El Café: Justice for Lucy

By Claudia Flores-Bravo

This book is about Ray, an FBI agent that always remembers a case in which he promises Mrs. Perez, the mother of the victim, that he will give her answers. Now he needs to find out what happened to Lucy, the daughter. But during his investigation he must deal with memories of his past and falling in love with Diana. Diana who has had a rough childhood. Has decided not to let her past dictate her future. But finds herself discovering things she would had never known if it was not for Ray. Together they find themselves in a situation they never thought they would be.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Dec 1, 2020
• ISBN: 9781664144576

Book preview

Prologue

When they found Lucy floating in a hotel’s pool, everyone assumed she had killed herself. But people who knew Lucy remembered her as the light of her family. Her smile would just shine. She loved music and dancing. She was a self-starter too. She had started a computer channel in which she would promote different brands. These brands would provide the accessories and pay her a percentage for her promotion. It didn’t make sense that she would take her own life. Her mom was very vocal during all of the investigation.

My daughter was not suicidal. She had already made up her mind. That’s why she was there. Lucy had decided to leave her husband. She was beginning a new life. Lucy was ready to be who she was before she met Erick, she said.

After ten years of marriage, Lucy had chosen to be on her own. So, she temporarily moved to a small hotel. She had seen herself and didn’t like whom she had become, a yes, dear wife. That was the way Erick liked it. He had come into her life and, little by little, changed her in-to a sad and insecure person. Erick had tried to start his own business but failed. Lucy’s success just reminded him of his failure, and he resented her for that.

Sorry, Mrs. Perez, for your loss. Can we ask you some questions? Detective Taylor asked.

Only if you promise me that you are going look into what really happened to my daughter. Mrs. Perez replied, not with sorrow or emptiness. Her reply was with anger and certainty, like saying, If you do not find who did this, I will.

After Detective Taylor comforted Mrs. Perez, he listened to her calmly. His patience was uncommon, something that Mrs. Perez had not seen in cops. Most cops she had known just wanted to do what they wanted, without a why, who, or what. He heard her as she told him how her daughter and husband were having trouble. She also told him how Lucy had found out that Erick was having multiple affairs throughout their marriage. Mrs. Perez told Detective Taylor that her daughter was at that hotel because she had left her cheating husband, but she didn’t understand what he was doing there with her daughter. Detective Taylor asked Mrs. Perez if her daughter had a drug problem. You could see the anger in Mrs. Perez’s eyes, but before she could say a word, Detective Taylor reassured her that the questions were routine.

She asserted, loud and clear, My daughter didn’t use drugs and would only drink on special occasions. My daughter would never have done anything that would put her kids at risk.

Mrs. Perez, We promise we are doing our best to give you answers, Detective Taylor assured.

***

Erick Birkmire was tall, Five feet eight inches, with blue-gray eyes and dark blonde hair. He worked in the loan department of a bank. He appeared happy and happily married, but behind closed doors, he was something else. He demanded dinner to be ready as soon as he crossed the house’s doorway. The kids had to be clean and in their seats no matter what time he got home. He didn’t like it when Lucy would go out without him. Shopping for the house was something done by only him. The house had to be spotless. They had no more date nights. Once they had kids, she had disappeared from her friends’ lives. Her family would hardly see them. While Lucy did everything he asked, he went to special lunches, late-night dinners, and well-accompanied nights.

Where were you when your wife died? Detective Taylor asked.

I was here, sleeping. We had spent most of the night talking about our problems and trying to fix our marriage. I must have dozed off, Erick responded.

Did you see anything out of the ordinary? Or was she acting unusually? Detective Taylor asked.

She was taking some pills and drinking wine. That was different in her. He paused, as if he were holding back tears.

I asked her why she was taking pills. She told me the doctor had prescribed it.

Detective Taylor couldn’t figure out if Erick was acting or if he was really grief stricken. Either way, Detective Taylor asked him not to leave town and, if he could remember anything, to call him.

***

So, what do we have, Doc? Taylor asked.

It all indicates accidental death. There is a head contusion and water in the lungs. She could have hit herself on the head and fell in the pool and drowned, Doc Dug responded.

Do you have the blood results, Doc?

As Doc Dug checked the hyoid, he answered, You know the drill. Four to six weeks. You’ll have to check back later.

So, he went back to his office to connect some dots.

***

What do we have on the Lucy Birkmire Perez case? Chief Sanders asked. Everything seems to be pointing to accidental drowning … The mom, Mrs. Perez, insists her son-in-law had something to do with her daughter’s death . . . I’ll check it out just a while more. I still have to wait on the toxicology report. Taylor answered.

"I understand this is your first solo case, and you probably want to cross your t’s and dot your i’s. But it seems like an open-and-shut to me. Go ahead. Check your work. Just don’t lose much time on it. Are we clear, Taylor?"

As you say, Chief.

***

After a couple of weeks and before the tox report was in, Detective Taylor was asked to close the case and move on. So, he did. After all, he was a rookie, but he always felt that there was something missing. The doc’s report was inconclusive. It could not prove accidental death or murder, but Taylor was just not content with the outcome. He felt that this case would haunt him.

Chapter 1

Ray

I was eighteen when I had enlisted. When I got back from my service, I became a cop in my local town. Not long after I was recruited by the FBI, but before getting recruited I was a detective. At only twenty-six, I worked on my first case in my local town, El Centro, California. This case had haunted me for some years. See, that case was bittersweet for me. I was forced to close that case as an inconclusive drowning. The bitter part was that this case was never brought to a conclusion. It was my first lead detective case. After this case and a sad chapter in my life, I went to train with the FBI. After I had been assigned to the Criminal Investigation Division, in San Diego, California. Now at Thirty-two, I am a decorated agent. I finally felt that I was in a position where I could finish what I had promised to finish.

I, agent Raymond Taylor, am going after an unfinished case, a case where the examiner’s cause of death had been defined as inconclusive and only because I had asked him not to declare it as an accidental drowning. However, I had always carried the image of a mother who wanted answers, a mother who was sure that her daughter had been murdered by her ex-husband. That meant going back to a town I didn’t ever think to return to. After being forced to end investigations on that case and a failed engagement, I had promised myself not to ever return, but I felt that one promise cancelled out the other. I had to return, no, I needed to return and finish what I had started. I needed to find answers for that mother. That’s when I decided to ask for my vacation days and start an investigation into Mr. Erick Birkmire. I was sure that I was going to do everything in my power to give answers to a dedicated mother. A mother who had done everything in her power to give her girls all that they needed, a mother who loved her girls and was heartbroken and sure, oh so sure, that her daughter had not killed herself.

I got to work as soon as I got my vacation days. Even though I had not done undercover work in a long time, but I felt that the less people could recognize me, the better. I added highlights to my dark brown hair, making it look dark blonde. I changed my eye color from amber to dark brown. I was more built now than what I had been more than six years ago, broad shoulders, six foot one and tanned. I felt that no one was going to recognize me. When I looked at my reflection in the mirror, I did not recognize myself either. I bought sports and casual clothing made from light and fresh materials. I would never forget the desert heat. I knew it was early spring, so it was like a San Diego summer down in the Valley, as they call it.

The Imperial Valley had been my playground when I was a teen. I remember it was out to Sunbeam Lake on weekends with my pals or at Heber Beach. No, it was more like the Sand Beach and nothing more. Still, we had fun on those fall or spring nights, going to the drive-in on those nice winter days, while getting snuggles from your crush or girlfriend, that was just gravy, or going to Salton Sea and pretending to fish. However, those were the good memories. . . I also had that memory.

The summer before my senior year in high school, my parents had a car accident, and both passed. I was well set by my parent’s life insurance. Nevertheless, I missed them every day. I missed my mother’s hugs after a bad day. My mom was my rock. She would know what was going on with me just by looking at me. She always had a sweet word of advice. She would easily melt my worries a-way.

My dad was the opposite. He would always tell me, Son, a bad outcome always has a lesson behind it. You need to learn from it and move forward and never look back. He was also the planner of the family. He had planned my life since before I was born, but it was those plans that permitted me to emancipate myself from the state and live out all of my senior year in the house that I had shared with my parents. I will return to that house, a house that, for some reason, I never sold, but I paid to be kept up to date. Now though, it was stirring something in me. I had no idea what it was, or why I had that knot in my belly. I was never going to find an answer to that, but one answer I was planning to find was the one that would help that mother find some kind of closure to her grief.

As I drove into town, I noticed the