The smell of disinfectant burned Detective Roberts' nose. It usually smelled like a terrible stew of cigarette smoke, sweat, and guilt. The cleaning crew must be new; the old one never came in here. By the looks of it, from the tiny window in the door, it looked immaculate, but the cleaning crew never sat in the chairs.
Roberts sat down and saw Escobar with his head down, sleeping. The jail cells were all loud with drunks and addicts, screaming about one thing or another. Roberts held back the impulse to slam his folder down along with his fist to wake up Escobar, startle him, throw him off. If Escobar got what he deserved, Roberts would have simply put an ice pick in his neck, donned his coat, and called it a day, collecting high-fives from his fellow cops, the city of New York, and probably God himself—but as Roberts fully well knew, only two of those were real.
He gently nudged the table and cleared his throat. Escobar woke up like he'd been jolted by a taser. He left himself vulnerable for a minute, a life-ending mistake—a lesson he learned in all the prisons he lived in.
"Morning, Escobar. Need to start your morning with coffee? Pot is fresh."
Escobar shook his head. Roberts knew he didn't drink coffee—Escobar was one of those energy drink hounds, slurping down whatever synthetic sugar he could.
"I can nick one of those drinks you like. Surges?"
"Blasts," Escobar said, perking up.
Roberts disappeared and grabbed one of the two raspberry-melon Blasts out of the fridge. He'd grabbed the last of them from the bodega before he came in.
Escobar opened it with deep pleasure and glugged it down. He coughed and wiped the purple liquid from his chin.
"Easy. Easy, Escobar," Roberts said. "How are they treating you? I heard you got your own cell now."
Escobar shrugged and rubbed his finger along the edge of the can.
Roberts scooted his chair closer to the table. "I got something to show you. And I want you to take a look."
"More pictures of Mary?" Escobar said with a grin even the devil wouldn't wear. "You guys still can't find her, huh? That little slut probably ran off or something." He scratched at his new prison tattoo—a skull along the side of his face, still puffy and probably infected.
Roberts held back. He wanted to slam his head into the table and shove the tall can down his tiny mouth.
"No. Different girl." Escobar perked up with an intense curiosity. Roberts brought out the file and opened it up. There were various pictures of a similar girl, nine years old. A school picture. Her running on the playground. A family photo. A trip to the zoo where she is feeding a giraffe.
"Disappeared two days ago."
"I was—"
"You were in your cell. I'm aware."
Escobar took a swig of his energy drink.
"This girl, just like Mary, got taken. Broad fucking daylight. During school hours with security. I gotta know how that is fucking possible, how Mr. Smiles gets these kids."
"You're asking me? Why should I fucking care? That sounds like a detective problem."
Roberts wanted to be the heavy and he could be. He could bench press two if not three Escobars on a bad day. Roberts went cold now. His anger was pushed away by something else, something darker. He relented to it and gave in to its request.
Roberts closed the folder and brought out another.
"Another fucking girl? You gotta be kidding me, Roberts! It's a fucking epidemic out there!" He let out a cold laugh and finished his drink with a disgusting belch.
Roberts opened the folder and a large bald man was pictured lifting heavy weights in the main prison yard. He was covered in tattoos that would need to be covered if he ever walked around outside. By the looks of him, he was a lifer, grizzled and regretless.
"That's Big Bill," Escobar said. "He's gone missing too? Shit! What a fucking day!"
Roberts leaned in and he could smell Escobar's breath—artificial and pungent.
"In ninety-five you molested a girl named Ally Gonzalez when you were a camp counselor. That's her uncle. We never got you on that one because the officer who arrested you fucked up your Miranda rights. One fucking sentence he missed and you got off. The family wanted to keep it quiet. Never told a soul."
Escobar went white and leaned back. He instinctively looked around to see if there was a way out, but that was only through Roberts. Roberts wasn't going anywhere.
"Yeah—but—"
"Oh, your private little cell? You are depending on that to keep you safe? Really?
Big Bill has been in that prison fifteen years and he has infinity to go. He writes her every day. You think he has something to lose if he somehow found out? He'd go through you like piss through snow."
Escobar glared and seethed like a dog cornered.
"How do you think he does it? How does he get the kids out of the school?"
Escobar rubbed his face with his hands.
"If I needed to get kids out of the school—I'd pretend to be a janitor, but ones that just fill in. Or a substitute teacher. I'd wait until the kid goes to the bathroom and then I'd get them there. I'd have a fake pass. But the risk, man. The fucking risk. You'd have to—"
"Not look like you." Roberts scraped his finger across Escobar's face tattoo. Escobar lunged for Roberts's throat and Roberts handled it with his fists and a smile.
If someone shared this with you, I publish a weekly(ish) newsletter where you can get my fiction, recommendations and just commentary on the writing world. You can sign up for it at the link above.