by January Bain
Cole gave a huge sigh. “Talk about bad timing.”
Gabby’s stomach tightened with fresh worry. Having the authorities on board would have been helpful.
She continued listening with one ear to the ongoing conversation in the café’s men’s room while multi-tasking with Cole and Quinn still discussing logistics.
“Hey, listen to this.” Gabby unplugged her headphones, letting the voices she’d been monitoring enter the cab of the truck unimpeded.
“Uncle won’t care. Come on, let’s go and have some fun. We’ve earned it, bro! We can finish this shit up later.” The sounds of water running muffled another voice. Then the hot air dryer blasted out, making it impossible to hear for a few seconds.
“No time today. Maybe tomorrow.”
“Shit, why wait? What if she’s gone by then?”
“Who pays you? You want to move up in this organization—you work first. Besides, the ship doesn’t sail until Monday.” The guy gave a snort of derision.
Cole sat as if electrified as the voices moved away and the noise of the bathroom door closing came over the airwaves. “They sound like the two mutts sitting with Chang earlier. Christ, I wonder if they’re talking about Sara? We’ve got to tail them if they leave here. Did you hear that, Quinn? I’m calling Jake. She must be at the docks.” Excitement lined Cole’s tone as he punched in Jake’s number.
Gabby couldn’t believe their luck. It all made sense now. “I’ll bet it’s a cargo ship. And that must mean she’s in a shipping container!” Her heart hammered, making it difficult to breathe. It was a natural—many people had been smuggled out from China in the dangerous conditions of a cargo hold. Some made it out alive, some did not. Only, this time, a reverse trip was in the making. Every instinct in her body screamed it to be the answer.
“I’m calling this in.” Cole’s expression tightened as he conveyed the gist of the conversation from the bathroom of Chang’s Café over the phone to Quinn. “Yeah, we’re on it. We need to know for certain and we need to check vehicle registrations. Can you take care of it?”
A short pause. “Good.” The call ended and Cole tucked the phone away.
“Quinn’s on top of it.” He started the truck. “Let’s drive around and see if we can spot anything in the back lane. Maybe you can put a hat on, so they don’t remember you from earlier.”
She reached into the back seat and grabbed a baseball cap with the logo from the LA Kings hockey team blazoned on the crest. “Really?” she teased as she pulled the gray and black hat down tightly onto the crown of her head, tugging her hair through the loop in the back.
“Guess I’ll need a new one now that I’m in Canuck-land.”
She swatted at his arm, good spirits restored with the break in the case. “You’re so bad.”
“I’m so bad, I’m good,” he quipped back.
Hmm. “That you are.” She arched an eyebrow at him. She swallowed hard at his wolfish grin. Good to be alive today.
As Cole cranked the wheel hard and merged again with the busy traffic on Pender Street, she swung her head back and forth to catch everything. The back lane was barely wide enough to thread the vehicle through and he drove around obstacle after obstacle. Right behind Chang’s business, a black van stood parked. Its back doors were flung open but the vehicle was tight against the building, making it impossible to see what was inside.
As Cole moved at a snail’s pace, Gabby made a quick decision. “I’m checking it out.” And before he could object, she hit the Unlock button on the door and jumped down to the pavement. She pulled the brim of her hat lower then, at a fast clip, raced to the van, grinning at Cole’s horrified expression. He didn’t know who she was if he thought she’d leave one stone unturned. One never knew what slime-bucket would crawl out.
The van windows were tinted, but with her hands acting like binders braced on both sides of her face, she could see inside enough to make out some boxes. And what was inside made her heart slam. Boxes of nails and liter-sized Mason jars. Worst of all, a small box of what looked like dynamite.
“Hey, what you doing? Get away from there,” a loud voice ordered. She spun around, face-to-face with one of the men from Quinn’s collection of photos. He’d come out the man door beside the van. His hardened expression turned her stomach.
“Sorry, just looking,” she said, pretending to be indifferent to whatever was inside, keeping her head down.
“Whatcha think this is? Nothing here for you.” The angry young man looked to be still in his teens, his scraggly chin whiskers adding a pathetic belligerence to his pinched face.
She moved away, not wanting any sudden movement to set him off.
“You have any change you can spare?” she asked, trying to sound desperate.
“I don’t help out junkies. Unless you want to earn it?” he said, his eyebrows shooting upward with the off-color suggestion. Yuck.
“I’m no fuckin’ prostitute!” She didn’t have to pretend she was insulted.
“Hey, Tommy, what’s up?” Another teenager had emerged from the building.
Two against one. She turned and hurried away, praying they weren’t going to give chase. But, if they did, she knew a lot of solid moves, thanks to Combato and Defendo, programs developed by ex-military Bill Underwood for the Canadian Military and the martial arts scene after WW ІІ, but why engage unless there was no other choice?
Any second she expected to feel a slimy hand on her shoulder, making her body crawl with worry as she strode away, pretending indifference. When she was far enough away that she knew they hadn’t bothered with her but were continuing about their business, she offered up a prayer. Thank you, God.
She found Cole parked in his truck a couple of hundred feet away just around the corner and out of sight of the van, his expression suggesting he was not entirely pleased with her. She climbed inside. He attacked before she could get a word in.
“What the hell, Gabby, you could have been hurt!” He stared at her, his angry, very worried eyes drilling into her soul and pining her to the seat with their sheer intensity. “I can’t have you going off half-cocked like that! For God’s sake, woman, we need to keep on the same page, plan our moves! Oh, God, if you had been hurt, I— I won’t allow it!”
His words lit a firestorm.
“For fuck’s sake, Cole, what was I supposed to do? It was the ideal opportunity! And you are not my father, like I’m not your mother! About as far from that as two people can be! I’m perfectly capable of taking care of myself. I’m a professional, not a fucking amateur, not a bimbo like that woman in the massage parlor or that oh-so-sweet one in the café. I don’t trade favors. I bed you, it’s because I want to. Not because I’m trading something for it.”
Complete silence filled the cab.
Gabby took a few breaths, her heart racing far too fast, her thoughts in turmoil. Danger lurked at every corner, and the one to her heart looked to be the one most likely to trip her up.
“Okay, I’m sorry. I was out of line.”
“Do you think?” She rubbed at her forehead as she snapped out her answer. “Okay, I know you’ve been hurt, Cole, lost people, but I’m a strong, resilient person. I don’t give up when the going gets rough. I hang in there, have no doubt on that score. I’m in this for the long haul. Whatever it takes, I’ll be there.”
She took a chance and looked at him. Indecision carved sharp lines into his skin, bruising the skin under his eyes with dark shadows.
“And I found out something very important. They’re planning on making incendiary devices. The van’s loaded with Mason jars, hundreds of small nails and sticks of dynamite.”
Cole let out a long breath as he assessed her information, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel, his jaw tightly clenched. “Looks like Chinatown’s headed for a protracted war. I have no damn choice. This will have to be reported through proper channels whether we like it or not. God, I hope we can contain this. Last thing we need is to have Chang know we’re this
close.” He took another breath, shaking his head. “As if this city doesn’t have enough trouble already with the current opioid crisis.”
“You know about that?” Though it was hard to miss, ambulances, triage staging areas, paramedics and firefighters attending to someone else lying prone on the streets.
“Who doesn’t? Hundreds of overdoses every month—it’s beyond comprehensible. How the fuck do we stop them? Get them to quit before they throw their lives away?” His pain-riddled eyes bruised her soul.
“You can’t blame yourself for choices that other people make, Cole. You can only be there when they are ready to accept help.”
He slammed his fist into the steering wheel, making her wince. That had to hurt.
“Sorry, I snapped.” His eyes swam with emotion, a rueful grin melting her right to the core when he looked up and locked glances with her.
“You did nothing wrong.” She hesitated. “If you want to talk about it, like I said, I’m a good listener.” She held her breath. Please. Let some of the pain out. For God’s sake.
Silence descended. She supposed the moment lost. Fine. She’d given him the chance.
But then he began to speak, almost as if he were talking to himself, words pouring out in a raging torrent. “Mathew, my son, he was a special little guy. Bright as a whip and so curious about life. It was so hard to keep him out of anything, to keep him safe. The day it happened—” He darted a quick glance her way, his expression laced with pain so harsh she could barely stand seeing it. “Mathew had been running around while his mother sat on the park bench, talking with other mothers of the play group she belonged to. She wasn’t watching closely, just nodding at his exploits. Just a normal day in paradise.”
He ran his hand over his head, then tightened it on the back of his neck in a stranglehold.
“A monster was watching from the bushes, waiting for his chance. He had a van parked on the street a short distance away, a rag soaked with chloroform in his hands. We found the evidence. He threw it onto the ground. He managed to get to the van, though Mathew put up a hell of a fight. One of his little sports shoes came off…” Cole voice trailed off and he pressed his lips tightly together. His hands moved to the steering wheel, clutched at it as if it were a lifeline, his knuckles white from the strain.
He turned the eyes of pain and death onto Gabby. She sat stock-still, unable to move or speak.
“Then, things just fell apart. Maddie began using, couldn’t handle losing her little boy. I failed them. There are things you can never un-see. I should have been there…”
Tears escaped. He dashed them away with an angry hand. “I’m sorry. I’m damaged goods, Gabby. I have nothing to give you or any other woman. Only good to be the avenger of death.”
“For fuck’s sake, no! You are so much more than that, Cole. You have to forgive yourself for this. It was not your fault. Evil exists in this world. Hell, it’s a daily fight for some to keep it at bay. Good people are hurt by others every minute of every day. Why should any of us think we’re so special that we should be spared? What, so someone else undergoes it instead? Is that right? No, it happens. Shit happens. But at least you picked yourself up, got back to work, and channeling all that pain to help others. Trust that this is your path—avenging evil in this world. I know. A man harmed me. Left me at the mercy of a loan shark. I could have fallen into the pit. But no, I’m using that hard-earned experience to help women who need out of bad situations. Who need proof to keep their children safe. To move on and rebuild their lives.” Gabby threw out all the lifelines she could, hoping one would be the one to spare him.
Silence.
Cole stared ahead, his eyes narrowed.
“Someone tried to hurt you?” he asked, turning toward her, locking eyes with her. She broke the connection first.
“It’s a long story. But my ex was a gambler and got into debt so badly that he fled the country with his tail between his legs. I was left to pay them off, or lose a limb, and I am kind of partial to all of mine.” She heard the shakiness in her tone. Couldn’t be helped. The last few minutes had blown her away.
“I am sorry. Your life hasn’t been easy, either.”
“No one has it easy. My grandma always said, ‘it’s damn hard to be human, child, but it’s all we got’.”
“No kidding.” Though still shaken, Cole sounded better.
“Okay,” he said, straightening his shoulders. He pulled out a laptop and connected to the satellite system, bringing up the Department of Motor Vehicles, hacking in within a few seconds. She understood. She’d break a few more rules, if it would bring Sara home sooner.
He turned to Gabby, all business now, his eyes clearer. “The van’s registered to Core Enterprises. Hmm, that’s a new one.”
“Let me check on it,” Gabby said, itching to get to the truth. Is it a Chang company or not?
Cole gave her some room to work as his cell phone rang.
“Aha, here we go!” she said with satisfaction, finding the exact information they needed a few minutes later. “Chang is one of the partners.”
“Good work. Okay, we’ll follow it if it leaves the area. And Silk just called to say they’ve scheduled two teams of low-level TETRAD operatives to relieve us in a couple of hours, then we grab a few hours of sleep. I don’t expect the two pervs will head to the docks until tomorrow at the earliest, but you never know, what with the threat of gang warfare hanging over everyone’s head.”
She began to voice her objections. “I can work all night, sleep right here—”
“No, you need your rest. Too many mistakes are caused by over-worked, sleep-deprived agents.
Cole started up the truck. “I’ll reposition.” He drove down the street, parking so they had a view of the area behind Chang’s Café, and cut the motor.
“They just might lead us right to Sara.” Gabby nodded as she spoke, keeping the peak of her hat low as she peered out her side window.
“We can only hope. And maybe offer up a prayer.”
“You believe in God, Cole?” She surprised herself in the asking, but the isolation of the cab invited confessions. Stake-outs were notorious for this. They were also notorious for long hours punctuated by extreme need for action. A crazy life for sure, but one she wouldn’t give up for anything. And when they solved the case or got the culprit or found someone and reunited them with their loved ones, it more than made up everything.
“I did. Not so sure these past few years. How about you?”
“I’d like to think someone is in charge of all this chaos. And the world is a remarkable place. Miracles happen every day in nature. And I was baptized Catholic as a child.”
He shrugged as he reconnected to Quinn. “We need a miracle, so any help we can get is more than welcomed.”
Gabby chewed on a fingernail as she monitored the noises and conversations in the café, kept an eye on her surroundings and listened in to Cole report her recent findings.
“Okay, good, here’s what I suggest. Have someone call in an anonymous tip on an untraceable line. Then Chang will be none the wiser. Good, catch you later.” Cole disconnected the call.
“That’ll work.” She nodded. “Good thinking. And to think I was just about ready to grab a cab to the police station and try to come up with a story on the way to explain seeing those bombs.”
“No cab. I would have driven you there. And any excuse you came up with would have been lame, anyway. No way to explain our being here.”
She sat back, stymied. “You’re a kind of a control freak,” she grumbled, letting off some steam as she cooled her heels. Any banter was welcome after the past few minutes.
He shrugged. “I was raised this way. Blame my southern mama.”
“I don’t think stakeouts are the kind of situation that have proper southern protocols attached.”
“Are you kidding me? I’ve been instructed exactly how to act in any given situation.”
“Say what?” The slight curve upward of his mo
uth said he was teasing her. The moment of brevity after the revelation took her breath clear away. If they could get this shit behind them, perhaps there was some hope for them.
“There they are. The two guys to watch the front entrance. A second pair of agents to take over for us will be here soon as well. Then, we can take a break.” Cole sat up straighter. Gabby watched a pair of operatives she knew slightly drive by in a black SUV on their way to setting up their own stakeout in the front of Chang’s.
“You should spend some time with your brother while he’s here in town.” The sudden thought was out of her mouth before she could stop it, not realizing it had been lurking in the back of her mind since she’d found out he called.
“And you should keep thoughts like that to yourself,” he snapped back, stunning her. His brother was one sore point. The guy was as far from being easy as one could get.
“Fine. Be that way.” She crossed her arms over her chest, pissed.
“I’m sorry. That was harsh.”
“Do ya think?” She kept her eyes focused on the landscape, avoiding showing him the pain she’d experienced at his rebuttal. She already felt out of sorts arguing over the van incident. And what if Sara had been inside? A long shot, but not out of the question.
“I really am sorry, beautiful. Been a hell of a year.”
She softened a bit. Nice to be called beautiful, apology aside. “Yeah, I get it. Just forget it happened. I’ve had far harsher words thrown my way from far lesser men.”
“That doesn’t make it right. You deserve so much better.”
“What do you know about what I deserve?” she asked, making light of it. There would likely be a lot more hours with them holed up together and the last thing she wanted was to be at loggerheads the entire time.
This time, she met his glance, and when her eyes locked with his, that overwhelming sense of connection made her swallow hard. Damn, alive and searing. The knowledge burned within her. They needed time away from the job or the lust that was threatening to burst into flames around them would combust again. Of that she had no doubt.
