The Shadow Cartel (The Dominic Grey Series Book 4)

by Layton Green

  Which was how Fred saw this case.

  The word on Frankie was that he had been a mid-level player at best, a pawn for one of the stateside cartel distributors who pushed their product to a bevy of South Florida dealers, an army of cockroaches carrying lice across the Southeast.

  The problem was, squashing Frankie was just like squashing a cockroach. He was filthy, dead, and very, very replaceable. It was not a DEA-caliber murder. If Miami PD wanted to investigate, that was up to them, but Fred knew they wouldn’t.

  Fred hit “Send” and pushed away from the desk. Though frustrated by his job, Fred believed deeply in what he did. He had three kids, a teenage son from his first marriage and two girls in elementary school. He chose not to think about the methadone clinic in which his teenager was currently enrolled, and he shuddered at the dangers awaiting his younger two as they grew up.

  After leaving the office, he skirted downtown and took Coral Way home. Even Fred had to admit it was a nice street, shaded by mature banyans and lined with sidewalk cafés and restaurants from over two dozen countries.

  He took Douglas and crossed over U.S. 1, debating hitting a strip club but deciding he would rather go home, crack a beer, and call his kids before bed. Hearing their voices put him in a different universe, washed away the grime.

  He pulled into Coconut Grove, a neighborhood nurtured by bohemian artists in the fifties and sixties, now filled with renovated bungalows and Spanish-style mansions hidden inside a tropical paradise.

  Good job, hippies. You did something right.

  Fred, however, lived on the edge of what was called the Black Grove: a dense collection of shanties next door to the mansions, filled not with lush vegetation but with broken sidewalks and dilapidated houses whose roofs curled from the heat. It was called the Black Grove because only black people lived there. Not white people, not Latinos, just black people.

  And it was avoided like a quarantine zone.

  Fred lived in a modest rental with an insipid square of a backyard. The location was great, close to everything, and Fred felt a kinship with the residents of the Black Grove, who were as invisible in Miami as he was.

  He cracked a Miller Lite and rang his former house in the suburbs of Birmingham, his home before his wife kicked him out.

  No answer. He tried her cell, then tried both the home phone and her cell three more times.

  Damn her. It wasn’t that late.

  He tried to enjoy the evening, but he missed his kids, and dusk had brought out The Enemy. While his neighbors in the fashionable part of Coconut Grove enjoyed the protection of lanais, Fred sat under a sterile lime tree, tortured to the edge of sanity by battalions of mosquitoes. After ten minutes he was sweating from the humidity, scratching his mosquito bites, casting wary glances at the incontinent parrots flying overhead, listening to the bass from some inane rap song rattling half the Black Grove, and cackling insanely as a pair of tiny lizards started humping right beside his feet.

  He gave up, stomping inside after kicking his lawn chair across the yard. Shotgunned another beer to relieve the itching. Cranked Springsteen to drown the rap.

  Fred was glad he had shot that meth dealer. He was just sad he had done it in front of an undercover cop. If he hadn’t, then Fred might be sitting in his trimmed green lawn in Vestavia Hills, looking at magnolia trees and tidy shrubs instead of man-size weeds and vines that could crack a foundation. There would be stars glittering in a svelte Alabama night, neighbors waving goodnight, Southern belles in tight shorts casting suggestive looks at the edgy DEA agent who kept their neighborhood safe from outsiders and drug dealers.

  That was where he would be, all right. Smack in the middle of the goddamn United States of America.

  His cell rang, and he glanced down. HQ in Arlington.

  Odd. Very odd.

  He put the phone on speaker. “Agent Hernandez.”

  “HQ dispatch here. Apologies for the late call. I understand from your supervisor you’re working the Frankie García murder?”

  “I was. Not much to work.”

  “We need you to attend a meeting concerning this matter, tomorrow morning at seven a.m. Details are in your inbox. I assume you can make it?”

  Fred frowned at his cell. He had only released his report a few hours ago. “Sure. Who’s the meeting with?”

  “The CIA.”

  SOUTH MIAMI

  Grey was hunched in his rental Civic a few blocks from the purple and white bungalow, secure in the parking lot of a clapboard Baptist church. With a six-pack of water and two Publix sandwiches to see him through, Grey had arrived at six a.m. to start his stakeout of Manny Lopez, Frankie García’s partner.

  The neighborhood surprised him. Located just a few blocks behind the University of Miami’s posh Coral Gables campus, Manny’s bungalow was in a dilapidated pocket of South Miami with dealers on the corners and low-slung sedans cruising the streets.

  Set at the end of a cul-de-sac, most of the bungalow was obscured by foliage. Iron bars guarded the windows and a high stone wall shielded the rear of the property. A Hummer occupied the driveway, arriving earlier with four men carrying takeout and clutching firearms. The house had the feel of a rebel camp under siege.

  Eyes trained for signs of movement, binoculars at the ready, Grey took another swig of water as sweat trickled off his body. He felt as if he were back in the jungle, scoping a target for Marine Recon.

  Dusk arrived and Grey grew restless. His plan was to scope out the scene, then go to the police and offer to wear a wire. He wasn’t sure how far he was prepared to go after that. He just knew Nya needed his help and she was going to get it.

  It wasn’t just about Nya. If Grey didn’t investigate this matter, no one else would, and Sekai’s death would be another ripple in an ocean of unheard voices.

  The sounds of laughter and men speaking Spanish spilled into the night. Grey wasn’t sure, but he thought they had come from behind the purple bungalow. After a moment of waffling, he grabbed his binoculars, stepped out of the car, and slipped into the shadows. The sickly sweet smell of rotting mangoes drifted on the breeze.

  He confirmed that the voices were coming from behind the rear wall of Manny’s place. Approaching any closer was risky, and he debated calling it a night. Then the cacophony ceased, and Grey heard a single voice intoning a mantra in an unfamiliar tongue. A bongo drum accompanied the voice. It reminded him of chanting he had once heard at a Juju ceremony in Zimbabwe, and the thought chilled him.

  The other houses looked abandoned, and Grey wondered if Manny owned the whole block. That or the neighbors were too scared to attract attention.

  The chanting took on a more singsongy tone. It was an African language, Grey was sure of it. Feeling exposed, he scanned the street and then shimmied up the rope-like aerial root of a banyan tree, taking cover under the heavy foliage.

  He focused the lenses on the rear wall, swept his gaze to the middle of Manny’s yard, and gripped his binoculars at what he saw.

  Vines, wild bougainvillea, and shaggy palmettos had overtaken the property. Tiki torches illuminated a patio, where a bevy of tense Latino men clutched handguns to their sides. But what harpooned Grey’s attention was the shirtless, barefoot man in the middle of the property, singing as he tossed a handful of dirt into a knee-high iron pot with sticks poking out of it. White crosses had been painted on the man’s cheeks and forehead and chest, and a jumble of necklaces swayed downward as he bent over the pot. Next to the priest, another man sat on the ground, hands banging a steady rhythm on a leather drum.

  Near the top of the cauldron, Grey noticed a blackened human skull. The priest stirred the pot with one of the sticks, and the skull rotated, exposing the empty eye and nose sockets. He stopped singing and grabbed a plastic bottle off a table next to the pot, took a swig, and sprayed the contents into the cauldron.

  Focusing on the table, Grey saw an array of items: chalk; a bottle of cheap rum; a cigar; a lit candle sitting in a teacup inside a glass
jar; a bag of desiccated lizards; an assortment of herbs and mushrooms; and a bundle wrapped in black cloth, about half the size of a meatloaf.

  A chill tiptoed down Grey’s spine, and he wished Viktor were there to observe.

  The priest grabbed a handful of dirt out of a sack and sprinkled it into the pot. Next he lit the cigar, puffing and ashing on the dirt, and then he grabbed the chalk and made a series of markings on the ground. As he worked, he continued to puff on the cigar and spray rum into the cauldron.

  After finishing with the chalk, the priest sliced his palm with a razor blade, then held his hand over the black-cloth bundle, saturating it with blood. He stirred the cauldron again, forearms twisting with the effort, and the skull rotated through the dirt in a macabre dance, uncovering other bones in its path.

  One of the armed men disappeared into the house, then returned holding a black cat by its neck. The cat jerked and thrashed, its screams escalating until they sounded like the cry of a child, but just before the priest swiped the razor blade, everyone stilled and was looking towards the house.

  Grey whipped the binoculars around and saw two college kids—a slender girl in a miniskirt and a long-haired guy with a backpack—at the door of the purple bungalow. They must have rung the doorbell, customers from UM looking for a good time.

  Tension radiated outward from the backyard, and Grey didn’t like the feel of the situation. These people would not appreciate being disturbed.

  The meowing stopped. The hum of insects replaced the low beat of the drums.

  The girl in the miniskirt reached for the doorbell again, and Grey tensed. He refocused the binoculars on the backyard. It had emptied.

  Leave, you stupid kids. Get your fix somewhere else tonight.

  Instead of leaving, the girl pressed the doorbell two, three, and then four times. Finally the door opened. Grey strained but couldn’t see inside.

  The college kids disappeared into the house. Grey guessed they were infrequent customers who didn’t have their ear to the ground. He prayed the dealers would make a quick sale and let them go.

  Just in case they didn’t, Grey grabbed his cell and dialed.

  “Emergency 911.”

  “I’m a private investigator,” Grey said, “and I need to report—”

  A burst of gunfire erupted into the night.

  “Sir—was that gunfire?”

  Grey cursed and gave them the address, then scampered down the tree and sprinted towards the house. He had no weapon and knew he was heading into a maelstrom, but he had no choice. He couldn’t leave those two coeds to their fate.

  The shots ceased. Nurturing a foolish hope that the gunfire had been a nervous reaction, he veered left, deciding to scale the rear wall. As he flung a leg over, the gunfire picked up again, this time longer and accompanied by screams.

  Grey’s adrenaline spiked. He had to get to those kids. He flattened on the wall, seeing nothing out of place except for the bulk of the iron cauldron, looming in the grass like something out of a Brothers Grimm story.

  The gunfire ceased again, and Grey slipped off the wall and against the rear of the house. He crept forward and pulled one of the long tiki torches out of the ground.

  As he edged along the patio, two Latino men burst out of a screen door right in front of him, waving firearms. Grey jabbed the torch into the stomach of the lead man, causing him to drop the gun. The torch thudded into his gut, spilling oil, and his linen shirt burst into flames.

  Neither Grey nor the second man had time to use their weapons before engaging, but Grey embraced that fact and his opponent didn’t. Grey dropped his torch and leapt onto the second man, grabbing the barrel of his gun with both hands. As his opponent struggled to free the weapon, Grey head-butted him in the face, then swept the back of his opponent’s legs out. Grey ended up standing over him with the man’s arm straightened, both of Grey’s hands torquing the wrist with the gun.

  The man managed to fire off a useless round before Grey slammed his knee into the distended elbow, shattering the joint. Grey yanked the gun away and stomped on his opponent’s temple to finish the job. The other man was still rolling around trying to extinguish the flames, and Grey pistol-whipped him unconscious.

  Grey couldn’t afford to wait; the kids might still be alive. He had seen nine men and only accounted for two. Where were those cops?

  At least now he was armed. He held the gun in his left hand, crouching as he eased the screen door open.

  It was a bloodbath.

  A lava lamp in the corner cast the room in an eerie red glow, and Grey counted six bodies on the floor, all pockmarked by bullets. Blood spattered the walls. The stench of gunfire filled the air.

  No sign of the kids. What had happened in here?

  A scream and then two more shots, this time the muted thwaps of silencers, coming from a hallway to Grey’s left. He crouched almost to a squat and swung the gun into the corridor. Unwilling to risk exposure, he hung back, training his weapon on whoever emerged.

  Seconds later, the girl in the miniskirt stepped into the hallway, the long-haired guy right behind her. Instead of innocent college students, Grey saw two experienced killers, their steady movements and the flatness of their eyes giving them away. Both had semi-automatics. Both saw Grey. Both opened fire.

  Grey scrambled to the side, his gun leveled at the entrance to the hallway. The gunfire ceased, and there was a prolonged silence. Grey knew trained assassins wouldn’t risk coming down that hallway, and he wasn’t about to walk into their line of fire. He debated slipping into the backyard but decided to hold his position. Climbing that wall would be too risky.

  He firmed his grip and hoped the sirens came soon.

  PEOPLES TEMPLE AGRICULTURAL PROJECT, NORTHWEST GUYANA

  NOVEMBER 18, 1978

  After listening to the tape of the mass suicide, John Wolverton felt as if the world had flipped on its axis, gravity had reversed, and he was floating away.

  The majority of Reverend Jones’s flock had killed themselves at his command, after injecting their own children with cyanide. Offering their lives to him as if disrobing for a lover.

  How could a human being possess that kind of control over another? Over so many? It was a power that seemed almost . . . supernatural.

  Near the end of the tape, Jones’s bodyguards had killed each other, until only Jones and one other remained. The final guard had shot Jones and then himself. Or at least that was John Wolverton’s presumption, since the final two shots were the last recorded man-made sounds.

  He saw a flicker of movement in the trees, and he stilled. Men in black fatigues creeping forward. Firearms raised. White skin glowing.

  The cleanup crew.

  After what he had heard at the beginning of the tape, Reverend Jones’s tell-all and the part that had caused John Wolverton to feel outside of his body, he wasn’t surprised by the men in the trees—just enraged.

  He should have known about the cleanup crew. The fact that he didn’t meant that he wasn’t part of their plans.

  He was part of the cleanup.

  His mind worked fast, and he spotted a pen and a piece of scrap paper on a table. The men in the trees were fanning out, a pattern of engagement he knew all too well. Creating a perimeter around the danger zone.

  Spotting an opening to the south, he planned his escape route. He knew he could disappear in the jungle, since he had roamed it for months.

  So he fled.

  And he took the tape with him.

  And he left them a note.

  As he slipped into the trees, following a path to the creek, his mind spun on what he had learned.

  They had left him to die. Worse: they had sent their own people to kill him. His people. Why?

  According to the Reverend’s confession, John Wolverton’s handler had told Reverend Jones that the CIA couldn’t stop Congressman Ryan from coming, their partnership was over, and the Reverend would have to disappear to Russia.

  Then it clicked in hi
s mind. The CIA hated Congressman Ryan and the emasculating Hughes-Ryan Act—they knew Jones would kill him. They also knew, from the reports John Wolverton had written, that the Reverend’s pride would not let him admit defeat, would never allow him to give up his flock.

  They had just solved both the congressman problem and the Jonestown problem.

  He looked to the sky. Soon the sweepers would disappear in their helicopters, and the official investigation would begin. He guessed the Guyanese were an hour or two behind the troops.

  But what about him? Granted, they had known about Tashmeni and the baby. A serious mistake on his part, but it had happened. He had loved them.

  The knowledge surprised him. He had not known he was capable of such love, of any love other than self-love. The personality tests, his own experience, suggested otherwise. But she had captured him in her own quiet way, the beautiful village girl who was kinder and funnier and more clever than anyone he had ever known. A world-class talent born into the most obscure circumstances imaginable.

  His relationship with Tashmeni had surprised his superiors as well, and they knew he was compromised. He forced away the lump in his throat and returned to piecing together the puzzle. He had warned them this could happen, the mass suicides. Hell, Jones had made his people rehearse it.

  John Wolverton had told his handler they had gone too far. The experiment was over, they couldn’t risk this much blood on their hands.

  He laughed to himself. How naïve he had been. What was the blood of hundreds to people willing to sacrifice whole nations for their cause?

  In the end, it was simple. Loose ends had been tied. He knew too much, he was compromised. He had delivered his last report two days ago, so they knew everything he knew.

  Or at least they thought they did, he thought with a smile as cold as the last touch of Tashmeni’s fingers.

  He knew he had to get to Georgetown, the impoverished capital of Guyana. There he could blend in and disappear. After days in the jungle and many a brush with death, he stumbled gibbering out of the vines and onto the highway. Emaciated and half-mad, he hitchhiked to Georgetown, scraped in garbage cans for food, slept in alleys.