Cold Snap (13 page)

“Isn’t that risky during the day?”

Lee didn’t like his orders questioned.

“Jonny knows what to do,” he said quietly.

“Yes, sir,” Jonny said. “Find the girl and the lawyer and kill them both.”

Effective. And long overdue.

CHAPTER 11

Patrick

I’m really sorry, but I have to go out and look for Kami. She may have gone back to Mia’s, or she might be at the center. Forgive me—but I waited too long last time, and they left Doreen dying on my doorstep. I can’t wait for them to kill Kami, too.

You have my number. I turned tracking on. I’m sure that’s something you can work with, considering.

Elle

P.S. I hope we can repeat last night. XOXO

Patrick wanted to throttle her. She knew she was in danger, and yet she walked out of her apartment without backup, without a bodyguard, without anything but her wits.

And right now, he wasn’t thinking too kindly about her wits.

His phone rang and he immediately thought it was Elle. But the caller ID was in Sacramento.

“Patrick? It’s Dean Hooper.”

“You have something for me?”

“You may have broken an ICE case wide open.”

Dean Hooper was one of the top-ranked FBI agents in Sacramento. He specialized in white-collar crimes, particularly money laundering, and his wife, Sonia, was an ICE agent who specialized in human traffickers. Between the two of them, they’d shut down more trafficking pipelines in northern California than any other interagency task force.

“Sounds great. Tell me what I did.”

“That woman you photographed is Margret Chin Soldare. Her father was British, her mother Chinese. She was raised in Hong Kong and married a businessman with a penchant for underage girls. She would procure the girls for him, then dispose of them by shipping them overseas. China is still the number one exporter of sex slaves. And Soldare is one of the top sellers.

“No one knew she was in the country. Sonia’s team shut down her pipeline on the Sacramento River and severely damaged her network. We translated the Chinese conversation—essentially, she was railing against the problems that destroyed her network and forced her to work with Lee who, apparently, she does not like. She turned over one hundred thirty girls to him last week—girls that were supposed to be on the boat—and he must guarantee that at least one hundred twenty of them make it to the border where she has a buyer.”

Dean Hooper certainly sounded excited, but Patrick was lost. “I don’t understand. Where did these young women come from? China?”

“I’ll backtrack a bit—last month, Sonia learned of a shipment of underage girls from China who’d landed in Vallejo. They were being transferred from the main ship to a smaller ship, using Lee’s shipping line, but someone tipped them off and when ICE got there, the girls were gone. From what we’ve determined, Lee—we didn’t know for certain, but after the conversation you recorded we have it confirmed—stored the girls for Soldare. We suspected they were waiting until ICE backed off unscheduled inspections, but because ICE essentially shut down Lee’s shipping company, they came up with an alternate plan. Moving them by truck, knowing we’re focused on the Sacramento River.”

“So these girls from China have been locked up for a month?”

“Yes, we think so.” Patrick’s stomach turned, but Dean continued. “ICE is mobilizing a team. I need a location.”

“The girls aren’t in his factory—I didn’t see any sign of them. But Elle is out looking for her contact.”

“Elle?”

“Gabrielle Santana, a lawyer. Long story, but I think she’s in trouble, as well as a young girl named Kami who claimed to have proof of Lee’s illegal activities.”

“Margret is ruthless. We’ve already alerted Homeland and she won’t be getting out via plane or train, but she has contacts we don’t even know about. Look, I’ll have the ICE team leader contact you directly. No need to have a middleman. I’m going through Lee’s finances; he’s good, but I’m better. I’ll find out how he’s laundering his money and exactly where it is.”

“What would help is a list of his businesses—anything he owns, or that one of his shell companies owns.”

“I’ll pass everything on through Homeland. And you’ll be looking for a facility with a truck bay.”

“Why?”

“Chi Sun Shipping doesn’t operate on water, it’s all tractor-trailer rigs. They’re putting the girls in trucks, not ships, which means the destination is somewhere in the U.S., though they might have a spot to cross into Mexico through Imperial County.”

“That makes me sick.”

“Join the club.” Dean hung up.

Patrick pulled out his phone and called Elle. She answered on the second ring. “I know what you’re going to say.”

“Get back here.” He set his phone to trace her GPS.

“I’ll let you know if I run into trouble.”

“You’re already in trouble, Elle.”

“It’s Sunday morning, it’s bright and sunny outside. I’m not going to do anything stupid.”

“You already have.” He winced, then tried to backtrack. “Look, Elle, there are a lot of people working on this. You’re safer here.”
Where I can keep an eye on you
.

“I’ll keep in touch.” She hung up.

“Dammit!” He slammed down his phone. He monitored the app that was tracking her GPS. It wasn’t a trace program, but since she’d turned on her GPS and made it public, he could follow her.

So could anyone else, for that matter.

He was going to have to catch up with her. She really irritated him. He didn’t like operating without a game plan, and now he was being forced to react instead of act.

He checked his gun, holstered it, and then his phone rang again.

“Kincaid.”

“It’s Jack.”

“I might need you—I’m in San Francisco.”

“I know all about it. I’m downstairs. Buzz me in.”

Patrick went to the door and buzzed the lobby door open. A minute later Jack was at Elle’s door. He gave Patrick a brief hug and slapped him on the back. “Good to see you.”

“You must have left at dawn.”

“JT got an ID on that Chinese chick and I knew we had a situation, so I came.”

“Thank you.” He showed Jack his phone. “Elle skipped out when I was in the shower and I’m tracking her. I need to bring her back. She’s not thinking.”

“What the hell’s she doing?”

“Trying to find Kami, a missing girl she feels responsible for. We tracked her to Lee’s main business, the garment warehouse, last night, but had no leads after. How did you know Soldare’s identity when Hooper just called me about it?”

“Where do you think he got his information? Probably told you
his
people ID’d her.” Jack half smiled. His smile looked almost sinister. “You go get Elle. I’ll work with Jaye to narrow down locations where Lee could be holding the girls. She’s been running through all businesses owned by Lee or any of his companies. The FBI is working on it too, but I’m putting my money on Jaye. By the time you get back, we should have a good list.”

“Thanks, Jack.”

“Be careful.”

Patrick opened the door, then halted when he heard a sound on the stairs. He looked around the bend and saw a teenage girl in a baseball cap limping up the stairs. She spotted him and froze.

“Kami?” he asked.

She turned and started back down the stairs.

“Kami! Wait!”

She didn’t stop.

Jack was right behind him. Patrick ran after Kami and easily caught up with her before she could open the door.

He grabbed her and held her from behind.

“Kami, I’m a friend of Elle’s.”

“Let me go!”

“Stop! You can call her. She’s out looking for you right now.”

Jack checked the door, made sure it was secure, then gave Kami the once-over as Patrick held on to her arms. “Where’ve you been?”

“Who the fuck are you?”

“Jack Kincaid. This is my brother Patrick.” He looked at her bare feet, the dirt caked onto her jeans and T-shirt. “The first thing they take from the girls they kidnap are their shoes, so they can’t easily run away.” He grabbed her arm and looked at her wrists. They were red and swollen from being tied. “You escaped.”

“How do you know that?”

“It’s written all over you. Do you know where they’re keeping the girls?”

She glared at Jack, scared and suspicious, but curiosity won. “You know?”

“We know a lot of things.” Jack looked at Patrick. “Let’s get her upstairs so she can clean up and give us a location. We end this now, not tonight.”

Patrick led Kami upstairs. “Elle is going to be relieved to know you’re safe. We looked most of the night, then she left early this morning. She’s worried.”

“I have to go back. I left Ashley—”

“We’ll get her and everyone else.”

“We escaped, but she was hurt and couldn’t run, so I hid her so I could find a car, and when I went back they had her. And I just—I just left.”

“You did the right thing,” Patrick said. “If you exposed yourself, they’d have you, and we wouldn’t know where they were.” He picked up his phone to call Elle. “Jack’s going to contact Immigration, who are all set up to help. I’ll get Elle back where it’s safe.” He picked Kami up because she was struggling to walk and carried her directly to the couch in Elle’s apartment. Her feet were cut up and bleeding. Jack saw and his face hardened.

“You call Santana, then Hooper, I’ll look for a first-aid kit and a map.”

Patrick sat on the table across from Kami. She was still wary and confused, and he didn’t blame her. Elle picked up. “Patrick, I’m at Mia’s. She’s not here.”

“I have Kami.”

“What?”

“She just walked into your apartment. Get back here now.”

“Yes—let me talk to her.”

Patrick handed Kami the phone. Kami immediately started crying when she heard Elle’s voice.

“I’m so, so sorry. I didn’t have any proof, and I went to find it, and I’m so sorry. He has so many girls, some younger than me, they don’t speak English, and Ashley—Richie found her at the bus station last weekend. And then said she’d gone back home, but she didn’t. He sold her. Sold her! And she got hurt real bad, I had to leave her. What if she dies and it’s all my fault because I left her?”

Patrick wanted to reassure her, but Elle was talking and Kami was quietly crying, and nothing he could say would make her feel better.

The only thing he could do for her was find Ashley. He prayed she wasn’t already dead, but Patrick knew how those people operated, and if she was a liability, they’d kill her.

Jack came back downstairs with a hodgepodge of bandages and sprays. “Santana is a slob,” he said. “But at least she has everything we need.” He sat on the table in front of Kami and waited until she was done with her phone call. Jack was a hard person to read, had always been that way even as a kid. But Patrick saw his well-controlled anger locked in his jaw. Patrick moved his own mouth up and down and heard his jaw crack.

Kami hung up, eyeing the first-aid materials with suspicion. “Elle’s on her way back,” she said. “She has to drop Clark off at his car.”

“What?” Patrick said. “Clark Grayson?”

“You know him?”

“Yes.”

Jack looked at Patrick. “You have a problem with him?”

“I don’t trust him. I think he’s involved.”

Maybe he was wrong. Patrick knew he wasn’t wrong that Clark was a criminal, but maybe he wasn’t involved with Lee’s human trafficking operation. Maybe it was something else altogether.

“Trust your instincts, bro,” Jack said.

“She also told me I need to call in to the social worker in charge of my case. Sandy Chin.”

Patrick found Sandy’s number and handed the phone to Kami. Kami listened, then said, “Voice mail,” to Patrick.

“Leave her a message,” Patrick said. “Tell her you’re fine and to call Elle later.”

Kami nodded, and into the phone said, “Um, Ms. Chin? This is Kami Toland. Elle Santana told me I needed to call because I came in late last night. It was totally my fault, I’m sorry. I’m fine, promise. Call Elle and she’ll tell you I’m good. Thanks.” She hung up and handed the phone back to Patrick.

Jack inspected Kami’s injuries. “This is going to hurt. But if we don’t clean you up, the cuts will get infected.”

He used tweezers dipped in rubbing alcohol to remove small rocks and glass embedded in her feet. She winced, but didn’t flinch.

“When are we going to get Ashley?” she asked.

“Soon,” Jack said. “How did you escape?”

“They took us out of the cells to force everyone to shower. One of the girls—she died last night. Two others were sick. I think … I think they shot the sick girls. Killed them. And everyone was crying and screaming and I took Ashley’s hand and we ran. Ashley has a huge bruise on her side, and couldn’t run far; she was coughing and the sun hurt her eyes—she’d been down there for days. Maybe a week, since I last saw her at Richie’s place. I hid her behind an empty warehouse and stole a car a couple blocks away, but when I got back, they’d already found her.”

Jack nodded toward a map on the table, and Patrick laid it out on Kami’s stomach. “Where?” Jack asked.

It took her a couple minutes as she oriented the teen center on the map, then TK Clothing, and then moved her finger farther south. “I think it’s here,” she said, and pointed to a dead-end industrial area near the Bay. “I’d recognize it.”

“It’s safer for you here.”

“I don’t know on the map! I’m not sure!”

“That’s okay, we will be. We have people running through all Christopher Lee’s properties, and knowing it’s in this area will narrow our search.”

“Cold storage,” she mumbled.

“What?” Patrick asked. “Cold storage?”

“We were kept in a basement that had an old sign that said ‘cold storage.’”

Patrick said to Jack, “That could be a restaurant or meatpacking or processing plant.”

“Good,” Jack said. “We’ll—”

Pop! Pop!

Kami jumped at the loud sound that came from downstairs.

Jack immediately had his gun in his hand.

Patrick pulled his own gun and ran to the balcony. Keeping clear of the windows, he cautiously peered out. Two cars were blocking the rear entrance, four goons—including Ringo—were outside.