by J. M. LeDuc
She didn’t wait for him to respond, she just stepped out of the truck and headed for the front door. “Good night, Troy,” she called over her shoulder. “Call me tomorrow.”
CHAPTER 25
An hour later, Sin was sitting across from Charlie in the library of the Johnson place. She held a cigarette in one hand and a cup of coffee in the other as she watched him hunt and peck on the keyboard.
“After all the conspiracy theories you have hunted down, you would think you’d be a better typist by now.”
He kept his head down, index fingers pecking away. “Eat shit and die,” he mumbled.
Hearing Charlie’s comment, a teeth baring smile surfaced on Sin’s face.
With one final peck, Charlie looked up at Sin and with his eyes he guided her to the wall monitor. She turned to face the screen as he tapped the enter key.
Pictures of all of the dead girls filled the first monitor. A record of Veloz’s activities in the past year flooded the second and the third screen showed a detailed schematic of the Church of the New Son.
Charlie pointed to the second screen. “I was able to dig up some of Veloz’s activities through some of my ‘unofficial sources.’ ” He glanced back at Sin. “So where do we begin?”
Sin ground the butt of her cigarette in the onyx ashtray and pointed at the first screen. “Can you check your super spy stuff and if see if any of these girls have been reported missing?” Charlie nodded and tapped at his keyboard. “While you’re at it, can you scan this picture into the database and see if you get any hits?”
Sin handed him a copy of Tia’s picture.
“Hits as in . . .”
“As in—has she turned up in any morgue as a Jane Doe in the past few months?”
Fifteen minutes later, Charlie had some preliminary results. “It will take a few hours to run a complete review of all of the files, but based on these results I’m doubtful any of these girls will show up.”
“Why’s that?”
“You know as well as I do, the people that run these slave rings make sure they cover their tracks.”
Sin lit another cigarette. “You think their parents were killed.”
“Or bought off. Either way, no one is looking for them,” Charlie said. “The fact that Alejandra was able to get up enough money and come looking for her daughter was a miracle.”
“Right now a miracle is what I need, she mumbled. “Okay,” she said, “screen two. What’s my old friend been up to since I last saw him?”
“Same ole’ shit,” Charlie said. “He’s holed up in an abandoned condominium in Puerto Cabezas—a small port city on the Caribbean side of the country. No one has seen him in the past six months, but the place is under heavy guard and intel says he’s there.”
“Who’s intel?” Sin asked.
“Ours—the U.S.”
“Why are we watching him?”
“He is now one to watch on the government’s terrorist list and his name seems to be shooting up the charts.”
“I’ll be damned.”
“I think you had a lot to do with that,” Charlie said. “You exposed him and brought his dealing into the light.”
“A lot of fucking good that did,” Sin said. “He’s free and living in a freakin’ condominium.”
“It’s abandoned,” Charlie said. “I’m not sure if he’s living or hiding.”
“Why is he there any way? With his money, he could live anywhere.”
“That depends on who you’re listening to,” Charlie said. “Our side says he’s sick and he doesn’t want anyone to see him in his current state.”
“And the other side?”
Charlie grinned. “They say he has been planning something big and he doesn’t want to be sidetracked or disturbed.”
Sin stood up and moved closer to the screen. “What kind of big are you talking?”
“Word on the street says he is moving away from drugs and girls and is about to put his hand in the black market weapons ring.”
“Does Westcott know this?”
“I’m sure he does,” Charlie answered.
“Then why the hell hasn’t he moved in. Veloz is like a sitting duck waiting to be plucked.”
“You know the game, Sinclair. Sometimes it’s best to wait and see if this fish can be used as bait to bag an even bigger one.”
“Those pricks,” Sin yelled. “They know where to find Veloz and they know what damage he can do, but—nothing!”
Charlie shook his head. “That’s why I got out of the game. Too many people jumping beds. You never know who is sleeping with who?”
Sin stared at the monitor. “Do you have any surveillance photos of Veloz?”
“Funny you should ask,” Charlie responded. “Even though he hasn’t left the building, he does venture onto the balcony to smoke.” He tapped the keyboard and pulled up a grainy video.
“Hell, that could be anybody,” Sin said.
“Typical woman,” Charlie groaned. “Hold on and I will make it all pretty.”
A few minutes later, the video repixelated and showed a clear picture of Veloz. Charlie sat back and admired his handiwork.
Sin watched and rewatched the two minute video at least a dozen times. He still walks with a limp from our last encounter, she thought. That could definitely work in my favor.
Sin checked her watch. “Let’s take a look at the schematic of the church. I want to hit it tonight.”
“Why tonight?”
“Sunday night is the best night to hit a church,” Sin replied. “Everyone that works there is tired from the big show they put on earlier in the day, even Heap’s hired help will be sketchy at best.”
Charlie smiled. “I like the way you think, Sinclair.”
Sin blushed at the compliment.
They spent the next two hours going over entry, route, and exit. They spent the most time on a contingency plan in case anything went wrong.
Sin watched as Charlie filled a small waterproof fanny-pack with implements you’d see on an episode of CSI. “Walk me through what you’re doing,” Sin said.
“If we are going to get a closer look at the church, I just want to be prepared,” Charlie answered.
Sin beamed in admiration. “I love the way your mind works.”
CHAPTER 26
Sin and Charlie rowed a blacked out skiff through the rough waters behind the church. Each was dressed in all black, including having their faces blacked out. Once behind the church, they dropped a small anchor off shore so the boat couldn’t hit any of the rocks and alert security.
Charlie signaled Sin with his hands and they both dropped into the water from opposite sides of the boat. It didn’t take but a few minutes for both of them to make their way to the thirty foot rock retaining wall that separated the church from the gulf.
The wall, although slippery from algae, had enough foot and hand holds so they were able to free climb without ropes or gear. Once over the wall, they donned night-vision goggles. Charlie hand signaled Sin and they headed for the back side of the church. They knew this would be the best vantage point where the security cameras couldn’t reach.
Using an old fashion slimjim—a thin steel bar used for unlocking car doors—to pop the window lock, they gained entrance into the church. Exactly two minutes later, they stood in the waiting room outside of Heap’s office.
As they readied themselves to break in Heap’s office, Sin went over the plan in her head one more time—the plan was simple, they needed to see what was in the room behind Heap’s private office and then they would make their way to the large room behind the sanctuary. In each location, pictures would be taken and they would be out in less than ten minutes. They knew they would probably trip a silent alarm, but they would deal with that when and if the time arose. They hoped for an easy in and out.
&n
bsp; Sin kept watch as Charlie picked the lock to Heap’s office. Things were going smooth, too smooth for her liking. Once inside the office, they quickly went through his desk and files but found nothing out of the ordinary. Charlie turned on Heap’s computer. The hard-drive was safeguarded with a password, so Charlie shoved a thumb-drive into the USB slot and downloaded all the files.
He would have to try to break the encryption later.
While he was waiting for the download to complete, Sin picked the lock on the inner office.
Entering, Sin noticed a couple things of interest. First, there appeared to be a woman’s touch to the décor. This must be Maggie’s office, she thought. Her next thought was, why does his wife need an office?
She tried to open the desk drawers—locked. The file cabinets—the same. She quickly picked the lock on the desk and rummaged through the drawers. There seemed to be nothing worth locking up.
As she opened the file cabinet, Charlie tapped her on the back and pointed to his watch. Time was running short. She nodded, opened the file drawers, and flipped through the folders. She found one labeled, orphanage, opened it and was startled to see snapshots of girls. She didn’t have time to process what she was looking at, so she quickly took pictures of them with her phone and replaced the file. At the same time, Charlie downloaded the computer files to another thumb-drive.
The two of them made their way back out the same way they came in making sure not to leave any tracks.
Making their way toward the sanctuary, they both heard voices.
“She’s in the prophet’s office. Our orders are to take her alive, so no shooting.”
Sin ducked behind a stone column and signaled Charlie who had done the same about twenty feet away.
“They think I’m alone,” Sin mouthed.
Charlie smirked. They’d known each other for so long that Sin had no doubt he could read her thoughts and anticipate her plans.
Sin waited until her pursuers entered Heap’s office before running for the door behind the altar. Charlie remained hidden in the back of the church while Sin picked the lock.
“She’s now in the sanctuary.”
“Why the hell did you make us go to Heap’s office?”
“Hell, I’m just following this signal. Now, shut up and stay low. We have her outnumbered four to one. She’s ours now.”
Charlie stayed hidden while Sin remained in plain sight.
She pretended to be having trouble picking the lock. The plan was to take care of their ‘friends’ here before they entered unknown territory.
Charlie waited until the first three passed him before grabbing the fourth in a chokehold. He quickly subdued the assailant and dragged the unconscious body behind the pillar.
“Freeze!” yelled the first guard. “Arms in the air before I shoot.”
Sin slowly raised her arms, eyeing her pistol holstered near her belt buckle.
“Turn around nice and slow or I’ll put a bullet in that pretty little head of yours.”
Sin recognized York’s voice. She didn’t turn, but spoke to stall for time. “How did you find me? I didn’t see you out front.”
“I told you I was better than any Special Forces piece of crap,” York boasted. “I was tailing you even before you drove onto the property.”
Dumb son of a bitch, Sin thought, he doesn’t even know how we gained entrance.
She stood her ground as his footsteps neared. She knew this was going to come down to timing.
“I said turn around,” York yelled.
Sin didn’t respond, she just stared at the face on her watch. She knew Charlie could see what was going on and as soon as York was in position he would give her the ‘go’ sign.
Adrenaline surged through her body as York’s footsteps neared. Sin began to tingle to the point that she thought she would burst. Just when she didn’t think she could hold off one more minute, she saw a red light flash on her watch.
At the same time, York grabbed her shoulder, Sin spun, knocked the gun from his hand, kneed him in the groin, jumped on his chest, pulled her semiautomatic from her waist holster, and held it against his throat. His eyes darted back and forth.
“Looking for someone?” she seethed. “No one is coming to your aid, dumbass. Do you think I would come alone?”
York’s eyes dilated and sweat poured from his forehead.
Sin’s expression turned to stone as she leaned into York and whispered, “I had inside help. You better recheck your friends.”
Sin felt his body tighten and a guttural sound rose from deep in his chest. As the growl escaped his mouth, Sin cracked open his skull like a walnut with the butt end of her pistol.
Charlie emerged from the shadows and held out a hand. Sin grabbed it and stood up. “What did you tell the big fella to piss him off?”
Sin smiled. “I told him I had inside help and to check his friends.”
Charlie shook his head and waved Sin through the open door.
Sin had a hard time delineating all the specifics of the room due to the green tinge from the night-vision goggles. “I’m turning on the lights,” she said. “I need a better look around.”
“Let’s be quick,” Charlie said. “Someone may see them from the outside.”
Sin pushed her goggle up onto her forehead and flipped on the lights.
She stood still, glued to her spot, and took in her surroundings. “It really is a damn movie studio.”
Charlie knew what Sin was thinking. “Stay objective as we process the scene.”
As Charlie went to work on the computers, Sin stood behind the camera that was set up in the middle of the room and followed its sight. It was aimed at the stage. She ran on to the stage, pulled a bottle of luminal out of her pack and sprayed the surface. “Charlie shut the lights off for a moment,” she said.
He did and blotches—small and large—glowed red.
“Shit,” she moaned. “There is blood everywhere up here.”
“Hurry up and take some pictures, so I can turn the lights back on,” Charlie huffed.
Her blood pressure was rising, and her head was spinning as she took the pictures. If I find out those girls were tortured and killed on film, I will castrate the motherfucker responsible. As soon as she snapped the last photo, Sin asked Charlie to turn the lights turned back on.
Charlie started the download sequence on the computer and then he took in the rest of the room. He pointed to twelve monitors, all of which faced the main stage. They were in three rows, set up in a stadium type of arrangement. “That’s a strange configuration for the monitors to be in,” he said.
Sin shook off her emotions and stood next to him. “You’re the expert, what do you think?”
“I’m not sure,” he said. “Start taking pictures of the entire room while I finish downloading the files. We don’t have much time before others show up.”
Sin snapped her head toward him. “Who?”
“Not sure, but just before the last guard entered the sanctuary, I heard him call in for back-up. I heard him say that ten minutes was too long, but he and York would try to hold you until they got here. That was eight minutes and fifteen seconds ago.”
The two of them crawled out the same windows they had entered as they heard the sirens and screeching tires in the front of the church. They stayed low, climbed back down the wall, and were in the boat before anyone else saw them.
CHAPTER 27
Back at the Johnson place, Sin sat in the library watching Charlie try to play the video they downloaded from the studio.
He banged his fist on his desk in frustration. “They used some professional encryption software on the hard-drives and videos we found in the studio. It’s going to take time to break it.”
Sin sifted through the papers on her lap and waved him off unceremoniously. “You figured out the gra
ssy knoll,” she said sarcastically, “you’ll figure this out.”
His shoulders slumped and he elicited a sigh, part in embarrassment, part because that was the one conspiracy that still ate at him.
Flipping through the transcripts from Heap’s office computer, Sin was getting more exasperated with each page. “This is all bullshit,” she said. “It’s just him sending out threatening emails to his underlings and kowtowing to his wife. Pussy.”
Charlie sat on the edge of his desk and pointed to the pile of papers. “Turn to the last page.”
As Sin read, her temperature rose. “Veloz!” she screamed. “He’s talking about Veloz!”
Charlie put his arms out as if they would somehow stop Sin’s anger. “We don’t know that, it just mentions a contact in Nicaragua who is sending a shipment of girls.”
Sin threw the papers at Charlie. “Bullshit,” she yelled. “It talks about money—lots of money—changing hands. No one buys girls so they can come live in a fucking orphanage.”
“So what do you plan on doing,” Charlie said in frustration, “go after him?”
“Damn right!”
“That’s suicide!” Charlie yelled back. “I won’t let you go. I’ll have no part of it.”
“You’re not my goddamn father,” she poked his chest with her middle finger, “and I don’t need your permission to do anything.” She ran her hands through her hair, clenched her fists, and squeezed the roots. “Grr,” she shrieked. “Girls are dying all around us, and I’m getting nowhere in this sand flea of a frickin’ town. Veloz may not be the supplier, but I would damn well bet he knows who is.” She looked straight into Charlie’s eyes. “You said it yourself. They sent me on a suicide mission. Well, damn it, if I’m going out, I’m taking someone with me.”
Charlie pulled at his beard. “Sinclair, think about what you’re saying.”
