Force of Attraction Page 27

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  They entered slowly into the gloom of an abandoned building in east Baltimore smelling of summer-baked trash, animal feces, and human piss.

  Once past the entry the dark became so consuming that the muzzle of a pistol held two inches from a nose would not have penetrated one’s senses. That awareness put all other senses into overdrive. Hairs stood at full attention along arms and the backs of necks. The rancid smothering smell caused the men to suck in careful breaths, as if they might choke on that tarlike blackness if they breathed too deeply.

  Yet there were people here. The sound of a boom box blasting annihilation made the building quiver. And the yelping of puppies keened out over the percussive bass. Somewhere, up the next turn in the stairwell, people were living.

  Scott felt a hand on his shoulder and flipped his night goggles down. The darkness suddenly jumped into eerie green-vapor focus. They were moving into a hallway with closed doors on either side. There were stumbling blocks ahead. An empty crate on the right. A tin can farther down on the left. A careless kick would send it careening noisily down the corridor, alerting all creatures of the night, harmless and lethal, that their lair was about to be disturbed.

  The adrenaline push felt familiar, almost welcome. It had been a while. They had come to bust a dealer’s hide.

  Scott watched with a twinge of envy as the Baltimore DEA SWAT team fanned out down the hall. Once he would have been in there in the lead. Now he was second tier. But that was fine by him.

  He reached down in the dark and petted his partner, Izzy. She shivered with excitement to match that of the men in the hallway. Yet she would not bark until and if given the signal.

  There was light coming from under a door on the far end. Their target was here. The taste of success was tempered by the metallic burn of anxiety. No way of telling what lay beyond the door.

  The SWAT leader signaled to his men to line up, chest to back. The point man with his weapon at the ready took up a position on one side while the second man moved to force the door. Night goggles no longer necessary, they flipped them up and entered.

  It was pretty much chaos after that as the team rushed through, shouting orders and knocking over people and things until it was clear that they had total command of the interior.

  A signal sent Scott and Izzy through the door. Izzy’s attention went in turn to each of the two men and one woman lying prone on the floor, hands cuffed behind their backs. Her job was to detect weapons, money, cell phones, and drugs.

  Izzy signed first on the woman. She was searched and a weapon missed in the initial discovery was found.

  “Gute Hund!” Scott patted Izzy. Screaming and kicking, the woman tried to get at Izzy, who, safely out of reach, watched her with the detached interest she would have shown in a cavorting puppy.

  One of the men was found to be concealing a cell phone in his shoe.

  Once the suspects were locked down, Izzy’s main job began.

  “Izzy. Such.” Scott took off behind Izzy, who went with methodical efficiency over every inch of the hellhole.

  She signed on the sofa, which was missing its cushions. And on a spot behind a TV. Both places yielded a few one-pound packets of heroin. In the kitchen Izzy gave sign at an unplugged refrigerator that had twenty thousand dollars in cash taped to the underside.

  Finally, Scott and Izzy moved into the bedroom, where two dozen puppies, two to four months old by the look of them, were corralled inside a large wooden crate.

  Izzy put her paws up on the edge of the crate and began howling, so strong was the scent of drugs in her sensitive nostrils.

  Scott scooped up what looked like a poodle and turned him belly up. A long bloody sutured seam lined his belly.

  He held the puppy up for the SWAT team captain to see. “And that, gentlemen, is how it’s done.”

  The group around him smiled and slapped him on the back. Mission accomplished.

  Scott gave Izzy a treat as they stepped back out into the fresh night air. There had always been the possibility that the information Jennifer and Lorene had given the DEA would be wrong or out-of-date. But they had lucked out. After the women delivered their puppies to the assigned place in Baltimore, DEA agents had followed the drug puppies to this location. Jennifer and Lorene would be happy. Lattimore would be even happier.

  * * *

  “The women are retirees, living on small pensions, who say they were recruited with a story of animal abuse.”

  Scott took a moment to click up the next photo in his presentation to the DEA task force he and Cole had been dismissed from only a week earlier. A picture of Jennifer Lutz and Lorene Doggett in matching floral tops and white walking shorts appeared on the screen.

  “Their job was to pick up a litter of pups in one state and deliver them to people in another state who, they were told, would then take them to no-kill shelters where they could be adopted.”

  “Regular Robin Hoods of the dog world,” one task force member commented.

  The table of participants snickered over the possibility of their do-gooder status.

  “You believe them?” asked another.

  Scott didn’t take a position. “The pups were stuffed with drugs. The women must have had their suspicions. But, like many civilians recruited to be carriers, they didn’t want to know. The initial urge to do good plus the lure of untaxable cash probably made it easy for them to look the other way.”

  Cole, who sat in the back of the room, finally felt compelled to speak. “After Agent Lucca and I approached them, it was a simple matter to persuade the women that they might mitigate their crime by cooperating with the authorities. As a good-faith gesture, they gave us their next drop-off point. And, as you are aware, the raid over the weekend was successful.”

  Scott brought up the shot of the puppies and bags of heroin taken in the raid. “In a show of good faith, the women have offered to continue their puppy deliveries and feed us leads until DEA can work our way back to the source.”

  “So we’d be using a geriatric Thelma and Louise of the canine drug world as informants.” Lattimore rubbed his chin. “Our liability and reputations will take a big hit if anything goes wrong.”

  Scott nodded. “Above my pay scale. Good luck with that. That’s all I’ve got.”

  “Shit to Sherlock within a week. Nice going, Lucca.” FBI Agent Hadley glanced at Cole. “You, too, Officer Jamieson.”

  When they broke up a few minutes later, Scott and Cole hurried to leave but Lattimore stepped into their path. “That was really fine detective work the pair of you did. It will go in your jackets.”

  Cole warmed with the praise. “Thank you, sir.”

  Scott was more reserved. “All in a day’s work.”

  Lattimore’s genial expression resolved into its usual neutral. “Now, about this other matter of X. Agent Lucca and Officer Jamieson, would you follow me? I have someone I want you to meet.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Cole made her mind a blank as she dressed. She put on a sports bra, tee, and cargo pants, under which she’d strapped her snub-nose pistol to her calf with nylon webbing. Then she put on her heaviest all-terrain boots with steel toes and stuffed her cuffs inside.

  She blocked all other thoughts from her mind as she checked the equipment on her belt. Be methodical. Be thorough. Responding to a crisis required using muscle-memory skills and daily mental focus to get into the right frame of mind.

  Her weapon was loaded and holstered, with an extra magazine attached. She checked her Taser, flashlight, pepper spray, handcuffs, and remote-control button that would allow her to release Hugo from the rear of her patrol vehicle even if she was out of sight. She looked at it a moment and then took the button off her belt and shoved it into her bra.

  She was a police K-9 officer. She was ready to answer a call for help. Search and rescue. Hugo was part of her definition of herself as a K-9 police officer. They were a unit: one.

  She refused to second-gu
ess herself as she strapped her belt on. When she was certain she had everything she needed, she grabbed her Kevlar vest and windbreaker with MONTGOMERY COUNTY POLICE stenciled in block letters on the back.

  She strapped Hugo’s K-9 police collar on.

  They’d been inactive for two long boring weeks, while she was a desk jockey for her unit. It wasn’t punishment, her sergeant assured her. But it felt like punishment. The department was trying to wait out the notoriety that had put her face all over the media.

  The latest episode of Shajuanna’s reality show, the one showing Cole’s cover being blown, had garnered the highest ratings of any cable show that week. She had a hit show on her hands. Moreover, Shajuanna was now an A-list celebrity, making all the major network talk shows, morning and evening, giving her a forum for her once maligned fighting-dogs rehabilitation efforts. And a new platform, one that promised that a portion of the proceeds from Eye-C’s new album would go to start a legal fund for people who had been falsely profiled for crimes they didn’t commit. According to entertainment media, the response was overwhelmingly positive.

  Cole certainly didn’t expect a note from Shajuanna, thanking Cole for her part in making her show a hit, but Cole felt a little better knowing that the worst day of her life was balanced by Shajuanna’s new success. After all, Shajuanna was a wronged party in all this. So far, the threats about lawsuits hadn’t been followed through. Maybe they were even.

  Cole blew out her breath. Even so, she could do with a little peace and quiet.

  There’d been a lot of teasing to face on the job. Hard, merciless teasing. But behind it she eventually noticed a grudging admiration that she had been tapped for a federal task force when none of them had been. The more she smiled or ignored the taunts of the jealous, the more a kind of respect grew around her. It would wear off. Such things did. But for now, she wrapped it around her like a life jacket. The experience had isolated her and she wasn’t sure when and if she would ever feel completely part of her department again.

  She couldn’t talk about the ongoing investigation, couldn’t even indicate where and what she’d been doing, even though she and Scott had broken the case after they were officially relieved of their duties. The main culprits behind the puppy-mule trade had not yet been identified but things were in motion for that to happen.

  As she faced her fourth and final night of her first weekly patrol after more than a month off the streets, she tried to look on the bright side. At least while doing night patrol she wouldn’t have to deal with the jokers or tolerate the curious stares of the envious. She was still too raw to put any of what had happened into perspective. She just needed to get through the night.

  So, maybe she wasn’t cut out to be a badass after all. Not everyone was. That didn’t mean she couldn’t do her job, and do it well.

  Finally she reached for her cell phone. Scott had left her a text. It said GOOD LUCK. He, too, was officially back on duty after two weeks of riding a desk. Tonight, they were both going back to work.

  * * *

  “So then I said, ‘Not if you want to keep both of your hands.’ Taser must have read my mind because he lunged, barking and showing every scary tooth in his head. That’s when the suspect decided that being arrested was going to be the better choice.” Sandra Martin’s laughter was as strong as the paper cup of coffee she held.

  “At least you’ve seen some action.” Cole anchored a hip on the edge of Sandra’s cruiser. “My patrol so far this week has been quiet as a grave.”

  Sandra was the other female K-9 officer in the Montgomery County Police Department. Her partner was a golden-pelted Malinois named Taser. She’d met Sandra coming out of an all-night convenience store located where their patrols intersected. Cole was there to take a bathroom break and catch her own cup of coffee.

  The radio crackled on Sheila’s shoulder. After a brief exchange she shoved her braids back up under her hat and picked up her to-go cup from the hood of her cruiser. “I’m out. Some of us got a job to do.”

  Cole nodded. “See you this weekend for softball practice?”

  “You know it.” Sandra slid into the seat. “We gotta get our props back from PGCPD.”

  Cole walked toward the front of the store. She really didn’t want any three A.M. coffee, often so thick it tasted like fuel oil. Nor did she need any Slim Jims or Little Debbie anything but it was not the best hour for shopping for anything wholesome. Even the bananas in a basket at checkout, she knew from experience, would be oily black by this hour.

  At the corner of her eye she saw a van pull in to pump gas. She had parked her cruiser near the front door but off to one side. Hugo was in the front seat watching her. He always did that, watched her every move from the driver’s seat when she left the vehicle. Otherwise he was content to ride in back where he was more protected. She waved on her way past, thinking she should walk him when she returned. Sometimes she just sat in the parking lot of this place on her break and ate a small bag of whatever seemed the most harmless to her health as she watched the wee hours of Rockville crawl by.

  Once inside, she went quickly to the ladies’, then the drink cases, found a bottle of latte and grabbed a package of almonds and headed for the counter.

  The young man behind the counter looked less interested in her paying than in the game on the small TV behind the counter. She could probably have walked out and he wouldn’t have cared. She plunked her items down.

  He glanced at her in surprise. “Oh hey, didn’t see you come in.”

  Cole looked at him. “You really want to pay more attention to who comes in here and when they leave. It’s the right time of night to be robbed.”

  “Uh-huh.” He nodded, rubbernecking over his shoulder as he rang up her purchase. “Sure thing, Officer.”

  Cole waved off the offer of a bag and collected her items. “Good night.”

  She saw a man coming toward the door as she pushed through it. She paused and allowed him to enter. He was big, ponytailed, with a tattooed neck and arms exposed by his T-shirt. She skimmed the vulgar threat printed across his chest and met his eyes. He jerked his head in greeting under his cap as he moved through the door. She waited until he was several steps past her before she exited.

  The van was now pulled up before the store with a space between it and her cruiser on her driver’s side. No one in the front seat. She surveyed the service station area. No one else in sight. A single car drove up, slowed, spotted her cruiser, and sped away. Hugo was watching her as she juggled bottle and nuts to release her weapon in its holster. Her heart was banging yet there was no clear reason.

  The man exited the store and moved toward the driver’s side of the van. She watched until he opened the driver’s side door. Relaxing a fraction, she set her goodies on the hood of her cruiser and with one hand on the butt of her weapon reached to open her door.

  The front passenger door of the van swung open behind her.

  She spun around, drawing her weapon, but it was too late. A man emerged from the van and grabbed her. He twisted her arm viciously to make her drop the gun. The van’s driver had rounded the van and joined them, forcing a cloth with a chemical smell over her nose and mouth, choking her and preventing her from screaming. The first man caught her arms and pulled them behind her so quickly that she couldn’t reach the button to release Hugo, who was barking and scratching, trying to get through the glass.

  She fought hard, kicking and biting and trying to reach the Taser on her belt, but they had come prepared to eliminate her options. She connected with thigh and gut more than once before they simply picked her up bodily. Twisting and kicking, she tried every move she’d ever been taught but her arms and legs were losing coordination. No, she was losing consciousness.

  The thought so enraged her she kicked out wildly when she was lifted up, her steel-toed boot connecting with muscled flesh.

  Blinded by the cloth, she didn’t see it coming. The blow of a fist jerked her head back. Through a burst of stunning
pain brilliant comets shot across her vision. She tasted blood as she was dumped in the back of the van. And then she was sliding down into a suffocating slack-limbed blankness.

  * * *

  The coordinates the county police dispatcher had just given Cole’s backup team were for an area of Montgomery County Scott didn’t know well. That didn’t stop him from driving like a street racer as his GPS locked onto the location.

  He looked back over his shoulder. Hugo and Izzy were with him, in the back of his truck. That was little comfort. No one yet had eyes on the target.

  Ever since they’d been alerted to Cole’s abandoned cruiser in the convenience store parking lot he had been going nuts behind his calm exterior.

  Locked inside the cruiser, Hugo had been beside himself, barking and whining and tearing at the upholstery.

  No one had wanted to go near the distraught K-9. But Scott knew exactly what the Bouvier was feeling. The same adrenaline-pumped rage and sense of helplessness was running through his veins like burning jet fuel. Cole had been taken, and neither he nor Hugo had been there to help and protect her.

  When released, Hugo had jumped out of the vehicle and into Scott’s truck without any coaching.

  The guy behind the counter at the convenience store barely remembered Cole’s presence, until reminded that she’d bought the bottle of coffee and package of nuts the police had found dropped by her driver’s side door.

  Scott had questioned the cashier himself.

  “I only called 911 because that big scary dog was barking and acting crazy, and scaring my customers. I seen the lady cop. Only I didn’t see nothing after she left. Dude came in, arguing about the gas pump not being honest. How he was being cheated of pennies per gallon. By the time he stomped out, nothing else was going on in the parking lot. Dude, I have no idea where the lady cop went. I swear.”

  Scott had a few ideas, and each of them a worse scenario than the one before it.

  If not for the wire on Cole, the police wouldn’t have a clue where to look for her. As it was, they’d lost precious time. Surveillance be damned.