“Bacchanalian Club. On theAmanda Rose.”
“And the logo of this club is an ornate B and a C—intertwined?” Angie said.
He nodded, tears wetting his cheeks now. “They have little books of matches with their logo on them. It’s a private gentlemen’s club—that’s what they call it. Super high-end clientele. Gracie wrote her cell number on a book of matches for me. They’re not supposed to give out personal information, but ... oh God, I can’t believe this is happening.”
“Go on, Jayden,” Maddocks said with a quick glance at Angie. “Who is ‘they’?”
“The girls.”
“Sex workers?”
He nodded. “Companions, they call them. Gracie and I ... we were getting close.” He sniffed and wiped his face.
“You’re a member of the B.C.?”
“I’m still a guest on probation. You need to qualify. Members can introduce friends as guests, and after a certain number of guest visits, and as long as all payments are cleared, and nothing goes wrong, and the girls have approved.”
“And so, you were a guest when you met Gracie? It was a Tuesday night—Gracie wrote B.C. and Amanda R. on her calendar,” Angie said.
“I got Gracie, yeah, on my first night. She was working PPN.”
“What does that stand for?” Angie said.
He put his head back, eyes rolling into their sockets. He panted in short breaths, and he was sweating, as if he was about to faint. The lawyer, who’d reseated herself beside her client, came sharply to her feet again. “I’m going to have to call an end to this, detectives. My client is in medical distress. I need some help in here.”
Angie and Maddocks exchanged another quick glance. They needed to close this deal, fast. Angie nodded toward the two-way mirror, where she knew Fitz, Vedder, a prosecutor, and a few other investigators were observing.
“Someone is fetching an EMT now,” she said, placing her hand gently on Jayden’s arm. “Jayden,” she said softly. “If you really just made a mistake, the more you can tell us, the better.”
He swallowed, nodded, wiped his face.
“Now, what is PPN?” she said.
“Plump Pussy Night.” He choked on the words. “Usually Tuesdays. Masks for the men. Robes and other costumes if they want them. Sex toys and other equipment.”
“Equipment like ropes?” Maddocks said.
He nodded. “Itwasa mistake, I swear it. I was just watching. The rope got too tight around her neck—Faith’s neck. He didn’t mean it. Then suddenly we noticed she wasn’t breathing anymore. I ... we panicked, tried to untie her. I couldn’t loosen the ropes. Oh, God help me.” He spun away from them.
“Whodid you watch, Jayden?” Maddocks said.
“Zach,” he said, voice small.
“Zach Raddison?”
“He’s the one who took me there.”
“Why’d he take you there?” said Maddocks.
“We ... we’ve been friends since high school.” Norton-Wells inhaled deeply. “Zach’s always had a reputation for knocking women about a bit. He likes his sex rough.”
“What kind of rough? Can you give me an example?” Maddocks said.
He swallowed, rubbed his knee. “One of his favorite things is to get a woman naked and down on all fours. He uses studded dog collars, and he makes the collar really tight around her neck. He affixes a leash to the collar, and he leads the woman around, verbally mocking and debasing her.”
“Debasing? How so?” said Angie.
Clearing his throat, he said, “By calling them dog bitches in heat, dirty cunts, that kind of thing. And he likes to hurt them a bit, to make them cry, and then he tells them to whimper louder, like an animal, and then he takes them on all fours, mounting them from behind. Sometimes he would take a new date out for a fancy dinner and be all chivalrous and gentle, and he’d bring them home, close the door, then suddenly shove them hard up against a wall with his hand around their throats. He loved to see the raw shock in their eyes.”
