by J. M. LeDuc
She cocked the trigger of her gun. The action caused all of her unit to draw their weapons.
“Alpha sniper, do you copy?”
“I’m here, boss lady,” Garcia responded.
“Take out the two heading for the back. We don’t have time to corral the strays.”
“My pleasure.”
As Sin and her men plowed through the door to the mechanical room, gunshots splintered the door frame.
“Fuck, I’m hit!” Fletcher yelled, stumbling behind a cement support post.
Sin spun one hundred and eighty degrees, hit the ground flat and fired with both barrels toward the door. It seemed like slow motion as she watched the face of the first assassin burst into a collage of blood and guts. The second took cover behind the door.
Sin glanced at Fletcher. He was hit in the lower leg. It wasn’t life threatening, but he would need help getting out. “Two of you help Fletch, and everyone head for the back door. I’ll cover you. Garcia, what’s your status?”
“One bitch is down and I have the others penned in. Your exit is clear, repeat, your exit is clear.”
“I’m not leaving you here alone,” Fletcher groaned.
“Move, that’s an order!”
As her unit made a run for the rear door, the assassin rolled across the entrance, firing as he moved. Sin countered and kept his aim off target. She quickly holstered her empty .45s and pulled her semiautomatic from her waist. She jumped to her feet, emptying her magazine as she headed toward the exit. Nearing the emergency exit, Sin gave the final orders. “Garcia, bug out. Wilson, blow this fucker!”
“But, you’re not—”
“Blow it!” she yelled.
Sin turned and ran blindly as the compression of the explosion knocked her off her feet. She stumbled―crawled―her way to the water and dove in with every bit of strength she had.
Her unit swam as hard as they could. With each explosion, more debris rained down, forcing them to dive deeper in the water. Fifty yards out from the shore, they pulled up and surfaced. Looking back, all that could be seen was fire and a building crumbling in upon itself.
“Nice job, Evans,” Sin spitting water between words. “The building imploded.”
“Thank Charlie,” Evans panted. “I just followed his design.”
“Bravo, did you see anyone get out?” Sin asked.
“Not alive, Alpha leader. Their fearless leader tried to scramble as soon as the first detonation blew, but I put a .50 caliber bullet in his chest as soon as he tried to bug out.”
“Good work,” Sin gasped, tired from treading water. “We’ll see everyone back at home base.”
“Can we congratulate each other later,” Fletcher breathed, “I think I’m about to pass out.”
57
“It’s good to hear your voice,” Charlie said.
Sin sat on the front stoop of Manuel’s home. “What have you heard from Washington?”
“Westcott is going freaking nuts,” Charlie said. “Troy has had a hard time keeping up with him. He’s been going from coffee shop to bar to his office to just wandering around. Constantly checking his phone and getting angrier with every glance.”
“He’s probably trying to reach his men,” Sin said. “It’s nice to know the bastard is squirming.”
“Let’s end the squirming and get you home.”
“Patch us through when you’re ready.”
“Are you sure Manuel can handle this?”
Sin looked back at Manuel who was sitting at the table staring at the pile of money—his money. “Yeah, he can handle it.”
A few minutes later, Charlie patched Sin’s phone through to Westcott’s. He bounced the signal off of so many satellites, that it would be impossible to trace.
Westcott was pacing the parking lot on the east side of the Pentagon when his phone rang. “Who the hell is this?” he growled through gritted teeth.
Manuel started to rattle on in Spanish, talking as fast as he could.
“Who the fuck is this?” Westcott yelled.
“My name is Manuel,” Manuel said in broken English. “Phone given to me by large man with dark beard.” He described the leader of the mercenary squad.
“Where is Kennedy?” Westcott was practically pulling his hair out as he stomped the pavement.
“I served them at the cantina and saw them go into the abandoned building, but the building is no more.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Westcott’s voice kept getting higher and louder. “What building and where are the men you saw?”
“The Condominio Elegante, Signor. As soon as the men enter, the entire building exploded.”
“Did you see anyone else enter the building?”
“Si signor, but they are dead, too. Everyone is dead.”
Westcott slumped over the hood of a parked car. “When you say everyone, what do you mean?”
“I mean everyone. The men I saw and the people they were following—everyone.”
Westcott’s voice perked up at the news. “Are you sure?”
“Si.”
Westcott laughed loud enough that he could be heard through the receiver in Manuel’s home.
“One more thing, Senor,” Manuel said, “the man with the beard owed me money and—”
“Fuck you,” Westcott said.
The line went dead.
Manuel gave the phone back to Sin and looked back at the money on the table. “No, fuck you, Senor.”
The next morning, Sin said her goodbyes to Manuel and Serena.
She and her unit made their way back to a small executive airport next to Tonconin International where Charlie met them for the flight home.
58
Sin sat in her rented apartment in Georgetown, mesmerized by what she saw on her computer monitor. Charlie had provided her with all the information he had amassed on Westcott and Marilyn.
He walked around the sparsely furnished room while Sin studied the screen. “You’ve been trailing Westcott for months,” he said, “and the best you could come up with was a card table, two chairs, and a mattress?”
Sin pointed to the kitchen. “There is a coffee maker and a fridge—all the necessities.” She stared at the monitor, “If I wasn’t looking at both pictures side-by-side, I wouldn’t believe it was the same person.”
“The difference is amazing,” Charlie said, standing behind her.
On the left side of the monitor was a picture of a chunky, plain, redhead. In that picture, the woman was standing next to Folsom Westcott.
“This picture—the before picture—was on your wall at the hangar, right?”
Charlie swigged the last of his cold coffee. “Yeah, it was taken on the day you graduated from the academy, six years ago. The original had you, me, and Alex in the foreground.” He leaned over Sin’s shoulder and moved the mouse to another file and clicked. “Here’s the original picture.”
On the screen was the picture Sin remembered from Charlie’s hangar. In the background were the mysterious redhead and Westcott.
Sin raked her fingers through her hair. “What made you think of looking at this photo?”
Charlie poured another mug of coffee and sat down in the metal folding chair beside Sin.
“After Heap was killed, there was a picture of his wife in the paper. Something about it didn’t sit right. It was as if she was too familiar and, it gnawed at me. I drove to the airport because I always think better when I pace the hangar. That’s when I saw this picture.” He pointed to the original. “Every time I looked at it, those eyes kept looking back at me. I scanned it into my computer, enhanced it, and stared at it with the same expression on my face as you have on yours right now.”
Sin sat back in her chair and stretched. “As farfetched as that is, I can accept it because you’re such a conspiracy theorist. But how did you go from point A,” she pointed at the before picture, “to point B?” she asked, pointing at the after photo. “I mean, damn, look at her. She must be at
least eighty pounds lighter and her entire facial structure is different, not to mention the blond hair.”
“In this business, Sinclair, sometimes it’s not the things you see, but the things you don’t that are the biggest clues.”
“Come again, Obi Wan?”
“You can change a lot with plastic surgery. Hell, look at her. Every physical attribute was changed. But, what you can’t change in people are their postural cues. When people get stressed or too relaxed, they always go back to their natural movements.” Charlie took the mouse and scrolled down to another file. Opening it, he brought up a series of photos.
“You have to remember, I’ve been around Washington and Westcott for longer than I care to mention. I’d been in the company of Ms. Magdalene Ramirez a number of times.” He enlarged two photos. “This is the old Maggie. Look at the way she cocks her hip and stands with her right foot turned in. Back then,” Charlie said, “she used to walk with a limp.
“Now, look at the new and improved Maggie.” He enlarged a second photo. “I took this one two days after Heap’s funeral. Notice her posture.”
Sin eyed both photos. “I’ll be damned, same hip angle and same turning in of the foot.”
“Yeah, she even had a slight limp,” Charlie added, “it was just hard to notice because of her exaggerated hip sway.”
Sin stood and poured herself another cup of coffee. “Magdalene,” Sin mumbled under her breath, “all this time, I thought York was saying Marilyn and he was saying Magdalene.”
She looked at Charlie who had a smug expression on his face.
“Are you going to tell me how Westcott’s girlfriend; the fat, frumpy wall flower—Magdalene Ramirez, became the pious yet sexy, Maggie Heap or am I going to have to read the entire file?”
“Sit back down, young lady, and let Uncle Charlie tell you a story.”
“Wise ass,” Sin laughed. “I’m not sitting on your lap so don’t go there.”
Charlie chuckled. “As you know, everything is connected, and I’m not just talking this case.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Sin waved for him to proceed. “I know, the entire world is one big conspiracy. God and Satan are brothers and Bin Laden is still alive. So tell me something I don’t know.”
Charlie cut his eyes at Sin, turned his attention back to the monitor, and brought up another file. “Heap’s obituary told of how he had been married for nine years, but when I checked, there was no marriage license, so―”
“So, you kept digging.”
“Yeah,” Charlie pulled on his beard, “I kept digging. Now stay with me on this because it gets a little disjointed until it isn’t.”
“You mean like that sentence?”
“Anyway,” Charlie let the word hang for a few seconds before continuing, “Westcott has always kept his private life very private. A lot of people thought he was gay. Hell, maybe he is, it doesn’t really matter. Five years ago, he started to show up at functions unattended. A year later, Heap showed up in Tumbleboat with his wife.”
“Why would Heap show up with a fake wife?”
“It was all part Westcott’s plan. He handpicked Heap from the back woods of Louisiana. Heap was a small-time street preacher who claimed to be a prophet. He even preached that he was the second coming. He had no following and was just a bit delusional.”
“A bit? He sounds like he was more than two slices short of a loaf.”
“Maybe a little more than ‘a bit’,” Charlie agreed, “but that all made him easy pickings for Westcott. Folsom needed a front, a solid front for his trafficking ring. The church and orphanage were perfect for him and Heap was the perfect chump.”
“Okay,” Sin interjected, “I get why Heap went along with it. He actually thought Westcott was trying to help him.”
“Right, and Westcott convinced him that any respectable, conservative, southern preacher needed a conservative, southern wife.”
“As fucked up and bizarre as all that is, I get it,” Sin said. “Heap was just a dumbass, backwoods preacher who saw himself as the second coming, who was easy prey, but why Tumbleboat and where does Miller fit into all of this.”
“Tumbleboat was in financial trouble. After the hurricanes of a few years ago, the fishing company was in shambles and there were more boats dry-docked than on the water.” Charlie had a gleam in his eye. “You could say, the citizens of Tumbleboat were looking for a savior.”
Sin made an expression like she just bit into a lemon. “That was cheesy, even for you.”
“Sorry, I couldn’t resist. Anyway, Westcott knew Miller from some of his twisted chat rooms. He became aware of Tumbleboat through Miller. The Keys have always been an accessible port of ingress for all types of smuggling due to its proximity to Central America and the Caribbean, so it all made sense. Westcott was able to ply Miller with more money than he had ever seen and supply him with girls for his perverted games. All Miller had to do was agree to play dungeon master in their little films.”
“I know you prefaced that this story would be disjointed, but help bring this back to Magdalene,” Sin said.
“I did a lot of digging into Westcott’s private life. I tapped his personal and business computers.”
“How?”
Charlie’s right eyebrow rose. “You of all people should know that if I fish long enough, I’m bound to catch what I need.”
Sin rolled her eyes and gestured for him to continue.
“Finding Miller and Tumbleboat were a dream come true for him, but . . .” Charlie stopped Sin from interrupting, “he needed someone to oversee the operation. That’s when he came up with the idea of sending Magdalene down there with Heap.”
“I am so confused,” Sin said.
“Stay with me,” Charlie pressed. “It will come together in just a minute.”
“It better, you’re giving me a freaking headache.”
“You need to read Maggie’s bio, later. It will fill in a lot of gaps, but for the sake of time just realize that Maggie was very pliable. She may be a dominant bitch now, but that wasn’t always the case. Westcott knew her weaknesses and he used them for all they were worth.”
Sin slouched in the chair, her head hung back over the metal frame, her legs splayed, and arms hung by her side. “My head is pounding,” she whined.
“Once Westcott had all the pieces of the puzzle,” Charlie continued, “all he had to do was assemble them. If Miller hadn’t been so careless when dumping the bodies of the girls, he’d still be in business.”
Sin sat straight up in the chair. “Did you find proof that Miller killed Alex and the other agents?”
Charlie turned his eyes downcast. “Yeah,” he nodded. “Frank had Miller’s computer confiscated and I was able to find erased emails between Miller and Westcott detailing the agents’ assignments, Westcott’s termination orders, and Miller’s affirmation of the completed kills.”
Sin eyed a photo of Miller that Charlie had brought up on the computer monitor. “I’m glad he’s dead. I’ll be happier on January first.”
59
Sin sat alone in her apartment, in front of the computer, reading and re-reading Maggie’s bio until her eyes ached. It read like a poorly written soap opera.
The file told of a girl who was given up for adoption at birth. The adoption fell through and she was rendered to a state facility. There were report after report from caregivers and administrators saying how she was a sweet, vulnerable child, but always over-looked for adoption because she was too shy to speak and not as ‘cute’ as the other children.
Sin scrolled up to a particular passage and read it verbatim.
“On June fifth, Nineteen Hundred and Eighty Seven, Magdalene R., a thirteen-year-old girl, was found beaten and unconscious in the stairwell of Stallings Home for Girls. Miss. R. could not or would not identify any of her attackers.”
After that date, Maggie regressed further into her own world. No other incidents were noted in the file and the state lost track of her when she
was released at the age of eighteen.
There was a gap in Maggie’s bio until she was spotted ten years later on the arm of Folsom Westcott: up and coming attorney and political juggernaut.
Charlie had described her as meek and submissive in nature whenever she was in public. She never looked anyone in the eye and never initiated conversation.
She was typical of a lot of abused women I’ve known, thought Sin. But all that seemed to change after her plastic surgery. The abused became the abusive.
For a moment, Sin felt sad for Magdalene Ramirez, but then she scrolled the computer files and viewed the pictures of the dead girls.
“I don’t give a shit what hand the world dealt you, Magdalene,” Sin said aloud. “You could have risen above it. Instead, you chose to sink deep into it.”
For the next two weeks, Sin followed Maggie while Troy kept a constant eye on Westcott.
On the night of December thirtieth, she met with Charlie at the coffee shop.
“Sin,” Charlie said, “let me bring Frank in on this―”
“No,” she interrupted.
“Why not, we know we can trust him. We have concrete proof of Westcott’s involvement in the trafficking ring and the filming.” He reached out and held Sin’s hand. “We have him dead to rights.”
“It’s not Frank I’m worried about,” Sin said. “Westcott is too connected to leave it up to chance. Two of the ‘guests’ we disposed of were federal judges. How many more does Westcott have in his back pocket?” She shook her head, “I’m not leaving this one up to the courts.” Her expression darkened. “This can only end one way. I’m judge, jury, and executioner!”
Charlie grabbed Sin’s coat. “You play this hand, Sinclair; there is no going back.”
She placed the file under coat and winked. “I still have one ace up my sleeve.”
60
“I’m glad you accepted my invitation,” Graham said.
