a film crew too. We'll lock down the building so the officers can talk to Mr. Mendez and your other tenants, and we'll be sure to tell them why we're interested in him. I'd bet more than a few of them will decide not to renew their lease once they know you rented to a drug dealer."

The guy's fake smile changed to a frown.

"Let me make a phone call."

Two minutes later, he hung up the phone and smiled again.

"In the interests of cooperating with the police, I've been authorized to tell you that Mr. Mendez lives in one of our studio apartments on the twenty fifth floor."

I smiled.

"I thought you might see it my way. I'd like to have a talk with Mr. Mendez, so if you'd call him for me..."

The guy shook his head.

"Can't do that because he's not here. He's in Mexico, some sort of deal he's working on to have his software sold there he said. Been gone for a couple of months and I don't know when he's coming back."

I didn't know for certain that Carlos was dead, so I didn't tell the guy he probably would be coming back. What I was wondering though was, if Susie had hooked up with Carlos and then killed him, might she be living in his apartment? If she was, that fit the model of a major drug dealer.

"Damn...I really wanted to talk to him. Maybe his housekeeper would know. He does have a housekeeper, doesn't he? I can't see a man making enough money to rent one of these apartments doing his own cleaning and cooking."

The guy nodded.

"Yeah, he has one."

"When does she come to work? Maybe she'll know when he'd coming back."

The guy thought for a while before he answered, and I figured he'd have to make another phone call before he did, but finally he leaned toward me and spoke in a quiet voice.

"She lives up there with him, and I don't think she's really a housekeeper."

"Oh, why is that?"

"He took her to Mexico with him."

I asked if she was still in Mexico, and he shook his head.

"No. She came back after a week down there. She said he told her to come back and get the apartment ready for when he got done. She said it would be in a couple of days, but like I said, it's been two months. Last time I saw her, I asked where he was, and she said he'd gotten a chance at some business he couldn't pass up and wasn't sure when he'd be back."

"Does she ever go out, like for shopping?"

"Yeah, usually Sunday afternoon."

"What does she look like, just in case I decide to come back on Sunday?"

"Well, she's really small and she looks like she's Japanese or Chinese -- long black hair and her eyes are kinda slanted. She's not bad looking...not bad at all."

"What's her name?"

The guy shrugged.

"I don't know her real name because she never said. Mr. Mendez never told me her name either. The only time I ever heard him call her anything, he called her his little dragonfly."