‘You see it, yeah?’ Parker asked.
‘Yeah,’ Tina said. ‘That’s the one?’
‘One and the same. You see that guy smoking a cigarette by the fence? He might look like he’s just a bozo on a break but he’s actually a watchman looking out for any suspicious activity on the outside. So whatever you do, don’t slow down or look out the window or anything as we pass.’
‘Ok,’ Tina said and pressed down on the accelerator.
As the car filled with glaring light from the huge spotlights around the base she ignored the instinct to look until after they’d passed the docking compound.
‘Take a right down here and park up,’ Sam said, ‘I know a shortcut inside.’
Tina parked the car along a quiet, dark little road and they quickly backtracked towards the docks. Crouched low they darted across the road and over to the compound that stood adjacent to the one with the gang in it.
‘Come on,’ Parker whispered, ‘we can get through the fence over here…’
Tina took a quick glance towards the guard up the street to make sure they’d made their excursion unnoticed. The grim, mean-faced guard continued to breathe smoke into the night and stare out into the darkness. She followed Parker over to an opening in the wire mesh of the fence and crouched down to follow him through.
‘I hope you didn’t make that hole yourself,’ she said as she stood up again on the other side.
‘Course not,’ Parker said, avoiding her eye as she watched him closely.
‘Hah, well forgive me for thinking otherwise,’ Tina said.
She looked around. They were in the yard of a large courier company, she could tell because the company name was written on the fleet of trucks parked nearby.
‘Are you sure we’re safe in here?’ she asked, ‘I mean won’t there be night security or something around?’
‘You tell me,’ Parker said, ‘you’re the one with the psychic abilities after all.’
Ok, he had her there alright, maybe she should have checked first and spoken later. She placed her finger on her temple and closed her eyes as she concentrated. The bigger hum of voices was coming from the gang’s compound up ahead but it wouldn’t be safe for her to try to invade the minds there. If Parker was right when he said the gang were supernatural then they’d probably have some kind of defense set up against psychic intruders. Further south she picked up the lazy mutterings of a human mind. It was the security guard from the courier company. He was laid out in the office reading a dirty magazine.
‘All clear,’ Tina said, ‘lead the way, Sherlock.’
Parker headed towards the dock and Tina quickly followed.
They came up towards the fence to the next compound over. Right near the water’s edge, where the concrete veered down into the dark soup of Moonlight City’s small slice of the Atlantic ocean. Parker crouched down and, as Tina approached, she saw that there was another opening in the fence.
‘Let me guess, you just happened to find this one here too, right?’
‘Elementary my dear Tina,’ Parker smirked and then hurried on through.
‘That’s breaking some serious laws there Parker,’ Tina said as she slipped after him, ‘if you got caught out here, you know there’s nothing I could have done to help you.’
‘I’m pleading the fifth,’ Parker said.
‘Whatever,’ Tina shrugged, ‘so where to from here?’
They’d emerged right beside a huge boathouse and by the noise and the strong light spilling onto the water around the corner, it sounded like the dockworkers were unloading a ship inside.
‘There’s another one of these on the other side,’ Parker answered, ‘but the real mother lode is in the warehouse between the two of them back towards the road. I can honestly say that I’ve never seen so many drugs in all my life. And bear in mind that I was a teenager while the sixties were going on…’
‘Ok,’ Tina nodded, ‘and what about the perps? How many of these guys are we dealing with here?’
Parker thought about it for a second. ‘More than I can count,’ he said. ‘You’re locked and loaded, right?’
Tina opened her coat and flashed him her holstered weapon.
‘Good,’ Parker said, ‘me too. And this time I’ve got a license and all, so hands off.’
‘Don’t worry about it,’ Tina said. She didn’t necessarily believe that he actually was licensed to pack heat, but she wasn’t about to give up on the cover now. ‘Oh shit,’ she whispered, ‘I can feel someone coming…’
A side door to the rusty boat house slid open and the sound of foreign accents emerged. They sounded Eastern European, Tina observed, as Parker quickly sidled up beside the door.
An average looking heavy stepped outside and produced a battered packet of cigarettes. In one swift movement Parker drove his elbow into the man’s throat and dropped him to the concrete floor. He was out cold.
‘Good thing he was just a human,’ Parker said, ‘or we could have been in trouble there.’
They dragged the thug over to the fence and flipped him over.
‘Hold on,’ Parker said and reached down to untie the man’s boot. He pulled the shoe of his foot and turned it upside down a little behind him.
‘What are you doing?’ Tina asked.
‘This way it’ll look like he tripped over his laces and hit his head if anyone finds him.’
‘Hah!’ Tina snorted, ‘you really are unscrupulous, Parker.’
‘Better safe than sorry,’ Sam shrugged and turned back to face the compound.
Keeping low, they waited at the corner of the boathouse until the coast was clear and then darted across the loading bay towards the main warehouse.
‘Over here,’ Parker hissed, sliding in behind a row of garbage skips around the side of the building.
Tina skidded in beside him and tried to regain her breath. From the sound of the voices around the base, she guessed there was veritable army of goons in there. All in all, it was turning out to be pretty far from the boring night she’d envisioned for herself earlier that evening.
‘Ok,’ Parker said, ‘there’s a side-door down here we should be able to get through. Then you’ll see for yourself what we’re really dealing with.’
‘Are you sure it’s safe?’ Tina asked.
Parker ignored the question and slipped out around the skip and towards the entrance to the warehouse. Tina pulled out her pistol and loaded it before following after him.
The door was open and Parker quickly leaned around the edge to make sure it was all clear before slipping inside. When Tina stepped through after him she had to bite her tongue to keep from speaking out in surprise. The whole warehouse was filled almost to the ceiling with bales of cocaine.
‘Holy shit Parker,’ she whispered.
Parker glanced back and nodded with a tight-lipped grin. He motioned towards a piece of loading equipment and they darted forward to take cover.
‘What now?’ Tina asked.
‘Wait a second,’ Parker replied, ‘I think I hear someone coming…’
Up ahead, the sound of men approached. A deep, thick European accent spoke as the group crossed the room.
‘It’s beautiful, isn’t it? All that marvelous powder. All that chaos, all that money…’
‘It’s really something, boss,’ a voice replied.
Tina lifted her head slightly up over the rim of the machine. Up ahead were two muscle-bound goons and a slick looking man in an expensive suit. Her eyes widened as she realized she recognized him. It was the demon prince who they’d busted across town in a coke deal a few months ago. When they’d first crossed paths with Sam Parker.
She dipped her head back down and stared at him intently, silently demanding answers. Parker stubbornly avoided her gaze and kept his eyes dead ahead.
‘Ok,’ the demon said, ‘I’m out for the night. We have two more shipments coming over the next week and then we’ll be ready to move onto phase two…’
The voices fad
ed as the crooks left the warehouse.
‘Hey,’ Tina grunted, ‘you never told me it was him, you asshole. You mind telling me what else you’ve been keep from me?’
‘That’s it,’ Parker muttered.
‘Ok,’ Tina said, ‘well let’s get out of here. We’ll talk about it on the way back to the city.’
Parker stared at her.
‘What?’ Tina demanded. She was pretty pissed that he’d had dragged her through all this danger without being straight from the start about what it was really about.
‘What do you mean, on the way back to the city?’ Parker asked. ‘Why aren’t we taking these guys?’
‘Are you serious?’
‘Of course I am,’ Parker said, ‘we’ve got guns, don’t we? Let’s finish this.’
‘You’re crazy,’ Tina said, ‘there’s scores of these guys and only two of us. I’m not going to risk those kinds of odds.’
Parker stared at her. The guy even had the nerve to look angry with her.
‘No,’ Tina said, ‘you’re not crazy, you’re stupid. I can’t believe I trusted you enough to let you lead me blind into battle like this. Come on let’s go.’
Tina stood up and darted back to the exit.
‘Tina,’ Parker called after her, ‘Hey Tina I’m sorry, ok?’
They escaped from the compound without much hassle and returned to the car. Tina was still furious.
‘Ok Sam,’ she said, ‘it’s time you gave me some answers for once. I want to know who that asshole is and what his relationship is to you. And don’t even think about lying to me here.’
‘He’s a demon,’ Parker said, ‘one of the old families, but you knew that already, right?’
‘Right,’ Tina said. She started up the car and turned around back in the direction of the city.
‘Yeah well he goes buy the name of Draco Aiolfo,’ Parker continued, ‘and he’s one of the coldest scumbags I’ve ever met.’
Tina glanced at him for a second and then looked back at the road. She wasn’t giving up on her frown for a second. ‘Keep talking,’ she said.
‘Draco’s the reason I’m in this backwards country. I’ve been tracking him here since I left London.’
‘Because he stole your money?’ Tina asked, ‘the quarter of a million dollars?’
‘No,’ Parker said, ‘I mean, yes partly, but that’s not the main reason. He killed my best friend Tina. My best friend in the whole damn world… and one way or another, I’m going to make that bastard pay.’
‘What the hell were you involved in?’ Tina asked.
‘Oh don’t look at me like that,’ Parker frowned, ‘I’m just a petty crook, right? You shouldn’t be surprised.’
Tina said nothing. She’d never seen him so worked up like this before. It was hard to stay angry now that she knew the real reason behind his reckless behavior.
‘It was nothing serious,’ he continued after a while, ‘we ran a little gambling racket, me and my mate Jimmy – that was his name. Sometimes we moved dodgy goods as a favor for friends but we never got mixed up in any violence or anything. I made a promise about that to someone very important to me, a long, long time ago…’
‘And Draco?’ Tina asked, ‘when did he come into it?’
‘At the end of August last year,’ Parker said, ‘this smooth-talking bastard turns up. He had a proposition for us. I never trusted the scumbag for a second.’
‘What was the proposition?’
‘Draco wanted to take over the London crime scene. Or at least that was his story anyway. He probably took us for a couple of gullible proles who’d believe anything said by a man in suits as fancy as his. He claimed that if we joined forces with him we’d all become millionaires. All we had to was front the cash…’
‘And did you?’
Parker stared at her. ‘Of course not,’ he said, ‘I said no way, not a chance – but Jimmy, he wanted to follow through. I told him to take a few days to think about it and hoped he’d see sense in the meantime. Two days later he turned up dead. He’d been tortured Tina. The stupid bastard must have agreed to meet Draco behind my back. Needless to say, the safe where we kept our funds was completely cleared out too.’
‘Jesus,’ Tina said, ‘and you’ve been following him ever since?’
‘Right up until the day you and Comrade Furball arrested me for practicing detection without a license.’
‘Wow,’ Tina said, ‘you must have been pretty pissed when we stopped you.’
Parker smiled for the first time since they’d left the docks. There wasn’t much humor in it. ‘Nah,’ he said, ‘I’m a pretty patient guy Tina – that’s one thing immortality teaches you – and I knew I’d find him again one way or another, just as soon as I dealt with you two. Even now I know I’m going to get that bastard. And then I’m going to kill him.’
Tina dropped Parker off at his office after making sure that he’d be ok for the night. She promised him she’d let him know what the next move would be as soon as she did.
It took a couple of days of frantic phone calls and form filling to get the clearance – not to mention the delicate process of liaising with the normals’ police department, since they technically weren’t even supposed to know the SDA existed. Tina’s contact at Homicide served as the go-between while they organized the bust, while meanwhile the higher-ups at the Byron Shelly Institute furnished the proper documentation that would allow her and Boris to stand beside the officers of the MCPD as one of their own. As a member of the old demon families, Draco Aiolfo had a lot of a sway with the Institute, but all the same, a crime of this magnitude would not be tolerated. Punition was to be swift and painful.
By Sunday night, it was set in stone; the raid on Draco’s compound would take place at dawn on Tuesday morning.
‘I’m coming with you,’ Parker said.
‘God dammit,’ Tina sighed as she strode back into her office, ‘do you know how much hassle I had to go through just to get it set up that me and Boris could tag along with the normals?’
‘A lot!’ Ernie the Egghead shouted, as he scuttled out from under her desk with a huge pile of paperwork on the hub of his walker. ‘I’ve been working overtime all week on this crap, so thanks a shit ton, Dracula.’
‘Yeah, well sorry about that Ernie,’ Parker shrugged as he followed Tina into her office.
‘Whatever,’ Ernie muttered and scuttled out into the hallway.
‘So?’ Parker said, ‘I’m a licensed private detective, it’s not unheard of that I’d be working with the fuzz.’ He looked at Tina coyly as she sat down on her desk. ‘And I am the one who brought the heist to your attention in the first place…’
Tina looked up at him. ‘You’re not going to take no for an answer on this, are you?’
Parker’s blue eyes twinkled as he smiled. ‘Uh, duh?’ he said, ‘obviously not.’
‘Fine,’ Tina sighed, ‘you ride with me, but you better be on your best damn behavior out there.’
‘You’re a star, darling,’ Parker grinned.
‘I’m serious here Sam. We’re taking Draco in alive. Whatever bad blood is between you two it doesn’t come out when we take down his crew. Alright?’
‘Absolutely,’ Parker said.
‘Good,’ Tina replied. She picked up one of the mugs half-filled with cold coffee on her desk. ‘Now make me a refresher, will you? I’ve still got a mountain of paper to file through before we pull this off…’
Tuesday morning came and Tina pulled up outside Parker’s office. The scruffy young vampire was already waiting by the steps, furtively dragging on a cigarette.
‘Hurry up!’ she called to him as he walked around to the side of the car.
‘Yeah, yeah,’ Parker sighed climbing into the back seat, ‘I’m looking forward to this just as much as you are.’ He nodded to Boris in the passenger seat beside Tina. ‘Alright Baz?’ he said, ‘How was the porridge this morning? Too hot? Too cold?’
‘Was good,’ Boris replied w
ith a wave of his huge hand, ‘how was the blood of innocent virgins?’
‘Disappointing,’ Parker said, ‘it usually is, but hey what can you do?’ He smiled at Tina. ‘And how are you this morning love?’ he asked, ‘all ready for the big one?’
‘You bet your skinny English ass I am,’ Tina smiled and started up the car.
The industrial area around the docklands was alive with activity this time around, as the factories and warehouses fired up for the day of produce and the work force poured in in their pick up trucks and battered old station wagons. Tina reached down to the radio and picked up the transmitter.
‘This is TP One,’ she said, ‘we’re approaching the target now. Request advice.’
‘Affirmative TP One,’ a crackly voice replied, ‘approach the formation on Wait street and get into line.
‘Roger,’ Tina said and drove towards the reconnaissance.
Down a discreet side road, a couple of SWAT vans and cop cars waited in the shadows. Tina pulled the Mercedes into the alley and drove down to the end. She flashed her papers at the officer and he waved her on through. She parked up and she and Boris stepped out of the car.
‘Hey!’ Parker called, knocking on the window as they walked past him, ‘what about me?’ The backdoors were fashioned with one way locks.
Tina approached the detective in charge.
‘Daniels?’ she said, ‘Detective Peterson, this is my partner.’
‘Glad you could make it,’ Commander Daniels answered, ‘this is quiet the bust you hit on here.’
‘Thanks,’ Tina nodded, ‘Hopefully it all goes off without a hitch. So what’s the plan?’
‘The Swat teams will go in first,’ Daniels said, gesturing towards the two trucks, ‘squad A will go incognito around the outside and B team will take the front. After they’ve ensured everything’s safe and sound, we’ll move in and sequester the big boys.’
The Moonlight Monsters Detective Agency Volume One Page 9