A New Empire: A Fog City Novel

by Layla Reyne

  “Where did you get this?” Chris asked.

  “It was on the table when I got back to the house and Scotty was gone.”

  Amelia had been the one to bring him to the house in Pac Heights. Chris wasn’t familiar with her handwriting, but he guessed he was looking at it right then. She was trusting him to do what? The right thing with whatever was on this drive? Or more than that? Her note was on this paper for a reason. She was trusting him to uphold the bargain they’d made in the transport van this—yesterday—morning. To do right by her and her family for her cooperation. And what? She was giving him the rest of the answers now? On this drive?

  “Did you check what’s on it?” he asked Jax.

  They shook their head. “It was clearly for you.”

  The urge to log on to any of the dozen computers in here to see what was on the second drive was damn near irresistible.

  Wait for Hawes, Izzy said in the back of his head, her voice returning from wherever it had disappeared to the past few days. Watch it with him.

  She was right. If whatever was on this flash drive was anything like the video on the first one of Amelia’s they’d found, he didn’t want to watch it alone. He’d seen Holt’s and Helena’s immediate reactions after watching that one and Hawes’s reaction at the condo when he’d nearly torn it apart. Hawes shouldn’t have been alone the first time he’d watched it. Chris wouldn’t be alone this time. And he wanted it to be Hawes with him.

  He folded the paper back around the second drive and pocketed it. “Is there anything on here”—he held up the first drive Jax had handed him—“that Kane and Tran shouldn’t see?”

  “No, it’s mostly financials and the incident footage,” Jax said, gathering up their laptop and files.

  “All right, then. Let’s go.”

  They reached Kane’s office and found the chief squaring off against Tran. “You didn’t think to tell us you were sending him in?”

  “Agent Wheeler called me,” Tran said. “He told me he needed inside the Madigan compound, and I had an hour to extract him.”

  “Amelia would have been closest,” Chris said, announcing their presence.

  Kane hardly acknowledged them, his wrath still directed at Tran. “Why did he need inside?”

  “I can answer that,” Jax said. They opened their laptop on Kane’s desk and logged on to a secure server. “Right now, we only have Amelia directly tied to the explosives, and she’s not our ultimate target. So Scott—Agent Wheeler—and I were following the money, trying to connect Rose more directly to trafficking in explosives, as that’s the ATF’s jurisdiction.” They opened an account ledger. “We flagged this separate trust account Rose set up for Lily. There were irregularities that stood out from the other trust accounts set up by Hawes, Holt, and Helena.” They toggled to side-by-side spreadsheets, one showing deposits, the other withdrawals. “We back traced the account that made these deposits into the trust.” They highlighted those green. “And the account that received these payments.” They highlighted those red.

  “Payments, from the trust account?” Kane said. “Lily’s eight months old. There shouldn’t be any payments.”

  “Exactly. And they’re all going, through a series of transactions, to the same entity, which has an account set up at the same offshore bank we previously flagged.”

  “That’s gotta be Rose,” Chris said.

  “And the numbers match,” Tran noted. “The money came in and went back out in the same amount.”

  Chris connected the dots. “She was using the trust account to funnel the money for her coup.”

  Jax nodded. “Separate from any other Madigan accounts.”

  “And that’s why she needed Amelia. To disguise the transactions and hide the money trail.”

  “How do you know it’s connected to the explosives?” Tran asked.

  Jax clicked on several of the green-highlighted deposits, then on the amount cells of the first two. “Add these two up. Does that sum ring any bells?”

  “Yes!” Kane said, tearing apart the stacks of files and papers on his desk. His prize was a thin manila folder near the bottom. He opened it, revealing a single sheet of paper—the ad for the dark web auction. Kane pointed at the buy-in amount. “It’s the sum.”

  “Exactly,” Jax said. “Now, that money came into the trust from this entity, which also made these two other deposits.” They clicked on the other green entries they’d highlighted.

  “Let’s assume this”—Chris pointed at the entity making the deposits—“is Brewster.”

  “We’re ninety-nine percent certain it is, given the account’s other activity and the corporate formation documents. We just need a warrant to get the Account Control Agreement.”

  “Give me everything you’ve got on this account and on Rose’s,” Tran said. “I’ll take care of the warrants.”

  “Thank you,” Chris said, then asked Jax, “Are there matching payments out for these deposits?”

  Jax toggled over to the payment screen again. “For three of them.”

  Three of them, Izzy prompted. Not four.

  Why not four? Chris reread each highlighted line.

  What’s important about those amounts? Izzy asked.

  The first two were the same—together, the total auction amount—and then the other two were the same, albeit significantly larger sums. Two sets.

  Installments.

  Made how often?

  The dominos began to fall in Chris’s head. “Look at the dates,” he said, reaching an arm over Jax’s shoulder. He tapped the date on the auction deposit. “That’s the down payment for the auction.” He pointed at the same payment a day later. “And that’s the rest of it, for getting the job done.”

  “But Hawes didn’t die in that auction,” Tran said.

  “He didn’t,” Chris conceded. “But he removed one of Brewster’s competitors, and Rose proved she had the explosives.”

  “So then this”—Kane tapped at the earlier, larger installment on the date of Callum’s funeral—“is the first payment for the explosives?”

  Chris nodded. “When Rose first stole them.”

  “And that’s the second,” Tran said, identifying the last. “Made yesterday, for when she delivers them. But she hasn’t paid it back out of the trust account yet.”

  “Because of Remy?” Kane asked. “Because she’s not sure she’ll deliver them to Brewster now?”

  “Or,” Jax said, “because there’s a delay in the bank showing it. They’re down for maintenance at this time of night, but if we’re in her system…”

  “You can see if the action has been scheduled,” Chris said, putting it all together. “And if she’s still planning to proceed with Brewster.” He rounded on Tran, another realization hitting him. “We could have not risked Scotty and trusted Amelia to confirm this.”

  “I didn’t,” she said. “And I wasn’t taking any chances. That’s why the timing was imperative. Rose has been paid for the job. If that money is paid out, she’ll steal those explosives right out from under their—and our—noses.”

  “No if about it,” Jax said. “Scotty just sent us a message.”

  All eyes swung to them, and to the text box open on their screen.

  Two words: payment scheduled.

  Chapter Twelve

  “That’s the plan,” Hawes said, looking up from the break room table he stood beside. It was covered with maps and satellite photos, a route marked on each. Five hours from now, just after rush hour, an ATF transport driven by Tran and Chris would travel that route, moving the seized explosives from evidence lockup to a controlled detonation facility, ironically only a couple of miles from where they now stood, in the warehouse where the weapons were manufactured and stored. “Everyone understand their roles?”

  Various points along the route had been circled. The plan Rose had laid out for him, and which Hawes had relayed to their operatives, included locations where the Madigans were supposed to intercept the transport, wh
ere a third party might beat them to the intercept and attempt a rip-off, and where they were supposed to transfer the explosives to Remy.

  Hawes, together with Chris, Tran and Kane, had subsequently added locations where a handoff to Brewster was more likely to occur, where Rose might try to steal the explosives for herself, and where SFPD and the ATF would have secondary teams. Law enforcement would be less than a quarter mile from each other identified location, ready to converge on their signal. They would allow the handoff to occur—either to Remy, who had made a verbal agreement with Rose for the weapons, or to Brewster, whose account agreements would show he’d paid for them—thereby solidifying the trafficking charge against Rose. If she tried to steal them for herself, with force, they’d have her on grand theft robbery, plus theft of evidence, obstruction of justice, and a whole host of other charges. Either way, once criminal action was taken, law enforcement would move in, seize the weapons, and make the arrest. Hawes had no delusions it would run so smoothly, but at least it was an elegant plan. Especially considering it had been conceived on no sleep at three in the morning.

  “All set, boss,” Avery said. She’d be driving the car with him in it, trailing the transport van.

  Connor spoke next. “And I’ll back up Kane on Rose.” Rose and Amelia, who was supposed to be back in custody by mid-afternoon, would be at the house in Pac Heights, operating as base command. “We’ll make sure she doesn’t slip free.”

  That had been Hawes’s one alteration to the assignments Chris had originally suggested. Kane was supposed to be the LEO on Brewster, but Hawes had shifted him to Rose. He was the one LEO in the least danger from her. Though Hawes couldn’t be certain she’d keep that promise, so he wouldn’t leave Kane without backup.

  Across the table from Hawes, Alice snapped pictures of the maps and photos, then handed the phone to Victoria. She quickly scrolled through them. “We’re good,” she said with a nod. “We’ll get orders to the rest of the captains.”

  Hawes braced his hands on the back of the plastic chair in front of him. “Last chance,” he said, meeting the gaze of each operative. “I’m giving you the same choice I did at the club. You and the other captains outnumber the four of us.” Chris and Helena stood on either side of him, and Holt was listening in by phone. “Do you want to do this?”

  “She put us through a needless test at Sterling,” Victoria said. Before explaining the tactical, Chris had filled them in on the accounts Jax and Wheeler had discovered, the proof that Rose still intended to sell the explosives to Brewster. “She lied to us.”

  “So did I,” Chris said.

  Alice tilted her head toward Hawes and Helena. “They didn’t.” Her blue eyes landed on Hawes. “You made your rules clear.”

  “And you fought with us tonight,” Connor said to Chris. “For Hawes.”

  “I intend to keep doing so.” His hand landed in the center of Hawes’s back, and Hawes felt its heat through the cotton of his tank, imagined it chasing away the chill that had gripped him since that call from Kane.

  Connor nodded. “We know who we’re standing behind.”

  “And what we’re standing for,” Victoria added.

  “All right, then.” Hawes straightened, and Chris’s hand drifted to his lower back, settling there, settling him. “Go home. Get a few hours of sleep if you can.”

  The operatives exited the break room into the main warehouse, Hawes and Chris trailing. Their steps boomed in the cavernous building, the sparse furnishings—the table and chairs in the break room, desks in the handful of offices, workbenches with scattered parts down the center of the A-frame’s open space—doing little to muffle the echoes off glass, steel, and concrete. It reminded Hawes of a fucking tomb. He bet the storerooms where they had kept the explosives were even more creepy. Good riddance to that inventory, if only Hawes could actually be rid of it.

  “Change of plans,” Helena said from behind them. “I’m on the primary intercept team.”

  Hawes spun, nearly knocking Chris over in his haste to shut this idea down as fast as possible. “No fucking way.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because when this is done, you’re the fucking queen.” The words were out before he could stop them. Before he could consider the full weight of them or discuss them with Chris. Not that they weren’t true. Not that Hawes’s thoughts hadn’t been headed this direction already. Not that the overwhelming sense of pride and relief in saying them aloud hadn’t suffused him with as much warmth as the hand at his back.

  Helena caught her balance against the nearest workbench, her big blue eyes staring back at him, shock and no small amount of fear swirling there. She looked much the same as she had in that courtyard after Papa Cal had died, except now the dark surrounded them instead of sunlight. And here again, it was as fitting a coronation as Hawes could imagine.

  Hawes pointed toward the door where the operatives had left the building. “They were here because of you. Same as they were in the club. They trust you. They follow you.”

  She shook her head, not wanting to believe what he was saying. He half expected her to cover her ears with her hands. “That’s not what I was after.”

  “I know,” Hawes said, and Chris gave him a slight nudge forward. Taking the cue, Hawes reached out and squeezed his sister’s shoulder. “And that’s why it should be you leading them when the dust settles.”

  “What are you going to do?” She shrugged off his hand, some of the litigator fighting back and infusing her voice. “Fuck off with him somewhere?” she said with a flick of her hand at Chris. “Because that’s not how this works. You, Holt, and I run this company, and the organization, together. That’s what we’ve been fighting for.”

  “I might fuck off for a week with him, to fuck,” Hawes said, trying to lighten the mood and earning the eye roll he wanted. “But after that, I’m back by your side,” he assured her. “You’re right. We do this together, and someone is going to have to step into Rose’s role, making the social and political connections the company and organization need to survive.”

  Her lips rounded into an O, finally seeing what he had. The more natural fit for him in the evolved Madigan empire. “The alliances you’ve made…”

  Hawes nodded. “Let me do what I’m good at, positioning us externally through the company and otherwise. You do what you’re good at, which is organizing and leading us internally. And Holt will continue to be the technical engine that keeps us running.”

  She crossed her arms and furrowed her brow, contemplating, which was better than outright refusing. “We’ll need to clear this with Little H.”

  Heat hit Hawes’s back as Chris reached an arm around him and set his burner phone, face up, on the nearest bench, the call to Holt still connected. “Let’s see what he says.”

  Helena gasped. “You kept him on the line?”

  “Your own trick.”

  “It’s the right move,” Holt said. “Every aspect of it makes sense.”

  “And what about you?” Helena asked Chris.

  “Seems your organization is the sort that could use a private investigator.” His hand returned to Hawes’s back, and Hawes never wanted to go without that touch. Chris’s suggestion made it all the more possible. “I’m with him, in whatever capacity you all need,” Chris said.

  Helena’s gaze shifted between them and the phone, as if she could somehow see Holt through it too. Eventually, she conceded, fighting with her topknot as she did. “I’m definitely not going to sleep tonight.”

  Hawes gently lowered her arm and cupped her shoulders. “One step at a time, Hena. You’re not intercepting the truck, agreed?”

  “Agreed, but if you need back up, I’m far away.”

  “Fair enough. We’ll get through this op, through today, and then we can worry about the day after,” he said, desperately hoping there was a tomorrow for all of them.

  “He puts on a brave front, but—”

  “But he’s barely holding it together,” Chri
s said, finishing Helena’s sentence. He had witnessed Hawes’s shaking hands during Kane’s call, had heard the cracks in his voice after, had felt the tiny trembles that continued to intermittently ripple through Hawes.

  Helena slung a leg over her Ducati. “Take care of him.”

  “Count on it.” The helmet was just over her head when Chris recalled something else he’d meant to ask. “Why does he think Kane is safer on Rose?”

  “Not totally. Connor is providing backup.”

  “That doesn’t answer my question.”

  “He made a deal with Rose,” Helena said. “It was his condition for breaking out Amelia.”

  “Because of Holt.”

  She nodded. “You hear from your family?”

  “Safe and sound at the cabin,” he said with a smile, translating family to Celia. “Thanks for taking care of them.”

  She couldn’t get the helmet on quick enough to hide her smile.

  Chris’s grin lingered as he walked back into the warehouse, until he glimpsed Hawes’s solitary form at the far end of the space. Right arm braced above him, he was leaning against the windows, staring out at the Bay. Except as Chris approached, as Hawes’s reflection in the glass resolved, Chris saw that Hawes’s eyes were closed. Above them, his brow was pinched and his forehead wrinkled, and below them, his lips were pressed together in a thin line. Distress was similarly reflected in the tense curve of his spine and the fingers he dug into his hip, knuckles white.

  “Hey,” Chris said softly, warning of his approach. Hawes’s eyes opened, the harsh lines of his face easing. Chris slid a hand under his, picking it up off his hip and holding it in his own as he wrapped Hawes in an embrace from behind. “You put on a good show just now, but you can talk to me.”

  Hawes didn’t dodge the comment; further evidence of his exhaustion. “I don’t want it to all be for nothing.”

  “No one fights this hard for nothing.”