by L. T. Ryan
Nothing she couldn’t handle. Not when she had the kind of protection here she never had on the streets. And when it came down to it, he was the only one who could and would protect her from those who wished to harm her. Those she fled from when she came here.
Her shoulders, arms, back all tensed at the thought of her ex-husband. Ex was a stretch, though. She left him in the middle of the night. Chances of him finding her in Colorado were slim. It took her months to crack the code. That dumbass would never figure it out.
This place offered protection, stability, and a sense of purpose. The question remained: How to get him to admit his love her for? Get him to stop sleeping with every other woman in the compound, the ones he wanted, at least. Some were off limits. Not the married women. Just those he wasn’t attracted to. And kids. That was a no-no for everyone.
There had been a guy who found his way in, did and said all the right things, then led two minors into the woods. She never found out exactly what happened to him, but rumor was, his body was dismembered and scattered about those same woods. They even let the kids take part.
She stood at the base of the driveway, looking up toward the house, admiring the clean driveway and walkway.
“A hard day’s work deserves a hard drink,” she muttered.
She left the shovel at the door and peeled off her outerwear in the foyer. He wouldn’t appreciate a mess, so she piled her coat and ski pants on top of the boots which she’d set on a towel. All the runoff would be contained to the single spot and most she’d have to do was wipe up a little puddle.
He’d recently unlocked the liquor cabinet for her. His instructions were don’t drink anything past half-full. She didn’t even take it that far, only having a drink a couple of times from bottles that had been previously opened, but hardly consumed.
She perused the selection, settling on Angel’s Envy Finished Rye. The rum casks added a nice bite to the whiskey. One sip tasted like honey. The next lit a fire in her chest and belly that fought off the lingering cold from her snow shoveling.
“Why don’t you pour me one of those?”
She spun, the glass clutched tight to her chest, and stared wide-eyed at him.
He smiled, unbuttoning his shirt, revealing his salt-and-pepper chest hair as he approached. His eyes were on the V in the middle of her yoga pants. He reached for her glass and drained the contents, grimacing against the burn as it trickled down his throat. He handed the glass back to her.
“You scared me.” She turned back to the cabinet, pulled down a second glass, and poured two fingers into each.
“Didn’t mean to.”
“How long have you been here?” She worried she had vocalized her thoughts as she entered the house. Would he have heard if she had? Was this an act and punishment was seconds away?
“Long enough to watch you working from the upstairs window. Gotta admit, made me feel kinda good seeing you do that for me.” He took the glass from her with one hand and pulled her close to him with the other. A kiss. Then a second. The whiskey on his lips tingling on her tongue. She reached back and set her glass on the bar, missing her mark. The glass spilled over. She tensed, knowing such things could set him off. But it didn’t. His hands found her ass. They slid down a few inches. He hoisted her up so her legs folded around his waist, and he carried her upstairs.
19
“What are the chances you can catch the next flight down here?”
Bridget hadn’t said a word other than hello and that’s what I hit her with as I stood in the lobby, pretending to admire a sculpture, while Liliana Marin and Emilia Lavelle broke off their embrace and headed for the nearest elevator.
She waited a few extra beats before replying. “Mitch, what’s going on?”
I walked in time with the women, dodging a couple of old ladies wearing those silly t-shirts that made them look like they were years younger, wearing bikinis.
“You sitting down?” I asked.
“Tell me what’s happening there.”
“Hang on a second.” I heard Bridget exhale in annoyance, but dismissed it. Liliana and Emilia were in animated conversation, waiting next to the elevator. I hung back a good distance, leaning against a marble pillar, watching them in my peripheral. The doors opened and they continued their conversation as they stepped inside. I hurried over to where they had been standing and watched the LED showing the floor number climb. It stopped on eighteen.
“You still there?” Bridget asked.
“Yeah, sorry, had to wait until it was clear to talk.” I continued past the elevators until I reached a quieter section of the lobby. There were no windows. No sun streaming in. The lighting overhead was dim enough to cast me in shadows. “Ready for this?”
“Been ready since I answered.” She made no attempt at hiding her aggravation.
“Yeah, right. Trust me, it’s worth it.”
“Hope so, because if it’s not, I’m sending you back home.”
“Followed Liliana to the strip, The Venetian.”
“Nice place.”
“Don’t I know it. A bit gaudy, though. Anyway, I expected Liliana was gonna have a rendezvous with Lavelle. I mean, she’s wheeling his suitcase around, ya know?”
“And is that what you saw?”
“Yeah, but not the Lavelle we were expecting.”
“Hold on.” She paused a few beats and when she came back on the line, it was obvious I was no longer on speaker. “What do you mean?”
“Emilia met Liliana in the lobby.”
“Emilia Lavelle?”
“The one and only.”
“The missing woman? the reason you were dragged into this whole thing? She’s there in Vegas?”
“Wouldn’t have believed it if I didn’t see it myself..”
“Lavelle’s mistress and his wife, together, hugging, in a hotel in Las Vegas. You’re kidding, right?”
“Bridget, I wish I was. But I shit you not, I walked up to those doors and saw the two of them in an embrace in the middle of the lobby. No doubt in my mind. Neither of them know me, so I got close enough no one could doubt me.”
“Did you get a picture?”
“Hang on.” I navigated to my Photos app and texted her the image of the two women together. Liliana faced away, but Emilia was clear as day. “Should be in your inbox now.”
“Give me a sec.” A few moments later, she was back on the line. “That looks like her. Hard to tell on Liliana, but I’ll trust your judgment it was here. What about the kids? Any sign of them? And David Lavelle?”
“No kids, but they might be in the room. And no clue where Lavelle went. Given the fact he had at least a ten-minute head start, he might already be up on the eighteenth floor, too. And if he’s not there, well, hell if I know, Bridge. This is the damnedest, most confusing shit I’ve seen yet.”
“That’s where they’re staying? The Venetian?”
“Can’t say for sure, but I watched the elevator after they got on. No one else got on with them, just the two of them. Eighteen is where it stopped.”
“Okay.” I could hear her banging on her keyboard. Clickity-clack, clickity-clack. “All right, gonna get the local field office involved. They’ll have the relationship with the hotel already in place, which will save us time versus you or me trying to negotiate with them for information. I’m thinking they can cross-reference all three names and we’ll see what pops up. Chances are, they checked in under one or an easy alias. Having the floor number helps narrow it down a good bit, but I think we should still search two floors above and below in case they were trying to cover their tracks.” She paused a beat. “Maybe you should visit the shops and change up your look? Lavelle’s likely hanging around somewhere. He spots you, it’s over.”
She made a good point about checking above and below floor eighteen. But everything they’d done was out in the open. I was thinking they didn’t care, or Lavelle with his background believed he was the smartest man in the room.
“You’re right
,” I said. “Best I hang back and try to blend in for a while. Only real concern is that they leave the hotel and don’t come back. Maybe this was just a rendezvous point, and now they’re getting ready to bounce. The lobby is probably the best place to post up for now.”
“You know how those monstrosities are, though. You can spend a week without leaving the hotel and casino compound. There’ll be several ways out, and multiple for them to come downstairs, too.”
“Nah, to get out, they gotta come through here.”
“What time is it?.” The earpiece filled with a static as she shifted her phone. “Um, just after one. Wait there at least until I can get a few agents in place. But take my advice, get a change of clothes, something casual, and maybe a hat. You’re the kind of guy who would look totally different in a hat.”
“The hell does that mean?”
“Never mind.” Clickity-clack, clickity-clack. “Awesome. Already got a reply from the field office there. They’ve to two agents en route. I’ll text you their info.”
“Sounds good.” I thought for a second about the other things going on in this case, namely, the Delgado kid. “Hey, what do we know about Manny’s condition?”
She took a deep breath. “Got word a bit ago he’s awake.”
“That’s great to hear. What kind of shape is he in?”
“That’s the problem. They won’t let Braxton talk to him. Not yet. Might be another day before they let us see him.”
“We really need to know what happened to that kid, and what he really knows about Liliana. Guessing nothing else came from the Alton Moore interview.”
Something still felt off about that guy, but I couldn’t place what bugged me so much about him. It wasn’t his record. That was a lot of petty stuff. Only reason I didn’t end up in jail as a teenager was I got lucky. Thinking back on how he looked at me while he formulated responses, there was something akin to the way a veteran sometimes stares at a person, but past them. The thousand-yard stare where a world that only existed in their brains felt as real as present reality. Only Moore’s stare went maybe sixty, seventy-five yards, max.
“Braxton didn’t say,” she said. “I think if he’d found something, he’d have passed it along.”
Was the trust in Braxton warranted? Hard to say. He could have been much more difficult to work with than he had been. Even bringing me into the interrogation room was a big step in the right direction. But was it bullshit?
“I know it’s tied together somehow,” I said. “If you get a chance to talk to Manny, bring up his mom and sis, and somehow, work Vegas into the conversation. Don’t be obvious about it, but talk about taking a quick trip and checking out the hotel.”
“You think he knows Liliana is there?”
“I got a hunch he knows a lot more about this than he’s letting on. Also, get the feeling he’s a bigger fish than the tadpole he presented himself as to us.”
We disconnected the call a few seconds later. The entire time, I’d been monitoring the bank of elevators and as much of the lobby as I could. Nothing had happened. Didn’t expect it to. Lavelle had made a ballsy move, leaving Denver to reunite not only with his supposed mistress, Liliana, but also his wife. Chances they were gonna go cruise the strip this afternoon were slim.
Bridget’s text had arrived. I scrolled through the details of the two local FBI agents. When they walked into the lobby, I had no trouble spotting them. They stood out in every way possible. Not a bad thing, I guess. We were in Vegas. Law Enforcement was everywhere. Most people would pay no mind to these guys. But Lavelle wasn’t most people. In fact, I now realized he was much more dangerous than I had thought.
The agents said they would take over surveillance. Progress on finding the room would have to wait, though. The hotel was pushing back and needed more concrete information before allowing it. I didn’t let that stress me. We knew they were here. Now we had to make sure they didn’t leave.
With the agents in place, I took the opportunity to find a clothing store inside the hotel complex. The men’s boutique was pricey, but the lady said I finally looked like I fit in after I purchased her recommended slacks, shirt, sunglasses and hat. Looking in the mirror, I thought the look worked. A regular Johnny Public who could blend in anywhere in the city.
And I had no idea I’d find out how much so.
20
The row of shops was what some might refer to as high end. But the constant stream of people who passed were a mix of anything but. I stood in the store exit and found myself almost face-to-face with a guy wearing shorts and flip-flops, no shirt, just a towel around his shoulders and a phone up to his ear.
David Lavelle continued past as though I didn’t exist. For a former military cop and someone entrenched in the security game, he inexplicably paid no attention to his surroundings. He was too relaxed, and that concerned me.
I fell in line behind him with about twenty feet between us. I was taller than everyone in between, so I kept my head tucked. This allowed the brim of my hat to shade my face. At the first cross-section were directional signs. Lavelle continued on toward the pool.
When we reached The Venetian’s restaurant row, I found another surprise, one which caused me to abandon my pursuit of Lavelle. I ducked into the restroom for a minute to buy myself some time.
I sent a picture of Lavelle to Bridget along with a quick message: It gets better…
What I’d seen left me a bit rattled. I don’t like coincidences, and this was a big one. One that perhaps explained Lavelle’s laissez-faire attitude while in the hotel. Hell, in Vegas in general.
Before exiting the restroom, I swiped through my photos until I reached one I had taken the day before, minutes prior to making Lavelle’s acquaintance. I zoomed in on the picture and exited the restroom.
The sign over the restaurant’s entrance read Matteo’s Ristorante Italiano, matching the name and logo on the napkin we found in a back-alley trashcan with a name scribbled on it.
I sent a picture to Bridget. Her response came back seconds later: You’re kidding…
Wish I was, Bridget. Wish I was.
She told me to get out of sight and stand by for a while. The local FBI agents believed they had the correct room number and were waiting for approval to enter. She had secured a position for me to tag along as an observer.
I found a dark corner in a bistro where I topped off my caffeine level. Knots in my stomach prevented me from eating anything. Probably better, anyway. Wouldn’t want to go into a raid weighed down by lunch.
I kept an eye on the walkway, watching for any of the trio to appear and for other undesirables. You wouldn’t think it with the decor in the place, but the element existed no matter where you were, and the ratio never changed much.
That I was sitting in a restaurant in a hotel-casino in Vegas struck me as a little unbelievable. Not too long ago, I was back in Philly, dealing with my disaster of a life. Bridget entered when I was incapable of forming a genuine bond with anyone new. Yet I had with her, only to watch her leave for Denver. Next, I found myself in Savannah after getting kicked off the force—temporarily—. Georgia saw me get mixed up in a crazy kidnapping case where my friend and associate Cassie Quinn was abducted. It was a postcard that led me to Denver. Led me back to Bridget. Hopefully would lead me back to Robbie.
Couldn’t help but wonder, was life leading me on the path to resolve my torment? Or was I digging that hole even deeper?
My phone buzzed against the table, sending vibrations through my arm. I checked the message from Bridget. She wanted me to meet the team in room 222. Lavelle had returned. Apparently, he made a one-eighty while I was in the bathroom. It occurred to me perhaps he knew I was there all along. They’d be watching for him to leave, though, so I didn’t focus too much on that.
Back in the lobby, I took a few moments to scout the area. Was anyone looking back at me? Did anyone look out of place? How were the front staff handling themselves?
At first glance, everythi
ng appeared normal. A text that came in indicated I had little time to find something out of the ordinary. The team would move without me if I wasn’t there in five minutes.
I hustled up the stairs and found the room. Three agents were huddled together, discussing their plan with two members of the hotel security detail. These men were not mall rent-a-cops. Gut told me they’d seen some real shit. Probably ex-Special Forces. Army, if I had to guess. I wanted to ask them if they recognized the name on the napkin, but it wasn’t the right time. We had business to attend to, and everyone in the room was eager to get on with it.
An agent named Howerton pulled me aside. He was a lanky guy with thinning, light brown hair. Could tell he’d been on the job quite a while.
“Any chance you got something I can protect myself with?” I couldn’t think of any other time in my adult life I had been unarmed for an op like this.
He pressed his lips tight together and shook his head. “Can’t arm you, Tanner, but I don’t want you going in there completely exposed. Take this.” He handed me a vest. “Hang back and once we’ve got things secure, I’ll escort you in.” He dragged his hand over his nose, lips, chin. “This is a definite breach of protocol, but I’m sticking my neck out for Bridget as a favor. Don’t make me regret it.”
“I owe you. I make people regret all kinds of things, but you have my word, I won’t screw this up.” Was it the truth? I wasn’t so sure, but saying otherwise would never get me a spot on the team.
The security guards led us to a service elevator. It required a key to call the elevator, and it wouldn’t stop on any floor other than our destination. We shuffled in. No one spoke during the short ride to the eighteenth floor. We didn’t exit right away. Howerton reviewed the plan one more time. I listened and held back my input.
In the room, we expected to face David Lavelle, his wife Emilia, and Liliana Marin. There was no confirmation the Lavelle’s kids were present. We had to operate under the assumption they were inside, though. It would be paramount to determine their presence as quickly as possible. Tactics would change if they were there.