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you wanted that you woulda brought a buncha cops with you. Everybody wants something, so just tell me what it is.”
    Stanton leaned forward. “I want the person that tortured and killed Hugh Neal.”
    Her face was stony for a moment and then she burst out laughing. “Really? That’s what you want? Do you know how many murders happen everyday? What the hell do you care?”
    “Let’s just assume I do. What information do you have for me that you haven’t given to the police?”
    She folded her arms. “What makes you think I have any?”
    “Because you wouldn’t have sent up two security guards to get me out of that room. You don’t want me finding something. What is it?” She was silent. “It couldn’t possibly be worse than credit card fraud.”
    She bit her lip. “I tell you, and you don’t send anyone to look at the books?”
    “I’ll consider it. But if you don’t tell me, my next call is to my fraud detail and then the FBI.”
    She nodded. “He was with an escort that night.”
    Stanton’s heart dropped. “What escort?”
    “I don’t know. We let an agency use our rooms and we get a cut. He was with one of them.”
    “And you didn’t want to lose their business so you didn’t say anything.”
    Her face contorted again. But this time it was with a mixture of fear and confusion. “Don’t judge me. Times are tough. We would have been outta business years ago if we didn’t make ends meet this way. Some fat bankers in New York make billions ripping us little guys off and then the government gives them dump trucks full of money, and I’m just supposed to go outta business without a fight? That ain’t fair.”
    “There’s other ways. You don’t have to sell your soul to make a living.”
    “I’m not selling anything except rooms. And pot and prostitution are gonna be legal in every state in twenty years. You just watch and see. You can’t ban what people want, not permanently.”
    Stanton actually agreed with her but he wasn’t about to share his political beliefs. “I want the name of the escort agency.”
    She sighed. “If they knew it was me that gave it to you, they’ll never use us again.”
    “I’ll try and keep your name out of it.”
    She hesitated a moment and then reached into a drawer. She slid the card across the desk.
    The card read, BABY DOLLS COMPANIONS.
    “We had a deal,” she said, nervousness in her voice now. “You won’t tell any more cops or the FBI.”
    “Refund all the money.”
    “What?”
    “Refund all the money to the customers. I’m going to put a note in my calendar to check back in sixty days. When I come, I’m coming with a warrant. I’ll look through the books myself and if you’ve refunded all the money, the investigation will end there. You have my word.” Stanton slipped the card into his shirt pocket. “Steal one dollar from one person, and we’ll look through everything. Including your personal accounts, which I’m sure you’ve been busy filling with embezzled, tax-free money. The IRS would like a peek at those too, I bet.”
    “Do you know—?”
    “I don’t care. Refund the money. Pot, I don’t care about. I’m sure you can more than make up for the stealing that way.”
    Stanton rose and walked out. She mumbled something under her breath, but when he looked back she was staring cold-faced at him.
    As he left the hotel, none of the employees would make eye contact. 

16
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Baby Dolls Companions was in a nondescript building in the Pearl City region of Oahu. The most famous landmark here was the harbor. Pearl Harbor functioned as part-museum and part-cemetery. Though as time wore on, the cemetery portion was being forgotten. Stanton pondered if the same thing would happen to Ground Zero in Manhattan.
    The building was basically a nice home; it might not have even been zoned for commercial use. He wondered if some county official had granted an exception in exchange for dates.
    After parking on the street