by Bella Juarez
“This is all your fault, Irene! She wouldn’t be in this situation if it weren’t for you fucking interfering!” David roared.
“David, tell me what you know.”
“Why the fuck should I? You won’t listen anyway!” David walked out the door.
Irene watched David stalk down the walkway and into his car. He slammed the door shut and hastily pulled out of the driveway. She knew exactly what David was up to and was comfortable with the idea that Gavin would handle him easily. She had cautioned Amy about David possibly coming to see her when he heard the news. She hoped Amy would stay firm and do exactly what Irene had told her to do.
* * * *
“I need to talk to you,” David said calmly.
“Okay, Chief, what’s up?” Gavin asked.
“Meet me at my office as soon as you can.”
“Call me when you get here, I’m at the station.”
David ended the call and drove. He was beside himself with rage and worry right now. This was the worst possible thing that could have happened to Amy. Tim was a psycho bastard and Gavin wasn’t much better. He had read Gavin’s declassified military file. The file was sparse, detailing only the first four years of Gavin’s military career. For twenty-four years in the military and most of that in the SEALs, his file should have read like a novel. The FBI wasn’t forthcoming with information regarding Walsh and his exact purpose here, either.
David had initially fought the idea of a federal task force being placed in his department. Yes, it was true, they had problems, but it wasn’t anything they couldn’t handle. He had been overruled by city council and the city manager, especially that nosey-assed bastard, Councilman Williams. Politics and buzzwords had won out in the end.
David walked to Gavin’s office.
“What’s up, Chief?” Gavin asked.
“You’re not marrying Amy.”
* * * *
Bakri sat in a comfortable chair in the small office as Livingston looked over the banking statements Bakri presented to him. Marco was sitting in front of the man as well.
“Here is account information. Here are the accounts where the money is to be divided and the amounts we want divided. I have masked the network in the office. You’re safe now,” Marco Lima assured the man.
“I want my money and then I want the hell out,” Tim said as he turned to the computer.
“We’ll be back in two days,” Bakri said.
“What about my problem?’ Tim asked.
“He’ll be taken care of. We’ve got eyes and ears in the police department and we know what he’s doing,” Marco said.
“When are you going to take care of that asshole?” Tim demanded.
“Soon. We have a man in play. It’s just a matter of him getting here. He’s in for a long assignment here,” Marco said.
“Special Agent Walsh has been the cause of enough damage, Mr. Livingston,” Bakri said as he thought of Omar and Krazi.
Gavin Walsh had been a real thorn in the side of this operation. He had managed to catch Omar and Krazi and have them arrested. They were awaiting transfer to the prison facility at Guantánamo Bay. He had also managed to shut down some of the other cells in Virginia. Gavin Walsh, however, hadn’t figured everything out. Bakri sat back and relaxed. There were some real surprises that no one would see coming.
* * * *
“Hello, hottie,” Gavin said, pulling Amy close.
“Hey!” Amy said.
Gavin released Amy and watched her as she put away the dishes. He wondered how he would broach the subject of David being impossible. David was demanding that Gavin tell Amy that getting married wasn’t a good idea. He had no intention of telling her anything of the sort. He had basically told David to mind his own business, thoroughly pissing David off.
David was threatening to send Gavin packing back to the FBI. Of course, David couldn’t. Even though the city council of Victoria formally requested federal aid, they had no choice. The State of Texas had accepted on behalf of the city. Gavin hated putting Amy in the position of choosing between him and the Ortizes, but that’s exactly the position David was about to take.
“Honey, we need to talk,” Gavin said.
“Okay. Is something wrong?” Amy asked, taking a seat at the table.
Gavin went to the fridge and pulled out a beer for him and a Diet Coke for Amy. He sat down across from her and took her hand.
“Honey, you know I love you. And I wouldn’t have asked you to marry me if I wasn’t sure about spending everyday with you from now on…” Gavin started.
Amy frowned. Her expression conveyed uncertainty and doubt. Together they had worked on better communication and being open and honest with each other, no matter how difficult the conversation was. They had agreed to do just what they were doing now, sit at the kitchen table and have a talk. Amy had come a long way in discussing things that bothered her. Gavin had worked so hard for her trust and now David was about to undo all his efforts.
“Honey, we’ll always have problems along the way, but we need to be able to sit down and talk. We can always work things out if we talk.”
“Gavin, what’s wrong? Have you changed your mind?”
“No, Amy. I’ll never change my mind.”
“Then what happened? You’re making me very nervous.”
Gavin smiled at Amy. Telling him she was nervous was a huge improvement in their communication abilities. Amy would usually stay annoyingly silent.
“We have a problem, Amy. David found out about us getting married and he’s not happy. He talked to me today and he wants me to leave you.”
“Why?” Amy asked in alarm.
“He’s very opposed to us being together. Amy, I don’t want you to choose between me and your family. But that’s exactly where this is heading and I don’t know what to do about that.”
“This isn’t up to you, Gavin. I will go talk to David.”
* * * *
Irene shut the door behind Amy when she left. She walked into the family room and saw David staring at the wall. Inwardly, Irene was proud of Amy and how she stood her ground. David was being impossible and irrational. In Irene’s mind, Gavin Walsh was the perfect man for Amy. He was protective, strong, and it was obvious, to anyone with eyes, that he loved Amy more than life itself. Gavin brought Amy to life and made her thrive. Irene wished they had run into Gavin fifteen years ago.
David gave Irene a dark look. “She’ll get hurt, Irene. Mark my words,” David said lowly.
“You keep saying that, David. Give me a reason to believe it. If you know something, tell me.”
David stood and brushed past Irene without a word.
* * * *
Gavin listened grimly as Lieutenant Gamez filled him in on the latest. Apparently, someone had gotten to Tim Livingston. For the past few days they had been unable to trace his telephone, internet, and office network traffic. Gavin and Rock sat looking at one another. Apparently, Esteban Ramirez-Merles, aka Marco Lima, had been able to circumvent the surveillance safeguards they had put in place with Tim’s knowledge and consent.
“That little fucking cockroach!” Gavin growled.
“What should we do, Chief?” Rock asked.
“I don’t know, Rock. We have Livingston’s consent. Can we put things back the way they were, Dan?” Gavin asked Lieutenant Gamez.
“Depends. Do we want them to know we’ve corrected it?” Dan asked.
Rock narrowed his eyes and looked away for a moment. Gavin had seen that look many times before. Rock had an idea and probably one hell of a solution that no one had even considered. Rock could not only think outside the box. He could build a new box without you realizing he had done it.
“What did you say they did again, Dan?” Rock asked.
“They masked the network. They changed equipment or addressing and the guy probably put a sniffer on the server when he shut down our access,” Dan said.
“What if we do something else…” Rock started.
<
br /> “Like what? String the motherfucker up?” Gavin asked.
“I’ve got an idea,” Rock said.
* * * *
“Sir, I’m from the cable company. You said your internet and phone was out?” the technician asked.
“Yes, and I need it fixed. It’s outside because all my equipment is working. My IT guy is in the other room trying to fix it. He says it’s on your end,” Tim said.
“Yes, sir. I need access to our modem that runs the phone and internet services. It should be located in your office,” the technician said.
“Marco!” Tim called.
A small, dark man came out of the back room and looked the technician over.
“There’s an outage with your equipment. There was a brownout earlier and the cable modem died,” Marco said.
“No problem, sir. I can replace it, if you just let me know where it is,” the technician said.
“I’ll take the new one and install it,” Marco said.
“I’m sorry, I have to take the old one with me, otherwise the company will charge you for the new modem,” the technician said.
“Wait here,” Marco said.
A short time later, Marco returned with the old modem in his hand. He handed the old useless equipment to the technician. The technician handed Marco the box he was carrying.
“Do you want me to install it and make sure it works?” the technician asked.
“Take an early lunch break. If it doesn’t work, we’ll call you back,” Marco said.
“Have a nice day.” The technician turned and left.
Marco watched the cable company technician leave the building. He went to the window and watched the technician get into the Road Runner/Time Warner van and drive away. He opened the box and looked over the modem. It was still in shrink wrap, but that didn’t mean anything. He connected the modem to his laptop and checked it over, running a specialized sniffer he had hacked and tweaked to check out the new modem for anything suspicious. Marco dug into the firmware and looked at the binary code and the string of numbers and letters that was the firmware chip serial number. Everything was clean. He adjusted the network settings and connected the new modem to the system.
* * * *
“Well?” Rock asked.
“It just kicked in. I was also able to download the guy’s laptop, Skipper. He attached the modem to his laptop to fuck with it. So, while he was in the modem, I got into the laptop,” Dan said.
“Good work, Lieutenant,” Gavin said.
“It wasn’t work, it was fun, Chief. That fucker is a hacker. He should’ve gone to school and gotten an education. He either missed or didn’t understand the hexadecimal code line in the firmware that set up the ghost network.” Dan smiled.
“It was Ramirez-Merles?” Gavin asked.
“Yes, Chief. It was him, all right. The guy called him Marco,” Dan said.
Rock and Gavin exchanged looks. Marco Lima’s true identity had just been confirmed by a very reliable eye witness.
* * * *
Gavin and Jimmy sat in a quiet corner of the little dive tavern. Both men had removed the batteries from their phones as they talked quietly. They were making plans on how to stop Rivera from bringing in his next shipment. Fifteen days ago, Rivera had brought in twenty men from south of the border. The human traffic wasn’t half as scary as the rest of the cargo.
Russian- and German-made weapons came in with these men. Gavin had been ordered by the ATF to let the shipment slide so they could follow it. His boss informed him that the ATF was trying to trace weapons they had provided to known crime syndicates to see where they ended up. Gavin argued that these were not provided by Homeland Security but by foreign crime syndicates. He had argued almost to the point of violence with his boss. In the end, all they could do was watch.
“When we hit Rivera, you know he’ll have some serious backup. Those guys are living in Corpus Christi, Lieutenant. What if they hit the port? We don’t know if all they brought were guns,” Jimmy said.
Gavin took a slow, deliberate drink and said nothing.
“Every time we try to tighten the noose, they seem to know. They got that shipment through during a shift change. We change the times on that schedule all the time. Someone’s giving them info. Boss, we’ve got a dirty cop here.”
“I know, Jimmy.”
“What should we do?”
“I’ve got an idea, Jimmy.”
* * * *
Rivera listened as he was given instructions to the pickup location of the next shipment. Rivera complained that the last pickup point was almost discovered. They had managed to cover it through Rivera’s contact in the police department. The FBI agent was being a real pain in the ass. The guy was a smart motherfucker and never trusted any one person with all the information. Rivera was learning some tricks from this guy’s style.
“Just show up at the drop location. It’s a secure area, so this guy won’t get in your way,” the man said.
“No problem, we’ll be there. Make sure I’m covered,” Rivera said as he hung up.
Rivera looked at the time on his phone. He had two hours before he was scheduled to pick up his delivery. He waited ten minutes and was driven to the location where the semitrailer was parked. He and his man got out of the car and into the big-rig truck they would drive to the pickup point.
They climbed into the cab and he reached under the seat as he had been instructed to do. All of the paperwork was in order. He nodded to his man and they left.
* * * *
Gavin trailed far behind the semi that Jorge and his driver climbed into. He followed them for the better part of two hours. His jaw dropped slightly as he watched them gain access to Naval Station Ingleside near Corpus Christi. How the fuck did they get that kind of access?
Following and presenting his active-duty ID card at the gate, Gavin was able to track them. He stayed as out of sight as much he possibly could and watched as they pulled up to a supply warehouse along the pier. A single pallet with a closed container was loaded. While they were busy at the pier, he dug through his bag in the back of the cab of his truck. He grabbed his green camouflage jacket, put it on, and zipped it.
The jacket had Gavin’s name and rank. He slipped out of his vehicle and up to the backside of the truck where he attached a GPS beacon to the trailer of the truck. At his last visit with Rock and Lieutenant Gamez, he had taken five of the little beacons and left four of them in his truck. Gavin slipped unnoticed back into his vehicle and drove away. He was on the phone with Rock as soon as he could get Rock to answer.
* * * *
Amy left the library and got into her car. She was driving to Corpus Christi for the weekend with Gavin. He had been on reserve duty this weekend and had asked to meet her at a bed-and-breakfast in Rockport near Corpus Christi. He had sent her a really sexy text asking her to secretly meet him. She was off for the weekend so she readily agreed. She pulled into traffic and got onto the highway that led her to her destination.
Amy switched on the radio to catch up on the news. She always felt so comfortable talking to Gavin and they always discussed the current events of the day. She would scream with laughter at times when he would yell at the TV as he disagreed with the news. She heard something that was particularly interesting and chuckled at what he would say.
Amy’s heart almost stopped in her chest when she saw the shape in the backseat manifest itself in her rearview mirror.
“Take the next exit,” a voice said.
Amy felt panic start to rise when she felt cold steel press against her neck.
* * * *
Gavin drove up to the house and instantly felt something was out of sorts. He pressed the garage door opener in his truck and felt the hair on his neck rise. Amy’s car was gone. When he walked into the house he could tell she had not been home because the house was pitch-black.
Even when Amy went out with someone for the evening, she left the light on over the stove and would have been home by no
w. It was almost one thirty in the morning. He checked the messages on the answering machine. There were no calls in the last couple of days. He dug out his cell phone as he rampaged through the house looking for any sign that she had been home.
“Gamez, it’s me, Walsh. I need you to call me back ASAP. I have an emergency,” Gavin said and he hung up the phone.
Gavin dialed Irene’s cell phone and got a response after a couple of rings.
“Irene, Gavin. I’m sorry to wake you up, but did you hear from Amy today?’ Gavin asked.
“No, why?” Irene asked, alarmed.
“When did you last talk to her?” Fear gripped him.
“About nine, when she closed the library. She called me when she was getting into her car. Where are you?” Irene asked as panic tainted her voice.
“I’m home and she’s not here,” Gavin said as a call interrupted. It was Lieutenant Gamez. “Irene, I’ll call you right back.” Gavin switched over the call.
“What’s up, Chief?” Lieutenant Gamez asked in a sleepy voice.
“Get those tracking beacons working. There should be two that are active. One I know is at a warehouse on the south side of Victoria. I need to know where the other one is,” Gavin said as he jumped into his truck.
“Okay, Chief. I’ll be at the office in twenty.”
“I want a location as soon as you know it.”
Gavin had placed a tracking beacon under the back of Amy’s car right after he had taken them from Lieutenant Gamez. They had used Amy’s beacon as an experiment to see if they were accurate. Gavin left it in place because Tim was an unpredictable asshole and Gavin always believed he would try something like this. He got a hold of himself and the fear that gripped him. He knew there was no way to help Amy if he panicked. He took a deep breath and focused.