Blood, a Bullet, and a True Sinner

by Kelly Shade

  Hunt ordered Gray to keep digging dirt on Dimitria while he, Lee, Valdez and Blake went to check the locations they had found.

  Connor and Blake went to the first one, and Ian and Nick headed to the second.

  “This warehouse is perfect for keeping hostages,” Blake said when they arrived in front of it. “I think this is it.”

  Hunt disagreed. “Why? It looks abandoned.”

  “If it is abandoned why is there electricity?” Jane pointed to the cameras and the motion sensors placed on every corner.

  “How are we are supposed to get in there without being seen?” Hunt asked when he saw all the security equipment plus two men with sniper rifles on the roof.

  “Diversion. We have to create a distraction,” said Jane thoughtfully.

  “Any ideas?” Hunt wasn’t fascinated.

  “I’m thinking.” Jane made a weird grimace. Her plan wasn’t the kind Connor would support.

  Nick and Ian called to inform them the second warehouse was empty.

  “Tell them to get C4 and to come here.” Jane muttered to Hunt, and even though he wasn’t okay with it, he made the order.

  Half an hour later Ian and Nick arrived with several blocks of C4. They were puzzled and eager to hear Jane’s plan.

  “Hey, guys!” Jane welcomed them with a smile. “We believe this is the place Michael Morse is hiding the girls. As you can see, he has tight security, and if we want to sneak in, we have to get creative.”

  “Why don’t we get a search warrant?” Nick asked.

  “Because probably Morse has connections in the police and what judge will sign an order just because an old lady overheard something years ago?” Jane explained the obvious. “I’ll disable the cameras and the motion detectors and Hunt and I can sneak in and see if there are girls inside.”

  “Why do you need the C4 then?” Ian asked.

  “You and Nick will make a distraction. You will put these blocks on the cars there.” Jane pointed at the four armored vehicles parked in front of the warehouse. “The security guards will worry about the explosions and about the shooting. Yeah you have to shoot too, and no one will look at us,” Jane finished happily.

  “What if you are wrong?” Ian was really concerned. “I agree there is something suspicious here. But what if it’s a cartel or some CIA or FBI operation? What do we do then? It’s way too risky, Blake!”

  “That’s why I will understand if you want out. But guys I have to do it. Rose was everything to me and if this person is the reason I lost her, “ Hunt closed his eyes for a second. “I will cross every line to catch him. Even if I have to spend my life in jail. Ryan feels the same, so we can take it from here.”

  “I’m not letting my team down! I’m in!” said Nick.

  “Me, too,” Ian added with a serious face.

  “Great!” chirped Jane. “So now you go place the explosives. Stay on the phone so I can tell you when to detonate them.” She smiled and waved to Hunt to go out with her. “Now we need to find the switchboard.” Jane peeked through the car window and whispered. “And guys, it’s time for stealth mode!”

  Ian and Nick nodded, got off the car and headed to their posts.

  Blake and Hunt went quietly to the fence. Connor gave Jane some binoculars. Jane was surprised he carried them around but she was pleased. She looked around and saw the switchboard. It was away from their location, in the middle of an empty parking lot. Luckily there were several trucks and machines which could help them hide. Jane went back to the car. She put the Bluetooth earpiece in her ears and dialed Ian. Then Blake opened the trunk and removed metal cutting scissors and a little bag of tools. Hunt was following her. Once they were at the switchboard, Jane gave the order.

  “Ian! Detonate the first car. When the security goes out, start shooting.” She waited for confirmation and added, “And try not to kill anyone, okay?”

  “Will do.” Nick’s voice came from the side.

  Jane waited for the big boom and, as planned, after the first car exploded security went out and opened fire. Gunshots were flying toward Ian and Nick, and they fired back.

  Blake cut some of the wires and spoke again.

  “The cameras are down. Blow the second car. We need all the security out.”

  “Copy that,” Ian confirmed.

  Hunt was after Jane every step of the way. They went close to a back door.

  “Damn! It is a touch screen deadbolt.” Jane opened the bag with the tools and started to unlock the door.

  “What about the passcode?” Hunt asked nervously.

  Jane handed face powder to him and smiled. “You’ll take care of it.”

  “What do I do with that?” he said holding the round gold box as if it were toxic.

  “The same as you do when you are searching for fingerprints.” Jane smiled “Nobody is wiping the screen after typing the pass.” And she winked.

  Hunt did as Bake said and in no time they were in the warehouse. Jane gave the last order to Ian and Nick “Explode the other two cars and continue shooting. In ten minutes we meet at the car. Nick, you are driving!” and she hung up the phone.

  Slowly Hunt and Blake crossed the storage room. They carefully opened a door to see ample space filled with wooden boxes ready for transfer. Jane went first and hid behind one of them. With another tool from the baggy on her waist, she opened one of the boxes and found a bunch of M16 rifles. She waved Hunt to come over.

  “Damn, these are military weapons!” Hunt said. “I knew this guy was a smuggler, but I didn’t think it was that bad!”

  Jane nodded, took two of them and handed one to Connor. Then they crept to the only door they saw at the end of the warehouse, and Blake opened it.

  “We have seven minutes and thirty-three seconds to learn if there are any women being held here,” she whispered under her breath. Hunt nodded in agreement and together they entered the room. The picture wasn’t nice. Two women had their hands tied and duct tape on their mouths. Their faces were covered in bruises. But the more disturbing fact was that a third young woman was dead. Her blood was all over the floor. The other two were snuggled in one corner, crying.

  Hunt checked for a pulse even though it was apparent she had bled out. Jane went to help the girls stand.

  “We are here to save you,” she whispered when she saw their horrified expressions. “But you have to do as I say! No screaming. I’ll take the tape off. Understood?”

  They nodded, and Jane gently removed the duct tape. She gave them instructions, and they were ready to go. The shooting from the outside stopped.

  “We have two more minutes, what the hell!” said Hunt.

  “Come on!” Jane pulled his hand. “We can’t take her, Connor! I’m sorry.”

  Hunt was looking at the dead body. He didn’t want to leave it behind, but taking her would slow them down. Jane tugged at him again, and he moved to the exit.

  They heard someone approaching; the security guard for the warehouse was coming back in.

  At the very last possible moment Jane, Hunt, and the two women went out the same door they came in.

  “We run that way.” Jane pointed the path to the terrified girls. “Maybe the snipers are already on their posts. No matter what happens, go to the black SUV outside. Nick Lee and Ian Valdez are police detectives from LAPD. They are waiting for us. Okay?”

  “Y-yes!” stuttered the women in one voice.

  “Hunt, we may need to use those!” Jane turned to Connor with a devious smile and lifted the M16 in her hand.

  “Yep,” he said.

  Jane called Nick and Ian to confirm they were in position. Hunt went first and after he took few steps, the sniper on the top of the building started shooting. Connor shot back with the rifle they stole from inside. The first one was down. Jane and the women ran. More people opened fire. Hunt and Jane were running backward, shooting, they had to make it to the exit. Luckily, both of them were excellent shooters and managed to hit all snipers. With fast breathing and we
ary legs, all of them jumped into the SUV and Nick drove off.

  “So we had to try not to kill anyone so you could shoot four of them on the way out?” teased Ian. But the sharp look from Hunt and Jane’s lifted eyebrow were enough to tell Valdez it wasn’t the time for jokes.

  They managed to get to the precinct without being followed.

  The women were put in the interrogation room while Nick, Ian, Jane and Connor made coffee and took a break. Hunt and Valdez volunteered to talk with the women whom they identified as Melissa Ivanovich and Fanny Renauldin. Melissa was initially from Serbia, Fanny from France. Their visas and documents were legit, but the question was why did Michael Morse captured them? Ian and Connor asked that question while Jane and Nick were listening from the back room.

  Ryan knocked on the door and asked Jane and Nick to follow him.

  “Look here,” said, Ryan, while sitting in his office chair.

  Blake took a look at the laptop screen. There were transfers in and out of Grigorovich’s accounts. Gray dug up bank accounts in the Seychelles and in Cuba. There were transfers worth millions of dollars. Dimitria was filthy rich.

  “Damn. Should we trace every sender?” Ian offered.

  “No. Look,” Jane pointed at one transaction from a few days ago. “This one is made from Los Angeles. I reckon starting with it.”

  Ryan traced the money back to the sender. Meanwhile, Ian and Jane went back to listen to the interview. To their surprise, Jane almost bumped in to Nick who was out of interrogation. He was followed by Hunt.

  “It’s bad, guys,” Lee said with a puzzled grimace.

  “Spill, come on!” Ian pushed.

  Hunt waved his hand in a sign that everyone should get back in the office to speak privately.

  “The women, Melissa Ivanovich and Fanny Renauldin, came to the US with Morse’s peoples’ help. They were offered free tickets and visas from men who connected them through the website Jane found in Amber’s notes. Melissa and Fanny are telling the same story. For a year or so they had virtual relationships with men who eventually visited them in their home countries. Everything looked legit. The girls thought they had found the loves of their lives. After the visits, the men offered to take them in the US as their wives. Melissa and Fanny were excited and accepted the offer. Of course, there were no legal marriages. They were faked so the girls would think everything was okay.” Hunt rubbed his eyes and breathed out loudly.

  “Melissa and Fanny came to California and went to apartments somewhere. As foreigners, they couldn’t remember where they were. They celebrated with a glass of wine and passed out. Next thing they woke up in the room where we found them.”

  “What about the third one?” Jane asked.

  “Katerina from Russia. She tried to escape, so they killed her and put her in the room with them. To remind them what not to do. The worst part is that a doctor came and took her organs. They are selling them in the black market!” Nick grimaced. “Anyway, the main plan was simple. They made new IDs and documents for the girls, after plastic surgery so no one would recognize them. Then each one goes to a different client and works for him as a prostitute. Michael Morse himself went to Fanny and Melissa to explain the situation and to warn them not to do anything stupid because his clients were, and I quote, people who don’t like mistakes.”

  “I guess the plastic surgeries are made under the radar so we can’t trace them,” Ryan said thoughtfully. “If they can sell organs, plastic surgeries should be a piece of cake to cover up!”

  “Yeah,” said Hunt. “The only shot we have is to break into Michael Morse’s mansion and gather enough evidence to charge him.”

  “So that means an illegal search?” Ian was worried. “Can’t we get a search order? The girls are witnesses!”

  “We can’t. The women can just describe Michael Morse, and they aren’t very reliable because they were drugged almost all the time,” Nick said sadly.

  “Now is the time to say if you are out. We understand!” Gray said softly.

  “Of course, I’m in. We all are in that!” Ian said irritably.

  “We need a plan, then!” Blake said happily. She was waiting for that moment for a long time. “We need the black book.”

  “The what?” asked Nick.

  “In Amber’s notes, we found something about a black book. I believe Morse has a list of all of his clients,” Jane explained.

  “Guys, I think we need to do something first!” Ryan was staring at his laptop with a worried expression. Everyone looked at him waiting for more info.

  “I think Grigorovich ran out of prostitutes’ kids and started stealing babies.”

  “What?” asked Jane, Connor, Nick and Ian in one voice.

  “The last transaction. I checked the family who made it. They were married for ten years, and just a day ago they adopted a baby boy. I searched for them in the social media, and I saw a picture of the child. Then I checked missing person’s reports on a hunch. A baby boy went missing a month ago with a red spot on the left hand. Like the one they adopted. It faded a little, but it is the same, I’m sure.” Ryan spoke slowly.

  Everyone was stunned.

  “Let’s go bring that boy to his mother! Come on!” Jane stood up and waved to the rest of the team to hurry. “Then we charge Dimitria Grigorovich!”

  Chapter 19

  Am I like him?

  Jane and Ryan hurried to get the birth mother of the boy. They went to her house, but no one was there. An old lady, who was spying on them from across the street, informed them where the woman worked. They had to drive to a diner out of town to find her.

  “She has to be here,” said Ryan while looking around at the almost empty diner.

  Jane asked him to sit down. She didn’t want to make a fuss. Blake knew this job was important for the woman and if someone heard the police were looking for her, it might be a problem. It didn’t matter if she was the victim. People didn’t like employees with problems.

  A skinny young waitress came to take their order. She had dark circles under her puffy eyes. Probably she had several sleepless nights, but she managed to smile.

  Jane instantly recognized her. Lorene Brown was the single mother of the stolen boy.

  “Ms. Brown?” Gray asked softly.

  The woman looked scared. She didn’t say anything; she just froze with her pen on the notebook.

  “We have news about your boy. When do you finish?” Jane spoke quietly because the cook was apparently trying to hear their conversation.

  “What? Now. I can go now!” Ms. Brown said excitedly.

  “You sure?” asked Gray glancing at the cook.

  “Yeah, this is my brother. We own this place.” Lorene noticed how Ryan and Jane were looking at the cook with suspicion. “You said you have information about my son. Who are you?”

  Jane and Ryan apologized and introduced themselves. They explained the situation. Lorene begged to go as quickly as possible to see her child, but Gray said they needed to receive a call from their boss. They had to be sure everything went well in the adoption family’s house. Ms. Brown waved her brother to join them. He was a massive man with tattoos and his face showed he wanted revenge. Mr. Brown closed the diner immediately and joined Jane and Ryan at the table.

  “Who are these people? Who stole my nephew?” he roared at them. “Where is Johnny?

  “Johnny is with a family who thought he was given for adoption,” Jane began without thinking whether she should give him details.

  “It is an ongoing investigation, Mr. Brown; we can’t share out leads,” Ryan interrupted and motioned at Jane to shut up. “The most important thing is we found him!”

  “Don’t tell me what’s important, cop!” Brown yelled again “My sister is at the edge of a nervous breakdown and my nephew is missing! Don’t give me all this crap!”

  “Mr. Brown, in five minutes our colleagues will call us, and we will see Johnny. This crap he is giving you is because we deal with hazardous people. They are
involved not only in illegal adoptions but also in human and firearms trafficking, selling organs in the black markets, drugs . . . almost everything you can think of! You can’t bring them down. You don’t need the info! The only thing you need is to calm down and think about your family! You are the one who’s taking care of them. I can see that! You won’t be much of a help in prison, will you?” Jane was staring at the man’s eyes and shouting at him. That seemed to calm him down, and he sat on the bench with his head in his hands.

  “I’m sorry. I’m just worried.” He spoke in a normal tone this time.

  Jane’s phone rang. She picked up instantly, and after a few seconds she had a broad smile on her face. Hunt had informed her the boy was fine and the family had no idea he was taken away by force. They thought they were paying for the quick procedure. They were devastated by the fact the baby was part of a trafficking organization.

  Ryan, Jane, Lorene and Mr. Brown hurried to the car. They were all excited. Blake used the ride to ask few questions because she didn’t want to ruin the mother-son meeting later.

  “I know it is hard, but you have to tell me how they stole Johnny.”

  Lorene was so happy her son was alive that she didn’t mind the question.

  “There is a nursery in our neighborhood, and I leave Johnny there when I have to work. There are three extremely nice women who are taking care of the kids. But the week Johnny was taken, one of them was sick. They had to find a temporary worker. I don’t know who she was, but they told me it was her last day at work. That woman took Johnny when he was sleeping and left. No one saw her.”

  “Did you tell that to the police?” Jane couldn’t understand how a crime like this wasn’t caught.

  “I did. When they looked at the records, they saw only her back. She knew where the cameras were and we couldn’t see her face. She was using a fake ID, and the director of the nursery said he was sure she had fillers in her face so no one would recognize her without them.” Lorene spat everything in one breath.

  Ryan and Jane exchanged worried glances. Dimitria Grigorovich was a pro for sure.