by J W Becton
Whoever she was.
“The 442 has attracted attention,” he said, cutting his eyes out the driver’s window. “I’ll go out and grunt over the car, and you get the lay of the land.”
I nodded and hopped out of the car, noticing that it had indeed drawn a bit of a crowd. I eyed it again, wondering how anyone could possibly know just by looking at the outside that this lump of metal held such an incredible engine.
One of the onlookers, a boy who couldn’t have been more than eighteen, let his eyes wander over the car, and then he looked me up and down.
“Nice,” he said.
I barely refrained from rolling my eyes at his obvious lack of flirting skill.
I didn’t mind the compliment, of course, but it would have been nicer coming from a male who was over eighteen and sober.
Then, hoping to let everyone know that I was decidedly off the market—and just because I could—I circled the 442’s enormous hood and stopped in front of Vincent. I smiled up at him and let the keys drop into one of his front coat pockets. “I’ll be back later, baby,” I said, standing on my toes to plant a kiss on his cheek and relishing the brief look of surprise and pleasure I caught in his eyes.
“Yeah,” he said, looking over the guys now looking over the car, “don’t be long.”
I wandered toward the area where the majority of the people seemed to be gathering, and just before I was out of earshot I heard one of the boys say to Vincent, “Yo, buddy, pop the hood.”
And I almost laughed at anyone calling Vincent “buddy.”
I walked along the line of cars, surprised at the variety of makes and models. I saw American muscle cars like the 442 and tiny little foreign jobs decorated with everything from the traditional flames to dragon art. I pretended to admire the vehicles, but all the while my eyes scanned faces for Lacarova.
As I drew farther away from the 442 and Vincent, I became conscious of the growing din of engine noise ahead, and I realized that the actual drag racing was taking place around the side of the main building, so I weaved through the parked cars and mingling people and headed in that general direction.
If the boss was working a fraud scam here, she would likely be among the racers, those who had the most to lose.
I eased through a swarm of college kids and popped around the corner, where the noise became almost overwhelming. Over the throaty growl of engines, a high-pitched whine threatened to deafen me completely. My first instinct was to cover my ears, but a quick look around told me that would make me stand out.
I winced. Everyone else must have already blown out their eardrums by now.
I stopped to observe as the two cars responsible for all the noise—the growler and the whiner—pulled to the starting line. A college-aged girl in skintight jeans and a tube top—probably freezing her butt off—was positioned between the racers, and she dropped her arms to signal the start of the race. In a squeal of tires, the cars shot forward down the makeshift track. The smaller car, a foreign model, began to lose traction almost immediately and swerved alarmingly. The driver got off the gas, the whistle faded slightly, and the car slowed as it limped down the quarter-mile track.
Thank God, the driver had the sense not to skid off the road and take out any onlookers.
I squinted at the distant finish line in time to hear a muted cheer rise from the crowd as the other car handily took the race. I kept watching as the foreign car rolled in at a much slower—and more sensible, given his traction issue—rate of speed.
I kept walking, scanning the crowd, and when I reached the end of the track, I turned and began to retrace my steps.
By this time, both cars were traveling slowly back up the distance of the track to the main parking area.
I was about to return to Vincent and the 442 to call Ted and hound him for information when I realized that the losing racer had pulled his car—a Honda Civic—around the side of the main office building.
The driver of the Civic emerged and turned toward me. He was tall, young, and blond, and he looked far too familiar.
I stared at him, my mouth falling open.
It was Justin Montgomery.
Vincent’s son.
Holy crap, I thought as I realized the implications of his presence. This was bad on so many levels.
Justin was engaged in illegal drag racing, probably underage drinking, maybe gambling, and, worst of all, he’d lied to Vincent.
I glanced over my shoulder, as if I expected Vincent to materialize. Thank God, he was nowhere in sight.
I stood rooted to the ground for a moment. What should I do now?
The practical, reasonable side of me knew that Justin was here of his own volition, given the fact that he had entered his car in a race and nearly rolled it over in the process. He had souped up the Civic and made the choice to be here at an illegal event, so he should suffer the consequences of that decision.
However, the protective side of me wanted to do something to avert the looming disaster when Vincent found out that his son had deceived him.
I shook myself.
There was a more immediate problem.
Justin knew me, knew that I worked in law enforcement with his old man. Blowing our already tenuous cover now could not only put Vincent and me in potential danger but could also endanger Justin. He was a cop’s kid, after all, and we were here investigating some seriously heavy crimes.
Crimes that Justin himself might be guilty of.
That thought took me aback.
Was Justin involved in fraud? Had the boss gotten her hands on him just as she had everyone else in her employ?
And what would Vincent do if that were the case? How would he react?
I honestly had no idea, but discovering Justin here, at an illegal drag race, was definitely not going to solidify their familial bond.
I forced my brain to stop spinning.
Sasha Keller was the most important person to consider, and my moment of indecision was not helping her at all.
But I now had another reason—besides finding Sasha and averting utter chaos—for trying to find the boss as quickly and quietly as possible.
Justin.
And Vincent.
I glanced one last time at Justin and realized that Michael Lacarova now stood in front of the Civic too. Lacarova studied the engine and then gestured to Justin around the raised hood. I didn’t know how an engine problem might have caused his obvious traction issue, but that was neither here nor there.
More important was that Justin knew Lacarova. The situation was looking worse and worse the longer I watched him, but at the moment, our priority was Sasha Keller.
I pulled out my cell phone with the intention of calling Vincent, but when I looked at my screen, I discovered I had missed four calls from Ted. I immediately went to my voice mail.
“Special Agent Jackson, I have a name for you: Carla Sumler—”
I didn’t need to hear another word.
I knew Carla Sumler, the independent insurance adjuster whom I’d met previously.
She was the boss, and she had abducted Sasha Keller.
And when I found her in this massive crowd, I was going to kick her ass.
Thirty
Lacarova saw the boss near the racing action, and he didn’t bother to disguise the smirk of victory on his face.
His plan had been to locate her, make sure she was on the property, and then tip off the cops to the race and to the fact that she’d been seen stashing a little girl in the trunk of her car.
Then, he’d disappear forever, knowing that she had finally gotten what she deserved.
He didn’t know what kind of time she’d get for kidnapping, but he was willing to bet it wouldn’t be a slap on the wrist.
There was of course the little problem of Tammy Wynn, but he figured one loose end shouldn’t hurt him. He’d be long gone by the time she squealed on him.
Lacarova laughed at the thought.
“Something funny, man?” Justin a
sked, head cocked sideways.
“You have no idea,” he said.
The college boy should thank him, really, because Justin was exactly the kind of person the boss would have tried to recruit. He’d been expelled from school, liked fast cars, and was handy with a wrench. But Lacarova was about to save him from the very fate from which he hadn’t been able to save himself.
“Look, I’ve got to talk to someone,” he said, brushing Justin off as they approached the boss. “I’ll see you around.”
Of course, he’d never see the kid again if things went well.
The smart thing to do was to call the police now and then retreat to watch the fallout, but seeing the boss so confident and powerful made his ass twitch.
Something in him made him want to confront her first.
“Hey, boss,” he sneered at her.
“Michael, son,” she said, gazing around her at the empire that was about to fall. “You’ve taken care of things, haven’t you? As I asked.”
“Yeah, no one can tie me to the girl,” he said, grinning. “You, on the other hand….”
The boss’s eyes hardened, and her jaw tightened so much he thought her teeth might crack.
“What the hell did you do?”
“I’m making things right,” he said, backing away from her reach. “You’ll see.”
He turned and sprinted into the crowd, phone in hand, ready to make the call.
Behind him, he heard her enraged voice shout, “Michael, what the hell did you do?”
Thirty-one
Two new racers approached the starting line and were presently engaged in dramatic burnouts, causing the acrid smoke of burned rubber tires to billow out behind them, obscuring my view of Justin and Lacarova. Resolved in my quest and barely able to hear, I felt safe to call Vincent’s cell, give him my location, and tell him quickly about Carla.
Almost before I finished explaining, Vincent appeared beside me and we disconnected our phones.
Vincent looked like he was ready to attack someone, and I laid a hand on his forearm.
“Listen,” I said. “Before we do this, I think you should know Justin is here.”
His eyes remained riveted to mine, and he went deadly still.
I felt compelled to assure him of something, but I didn’t know what.
“I watched him race his Civic, and then I saw him talking to Michael Lacarova.”
Vincent remained quiet for a beat and then scrubbed a hand along his jaw, which seemed to harden the longer he thought.
“Dammit. I knew he was lying.”
That was all he said.
“How do you want to handle this?” I asked, studying Vincent’s eerily blank expression before rambling on. “Do you want to try to speak to Justin, find out what he’s doing here, what he’s involved in and to what degree, before we call in the raid?”
“No,” Vincent said finally. “Sasha Keller’s safe retrieval is the priority.”
“And what about Justin and the raid?” I asked.
Vincent eyed me but said nothing.
“You’d let him be arrested? Go into the system?”
“We’ll see how it goes,” Vincent said, “but it’s not my decision to make. He’s here of his own free will.”
If we had any hope of talking to Justin before the whole situation imploded, we’d have to make Carla’s takedown silky smooth.
And nothing in this business ever goes silky smooth.
So in short, I already knew what would happen. Justin would acquire a police record tonight, Vincent would suffer yet another disappointment on that front, and there was nothing I could do to stop any of it.
But at least we still had the opportunity to rescue the true innocent in all this: Sasha Keller.
If she were still alive.
Everything was ready. The MPD was on standby, waiting for us to call them in, but Vincent and I wanted to try to apprehend Carla as quietly as possible. Try to keep the situation contained until we knew where Sasha was.
First, of course, we had to find the bitch.
And that was largely up to me since I was the only person who had seen her.
My first instinct told me to follow Lacarova for a bit. He worked at Allred Racing, which Carla owned, after all. Maybe he was here on her behalf tonight, working some fraud angle. When he finally started moving, Justin at his side, Vincent and I strolled along after them, keeping ourselves hidden as well as possible in the crowd.
After moving slowly from car to car, Lacarova ditched Justin and walked toward a white sedan that I recognized. Only now it didn’t have the Mercer Loss Consultants sticker on the side.
“That’s her car,” I said, nudging Vincent and pointing out the sedan.
And as the words emerged into the air, I spotted Carla.
“There’s Carla,” I said suddenly. “Blue puffy coat, white hat.”
We watched as she and Lacarova carried on what appeared to be a tense conversation before the mechanic disappeared into the throng of people. Carla looked positively murderous, turning and shouting something after him.
Now was our chance. Justin and Lacarova had moved away, and the boss was alone.
“I’ll approach Carla first,” Vincent offered, knowing that she would recognize me.
I turned my profile toward Carla and then watched in my peripheral vision as Vincent circled around his target, planning to drop in behind her.
I also kept alert for any sign of Justin and Michael Lacarova, but I could no longer spot them in the crowd. Cutting my eyes back to Carla, I saw that Vincent was behind her now. Close enough to speak. He said something, causing her to turn slightly.
She eyed him up and down, scowled at him.
They drew nearer to me, and I turned my face farther away, obscuring my view. But at least I could hear them now.
“Will you walk with me?” Vincent asked. I envisioned him looping a hand along her forearm, ready to move into a wristlock if needed.
“Go to hell, pretty boy,” she growled.
Ah, Southern manners.
“But I have some questions,” Vincent pressed, “and I’m told you’re the person to ask.”
“Back off,” she hissed. “I’m not in a question-answering mood.”
Now that they were past me, I turned once more to try to locate Lacarova and Justin. Nothing. Maybe we could get this done without Vincent’s son ending up in the mix. Get in and out quietly.
I came up beside Carla, but upon seeing me, she knew something was wrong. Her eyes began darting wildly around, and she tried to rip her arm from Vincent’s grasp, failed, and still attempted to turn away.
“Where do you think you’re going?” Vincent queried with false calm as I grasped her other arm, and together we propelled her forward.
“What are you? Cops?” Carla demanded, her too-loud voice carrying even over the din of the crowd.
Okay, this wasn’t going so well now. I could feel her energy shift, and I lowered my grip to her wrist, ready to apply pressure if needed.
Carla exploded as if she’d just taken a hit of meth. She yanked away from my grasp, rounding on Vincent with a shout. Her free hand shot up to Vincent’s chin, her palm connecting, fingers reaching up his face.
She held on to him like a tick as I tried to peel her off my partner. I managed to pull her away, but her red, claw-like nails dragged along his skin, leaving angry streaks behind.
This was the woman who had remained aloof and distant and in control of such a large fraud system? For someone supposedly so in control, she was absolutely insane now.
“Cops! Cops! Cops!” she shouted as she tried to gouge Vincent’s eyes.
People in the crowd had begun to repeat the word “cops,” and the general atmosphere shifted from harmless fun to hostility. The shit was about to hit the proverbial fan.
The noise level rose steadily, and suddenly the crowd seemed to converge at once, pushing and pulling in all directions.
Then someone threw a punch.
>
And that’s all it took to turn a too-tight jumble of people into a crazed, brawling mass.
Cursing as some fool shoved hard into me, I let go of Carla’s arm only to see her fist flash out and connect with Vincent’s jaw.
My partner glowered at her, his bloody face contorting with barely controlled anger, before jerking the woman’s arm roughly behind her back as he continued to propel her relentlessly through the throng of humanity.
“Help! Help!” Carla shouted now as she struggled against Vincent, pulling and diving like a fish on a hook as I attempted to get back beside them. But the crowd was rapidly becoming out of control, and people began shoving against Vincent, trying to help Carla. Bodies were constantly in flux, running into me. I tried to push one aside only to have another take its place.
“Dammit,” I said as my view of Vincent and Carla became obscured in the chaos.
I tried to assess the situation, my hand going instinctively to my M&P. This was very bad, and I needed to get control of the mob, but drawing a lethal weapon in this chaos was not a hot idea, especially given that we didn’t know what other weapons might be scattered among the onlookers. I might unintentionally instigate a shootout.
I could no longer see Vincent or Carla, and I had no idea where Justin was in the melee, but the whole thing was going downhill fast, and we needed backup.
Dodging flying bodies, I managed to use my phone to summon the waiting police cars to the scene, and I knew I would soon hear the sound of sirens coming toward us, but I couldn’t wait. Vincent was still in that jostling, rumbling crowd, and they knew he was a cop. That meant he was in trouble.
With mostly steady nerves, I pulled my pepper spray and baton from my belt, putting one in each hand like some kind of demented warrior, and waded into the crowd, determined to regain some control of the situation.
