Power and Empire

18

Special Agent Callahan put two Ellis County ambulances on call when she was two minutes out from Naldo Cantu’s farmhouse. The headlights of her Bureau-issued Expedition played on the grassy ditch as she came around a slight curve in the road. She nodded toward Caruso. “Jump on the radio and tell Ellis County where we are. I don’t want them to— Oh, shit!”

Callahan yanked the wheel hard left, narrowly missing a slender Hispanic man kneeling in the middle of the gravel road, just in front of the gate. His arms were fully sleeved with tattoos and his hands were taped behind his back. A pillowcase had been pulled over his head.

Sergeant Bourke and Special Agent John Olson were in the car behind her. Bourke had turned his lights off earlier on the approach, and narrowly avoided rear-ending the Expedition.

Callahan reached for the radio in Caruso’s hand, snatching it away.

“Listen up,” she said, at the same time she pressed the gas to drive around the hooded man.

Ellis County Sheriff’s Office came back. “Unit calling?”

“Damn it!” Callahan said. “Disregard, Ellis County.” She pressed the button on her radio, flipping it back to the encrypted frequency. Leading a task force made up of many different agencies made secure communication problematic. Instead of 10-codes or other unique signal language, she employed plain talk and relied on encryption.

“Listen up!” she said again when she was back on the secure channel. The Expedition bounced across the rutted field as she drove around the bound man. “Caution as you come to the gate! Hispanic male, tied and hooded. Olson, you and Winston peel off and scoop him up. You’re gonna have to stay back and babysit. The rest of you haul ass to the house with me. I’m sure they already hear us coming.” She tossed the mic to Caruso. “Now you can call Ellis County with our location.” She wheeled around to the far side of the house, out of the line of fire from the front door. “Leave it on the open channel this time, just in case we’re walking into a whirlwind of shit.”

Naldo Cantu and his cousin Reuben were so engrossed in Dancing with the Stars that they had not heard the approaching vehicles. Flaco, who blew a.14 on the PBT, had left the door unlocked when he’d gone for beer, so Jermaine Armstrong didn’t even get to use his ram.

Now Caruso stood in the yard, just outside the pool of light from the yellow porch bulb. A Rock River Arms LAR-15 with a collapsible stock hung from a single-point sling around his neck. Pistols were well and good, but he always felt better when he had a long gun in situations like this, so he’d borrowed one from the field office. He pressed a cell phone to his ear.

John Clark filled him in on the roadside interrogation of Flaco.

“Wish I could have been there, boss,” Caruso said. He refrained from using names, just in case any member of the task force had better-than-average hearing. “Things went off without a hitch here. Two in custody plus the one bagged at the gate.”

“The girls?” Clark asked.

Caruso took a deep breath. “One of them is in pretty bad shape. Veins were so collapsed from all the dope they’ve been giving her, medics had to use an IO gun to get fluids started.”

Dom winced just thinking about the drill-like device that shot a fifteen-gauge needle directly into the poor kid’s femur. She was so stoned from whatever these assholes had been shooting into her that she didn’t feel it, but the heavy thunk of metal puncturing the large bone made Caruso gag. There was a reason he’d gone into law enforcement instead of medicine.

“Anyway,” Dom continued. “She’s on her way to the hospital. Callahan had two Child Protective Services officers follow us out and hang back until we made entry. They’re with the other two girls now. Sounds like all three of them are from Mexico. How about you? Did you get anything good?”

Clark grunted. “Some. Coronet’s last name is possibly Chen. We also got a cell number he’s likely to ditch in the next day or two. I’ve already got Gavin working on it. These guys are the tip of the iceberg with this human-trafficking ring. It’s worth our time to talk to a few more. They may have more information on Chen and what he’s up to.”

“Copy that,” Caruso said. “You know that thumb drive we heard Feng mention on the GSM bug?”

“What about it?”

“Some kid — a girl he was sleeping with — swiped it from him, if you can believe that.”

“Where’s this drive now?” Clark asked.

“The girl gave it to the troopers, who passed it on to the FBI. Special Agent Callahan has it now. I didn’t hear all the interrogation, but somehow Feng got his hands on a bunch of data related to Coronet/Chen. She believes it has information about human-trafficking payouts et cetera. I haven’t seen it, but the way she talks, it’s coded.”

Clark was silent for a long moment. “Dom,” he finally said, “we need to get the information on that thumb drive to Gavin.”

“So put in a request,” Caruso said. “It’s national security — related. Gerry can get someone to back-channel the director. He’ll order Callahan to turn it over.”

“That’ll take too long,” Clark said. “I need it tonight.”

“Are you kidding me?” This whole conversation made Caruso’s stomach ache. “You want me to steal it from the FBI?”

He could almost hear Clark smile on the other end of the line.

“Now you’re tracking,” Clark said.

“The task force isn’t even located at the field office. I don’t have a code to get in the building.”

“Ah,” Clark said. “But you’ve got Gavin.”

“Seriously?” Caruso shook his head and looked skyward. He dropped his voice even lower. “Hell, forget prison, Callahan will just murder me. Due respect, boss, but—”

Caruso stopped talking and waved at Callahan, who was now marching across the shabby lawn, apparently on the hunt for him.

“She already trusts you,” Clark said. “I can hear it in her voice.”

Callahan stopped directly in front of him and folded her arms tight across her chest. Her eyes were narrowed, head tilted back so she was looking down her nose. The explain-yourself-mister stance made him feel like a seventh-grader whose mother had just figured out how to search the browser history on his phone.

“Are your friends responsible for that kidnapping?”

“No,” Caruso lied, giving her what he hoped was a sufficiently indignant smirk. He chose the more direct “no” because Callahan would have taken anything else for the dodge that it was. Why would you ask that? or I’m not going to justify your question were obvious attempts to obfuscate. A quick and direct denial was always best — making sure not to overreact. Did you sleep with that other woman? was at one end of the spectrum while Did you eat the last of the cereal? was at the other. Did your friends kidnap that guy? fell somewhere in the middle for the appropriate amount of indignation.

Still, lying about anything was a slippery game when played with trained interrogators, so he decided it was better to change the subject.

“Good job tonight,” he said.

Callahan nodded. It was obvious that she still didn’t believe him, but she unfolded her arms. That was something. “Still no Magdalena, though,” she said. “I don’t know why, but I thought we might find her here, too.”

“You saved three kids,” Caruso said. “That’s cause for celebration. Cut yourself a little slack.”

Callahan said, “Don’t get me wrong. I’m happy about that.” She sighed, choosing her words carefully. “Hey, I need to talk to Flaco, but the other two have already lawyered up. Want to get a drink after?”

“So you can interrogate me, too?”

“No,” she said, mimicking Caruso’s previous indignant smirk.

The radio in Callahan’s hand broke squelch. “Ellis County Fire to any unit at the Cantu residence.”

The fire department ran the ambulance, two of which had just driven away carrying the formerly imprisoned girls.

“Special Agent Callahan, go ahead.”

“Thought you guys might want to know there was a guy parked at the end of the lane when we drove out of there. He pulled a bootlegger’s turn when he saw us coming and beat feet.”

“Did you get a plate number?” Callahan asked.

“Sorry,” the ambulance driver said. “He made a right before we could catch up to him. We had to turn toward the hospital. I do have a description, though. A small dark blue pickup. I’m guessing a Chevy S-10.”