Strike Force

by Beth Rhodes

  Stacy gave him one last squeeze on his shoulder before she and Hawk left. Malcolm looked around for something to pound.

  “Don’t even think about it,” Craig said, eyeing him suspiciously.

  Malcolm sat back down and opened his laptop again. He turned on the active map and GPS system and zoomed in on Dimitru’s property. She was in there, alone. No, worse. Not alone at all.

  He watched the red dot move on the screen, the ache inside easing at the sign she was alive. The super-secret device he’d stuck between the sidewall and tongue of her boot before she’d left—his last resort. His perfect hope. He’d been able to track her even as she’d moved from level to level.

  Unfortunately, Hawk was right.

  It really was time for him to quit his bitching.

  He knew she felt guilty, and this was her way of making up for it.

  Yet, as far as he was concerned, her feelings were now misplaced.

  ***

  Voices broke through her subconscious and roused her from the shallow sleep of imprisonment. Imprisoned again—voluntarily again. She slid out of the twin bed and pulled a sweatshirt over her head. Thankfully, some more digging had led to finding a few more casual pieces of clothing.

  At the door to her room, she leaned in and set her ear against the flat surface. Gregory had come to Dimitru’s room and they spoke in short, quiet tones. Then they walked away, down the hall. But not the way she expected, toward the stairs. Instead, they headed north to what she’d assumed was a dead end.

  When it had been quiet outside her door for more than a minute, she pulled it slowly open.

  The hall was empty.

  Gain trust.

  Acquire information.

  And good Lord, save those women. Do something for the good of mankind, Marie.

  She crept down the hall in the direction she’d heard the men go. When she reached the window facing north, she turned back around. “What in the hell?”

  There was nothing there. She turned another circle, looking up this time, but still found nothing. “Come on now,” she whispered, as her gaze was pulled out the window to a small delivery truck pulling around on the driveway to the back of the house. She pressed her face to the window and heard a soft puff of air and a small click to her left.

  The wall next to her had moved. She hadn’t seen it, but she would bet her life on it.

  She cupped her ear against the surface and tapped lightly against the drywall. Hollow. Placing her hands flat, she pushed. But the wall didn’t budge. Frustration ground through her. There had to be a way.

  She went back to the window. Both men stood next to a truck, which had backed up to the loading dock. Dimitru stood back when a small man…

  Marie squinted, focusing through the dark to the lit area.

  Not a small man but a woman. Very short, small, possibly Asian descent. Long black hair. Despite her diminutive stature, she was in charge. She looked to be making demands of Dimitru and Gregory.

  And a third guy. Lumberjack type, bigger and wearing a flannel shirt. Untied boots and a cigarette hanging from his hand. Smoke wafted up amidst the small group. Finally, after the talk was over, the woman nodded to the big guy and he bent over to open the back of the delivery truck.

  Marie held her breath. Could this be it? The FBI expected a container shipment from overseas. They were watching the docks in Portland, watching the high seas off the coast, and it looked like Dimitru’s delivery had already made it inland.

  Lumberjack reached in and pulled out a box.

  Dimitru opened the top flap and pulled out a knife. He cut into the box.

  “Holy—” Marie said as a tuft of white powder drew her attention to Dimitru’s hand. He stuck his pinky in and then snorted a small amount. She’d seen enough television. Drugs. Heroin. She went to back up, but before she lost sight of the group, Gregory pulled a gun on the woman.

  Marie sucked in a breath.

  Gregory pulled the trigger, shooting the woman in the chest. Marie squeaked, her heart raced, and she froze to the spot as the woman crumpled to the ground. “Jesus, Jesus, Jesus.”

  She scrambled back to her room and shut the door. She breathed, breathed again. “Oh, man. Oh, man.”

  This wasn’t what they expected at all. Dimitru’s get-rich idea wasn’t women.

  It was drugs.

  A truck full of heroin.

  And murder.

  She wanted to run. So badly, she wanted to escape. But she still had her uncle. And what about the women? The FBI and Agent Graham couldn’t have been wrong.

  “Think!” she said, and then immediately knew she needed to talk to Uncle Bert.

  Quietly, she crept into his room.

  He eyed her, displeasure on his face. “What are you doing here?”

  Marie ignored him and knelt at his bedside. “We have to get you out of here, Uncle Bert,” she whispered.

  In an unexpected show of affection, he ran his hand through her hair. “Say the word,” he said, then began coughing.

  She couldn’t move him, not yet. He was too weak. She shoved the fear aside and smiled. “Right.”

  He grinned at her. “Don’t mind me. I actually do feel a lot better. Having you here—” He coughed again, and she held her breath as he struggled. “Even though it brings me comfort, you must go, Marie.”

  “Did they search you when you got here?” she said, getting to the point, not knowing how much time she had before Dimitru returned. “Do you have your cell phone?”

  Uncle Bert’s eyes brightened. “Ah, my mischievous little brat.” He chuckled and reached between the mattress and the wall with his pale shaking hand and pulled out his small flip phone. “He took the smart one. I had this one in my shoe.”

  “Your shoe? What—” She gripped the phone. “How?”

  “Got good arches.” He whispered, “Be careful, my dear.”

  “I’m always careful. You know.” With her back turned to the door, she quickly opened the phone and went to the settings to turn off the sound so the stupid thing didn’t beep every time she pushed a button, which was going to be a frickin’ lot with the numeric keypad.

  “Yeah, but your heart’s in this now, and that changes things.”

  He had a point, and she had no choice. “Look, Uncle Bert. No matter what happens, I love you. Okay?”

  “Don’t talk that way. Everything’s going to be fine.”

  She hesitated, not wanting to worry him more than necessary. “Be very careful. Dimitru is into a lot more than we thought. It’s bad. He shot you, would have killed you. He still could.” The panic built as she spoke, so she slowed down. “I’m going to do whatever necessary to get you out of here tomorrow. You hear me? No matter what you hear, how crazy it sounds, I need you to follow my lead, okay?”

  “Sure thing, pretty girl.” His eyes were fluttering closed.

  “Uncle Bert,” she said, needing him awake. “Tomorrow I leave to prove myself to Dimitru.” She paused in her typing. “I must contact your old Romanian cronies. Dimitru tasked me with acquiring a piece from the local art collection. He and I are going after Lot 26.”

  Uncle Bert opened his eyes, sucked in a breath, and gripped her hand. “No. Impossible. They will be heavily guarded. It would take an entire team of Bălans to acquire such a treasure.”

  She kissed his cheek. “The goal is to get out of here way before that happens, uncle. I’m working on it.”

  “And your team?”

  Her heart pounded. “My team. Yes. Hawk’s got my back.”

  “Malcolm?”

  She shrugged. “Reluctantly, yes.”

  “He wants an honest wife this time. You will have to change your ways, Marie.”

  Marie eased off her knees and scooted up onto the end of the bed to put her back against the wall. “He’s changing my ways, whether I like it or not.”

  “You like it, though. You never were one to steal something for no reason.”

  Shrugging, she thought of the arm
band. “Tell me about your buddies. What’s changed in the last fifteen years. Any surprises?”

  “I haven’t attended any of the meetings in some time.” He sighed. “But you will be safe with them. Look for Bruce. You remember?”

  Marie nodded as she finally finished her text, the anticipation of getting a message back from Malcolm making her feel like a ridiculous young girl.

  Tomorrow. 1000.Meet.

  “I remember. Big guy with the beard?” She finished off the text by adding the cross streets.

  Uncle Bert patted her hand, and he leaned back and closed his eyes. “You’ll do fine. Watch out for Dimitru.”

  The sharp knock on the door had her heart pounding, and all those funny ideas about magic cropping up in her subconscious. Geez. It was like he knew Dimitru had been coming. She quickly slipped the phone back behind the mattress and turned as the door opened. Standing, she came face to face with Dimitru.

  Dimitru scowled. “You shouldn’t be wandering around at night.”

  She smiled—it was forced—and looked down at her uncle. He’d closed his eyes, and for an instant, her heart stopped. Was he pretending? Had he fallen asleep? Was he dead? “I was only checking on him,” she whispered. “I’m going back.” She stopped in front of Dimitru. “How did things go tonight? Everything okay?”

  “Fine. Had an unexpected glitch. Nothing I can’t handle.”

  “I don’t doubt it,” she said, patting him on his arm. “Uncle Bert’s doing well. Thank you for bringing the doctor in.” She sidled past him. “I’m very tired, and I have a long day ahead of me, but a good one. Been a long time since I went out for a true acquisition.”

  Dimitru lifted a brow.

  “Oh, the armband doesn’t count,” she said. “We’re practically family. It’s like stealing my brother’s car—more like borrowing, right?” She shrugged.

  “Don’t think of us as siblings, Marie.”

  “Right.” She swallowed when his hand came up around her throat again. “I mean in theory.”

  He seemed happy about her agreeableness, so much so that he leaned in and murmured against her lips, “Perhaps we will make a good pair after all.”

  He firmly kissed her and didn’t seem to mind that she couldn’t bother to force any enthusiasm.

  “Affection will grow,” he said, answering her thoughts.

  “I better go,” she said, waving a hand down the hall. “See you for breakfast? I can run the plans for the heist by you.”

  He nodded.

  “Okay,” she said breathlessly as she made her escape.

  Tomorrow, she needed to talk to Malcolm. She needed to report the dead woman. But mostly, she needed to get her uncle out of here without raising any red flags. It was obvious Dimitru had no qualms about getting rid of the competition.

  As far as he was concerned, she would have to be irreplaceable.

  She had no other option.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  After moving back into town and the safe house the night before, Malcolm hadn’t stopped staring at those three words. One message, from a burner phone and untraceable. Marie would be on the streets of Portland today, doing God knows what for Dimitru.

  He rubbed at the smooth, worn spot on the side of his phone cover.

  For the first time since she’d gone in, he felt like he could relax. Anticipation rocked through him. He got up and started getting ready. He put baggy pants on, and a tank under an oversized sweatshirt. He left his hair down and covered his head with an old hat. The brim covered his eyes and ears.

  He grabbed a stack of cash from his wallet and slid his knife harness onto his belt, and then added his smaller blade inside his boot.

  After checking in with Hawk, Malcolm made his way downtown.

  He came to a street with an eclectic array of buildings built sometime in the seventies. Some brick, some with aluminum siding that needed paint. A community center on the corner followed by a line of low-income housing. Crappy aluminum windows, crappy siding, cracked sidewalks, and doors that weren’t hung square and didn’t close.

  The opposite side of the street had a five and dime, a coffee shop, and an antique shop on the corner. A table outside the shop was surrounded by a bunch of old guys, who were arguing the latest in politics, and Ruby’s pie and which was better—the apple or the pecan cream.

  The peeling gingerbread trim of the antique store might have proven this little street hadn’t always been so run-down. The old-style gaslight street lamps also brought a little bit of charm.

  He went another block and found the street sign in front of him. He recognized the name, went half a block more, and turned into the alley. Too narrow for traffic, it was more like a courtyard for the back door to the few vacant buildings. In its heyday, he imagined kids running in and out, playing stickball.

  Weird. He wasn’t usually the guy filled with nostalgia. But the crap conditions reminded him of home. The city living, the hunger, the excitement of a cool day in the fall…

  And the anticipation of joining the military.

  The hope of having a woman at his side for the long haul. But the disappointment of losing didn’t seem so strong any more. So he’d failed in his first marriage.

  Heather had failed him.

  The air stilled around him, but he noted every scent, every flutter of the cold breeze. There was an unlocked gate in a brick wall straight ahead, connecting this passage to another on the next block over. Two fire escapes, one on either side of the corridor, rose from the stained blacktop.

  He sat on the overturned barrel next to the big dumpster, crossed his feet under him, and leaned against the cement block wall at his back. He checked his watch. On time.

  She was late.

  From under the brim of his hat, he gazed out onto the main street. Traffic was slow and random, the most activity happening at the café across the street as the older men razzed each other, a few leaving and more taking the empty spots as the minutes passed.

  The longer he sat, the more infused Malcolm became by the life around him.

  He’d thought the street looked run-down and dead. Yet as he sat, he heard arguments above him. Children played around the corner, out of his line of vision. A radio blasted from an open window somewhere on the block.

  And he heard Marie’s family language, too. No doubt there was a reason he was meeting his little Romanian thief in a neighborhood filled with her people. He never would have thought to find it, not of this modern city known for its hipster communities. It was like a special hidden subculture.

  So hidden, no one even knew it existed. Well, not him, anyway.

  Marie came around the corner with her head down. Malcolm tensed at his post and watched her pull the stocking cap off her head. Her hair was pulled into a tight bun at the back of her neck, and her hands shook as she tucked the cap into her coat pocket.

  He slowly got down off the trash barrel and leaned back against the brick wall.

  She walked deeper into the alley, where he could tell she was gathering her wits, perhaps calming her racing heart. His heart was racing as well. His spot kept him hidden, and when she turned, she made a beeline for him.

  He wanted to grab her and hug her and kiss her, comfort her in the only way he knew how, because he was a man, one who didn’t know how to use words.

  “I wasn’t followed,” she started.

  But at the sound of despair in her voice, the word fuck went off in his head, and he grabbed her into his arms and stepped further back into the semi-hiding place next to the dumpster. She gripped his jacket and let out a sob, even as she fought to maintain control.

  “Talk to me, Marie.”

  Instead, she stood on tiptoes and dragged his head down. He opened his mouth to hers, tasted her tears, lived her frustration, and cradled her into his embrace. He slowed the kiss, touched her face, her hair, her neck. And then finally, as her angst was spent, he pressed slow, tender kisses on her trembling lips. He stopped in order to breathe her in.
She looked untouched, but he also knew looks could be deceiving.

  “I saw someone kill a woman, Malcolm,” she whispered. “Like he shot Uncle Bert. Point blank, his man put a bullet into her chest.”

  He drew back and gripped her chin, his brow furrowed. “What did you say?”

  She swallowed. “He killed her over the heroin.”

  His mind screeched to a halt again. “What?” She wasn’t making any sense. “Killed who? Is Uncle Bert all right?” He did another scan of her person, looking for any injury.

  Marie’s head fell to his chest, and she took a deep breath.

  “Marie, you’re scaring me. Are you okay?”

  “The women are only part of what he’s doing. Last night, a truck delivered drugs. Heroin, Malcolm. And then he killed the woman delivering it.”

  Every protective instinct was screaming. “How did you get out?”

  On a cold, harsh laugh, she glanced to the road as if checking her six. “I’m proving my loyalty. I need to go steal a piece from the Old Boys’ Club. They meet once a month to brag about their finds, their possessions.” Her face softened. “But that’s only what Dimitru sees. They’re really there to share stories and keep the old country alive in their hearts.” She looked up sharply at him. “I can’t let him win.”

  “We can come in now.”

  “No,” she disagreed, gripping him hard. “We finish this. He can’t get away with any of it.”

  “They can stop him without you. You can leave with Uncle Bert—”

  “Dimitru isn’t going to let us go now.”

  He froze. “Why the fuck not?”

  “He thinks I’m going to marry him and make him immortal.”

  A little explosion happened in his brain. “What the fuck did you say?”

  “He thinks owning the armband and marrying a Bălan will make him immortal. I’m the last of the Bălan family. And though I’m in it for the gold we intend to steal next week, I’m willing to go along with it. Materialist bitch that I am—”

  “You’re not marrying him.”

  Marie gently gripped his chin. “Of course not.”