The Missing Witness by Allison Brennan
About the Book:
When a key witness
goes missing, Quinn & Costa must find her before a killer silences her for
good…
Detective Kara Quinn is back in Los Angeles to testify
against a notorious human trafficker, finally moving past the case that upended
her life. But when the accused is shot in broad daylight, the chaotic scene of
the crime turns up few reliable bystanders. And one witness—a whistleblower who
might be the key to everything—has disappeared.
After another person close to the case is killed, it’s clear
that anyone who knows too much is in danger, and tracking down the witness
becomes a matter of life-and-death. But as explosive secrets surface within the
LAPD and FBI, Kara questions everything she thought she knew about the case,
her colleagues and the life she left behind months ago.
Now with FBI special agent Matt Costa’s help, she must race
to find the missing witness and get to the bottom of the avalanche of
conspiracies that has rocked LA to its core…before it's too late.
Excerpt:
1
My parking garage off Fifth was
nearly a mile from where I worked at city hall. I could have paid twice as much
to park two blocks from my building and avoid the rows of homeless people: the
worn tents, the used needles, the stinking garbage, the aura of hopelessness
and distrust that filled a corner park and bled down the streets.
I was listening to my favorite
podcast, LA with A&I. Amy and Ian started the podcast two years ago to talk
about computer gaming, technology, entertainment and Los Angeles. It had
blossomed into a quasi news show and they live streamed every morning at seven.
They’d riff on tech and local news as if sitting down with friends over coffee.
Like me, they were nerds, born and bred in the City of Angels. I’d never met
Amy or Ian in real life, but felt like I’d known them forever.
We’d chatted over Discord, teamed
up to play League of Legends, and I often sent them interesting clips about
gaming or tech that they talked about on their podcast, crediting my gaming
handle. Twice, we’d tried to set up coffee dates, but I always chickened out. I
didn’t know why. Maybe because I thought they wouldn’t like me if they met me.
Maybe because I was socially awkward. Maybe because I didn’t like people
knowing too much about my life.
Today while I drove to work,
they’d discussed the disaster that was city hall: all the digital files had
been wiped out. The news story lasted for about five minutes, but it would be
my life for the next month or more as my division rebuilt the data from backups
and archives. It was a mess. They laughed over it; I tried to, but I was
beginning to suspect the error was on purpose, not by mistake.
Now they were talking about a
sweatshop that had been shut down last week.
“We don’t know much,” Amy said.
“You’d think after eight days there’d be some big press conference, or at least
a frontpage story. The only thing we found was two news clips—less than ninety
seconds each—and an article on LA Crime Beat.”
“David Chen,” Ian said, “a Chinese
American who allegedly trafficked hundreds of women and children to run his
factory in Chinatown, was arraigned on Monday, but according to Crime Beat, the
FBI is also investigating the crime. And—get this— the guy is already out on
bail.”
“It’s fucked,” Amy said. “Look,
I’m all for bail reform. I don’t think some guy with weed in his pocket should
have to pay thousands of bucks to stay out of jail while the justice system
churns. But human trafficking is a serious crime—literally not two miles from
city hall, over three hundred people were forced to work at a sweatshop for no
money. They had no freedom, lived in a hovel next door to the warehouse. Crime
Beat reported that the workers used an underground tunnel to avoid being
seen—something I haven’t read in the news except for one brief mention. And
Chen allegedly killed one of the women as he fled from police. How did this guy
get away with it? He kills someone and spends no more than a weekend behind
bars?”
“According to Crime Beat, LAPD
investigated the business for months before they raided the place,” Ian said.
“But Chen has been operating for years. How could something like this happen
and no one said a word?”
I knew how. People didn’t see
things they didn’t want to.
Case in point: the homeless
encampment I now walked by.
I paused the podcast and popped my
earbuds back into their charging case.
“Hello, Johnny,” I said to the
heroin addict with stringy hair that might be blond, if washed. I knew he was
thirty-three, though he looked much older. His hair had fallen out in clumps,
his teeth were rotted, and his face scarred from sores that came and went. He
sat on a crusty sleeping bag, leaned against the stone wall of a DWP
substation, his hollow eyes staring at nothing. As usual, he didn’t acknowledge
me. I knew his name because I had asked when he wasn’t too far gone. Johnny,
born in Minnesota. He hadn’t talked to his family in years. Thought his father
was dead, but didn’t remember. He once talked about a sister and beamed with
pride. She’s really smart. She’s a teacher in…then his face dropped because he
couldn’t remember where his sister lived.
Four years ago, I left a job
working for a tech start-up company to work in IT for city hall. It was barely
a step up from entry-level and I couldn’t afford nearby parking garages. If I
took a combination of buses and the metro, it would take me over ninety minutes
to get to work from Burbank, so factoring the combination of time and money,
driving was my best bet and I picked the cheapest garage less than a mile from
work.
I used to cringe when I walked by
the park. Four years ago, only a dozen homeless tents dotted the corner; the
numbers had more than quadrupled. Now that I could afford a more expensive
garage, I didn’t want it. I knew most of the people here by name.
“Hey, Toby,” I greeted the old
black man wearing three coats, his long, dirty gray beard falling to his
stomach. He had tied a rope around his waist and attached it to his shopping
cart to avoid anyone stealing his worldly possessions when he slept off his alcohol.
“Mizvi,” he said, running my name
together in a slur. He called me “Miss Violet” when he was sober. He must have
still been coming down off whatever he’d drank last night.
I smiled. Four years ago I never
smiled at these people, fearing something undefinable. Now I did, even when I
wanted to cry. I reached into my purse and pulled out a bite-size Hershey Bar.
Toby loved chocolate. I handed it to him. He took it with a wide grin,
revealing stained teeth.
One of the biggest myths about the
homeless is that they’re hungry. They have more food than they can eat. That
doesn’t mean many aren’t malnourished. Drug and alcohol abuse can do that to a
person.
A couple weeks ago a church group
had thought they would bring in sandwiches and water as part of community
service. It was a nice gesture, sure, but they could have asked what was needed
instead of assuming that these people were starving. Most of the food went
uneaten, left outside tents to become rat food. The plastic water bottles were
collected to return for the deposit, which was used to buy drugs and alcohol.
But no one gave Toby chocolate, he
once told me when he was half-sober. Now, whenever I saw him—once, twice a
week—I gave him a Hershey Bar. He would die sooner than he should, so why
couldn’t I give him a small pleasure that I could afford? Toby was one of the
chronics, a man who’d been on the street for years. He had no desire to be
anywhere else, trusted no one, though I thought he trusted me a little. I
wished I knew his story, how he came to be here, how I could reach him to show
him a different path. His liver had to be slush with the amount of alcohol he
consumed. Alcohol he bought because people, thinking they were helping—or just
to make themselves feel better—handed him money.
As I passed the entrance to the
small park, the stench of unwashed humans assaulted me. The city had put four
porta-potties on the edge of the park but they emptied them once a month, if
that. They were used more for getting high and prostitution than as bathrooms.
The city had also put up fencing, but didn’t always come around to lock the
gate. Wouldn’t matter; someone would cut it open and no one would stop them.
Trespassing was the least of the crimes in the area.
I dared to look inside the park,
though I didn’t expect to see her. I hadn’t seen her for over a week. I found
myself clutching my messenger bag that was strapped across my chest. Not
because I thought someone would steal it, but because I needed to hold
something, as if my bag was a security blanket.
I didn’t see her among the tents
or the people sitting on the ground, on the dirt and cushions, broken couches
and sleeping bags, among the needles and small, tin foils used to smoke
fentanyl. I kicked aside a vial that had once held Narcan, the drug to counteract
opioid overdoses. The clear and plastic vials littered the ground, remnants of
addiction.
There was nothing humane about
allowing people to get so wasted they were on the verge of death, reviving
them, then leaving them to do it over and over again. But that was the system.
The system was fucked.
Blue and red lights whirled as I
approached the corner. I usually crossed Fifth Street here, but today I
stopped, stared at the silent police car.
The police only came when someone
was dying…or dead.
Mom.
I found my feet moving toward the
cops even though I wanted to run away. My heart raced, my vision blurred as
tears flashed, then disappeared.
Mom.
Excerpted from The Missing
Witness by Allison Brennan, Copyright © 2024 by Allison Brennan. Published by
MIRA Books.
Purchase
Links:
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/077836965X/httpwwwalli0f-20
Books a Million: https://www.booksamillion.com/product/9780778369653
About the Author:
ALLISON BRENNAN is the New York Times and USA TODAY bestselling
and award-winning author of over forty novels, including The Sorority Murder.
She lives in Arizona with her husband, five kids and assorted pets. The Missing
Witness is the fifth thriller in the new Quinn & Costa series.
Keep in touch on social media:
Author Website: https://www.allisonbrennan.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AllisonBrennan
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Allison_Brennan
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/abwrites/
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/52527.Allison_Brennan
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