Agent Provocateur

Sissy,Carlotta ,Tyriq and I rang the doorbell in the quaint neighborhood in the Roxborough section of the city..

Carlotta greeted the middle aged white man who answered the door...He wore glasses and still had sandy blonde hair...

''Hola...I am Detective Carlotta Wallace and This is Detective Tyriq Pile ,Lieutenant Sissy Van Buren and Assistant District Attorney Keith Wallace...We are here to speak with you about your son, Tony...Mr. Robinson." she said.

He eyed all of us suspiciously....Then naturally asked...

''Is he in some kind of trouble?  I figure he must be if I get a visit from two detectives, their supervisor and an ADA." he said.

''Sit down sir" said Tyriq, who then handed him the Sickle Cell Anemia medical bracelet...

"We found this in the parking lot across the street from where your son works yesterday...and a lot of blood..blood that matches your son....but there was no sign of him...We want to know if you've heard from him sir..If you know where he might be or if he's injured in some kind of way." said Tyriq.

''No...Well no..I haven't heard from Tony in about a week...He came by here to wash his clothes...But that's normal...He's a boy...He didn't call me every day....His mother is deceased...been about a year now." he said.

"Mr. Robinson...We just want to find him...He's not in any trouble...but by the amount of blood we saw in that parking lot yesterday....He's possibly injured...in a life threatening kind of way....Was he in any kind of trouble with someone?..Did he owe anybody any money?" asked Sissy...

"The only money he owed was his student loans...He graduated from Temple five years ago and just started paying them back...The loan people call here all the time...But no..He didn't gamble....He works at this bar..Stoleys....but I suppose you know that."he said..

''Did he have any trouble with anyone there?" asked Carlotta..

''Well it's a bar....and he's a bouncer.....You know how that goes??...But nothing he lost any sleep about."said his father.

"Do you have a phone number for him?" I asked..

"Yeah...here is his home phone number...his work number and his cell phone number...and this is his email address..." said Mr. Robinson...."Oh yeah...This is where he actually lives."said his father.

''Thank you sir..We don't know anything just yet...We are just concerned sir."said Tyriq.

"Well Thank you." he said and we left...

II-

An hour later, Sissy and I and Detectives, Sirena Pile, Tyriq's Wife and Tony Hopkins, along with three uniform policemen were at Tony Robinson's apartment building in East Oak Lane...

 Sissy rang the door bell....The building super then opened the room for us...Sirena and three uniforms entered and searched each room...

''It's clear boss lady....Looks like nobody has been here for at least a day..." said Sirena.

"This place is too clean...Beds made...No dishes in the sink...Blinds drawn....Something just seems a bit off."said Hop..

''A little too neat for a single guy huh?" I laughed..

"Yeah..." he said...He went through his drawers..he found a role of condoms.....He shrugged...Then he found a black bra and matching panties....

''Look at this." said Hop....

''Still too neat for a single man partner?" laughed Sirena..

''Nothing strange about that...Just means he had a girlfriend..."said Sissy, who found a woman's bathrobe and two toothbrushes in the medicine cabinet.

A uniformed policeman found some photos of Tony and a girl with dark hair...

''These are time dated...they are from last year..."I said.

''Here are some more photos sir." said another officer...Sirena looked at them...

''These are more recent...She's a blonde..." said Sirena..

"Bag this stuff and tag it for evidence...If we find him alive and I certainly hope we do...He can have it back."said Sissy.

''Do you think he's alive Sissy?" I asked.

"Hard to say Keith...Hazel said that with that much blood loss if he didn't get some medical attention soon and she said within six hours...He was a goner...I just don't want to get his father upset and then we find out the guy is alive." said Sissy..."That's why I'm glad Chica and Rico didn't say we were Homicide." she continued..

III-

Duke called us...

''Yo Keith, Lou....I found the car!!!..."He said... ''Checking out the ATM Cams ,Traffic Cams and Crime Stopper cameras for the five mile radius panned out...You need to get over here." he said.

"The car, A 2011 Nissan Sentra was found on an abandoned street full of warehouses...with a brick in the windshield!!!.....No blood was found on it... At first I thought that maybe this was a B& E...But no B&E breaks the windshield to enter...Too much noise..too much glass...I got CSI guys looking for prints...There are a lot of prints on this car...a lot of em..."said Duke..

"Good Work Duke...There's no more to be done here...Did you run the plates?" asked Sissy..

"Yeah....They're Tony Robinson's...This is his car. I talked to a number of people around here...Bums, Homeless people, transients...Nobody knows how long the car was here or how it got here"said Duke.

''Pretty Hard for somebody to drive it here with four flat tires..."I said.

"I know...I'm calling all of the local tow truck companies in the area."said Duke.

"This guy is dead...Somebody hid his car...I'm 100 percent certain of it." I said.

"Yeah, but we got no body...."said Duke.

"No...but let's go find us some suspects." said Sissy.

IV-

''How come you and I have never been here?" I asked my wife Carlotta, as she, Sirena, Hop and I entered the tony Bar and lounge.

''Because you have not asked me to go or bothered to take me." she answered back and looked at me and laughed..She has such a devilish sexy laugh...

Like Aqua Bar...Stoley's was located on the third floor of a warehouse...It was beautiful inside...Like Aqua Bar, the drinks were high...The people, Black,White,Latino,Asian, young, ultra hip...The music...Hip Hop, Trap, Ska, Euro-pop....Not really my type of music....but my wife was a little younger than I...She might like it...I made a mental note to take her here...Especially if she had on one of her hot dresses or skirts..

Sirena introduced us to the bartender, a West African man named Rafi.....

"Rafi...I am Detective Sirena Pile and This is Detective Carlotta Wallace and Detective Tony Hopkins..And ADA Keith Wallace."she said.

"We are here investigating the disapearence of Tony Robinson." said Hop...

"Yes..When he didn't show up for work today or call in...I became concerned...I called Police Missing persons unit..."he said.

"Did Tony have any girlfriends?" asked Carlotta...

"He did..he had just started dating this woman..Uh, her name is Amber...Amber Moore...About six weeks ago...She comes in here a lot..She's not in here tonight though..." he said.

"Tell us about her." I asked.

"She is very pretty, about 29...She usually would come in with her business partner...Jimmy....Jimmy White..He's 29 too and his wife...Mellie... Uh Amber and Jimmy own a Website design business...Their business, "Agent Provocateur " was just named the area's 'Start Up of the year in Philadelphia Weekly..
The three of them came in here two weeks ago and Amber introduced Tony to Jimmy and his wife...It was weird...The guy Jimmy was giving Tony the third degree like he was Amber's father...Amber pulled him to the side and told him to cool it..and he said he didn't want to see her hurt again....like she had by so many other guys before...It was real touching..She told him that this was different ,that Tony was employed and that he kind of reminded her of him and he kind of backed off.." said Rafi.

"They had this entire conversation while his wife was sitting there listening to the whole thing?"asked Hop...

"Yeah...She looked kind of annoyed...But Jimmy sat down with her and began kissing her passionately, almost like he wanted Amber to see him and his wife making out...The whole thing was crazy...Amber and
Tony left soon afterwords.."said Rafi.

"We found his car this morning..Someone had smashed the windshield and flattened the tires....Do you have any idea who would do that?" asked Carlotta...

"No...I can't imagine.."he said.

Sirena showed him photos of two girls....

"The dark haired one...That's Tony's ex-- Raven McCallister ,They have been broken up for a year now...They were engaged..When they broke up..Tony took it really bad. She took it kinda bad herself.."said Rafi..

''Bad enough to smash up his car if she found out there was another woman in the picture?" asked Carlotta.

"Noo..No...That wasn't her...She cheated on him !!!He broke it off with her...She hasn't been around here in ages." he said.

Carlotta smiled...

"Thank you Rafi...you've been very helpful.."said Carlotta.

V-

When we returned to C.I.D., Ironically, there was Detective James "Jimmy" Barlow and three female uniformed policemen in the surveilience room...We hadn't seen him all day...Carlotta walked over to him..

''Hey Buddy, what are you doing here?" she said smiling..

''Working on this case....I found something weird...This guy...Tony Robinson...Has two Facebook profile pages..."said Jimmy...

"Maybe he forgot his password and started up another one."said Carlotta.

"Yeah...I thought that too, but there are entries on both as recently as yesterday."said Jimmy...

"Ouuuuuuuuuu, that is odd."said Carlotta.

Just then, Duke walked in...

 "Hey guys..Check this out...I found the tow truck company that towed that car...."Shawn's Towing Company" The tow truck driver said that he got a phone call from a man...presumably Tony Robinson at 2:30 pm yesterday afternoon with instructions on where to take that car....and that it was paid for over the phone with his credit card....The driver said that he never actually saw him." said Duke.

"But we know that Tony Robinson couldn't have made that call....He was already missing and that was just a half hour after we discovered all of that blood." said my wife Carlotta..

"The call had to be made by his killer...I'm just going to say it guys...I think he's dead and the killer is covering up..." said Jimmy.

"Much as I hate to say it...I think you guys are right...But it's very disturbing that we can't find a body...Without a body ,we still don't have any proof that he is in fact dead.."I said.

Tyriq and Hazel walked into the office just then....

"We got DNA off of the panties and bra that we found in his apartment and it matches the bathrobe and the toothbrush...We just don't know who it matches to."said Tyriq...

"That means he had a girlfriend that stays over ocassionally..." said Hazel..

''Well we have the name of the girlfriend...Amber Moore..." said Carlotta..

"Amber Moore? Really?? She's Hot!! I've seen photos of her in computer magazines...Her and her partner,James White have the hottest website design company in the city right now...Agent Provocateur."
said Jimmy.

Carlotta,Duke and Tyriq gave him the side eye..

''What would we do without Junior?"laughed Duke...

"Who are you Partner?" laughed Carlotta...

"Actually, we already knew that Jimmy...We were told that by a bartender in Stoleys."laughed Tyriq...

"Well You guys know that I'm a computer geek..I read up on all that stuff."laughed Jimmy...

I smiled ...."And I am glad you do Jimmy." I said.

We all laughed.


Meanwhile...We had a missing man....a lot of blood, a vandalized car and not a clue as to what happened to him.....but we all kind of knew....

Sissy walked in the room just then...She was smiling from ear to ear...She motioned for Jimmy to walk outside...We all looked at both of them strangely..They were whispering...Sissy was smiling and Jimmy smiled and held his head down...Sissy hugged him and jumped up and down like a school girl...

Nobody knew what this was about, but the two of them obviously had some secret....It had something to do with where he was today...

Whatever it was ..it was as much a mystery as all this blood and the fate of the missing Tony Robinson..


(TO BE CONTINUED)