Fatal Secrets

CHAPTER TWELVE

Noel Marchand had lost his patience with the turncoat.

“Greg,” he said with a heavy sigh, “I’m unhappy with your answers. For the last twenty minutes I have been asking very simple questions. Who’s your contact in the FBI? What did you tell them about Mr. Jones? What did you tell them about me? I cannot understand why you refuse to answer.”

Jeremy Ignacio had met Noel and Ling at Vega’s house to disable the alarm system, which had been the primary reason Noel had had to wait until after four that morning to break into the traitor’s house. Fortunately, the Vegas had been sound asleep in bed, the wife easy to grab with her large belly sticking up.

Mrs. Vega was tied to a chair where Greg Vega could see her. Ling stood behind her, a gun at her head.

Vega was hard to shake. He had been a good employee for Jones until he went running to federal law enforcement; he would have made a good employee for Noel.

“Let my wife go.” His voice had begun to quiver slightly, but he’d maintained for twenty minutes that he wasn’t a traitor and had never spoken with the FBI.

“I was surprised it was you,” Noel admitted. “I’d planned on taking you on when Xavier became too great a liability. Losing that little kid was truly the final nail in his coffin, and since you’ve been with him longer than anyone, well, I thought you’d be his natural successor here in the West.”

He nodded to Ignacio, who walked over to the adjoining kitchen.

Noel continued. “Jones and I disagreed on one key point. He picked men with families because he felt that the implied threat to your ‘loved ones’ would keep his men in line. I, on the other hand, prefer employees who are unattached. Individuals who enjoy the unique benefits of our business. And until now our different philosophies have never been a problem.”

Ignacio retrieved the bug he’d planted earlier from under one of the kitchen chairs and held it up. Noel gestured at the bug and saw the fear in Vega’s eyes. Fear was useful in getting information, but it wasn’t a beneficial emotion. Especially since there wasn’t anything Vega could say or do to save himself.

“Now we’re done with the lies. Answer my questions or your wife will suffer.”

Noel bent over Vega, who futilely fought his restraints. His nose had been broken from the brief scuffle in the bedroom, and dried blood covered his face. Noel had already cut off one earlobe, which continued to slowly drip blood onto the white T-shirt Vega wore. His legs were bare, only boxers covered his ass.

Noel took his knife and stabbed it into Vega’s bare foot so hard that it went all the way through the carpet and padding and into the hardwood floor beneath.

Vega screamed and spouted profanities. No one heard him, though; he lived in the country, a nice five-acre spread in Galt. Probably thought it was a good place to raise kids. Probably thought it was safe.

“Talk now or the next knife goes through wifey’s stomach.”

Kendra Vega screamed against the cloth in her mouth. Noel had told Ling to gag her when her sobs and pleas began to irritate him.

Vega’s teeth clenched and sweat poured off his face. Noel impatiently tapped his own foot. He nodded to Ling, who hit the woman across the head so hard her chair fell over on its side.

“It wasn’t the FBI!” Vega screamed. “Don’t touch her again, you fucker! Don’t touch her!”

“You’re lying-” Noel considered Vega’s words. “If you didn’t talk to the FBI, who did you talk to?”

Vega’s squeezed his eyes shut. “I’m tell you. Please don’t hurt my wife. I’ll begging. Kill me. Don’t hurt her. Please.”

Noel didn’t respond. He waited.

Vega had been in this business long enough to know there would be no survivors. His choice was to die with pain, or without pain. Vega broke down when the silence extended into the third minute.

“Immigration.”

Noel pulled a blackjack from his pocket, the leather-wrapped weight solid and comfortable in his grip. He hit Vega across the cheek. Blood and a tooth fell from his mouth and onto the floor. “You brought ICE down on my operation?” Noel’s voice was a mere whisper.

Vega shook his head, spat blood onto the carpet. “Not you. Just Jones. I swear to God, just Jones.”

“You never mentioned my name?”

“No! No one. I told them I didn’t know any of the players. I just wanted out. I wanted to disappear. She only wanted Jones.”

Of course ICE wanted Jones. Jones knew all the players, knew where all the money came from and where it went. Noel was certain Jones had records, somewhere, of his activities. Jones was a meticulous bastard, he’d have something. By the time the FBI found it, Noel would be out of the country, so he wasn’t hugely worried about incarceration. What bothered him was rebuilding his business. It would cost him an extaordinary amount of money, not to mention rebuilding trust with his clients after something like this.

If Vega was lying, ICE-and probably the FBI at this point-knew him as Noel Marchand. That name was now in their ridiculous law enforcement database. But Jones didn’t know the Devereaux identity he used in the States, and therefore Vega also couldn’t know it.

But there were still other issues to contend with.

“Does ICE know about the pending shipment?”

“No details. Just that it’s going to happen. I didn’t have the time and location. Mr. Jones always tells me right before. I swear. God, please, let my wife go.”

Noel asked, “Who’s your contact?”

“Agent Sonia Knight. I swear, she’s the only one I’ve talked to, and I haven’t spoken to her in days. I’m supposed to call when I have the details about the next exchange, and that’s it. I swear, I never mentioned you or anyone else, she’s just after Jones. God, please, I swear.”

Noel’s blood ran cold. “Sonia Knight.”

“Y-Yes.”

He hadn’t thought about Sonia Knight in some time. He’d known she’d been in the San Francisco office of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, but had not known about her transfer to Sacramento’s regional office. Or was she here solely because of Jones? What did she know? This was a complication Noel couldn’t afford.

“How did you pick Agent Knight?”

“I–I didn’t. I contacted their hotline. Two months ago. She’s the one who met with me. I’ve only met her face-to-face once, talked to her a couple times. I swear to God, please-”

“What does she know?”

“She has no proof. I think … I think she has theories but no proof.”

“And you were willing to give her the proof?”

“Only on Jones! I swear, it was just him. I needed out. I needed out, and he doesn’t let people walk.”

“Of course not.” Noel didn’t like this development. The FBI played by strict rules. Homeland Security, and ICE, had arms that stretched much farther and crossed U.S. borders.

“What exactly did you tell her?”

“I told you!”

“She wouldn’t get you out without something tangible.”

Vega swallowed nervously, shaking, glancing at his wife. Noel stepped to the left and blocked his view. “You will answer me.”

“I confirmed information that she already knew.”

Noel pulled the knife from Vega’s foot and the traitor cried out, his muscles straining as he fought the pain and restraints. He put the knife to Vega’s neck and said, “Specifics.”

“The Omega Shipping Lines is controlled by Jones’s people. That he uses the Sacramento Deep Shipping Channel but moves the merchandise before they reach the Port of Stockton. I confirmed the operatives she knew, but didn’t give her any she didn’t-she had about half of Jones’s people.”

“I want the list that she has.”

“Okay.”

“Now.”

Vega recited names and Noel ordered Ignacio to take them down.

“What else?”

“J-Just that he uses multiple holding facilities. She’d discovered one two years ago and-You must know this, she took the girls.”

Noel didn’t know; Jones had hidden that raid from him. If he weren’t already dead, Noel would kill him far more painfully than the easy way he had, the bastard.

But Noel wasn’t going to tell this cabron that he hadn’t known. “I only confirmed it,” Vega said. “And I gave her two more abandoned facilities-you know, for g-good faith, so she’d get my wife protection.”

“She’s certainly done a good job, hasn’t she?” Noel stepped aside so Vega could see his wife, still tied to the chair, lying on the floor.

“God please God please, please, please,” Vega begged.

“Does she know how we move the women when they get here?”

“No, she assumes trucks, and I didn’t correct her. I was holding back in case she tried to renege on our agreement.”

Vega seemed motivated by Noel’s calm demeanor to keep talking, as if his compliance now would save his life. “She knew about the Omega shipment from China, and they searched Omega ships headed for Stockton, but couldn’t find them. She’s frustrated, and-”

He was rambling and saying nothing important, so Noel cut him off. “Do you know where the Zamora kid is?”

The confusion on Vega’s face made it clear he didn’t know the kid’s name. Noel elaborated. “Last week, Jones made a mistake and brought a boy to his house. He escaped. What do you know about it?”

“He was kept in the garage of the old house, over a mile away. I didn’t even know he’d been brought there until I was told he’d escaped. I looked, couldn’t find him, and Jones was worried about it, and-Oh!”

“Yes?”

“Someone told Agent Knight about the kid. Anonymous.”

“Not you?”

He shook his head. “No, not me, I didn’t tell her, someone else told her. I swear to God.”

“Who knew?”

“A lot of people. Everyone on the inner security team. We all were looking. Donny, Juan, Chuck, Lars, his accountant I think, Chris-”

Ignacio interrupted. “There’s no Chuck on this list.”

“Who’s Chuck?” Noel demanded.

“Ch-Chuck Angelo. Jones’s driver.”

“Why is he not on your list?”

“That list was the people Agent Knight knew about. She didn’t ask about Chuck, so I didn’t tell her. He’s new, three or four months.”

Driver. Noel had made a mistake. He’d assumed Jones drove himself to the restaurant. Jones often met with principals alone-or so Noel had thought. Where was the driver last night? Had Jones’s driver witnessed his assassination? Or had Jones left him home?

“Where can I find Chuck Angelo?”

“He lives on the property. The old caretaker’s house.”

“Is that anywhere near where the kid escaped?”

“I–I-I guess. Walking distance.”

“Is there anything you have neglected to tell me? Anything?

“No. I swear.”

“If you lie to me, I will know. And your wife will suffer greatly. Perhaps you’d like to see your child carved out of her stomach?”

“Please, please, I told you everything Knight knows, everything I know. I don’t even know where the shipment went after it arrived in Stockton. I don’t know, I don’t know where they are, I don’t know where the meeting is, please, please let us go. I’ll disappear, I’m so sorry.”

Noel said to Ling, “I think we’re done here.”

Ling aimed his gun at Kendra Vega’s head and shot her three times.

Vega screamed. “No! NO! You bastard! You prom ised!”

“I said she wouldn’t suffer. I didn’t say you wouldn’t.”

Noel took the knife he had in his hand and cut out Vega’s tongue. Vega’s screams of agony gave Noel neither pleasure nor remorse. Murder as punishment was simply a job that needed to be done; Noel didn’t dwell on it. He stabbed the blade into Vega’s stomach up to the hilt. He’d live ten minutes. Maybe a little more, or a little less. Though Noel was certain he wouldn’t survive, he wasn’t about to take chances.

“Ignacio, stay for a while. If he’s not dead in twenty minutes, put a bullet in his head.”

Noel left with Mr. Ling. The sky was just on the lighter side of night. “Will he be alive at sunrise?” he asked.

“What time is sunrise?”

“Four fifty-eight A.M.”

“No,” Ling said.

“Do you want to wager?”

“A hundred?”

“You’re on,” Noel said.

They got into the rental car and Noel said, “Find everything you can on this Chuck Angelo. He may be a mole. And I want renewed efforts put into tracking down the boy. If he’s in federal custody, we have a problem.” Two kids-the Zamora boy and the girl Tobias failed to kill and dispose of properly-were the greatest threats to his freedom. “I want that boy and the woman in the hospital dead.”

“Yes, sir.”

“I have to take care of Agent Sonia Knight.”

“I agree.”

“She’s not going to be easy to take out.” His anger had been simmering from the minute he heard Sonia’s name. She had been a pain in the ass since the minute he laid eyes on her. He should have killed her years ago when he’d had the chance. “Mr. Ling, when we get back to the hotel, pull together whatever information we have on her. Address, adopted family, friends, habits-anything you can find.”

“Sir, if I may?”

It’s what Ling always said when he had an idea Noel wasn’t going to like.

“Go ahead.”

“A sniper’s bullet is the best way.”

Noel knew he was right. But it wasn’t what Sonia Knight knew about this upcoming transfer, it was her activities in general that negatively impacted his business. He wasn’t going to give up the entire western states because one bitch had made it her personal vendetta to stop people like him. In actuality, Noel offered poor girls a chance to get out of the farms where they were already virtually slaves by being born into the decrepit, poor villages. He removed them from the squalor they lived in and employed them. Sex was a viable commodity. They provided a good fucking-or whatever the client wanted-and Noel and those he sold to made sure they had a place to live, food to eat, and medical care. Hell, most of the girls he handled had never seen a doctor before Noel took them for brothels around the world.

Sonia Knight would never be able to stop this profitable business. It was getting stronger every day. But she could hurt his bottom line, and Noel took that very seriously.

Especially coming from her. He wanted to see her face when he killed her. He wanted her to know who he was before she went to her grave. He wanted to make her suffer for every dollar she’d cost him over the years.

Of course, he didn’t want to be caught. He was in his prime, his business thriving especially after he took over when his father died.

“Very well, Mr. Ling. We’ll do it your way.” He sighed. “Too bad I can’t take her back to Mexico and make her work off all the money she’s cost us-on her back.”