Page 52 of Special Agent Joseph

“See… I don’t believe that’s what happened. No way a drug-addict would have left them here unless coerced.”

“What are you saying?”

“I don’t know for sure. But it scares the hell out of me. Let’s go and watch Vinnie’s videos.”

Later, they got the answer to Joe’s question. Watching the security images, they saw the gray Camry drive by slowly and then reverse to eventually park where they’d found it. They saw a smaller figure leave the car, wearing a white jacket. Whoever it was kept their face down, and they were hunched over, making it damn near impossible to come up with any kind of identification.

For a few moments, the person disappeared to return ten minutes later… only to be approached by a large man, all dressed in black. At this point, they clearly made out Lucia. Though she didn’t appear to want to talk, the man forced her attention when he slammed the car door closed after she’d opened it to leave.

A few more seconds of dialogue followed, and then the man reached out, grabbing Lucia who was now fighting for her freedom. Throwing her over his shoulder, he headed for a dark SUV which drove forward, showing up on the screen. He literally threw her inside the back where hands reached out to control her. Then he slid in beside her and slammed the door shut before they drove off.

The hijacking took a matter of seconds… maybe a minute. When Vinnie saw what they all watched, he broke down completely. Sobbing, he said, “It’s them. The Chinese. I know it. Chen Bao wouldn’t accept my retirement. He warned me. Now they’ve got Lucia. That son of a bitch has my granddaughter.” Angrily, he bolted out of his chair just to drop to the ground, his legs unable to hold him upright.

Jie rushed to his side and between him and Joe, they guided Vinnie back to his office. “Now I have to go through with the deal. He warned me if I didn’t, he’d get to me, and he has.”

Megan stepped forward. “Do you expect him to call with a ransom? To make you do what he wants, and then he’ll give back Lucia?”

“No. It’s not like that. He warned me earlier that I’d insulted him and would need to make amends. He’ll be expecting me to reach out.”

Joe added, “You’re sure that’s him? Did you recognize who took Lucia?”

“Oh, not the big man who approached her. But the ring on the hand that reached out to pull her inside, I’d know that anywhere. It’s the gaudy Chinese symbol Chen wears. There’s no mistaking it. The devil knew I’d recognize it.” Vinnie turned to Jie. “Get him on the phone.”

Jie took a few seconds and then handed it over to Vinnie. “Chen I got your message. The deal is back in place. Listen to me my friend, you hurt one hair on my little girl’s head, and you’re a dead man.”

Chapter Thirty-eight

Megan wasn’t sure if she was happy or not with this new twist. To have the chance of capturing the crooks in the act would be a huge advantage. Originally, their intentions had been to arrest the bad guys, including Joseph, and get the junk off the streets… like millions of dollars of Iso, Fentanyl, and similar crap that kills.

Yeah… but that was before Lucia was involved. Now they had to resist making any moves until they knew the girl was safe. That meant they could possibly lose again. She’d reread the files of the last drug run Vinnie had made where the FBI had followed Joseph’s info and lost the bust. By the time they’d shown up at the address he’d given them, the drugs had been cleared out and no arrests had been made.

They couldn’t afford another screwup like that and more deaths on their streets. Megan knew it as well as Kramer and their boss.

The three of them waited at headquarters for Joe to appear. They needed to get their plan in place if they were to be successful in the takedown and save Lucia. Both Tom and her paced in the limited space, following each other.

Sheila spoke first. “You two are making me nervous. What the hell is wrong with you? Is there a trust issue with Joseph? Don’t forget, he’s played this game before, and we lost. The only reason he’s still walking around free is because he left the city and no one knew where he went. Then the guy shows back up in the vicinity and flips his truck, almost killing himself. Now he’s willing to play on our side.”

Although Joe had been weirdly absent the night before, leaving her on pins and needles when she heard nothing, Megan still believed in him. She answered Sheila, her conviction firmly in place. “No. I’m not worried about Joe or his abilities. It’s just Chen Bao. Man’s a loose cannon. Bastard struts around as free as a bird yet he’s been linked to more crimes than I can count on both hands. It’s like nothing sticks.”

Tom nodded sadly. “True dat. The prick’s Teflon. But I have faith that for every rotten action, one day they’ll be consequences waiting to be paid. And this asshole has a lot of payments due. Hopefully, we can make this his judgement day.”

Smiling, Megan poked him. “What, you believe in karma now?”

Grinning, Tom dropped his head as if he were shy. “Gosh, ma’am, that I do. Then again, I’ll admit to putting my trust in the Almighty as well.” He waited seconds before adding, “And in our ability to beat them bastards at their own game. That’s with Joe’s help.”

“Someone speaking my name in vain?” Joe’s obvious side grin made the others laugh.

Megan’s body tightened with glee at hearing Joe’s voice after his latest absence. Before she could comment Sheila spoke up.

“You’re on the team, right? Therefore, we need to know what Vinnie shared.” The boss’s tone made everyone aware of the seriousness of the question. The time had passed for any evasion.

“Yeah, about that. He wants to play the same game as we did before. I had to ask him exactly what we did to lose the cops last time and get the shipment away from the police. For a few seconds, I wasn’t sure he’d reply… my not knowing threw him. Until I reminded him about my accident and my memory loss. Then he explained. He said we’d led you to believe the drugs would be at his main warehouse in the Apex industrial park at a certain time. But he actually has more than one place that he can store them. The other warehouse is owned by another of his fake companies under an LLC completely unattached to his business, and it’s in the Northwest Industrial Business Park located east of US-95.”

“Did he tell you what it was called?”

“Nope. Didn’t ask. But he gave me the address.” Joe shared the information and watched Sheila bring up the page on her screen.

“Yep. I see it. There’s a lot of places there. It’s rundown and not very large, which would make it seem quite ordinary. Bet they have top security inside.”

---