“All right,” Jake said. “How about we check out the other guest rooms next? If we were, in fact, harboring a sex slave, that would be the most likely place to keep her, right?”
“Right,” Stivick agreed.
They went through all four of them, one by one, and then he took them to the composition room where he worked on his music. The deputies were all impressed by the room, looking at the guitars in their racks on two of the walls and the multitude of gold and platinum records that took up the entirety of another wall. Jake saw with alarm that Laura’s sweep of the house had not come through this room. His stashbox, which was a Cuban cigar box that contained a quarter ounce baggie of excellent pot, a pair of small scissors, and some rolling papers so he could get himself in the proper composition mood, was sitting on the desk amid the clutter of musical score sheets and notepaper, right in plain view. Thankfully, however, the ashtray, which was also on the desk and which often had a roach or two in it, had been dumped by Elsa before she had left on vacation (Jake had long since gotten over her throwing roaches away and she had subsequently discarded probably a thousand dollars worth of weed over the years). That ashtray was the only thing on the desk that she was allowed to touch. All three deputies noticed the box—they had cop eyes that missed little—and undoubtedly knew what it was for, but none made any comment on it. After all, the contents of the box were not in plain view and therefore they had no right to open it—a now clear legal precedent thanks to Matt Tisdale and his attorney a few years back.
“This is where you write your music?” asked Stivick.
“Ever since we’ve moved here,” he said. He pointed to the battered old Fender that sat in a place of honor on a tripod stand next to the desk. “That’s the guitar I always use. It’s the first acoustic I ever bought back when I was in high school.”
“That’s pretty cool,” observed Clark.
“I bet that will be worth some serious money someday,” put in Maxwell.
“It will never be for sale,” Jake said sincerely. “At least not in my lifetime or Laura’s lifetime.”
Next, they went to the office with its video monitors and computer screens that watched over everything. They were particularly impressed with his setup.
“Wow,” Stivick said, looking at everything. “This must have cost you a pretty penny.”
“More than twenty grand for everything,” Jake told him. “I need it though. There are lots of people in the world who would like to try to rip me off or attack me or my wife. I get letters from them sometimes. Nothing moves on this property without being seen on the cameras. The doors are all steel-reinforced and secured with security bars. The windows are all fitted with bullet-resistant glass that you can go at with a sledge hammer and they still won’t break.”
“Do you have guns?” asked Clark.
Jake shook his head. “So far, I haven’t felt the need for one.”
“You might want to think that over,” suggested Stivick. “You’re a ways off the beaten path here on this cliff. Our response time to your house on a busy night might be as much as fifteen minutes, maybe longer depending on where our units are. A lot can happen in fifteen minutes.”
Jake nodded thoughtfully. “I’ll take that under consideration,” he said.
“I’d suggest a shotgun,” said Stivick. “There is nothing in the world better for home defense than a 12-gauge pump action loaded with double-ought buck. The sound of you racking one in will scare off ninety-five percent of intruders. And, if worst comes to worst and you have to engage, you’ll hit anything you’re shooting at at close range and the rounds won’t go through a wall and kill someone in another room.”
“This is assuming that you are allowed to own a gun,” said Maxwell. “Do you have any felony convictions?”
“Convictions? No. I’ve been accused of various things here and there but have never even been convicted of speeding.”
They passed a look around but said nothing.
He took them to the garage next, turning on the lights and letting them see his BMW, Elsa’s Four-Runner, and Laura’s Volkswagen. The rest of the space in the garage was empty except for a small tool chest filled with hammers, screwdrivers, wrenches, and other things needed for simple household repair (which was inevitably done by Elsa).
“And that’s the tour, gentlemen,” he said as they headed back toward the living room and the foyer.
“What about upstairs?” asked Clark.
“There is no upstairs,” Jake said. “The house is one level only. My goal in building it here was not to be pretentious. There is an attic, however, and you are welcome to poke your heads up there to make sure I don’t have a tranny chained up inside.”
“Is it easy to access?” asked Stivick.
“It is,” Jake said. “It has one of those ring pull things with a ladder that comes down.”
“I suppose we should take a quick look,” Stivick said.
Jake led them back to the main hallway, which was where the access hatch was located. He opened it up and the ladder slid down. A light automatically came on up there when the ladder extended. Stivick climbed up enough to poke his head inside and see that there was nothing but the furnace, the air conditioning coils, insulation, and a few boxes of things like Christmas decorations and old clothes.
“Looks like an attic to me,” Stivick said, climbing back down.
Jake pushed the ladder back up and the hatch sealed once again. “All right then,” he said. “Are you satisfied that we are keeping no one here against his or her will?”
“Almost,” Stivick said. “I noticed when we pulled in that there is another structure here on the property. The house next to this one?”
“That is where the actual maid stays,” Jake said. “Her name is Elsa Tyler, I pay her for her services, she is from Nigeria originally, she is old enough to be my mother, and she is on Christmas vacation right now.”
“Do you mind if we take a quick look through that house as well?” Stivick asked.
“I cannot consent to that,” Jake said. “That is Elsa’s house, her private space. I have not been inside there since I did the final walk-through for closing on the property.”
“But you have a key to it, right?”
“I do, but, as I said, that is Elsa’s private residence and I cannot and will not give consent for you to enter it.”
“Perhaps you could call this Elsa person and obtain consent from her?” suggested Clark.
“I will not even ask her,” Jake said. “Searching her residence is not reasonable.”
“But if you were keeping someone captive, that would be the logical place to do it,” said Stivick.
“Really?” Jake said, raising his brows. “Keep an underage captive in a separate house where we can’t see what she is doing, where she could just wander off at will?”
“Again, Jake,” Stivick said, “I am not saying that I believe you are actually holding someone against their will here. I am just saying that I cannot, in good conscience, write in the report for the PIO that we have determined the accusation to be false unless I look inside that house as well.”
Jake sighed again. He did not get the impression that Stivick was trying to coerce him. He was just stating a fact. But that did not change his decision. Maybe, however, there was another way.
“I can’t let you search Elsa’s house,” he said. “But what if I were able to prove to you beyond a reasonable doubt that the email that all of this is based on is completely made up?”
“How would you do that?” Stivick asked.
Jake smiled. “Let’s go back to the office,” he said.