Shadows of Deceit (A Series of Shadows)

by Mell Corcoran

  “Me?” Lou feigned a look of indignation. “I cannot believe you would think such a thing!”

  Miles rolled his eyes then walked over to sit down at the table. He opened a folder and grabbed a pen then began to scribble.

  “Now you need to wait for me to sign off.” Cantor reminded her. “Don’t go strapping on your holster just yet, OK?”

  “I won’t. I promise.” Lou thought it sounded sincere but by the snort emitted by Miles, she guessed not. “I promise! I have plenty I can do from here for the next day or two anyhow.”

  “Day or two. You are assuming those labs come back in your favor!” Shevaun appeared out of nowhere, scolding Lou already. “You better put those brakes on young lady. Until Doctor Cantor signs his name on that dotted line, you are still benched. You got that?”

  “Well I owe myself fifty bucks.” Lou grinned. “I bet myself you were going to show up during the stress test. I’m surprised you held out so long.”

  “Very funny.” Shevaun was clearly not seeing the humor.

  “I got it, Momma.” Lou walked over and wrapped her arms around her mother. “Please try not to worry so much?”

  “Please try not to be such a pain in my ass?” Shevaun mimicked Lou with a condescending tone as she held her daughter for a long while.

  Lou grinned and held her mother tight. “I’ll try, Momma.”

  It was another half hour before Lou’s mother and the doctors finished reading her the riot act and she was able to retreat back to her room. When she walked in the door she immediately spotted Niko casually leaning back in her desk chair, examining the data that was scrolling across the screen while sipping from a mug.

  “When did you get here?” Lou wasn’t really surprised to see him.

  “About an hour ago.” Niko flashed his wicked smile at her and gestured with his cup. “Your out of kona blend.”

  “Good to know.” Lou smirked. “Write it down for me or I’ll forget.”

  “Already did.” He looked back at the monitor and squinted a little.

  “You can’t possibly be able to read that, can you?” Lou looked at the screen and started to get a headache from the data zipping by, right to left. She was sure each entry was visible for less then a nanosecond before the next one pushed it out of view.

  “Yeah, but it’s kind of annoying.” He set down his mug and rubbed his eyes. “I’m not sure why I do that.”

  “Because you can.” Lou said with a grin as she dumped her empty water bottle into the wastebasket under her desk. “Mind if we skip our workout? I just ran the gauntlet for the docs and I am pooped.”

  “Yeah, no.” Niko caught himself reading the data again, it was addicting. “Gah! I mean, yeah, I know. Max told me they were going to grill you to see if you could cut the mustard. I didn’t feel like working out today anyway. Hit the showers then we can talk.”

  “You? Not want to work out?” Lou mocked. The man was a physical beast and could probably crush her with one hand. “You feeling OK?”

  “You’re a funny little girl. Now quit messin’ around. We got work to do.” He waved her off and resumed watching the screen.

  Niko Gattilusio was Max’s first lieutenant and over the past several weeks had become like Lou’s big brother. He personally stood guard over her while she was in the hospital and when they brought her home, he set up camp on her terrace which is where Lou suspected he and Angus bonded. Niko would not leave except to walk the perimeter until the new security system and teams were put in place, both at the house and in the community. He had taken it personally when she was kidnapped by Albert and although he would never admit it, he blamed himself for Albert getting away.

  When Lou finally was up and about, Niko took great time and care to help her learn everything he felt she needed to know in order to handle the position of Principate. He also walked with her every day until she was able to start her official rehabilitation. Once that began, he trained with her every day since. Niko liked Lou from the get go, not just because Max was smitten with her, that was just the bonus. He liked her because she was smart, quick witted and tough as nails in the little package she came in. Lou saw past Niko’s bad assed exterior and treated him like the silly geek he really was. They got each other’s sense of humor and she never put up with his crap. Just as Lou considered him the big brother she never had, he claimed her as the little sister he always wanted.

  Lou emerged from the shower several minutes later fresh as a daisy in her Kings hockey jersey and yoga pants. Niko was still in her chair but now he was talking on his cell while petting Angus who was sound asleep in his lap. Recently Lou was wondering if Angus liked Niko more than her.

  “We got I.D.’s on your guys.” He informed her after ending his call.

  “How’d you know I was looking for I.D.’s?” It didn’t really surprise her that he knew but she preferred to know how.

  “A flag pops on the Council system when a search is initiated on people we have interests in.” He reached around carefully to the side of the desk, trying not to wake Angus as he pulled several sheets of paper from the printer.

  “Have interests in? The victims were Sanguinostri?” Lou had expected Caroline would have discovered that right away.

  “No, they were not Sanguinostri. These guys are people on our radar though.” Niko sorted the print outs and turned the chair around to face her. “They are not nice guys who work for even worse guys that we would rather not exist for too much longer.”

  “Why do you always have to be so cryptic and talk in riddles?” Lou snatched the papers out of his hand, startling Angus in the process. “Why can’t you just say they are thugs who work for criminals you are trying to knock off legitimately?”

  “Because my way sounds nicer and more sophisticated.” He snickered and began stroking Angus to calm him down. “Isn’t that right, Angus?”

  Angus looked up at Niko and mewed as if he were a sweet little kitten which made Lou want to gag. She plopped down into the overstuffed chair and scanned the profiles of their three victims.

  Marco Salazar was a Colombian national along with his brother Juan Salazar. They were both low level enforcers for a well known Colombian drug cartel and had entered the U.S. illegally several days ago, completely under the radar. The two had absolutely no record in the U.S nor did they have any known contacts within the states. Why they were here was just as much a mystery as how they ended up without their heads.

  Johan Esterhuizen was a South African arms dealer although he apparently kept his options open. He had been known to dabble in smuggling everything from weapons, to people to embargoed gemstones. British Intelligence had recently upgraded him from bad to worse when they received a tip that he was looking to sell an unidentified biological to the highest bidder.

  “What the hell does ‘unidentified biological’ mean?” Lou didn’t like the implications.

  “Exactly what you think it means.” Niko gently scooped the cat from his lap, got up and placed him in the empty chair next to Lou. “I would say some sort of nasty virus that could potentially kill a whole lot of people if it landed in the wrong hands.”

  “Well that’s reassuring.” Lou watched Niko step outside. “Where the hell is it if this guy is dead and he didn’t sell it yet?”

  “The plot thickens, doesn’t it detective?” He pulled his antique silver cigarette case from his pocket and retrieved one of his signature black and gold cigarettes.

  “You think Arcano had something to do with this and that’s why he’s missing?” The possibilities started to make Lou’s head swim.

  “That, I don’t know.” Niko inhaled deeply then let the smoke drift from his lips. “I do know that we need to find out, don’t you agree?”

  “Uh, yeah!” Lou set the papers down on the coffee table and tried to think. The critical step now was having the identities of the three men come up through proper channels for Vinny and Dillon. “Will this come up if Caroline runs them through Interpol?”


  “I already texted her.” Niko said as he leaned back against the railing of the terrace and looked in at Lou. “This is going to send up flags and you need to be prepared for that. She’s going to stall on running them for a few hours.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean this crosses international territory so a lot of different agencies are going to stick their noses into this if you don’t take precautions. You need to be prepared for some bullies trying to take over this investigation.” He walked over to a planter and snuffed his cigarette out in the soil.

  “Don’t we have people everywhere? That can intervene?” The last thing Lou needed was a jurisdictional battle on her hands. Especially if she was not back on the job. Vinny would have no choice but to relent to the higher-ups.

  “You’re Principate.” He snickered. “You should know the answer to that.”

  “I’m a wanna-be Principate!” She huffed. “In theory, yeah I should know the answer to that but I need your help to walk me through all this for a while. This is a big deal!”

  “Right.” It was cruel for Niko to tease her but he so enjoyed it. “Hit your computer and I’ll walk you through it.”

  Lou hopped up and did as directed. While the computer system looked like a standard, high tech Windows PC, it was oh so much more. The screen itself had a built in retinal scanner and the body of the mouse concealed a biometric scanner. An innocuous icon was placed on the desktop and when clicked or touched, it activated the security protocols and both of the scanners did their thing. Once the identity of the user was confirmed as authorized, the super system kicked in and connected to the Sanguinostri network. From there, Lou could access all databases and specialized programs that facilitated her work without detection by any outside law enforcement agencies. It was truly handy for Lou but it was also top secret and there was no way anything she came up with utilizing the system could ever be seen by outsiders let alone used as evidence. She would have to find a way to get to it using conventional means. Lou had find a way to make it legitimate as a regular old homicide detective.

  Niko showed her how to access their database of contacts in every law enforcement agency in the world. Lou gawked as she saw the various names like Interpol, Europol, MI5, the CIA and the FBI. The list went on and on. He showed her how to access each agency’s list of Sanguinostri operatives and their respective dossiers. She was seriously impressed. After she perused a few individuals just out of curiosity, Niko showed her how to send encrypted communications to the agents, both individually and via multiple broadcast. Once she knew how to do it, she needed to formulate what exactly she was going to say. That was going to take a bit of thought.

  “Is this how you guys sent out the BOLO on Albert?” Lou was curious.

  “No.” Niko smirked. “That went out via the Mad Max method and that was not a Be On the Lookout.”

  “What is that supposed to mean?” She could only imagine.

  “Max went directly to the Senatus. From there all the Dominors issued BMH orders to every Sanguinostri on the planet.”

  “What does BMH mean?”

  “Bring Me the Head.” He gave her a wink.

  “Oh lovely.” Lou took only a half a second to think about it. “Hey!”

  “What?” She had startled him.

  “Those three guys had no heads! They have yet to be recovered!” Lou spun her chair around and looked at him intently. “You don’t suppose someone issued a BMH on these guys do you?”

  “We would have known about it.” Niko didn’t sound so sure.

  “Why?” Lou felt like a child asking why endlessly.

  “Because a BMH is a capitol order and just like with Albert, the Senatus must approve it. It’s protocol.”

  “Yeah, if you are playing by the rules that is.” It seemed like too much of a coincidence to her. “But what if someone was stepping where they weren’t supposed to? Something went wrong and they have to cover their tracks before they get caught?”

  “I suppose that could be the case but only a Dominor can issue a BMH order.” Niko leaned forward when he saw Lou was confused. “Say Caroline, for instance is severely injured and wronged. She has a legitimate and iron clad case to demand a BMH. She would have to go to her Dominor and present her case. If the Dominor is in agreement, they present it to the Senatus and they must also agree. Only then can she be granted that level of justice and the BMH be issued.”

  “I understand, but still. That is contingent upon Caroline, for the sake of argument, having a real legitimate and above board case.” Lou was still putting things together in her head but it was making sense. “In this hypothetical let’s say Caroline was running drugs out of the morgue and she had a whole crew she was running. If someone crossed her, say they ripped her off huge and threatened to expose her to the Dom, she could issue her own BMH within her little corrupt crew, right?.”

  “Well, yeah. Of course she could.” Niko didn’t like where Lou was taking this. The implications were bad.

  “It’s not like everyone has a direct line to the Dom to verify if it’s a legit order or not. Hell, you could tell me Max ordered something and I would believe you. Just one bad apple could pull it off.” Lou’s head was flooding with scenarios. “Also, we all know that the one sure fire way of killing a turned Sanguinostri is to remove their head and keep it that way, right?” Niko saw the gleam in Lou’s eye. She was definitely on to something.

  “Yes, that is common knowledge among our people.” He sighed as he thought about it. Another traitor among them was not a good thing and even less so if they were under Max’s rule.

  “So, to leave three bodies to be found without their heads anywhere is one seriously strong message, don’t you think? The word is going to spread pretty quick once it hit’s the grapevine, right?” Lou knew Niko was understanding where she was going now.

  “Right.” He hated to admit it but her theory made sense. “We need to call Max. This is going to have to be brought to the Senatus’ attention, even if it is just a hunch.”

  “We need to find out where these guys come from and who’s jurisdiction they fall under first.” Lou grabbed the papers on the dead men from the table. “If one of the other Dominors is involved, tipping them off just gives them time to cover their tracks.”

  “It would never be a Dominor and I can’t believe an Aegis would ever be involved in anything of this nature.” Niko protested. “You have no idea what it takes to even be considered for ascension.”

  “I am sure I don’t.” Lou knew it was going to be a touchy subject. “But Albert was once an Aegis, remember? Look at what a scumbag he turned out to be.”

  “Fine.” Niko hated that she was right. “We keep this in house for the moment until we are sure. We need to hold a Council meeting right away.”

  “What about the other Principates? Should we call them in too?” Lou was the Western Principate which covered the West Coast, Utah, Nevada, Arizona and Colorado. The rest of the U.S, was divided among the other four Principates; Central, Eastern, Southern and the North which encompassed all of Canada. “I know we have a meet and greet coming up soon anyway but you think we should move that up?”

  “No.” He didn’t hesitate. “Ultimately that will be Max’s decision but we keep this tight for now.”

  “You’re the boss.” Lou meant that literally. Bottom line was that she answered to Max, as did everyone under his purview but between him and her was the Aegis Council. Niko, being the first lieutenant, put him smack underneath Max in the hierarchy.

  “I’ll get Abby to notify everyone.” Niko pulled out his cell phone. “I hope you don’t have any plans for the next day or two. Your Principate training is about to be put to the test.”

  “Oh joy.” She knew it was going to happen sooner or later but she had hoped for something a little less heavy duty to cut her teeth on. “Never dreamed I would want the docs to stall on signing off on me going back to work.”

  “You’ll have time if they do re
gardless.” Niko understood her apprehension. “The department will have to process all your paperwork and that will take at least a day after they get the doctors sign-off.”

  “Good point.” She felt a small amount of pressure lift. “Should I wait on telling Caroline?”

  “That’s your call.” Niko held up a hand as if to tell Lou to hold on then proceeded to walk back out onto the terrace.

  Lou could hear him talking to Abby, explaining what he needed her to do in very clear and precise terms. It always struck Lou as funny how the guys could go from casual jokesters to hard-core military professional in a half a second. No one ever took offense or misunderstood. It was just the way things worked. Yes, they all were like family but their jobs and the Sanguinostri always took priority above all. Lou got that now and she knew it had to be the exact same way for her too.

  After a few minutes Niko hung up and came back inside. He noticed Lou was already navigating her way around the regional directories for the Sanguinostri and taking notes.

  “As far as Caroline is concerned, you are the best one to judge if she can keep a tight enough lid on things.” He picked up her question where they left off. “Make sure you shred those.”

  “Right, no paper. I remember.” Lou knew how important it was for there to be no data what so ever left to fall into the wrong hands. “It looks like these guys fell under two different territories.” She referred to her notes as she spoke. “The Salazar brothers were from Colombia but it looks like their last known whereabouts was Juarez, Mexico. They had been going from Bogota to Costa Rica then to Mexico City and from there to Juarez. They followed the same path back down and ran it several times over the past year. The majority of time spent in Bogota, Costa Rica then Juarez.”

  “Sounds like a drug running route to me.” Niko looked at his phone. “Listen, check with you’re mom and ask her if it’s OK for us to have the meeting here tomorrow night?”

  “I’m sure it’s fine.” Lou didn’t think it was necessary to ask. Her mother loved all the guys.