Lawyer & Liar

by T Wells Brown

  I invited the women who I’d enlisted help from the previous day to join me so we could catch each other up and plot our next move. Did I have a lot to share with them!

  Chapter 20

  Little Warrior

  B ecca, Sophie, Terra and Susan agreed to meet me at the airport café. Lucas was seriously unhappy about it, but drove me to meet the ladies anyway.

  The café was located inside of a huge cavernous hanger and decorated as such, with large industrial looking everything. The metal tables and chairs were oversized and had rivets in them. The main counter was a giant airplane wing and was seriously cool. The walls were covered with various large old fashioned framed posters of Rosie the Riveter.

  Even the café sign was the tail fin of a large plane. It was an awesome vibe. The left side of the hanger had been fitted with giant floor to ceiling glass that allowed the diners to watch the colorful display of parachutes as they descended. The jump center was internationally rated and was a big draw for thrill seeking parachute enthusiasts from all over the world.

  The café served breakfast and lunch, and was always bustling. The farmers and their farm workers kept the café busy, not to mention the parachute center, pilots and the wealthy wine elitists who flew in for wine tasting. It was a nice mix of clientele and everyone from the farm hand to the wealthiest plane owner, was treated with the same level of friendliness and respect.

  To say Lucas was upset that I’d been snatched while under his watch was putting it mildly. He was even more dark and broody than usual. I told him he didn’t have to come with me to the café, that I was meeting some of my tribe and I thought I’d be fine. He gave me what I was coming to know as his typical response to most things I said and he scowled at me.

  I’m glad I wasn’t able to talk him out of it, because when we pulled up to the café Russian thug number three pulled in and parked next to us. I sank down low in my seat and whispered to Lucas, “One of the Russians who took me yesterday is here.”

  Lucas gave me a hard look and said, “Yeah, I know. He was waiting outside your giant fucking house.”

  My house wasn’t giant. It was large but it wasn’t giant.

  “Oh, I didn’t see him.”

  “Chica promise me right now, you won’t go anywhere without one of us with you.”

  “I promise,” Lucas watched me for a minute and then said, “stay here. Don’t leave the vehicle.” I nodded that I understood and watched him fold out of the car and approach thug number three. Thug three watched this too and folded out of his car to meet Lucas near my side of the car door. Thug number three looked over at me and smiled. It gave me the creeps.

  “Take your eyes off her.” I could easily make out Lucas’ menacing voice through the window. “You don’t look at her. She isn’t for you,” Lucas stepped in front of my window blocking his view of me.

  That was a weird way to phrase it.

  “I do better to keep her unhurt than you,” thug three said in a clipped heavily accented manner and took an aggressive step towards Lucas, coming back into my view.

  “Not true!” I shouted and exited the vehicle, completely forgetting my promise just minutes before.

  “Look what you did to me!” I pulled the long sleeves of my shirt up and thrust my bruised arms out for thug number three’s inspection.

  “This is what you did to me yesterday while you were KEEPING ME UNHURT! You big oaf!”

  I noted another car joining us in the parking lot but didn’t look to see who had arrived. I also wasn’t aware Becca had walked up behind me when I uncovered my bruised arms for the men, and everyone apparently, who suddenly seemed to arrive right at that moment, to see.

  “Little warrior ,” thug three uttered in Russian as he took in the blue and black bruising on my arms, and grimaced.

  “Mother fucker!” was yelled from close behind me as Becca threw herself at thug three knocking me into Lucas, as she tackled thug three to the ground. Becca continued to yell at the Russian things like, “Don’t you touch my girls!” and “You piece of shit you hurt her!” and “No one marks one of my bitches and lives!” while rolling around trying to hit him.

  Oh boy! Wait till Jenna found out she was still calling us bitches!

  Oh, Lord Almighty ! This was chaos!

  Now, while I appreciated Becca’s determination to protect and seek revenge for us gals when she believed we’d been injured, she wasn’t very big. Therefore thug number three, who was really big, easily bested her and tossed her off of him like a rag doll. Luckily, after she scrambled back into a standing position, but before she could throw herself on him again, Marcus wrapped an arm around her mid-section and hauled her back so she was spending her energy flailing arms and legs, but not really getting herself into any more trouble.

  I wasn’t sure when Marcus had arrived but was damn thankful for him and his interference with Becca. Although, all this did was clear the way for Lucas, who had been simmering quietly since I’d revealed the bruises on my arms. He went from zero to sixty with sudden action when he lunged forward and knocked thug three back to the ground and out cold with one punch to the head.

  Everyone went still (even Becca stopped moving) and stared at the man knocked out cold on the ground and back to Lucas.

  “You the MAN !” Becca yelled punching the air above her head, “You the Fucking Man!”

  Lucas looked down at me and said, “You promised you’d stay in the car.”

  “No, technically, I promised not to go anywhere without one of you. I will absolutely keep that promise!” I knew Lucas and I were going to be fine because he scowled at me again. I smiled at him. He shook his head, looked at Marcus and said, “They’re all yours man.”

  “Wait, where’re you going?” I asked, as he opened his car door and started to climb in. I still needed his intel.

  “I have to monitor the surveillance room. Marcus has your info; he can bring you up to speed,” and like it was any old ordinary morning, closed his car door and backed out of the parking lot, leaving us all standing around unsure what had just happened.

  Marcus released Becca and looked at me, “You need to press charges about those marks on your arms.” Everyone was watching and waiting for me to respond. I looked down at the Russian who was starting to regain consciousness and said, “Okay.”

  What was the point of fighting it? Thug three needed to know he couldn’t go around hurting people, especially people who were smaller than him, which was pretty much, everyone.

  “In the meantime can we go in and order something to eat? I am freakin’ starving,” Becca said. We could always count on Becca to keep things moving along. The five of us gals went into the café and were seated at one of the tables by the window. Marcus stayed outside while thug three regained consciousness, had a heated discussion with Marcus, and then loaded up in his vehicle and sped out of the parking lot.

  Marcus joined us at the table and sat down. The five of us watched him as he sat and waited for him to report what the heated conversation was about before thug three sped off, but he wasn’t spilling.

  Great. Just what we needed, another man who didn’t spill the tea.

  Once we placed our orders (and Becca’s million side orders of this and that) we got down to business.

  “Ok, so much has happened since yesterday I almost don’t know where to start. Let’s go ahead and throw out everything we’ve learned, Susan can add it to the files, and then we will formulate a plan.” The plan and our direction had changed, but it was good to know what intel we had to work with.

  Susan flopped the files I’d asked her to create and organize on the table and said, “I’ve got everything I could find on the Triple D’s and filled the files. It isn’t much but it’s enough to justify the assumption that these deaths were committed by the same group of men, regardless what the new Deputy DA says.”

  I picked up one of the red files and flipped through it. She included every piece of info she could dig up in them already. I pic
ked up another one and noted a report with the SDI heading that had all of the details about the victims.

  “When did you get this?” I asked, holding the report up.

  “Lucas got those to me last night.” It was nice to know the SDI commandos were taking this all very seriously and we were getting their support.

  “Okay ladies, here’s the deal,” I leaned forward and looked each of them in the eye, “We are changing focus, and I need you to trust me on this and not ask why.”

  I looked at Susan and said, “You know better than anyone I wouldn’t leave any girl at the mercy of those monsters, right?”

  Susan looked at me and then to Sophie, and said, “I know. But woman, you better have a damn good back up plan happening cause I don’t know what I’ll do if we lose another one.”

  I got her. I knew she was putting all her faith in me and in turn I was putting my faith in Roman. Two days ago it would have been a no brainer. Right now however, I wasn’t feeling like things were clear so it was shaky, but I was following my gut, my gut never steered me wrong, and this was the right course of action.

  “New direction, operation take down the asshole Chief Deputy DA.” I placed the files back on the table and indicated for Susan to put them away. “This isn’t going to replace looking for the Triple D killers but we’ll focus on this and if we need to divert our attention back to the case we will. But I made a promise we would give another individual a chance to do something first.”

  The ladies nodded even though they didn’t know what I was referencing. They trusted me enough to believe I knew what I was talking about, and that felt damn good.

  Our food and drinks arrived and we ate in silence before Terra asked, “Are we totally obliterating the asshole or just making him miserable?” I felt Marcus tune back into us. I hoped he wasn’t going to be a problem.

  “Let’s start off making him miserable and ramp it up. If we go all out he might catch on. Roman says he is prepping for the District Attorney position when DA Sanchez retires and I want to make sure no one, not even his mother, would vote for him.” I could feel Marcus looking at me but I ignored him and continued, “I want his phone, cable, internet and any other subscription packages he has cancelled.” Marcus turned his body towards me but I continued to address the ladies and ignored him.

  “I want his car towed and the impound paperwork lost. I want any appointments he might have like dentist, haircuts, whatever; rescheduled for times he can’t make. I want to know his emails and text messages, who he calls. I know he isn’t married, so find out if he is dating anyone and if he is, make it stop. I don’t want him to be able to order a pizza or make reservations for dinner anywhere .”

  “Your lady wine group can do all that?” Marcus asked incredulous.

  “Oh sweet, dear man, our wine group can do all of this, and so much more,” Terra replied, patting his hand.

  “Let’s also disable his uber account. We’ll save his mortgage and insurances for the next phase,” I said to Terra.

  “Holy Shit. Does Cabe know?” Marcus responded and pulled his phone out of his pocket. I thought he was going to make a call to Cabe about our newly discovered super powers but he placed it to his ear and said “Yeah.” I didn’t hear it ring, it must have been on vibrate.

  “Are you fucking shittin’ me?” He yelled, stood, looked at our table and said, “Gather your bags we gotta go!”

  “What’s going on?” I asked starting to panic.

  “Isabella’s been taken.”

  Chapter 21

  Isabella

  B y the time our group arrived to the old harvester shed, where Isabella had been taken, police, emergency and all of Cabe’s men were roaming around every inch of the old building and its grounds. I’d given the info I’d uncovered about one of the largest wineries in our region and why they might be after Isabella, and Antonio’s old grapes, to Cabe just last night. I was so preoccupied with my own stuff I’m afraid I’d dropped the ball watching over Isabella.

  I teared up as the police held us all back and the other Women of Wine Country sisters arrived to the scene.

  Oh, Lord Almighty! I’d let Raquel down! I didn’t watch over Isabella like I promised I would and now God knows what has happened to her. We watched as Isabella and Cabe exited the building with Isabella’s crazy as hell mother hanging onto her. All the while Becca was shouting and cursing to anyone and everyone.

  Jules arrived, took note and went after the police and news reporters, who had begun to arrive too. The place was chaotic and I was going to be damned if I wasn’t getting to my Bella! I looked at the cop who was holding us back and keeping us from our girl who needed us, and was just about to blast him with all my force, when Roman appeared from inside of the harvester shed. Once he saw us and that we were being held back, he beelined straight for us and convinced the officer to let us through.

  Once we were allowed past the police barriers our tribe ran straight for Isabella, it was very reminiscent of when we met her at the airport only a few months ago. We stopped short when we saw she was covered in what looked like matted blood and chunks of vomit. Her mother was also covered in blood and was chanting over and over “Bella baby, Bella baby, Bella baby,” she wouldn’t let go of Bella even for the EMT’s to check her out. Every time they tried to pry her off, she would become even more agitated until finally they sedated her. Then after a big argument (one we all got involved in) the ambulance loaded up both Isabella and her mother to take them off to the hospital.

  Oh, Lord Almighty! I saw things there I never wanted to see again. Hopefully this would be the end of this feud over Antonio’s coveted grapes. I had a feeling it was not. As chills ran up my arms, and goosebumps rolled out over my skin, I knew in my gut this was only the beginning and more was yet to come for Isabella.

  The hair on the back of my neck stood up and I thought it was from the grisly crime scene unfolding, but looking around I quickly realized it came from my own personal threat. Thug number three was standing back away from the crowd and had his eyes locked on me.

  Oh, Lord Almighty! What was going on with him?

  “Damn it Cabe, you beat the shit outta him,” Becca muttered next to me as they brought the gurneys out of the old shed.

  “Wasn’t me,” was Cabe’s response before climbing in the back of the ambulance with a really mad Isabella. The doors were shut with them both inside, and it drove off.

  “Becca,” I whispered, “the Russian who was at the café is here. Don’t move or look at him. We need to let Roman know.” I barely spoke the last word when Becca let out a high pitched whistle and yelled, “Yo! Roman!” No matter how hard we tried there just wasn’t any shushing Becca up.

  I rubbed my temples and resisted the urge to look and see if her outburst had scared thug three off. “Becca, why’d you do that? Now he is going to know we are on to him.”

  “On to who?” Roman asked arriving at our small group.

  “That motha’ fuckin’ rusky who did this to my bitch,” Becca grabbed one of my arms and pushed my sleeve up exposing the angry bruises. I gave her a look that was meant to melt her into puddles in her stinky boots!

  “Angel, you didn’t tell me he’d hurt you.” Roman gently took my arm from Becca (who was in big trouble with me) and looked it over. He had sweat on his forehead and his hands felt clammy when he dropped the arm he was holding, took my other arm and pushed up the sleeve exposing more of the hideous bruises.

  “They don’t hurt that much,” They looked terrible. It’s why I was wearing long sleeves and hadn’t said anything to Roman. And honestly, they hurt like the dickens but I didn’t want to make a big deal out of it. So many worse things were happening all around us to people I cared about.

  His breathing was heavy through his nostrils and his jaw was clenched so tight, I thought for sure he must have been breaking teeth. I didn’t have an opportunity to process this information when his head swung around and he scanned the crowd. “Where is he Becca?�
� What was he asking her for? I was the one who’d spotted him.

  I looked to where he was standing when I’d first seen him and noted that he was gone.

  “He isn’t there anymore,” I said, to no one in particular.

  Roman’s head swung back to me and he watched me with such intensity I started to feel uncomfortable. His head swung to Becca when she said, “That motha’ fucker was at the cafe in a standoff with the sinister looking Macho Man.” She pointed across the crowd at Lucas. She was so upset her voice was shaking. I looked at her and realized she was going to explode or kill someone. Too many of her girls were getting hurt, or like Raquel, killed. Becca prided herself in watching out for her tribe, protecting us and sticking up for us, with everything that was happening, this was way out of her wheel house.

  “Babe, none of this is your responsibility. You know you can’t protect us all right?” I said softly to her. She looked at me with wet shining eyes.