Bite Back Box Set 2

by Mark Henwick

  Reed had let me brief the team and assign the positions for the cars. One as an outrider, to shadow Bryant’s SUV from a block away. Another to follow, well back. That one we’d call our point man, and we’d swap that car around every mile or so. None of us would stay in his rearview mirror for long. The van, with Reed and me in it, would stay even further back, with one of the cars behind us checking our six.

  No police radio calls. No 10 codes. A handful of simple pre-agreed codes to say what we were doing.

  Big Bob, the detective I’d met at the station, was in the last car. It was his own high-mileage Mazda, and he had a short and nervous-looking colleague riding shotgun. They didn’t fill me with confidence. I hoped we didn’t have to use them.

  A text from Tarez: FBI taking over trafficking case. Agent Ingram and team on their way.

  What?

  Shit. No matter, I couldn’t leave Dante. If Tarez insisted and forced the issue, I’d end the operation, even if I had to snatch Dante out of Bryant’s car.

  I didn’t trust Reed enough, and it was just too dangerous for Dante. If Bryant was a fixer for Forsythe and Dante made just one slip, she’d end up dead. And if she was lucky, it’d be quick.

  She was relying on me.

  And yet, our plan was so full of holes, I still wanted to call it off right there when I saw a black Chevy Tahoe with mirrored windows turn in at the studios and go around the back.

  “We’re rolling,” Reed said.

  I didn’t call it off.

  We’d unplugged the headphones, and the feed from Dante’s wire was coming out of a couple of speakers.

  All we needed was to hear her say the word gnarly. We heard that and we would go in and stop the Chevy.

  “Where are the last two cars?” I asked Reed.

  “Held up a few minutes. Accident on the 110.” He looked at me. “We got it, Farrell. Bryant’s head’s gonna be in his pants.”

  You hope.

  We listened as Bryant pressed Dante against the wall in the private area the rear of the studio and groped her for a couple of minutes before he loaded her into the car.

  I still didn’t call it off.

  She’d made it sound as if she enjoyed it. My stomach twisted. Her reality.

  Reed studied the screen of his smartphone and said nothing.

  The Tahoe pulled out and we started our chase pattern, stretching out behind them. It was getting dark and the car on point was only one car behind the Tahoe.

  “Oh, real leather seats! I love the feel. And it’s so clean,” Dante’s voice came clearly from the speakers. “Is it brand new?”

  “Detailed every couple of days. Boss don’t like smelly cars.”

  Or cars with forensic evidence.

  Dante started talking, enthusing about the industry, the show and how well she could do, if she just caught a break with Forsythe. She played the airhead well, mixing in just enough flirting to keep Bryant interested.

  But after speaking coarsely when he’d been groping her, Bryant had gone quiet.

  I didn’t like that. I started fidgeting with the volume, trying to imagine what it was like inside the Tahoe.

  Maybe he had his head in his pants. Then again, maybe he was suspicious, and groping her was a good way for him to check if she was wired up.

  Traffic was slow and we were headed north into Hollywood. Slow and busy was both good and bad—that many cars meant we weren’t easy to see, but traffic lights and cars cutting in could make it difficult to keep eyes on the Tahoe.

  “If you were laying down security procedures for that driver,” Reed said, “what would they be?”

  He was still making an effort to keep me onside.

  “Pull over for a couple of minutes. Possibly on a side road, a quiet one. Then double back,” I said. “That’s level one—basic checks.”

  “Level two?”

  “Same maneuvers, but with a sweeper—a car following and watching from a ways back. Level three: everything so far and also swap cars in some turnoff where you can’t be seen.”

  “You figure he’d do that if he was taking someone to see Forsythe?”

  “If Forsythe wanted to be sure there wasn’t anyone watching, yeah.”

  “But Bryant is on his own time tonight, thinking he’s going out to get lucky with a girl. He’s not going to have anyone else involved.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Bob.” Reed spoke into the walkie-talkie. “You where?”

  “Three behind. Haven’t picked up any of our friends.”

  At least he was keeping to the script with the agreed codes. Three cars behind us and no sign that there was anyone else following the Tahoe or us. I wondered if Bob would be able to spot a sweeper.

  “Where are we going?” Dante said.

  “Sunset,” Bryant said.

  “The Strip?”

  “Nah. The old 66 down in Echo Park.”

  “Cool.”

  It was the cooler end of Sunset, away from the bright tourist area and the Hollywood bars.

  Also darker and fewer witnesses around.

  “So, you know the Boss, what does he like about a girl?” Dante said.

  “He likes actresses,” Bryant said. “Really good actresses that don’t need directions and give the best performance of their lives when he wants it. Girls like that do real good with him.”

  His voice was lost for a second to another sound. Maybe Dante moved and her belt rubbed against the seat. I frowned. A wire was never perfect, but we couldn’t afford to miss anything.

  “You think you’re that good?” Bryant was saying. “’Cause I ain’t gonna give him your name unless you are, and you gonna have to convince me.”

  “You tell me what I need, Willard, and I’ll give you what you need.”

  “He’ll have to turn east for Echo Park,” I said quietly. “When he turns, we do our first change.”

  Reed relayed instructions and two minutes later, the Tahoe turned onto Melrose Avenue.

  The point car followed instructions and kept straight on. Luckily enough, the outrider had been a block east and pulled out right behind the Tahoe.

  “Neat,” I said. “Get number one to make their own way to Sunset.”

  We didn’t have enough resources to replace the outrider yet.

  The van turned onto Melrose. Other than seeing it on a map, I didn’t know the street. It was quieter than the road we’d been on. Less traffic and moving faster. My pulse picked up.

  “Where are the last two cars? Can they cut across?”

  Reed spoke on his cell for a couple of minutes. “They’ll get onto Sunset down in Echo Park and wait. They’ll be there before we are.”

  That could work for us. People never expected their tail to be in front of them.

  “He’s stopping!” That was Randall, the new point man, the only one we had that was in sight of the Tahoe.

  “Keep going, Randall. Everyone else lay off.”

  We all came to a halt, except Randall. If he kept to the plan, he’d drive on, take a side turn somewhere well ahead of the Tahoe, and rejoin us as the last car in our tail.

  “This ain’t Sunset,” Dante said on the wire. The SUV’s engine was still running.

  “Gotta make a call.” Bryant began speaking on his cell.

  What he said didn’t seem suspicious. He was telling some guy he was going off the clock, out for a drink and he’d be back in tomorrow.

  “I don’t like it,” I muttered.

  “He could just have forgotten to do it before,” Reed said. “Head in his pants, remember?”

  Maybe. I opened the side panel of the van and peered into the darkness. We were too far away, of course.

  “Yelena?” I said into the walkie-talkie.

  “Eyes on,” she replied, and I felt better. Motorcycles could get places in a hurry.

  Bryant finished his call.

  “Done,” he said. “Cell off. You too.”

  “Uh…how come?”

  “First lesson.
When the boss tells you something like that, you don’t ask why. Get it? Me, I’m a nice guy, so I’ll tell you. We’re out for a good time and I don’t like getting interrupted.”

  “I’m sorry. No problem.”

  Dante switched her cell off.

  Without the boost from the cell, the signal from the wire was lousy.

  “Good,” Bryant said. “You want to get used to doing what you’re told with the boss.”

  “I love doing what I’m told, Willard. It’s my thing.” There was a pause, full of the quiet hiss of the signal. “Is that what Tamanny got wrong?”

  “Lots of things that bitch got wrong,” he said.

  Reed and I leaned forward as if that would make the signal clearer.

  “All tease and no please, that one. Got away with it because she was winning the competition. No way the boss will take that from you.”

  “Oh, he won’t have to,” she said, her voice sultry with promise.

  “Now listen to me. You ain’t gonna enjoy everything he do, and it make no fucking difference, right. He hurt you, you can scream. That’s okay, so long as when he wants it again, you give it up to him straight and ‘yes, please’, no argument, no back chat. No ‘but it hurts, Tanner’. He knows it hurts. Get it? You gonna handle that?”

  “Better than that. I’m gonna like it. I’m real bad like that.”

  Bryant grunted. “We’ll see.”

  I could hear the Tahoe pull out, and number three in our tail called “I’m on.”

  Bob overtook us to move into the next slot.

  “Really don’t like this,” I said. The whole thing was making a sour taste in my mouth.

  “It wasn’t a side road. He made a call. He hasn’t turned around.”

  “Doesn’t mean it wasn’t a check for a tail, and this road’s too quiet. He might be suspicious.”

  Reed shrugged. “If he’s looking, he’ll have seen different cars. Nothing for him to be suspicious about.” He tilted his head at one of the screens in the van, which was taking a feed from a camera pointing behind us. “There’s no sign anyone’s watching us.”

  But it had changed in the Tahoe. Bryant was sounding different. More aggressive and demanding. He was starting to work on Dante, trying to get in her head.

  “Oh yeah, that’s all good,” she was saying. “I guess she couldn’t handle it?”

  “That Tamanny bitch? No.”

  “So tell me, how did he punish her?” Her voice was breathy, excited. “I want to hear.”

  “Why you want to know that?”

  “I like it. That kinda thing gets to me, y’know. Turns me on. Gets me hot. Besides, I got to know what the stakes are,” Dante said. “He could mess it up for me so I can’t ever work in the industry.”

  “Huh. Lot worse than that, what he got lined up for that stuck-up bitch,” Bryant said.

  I immediately looked at Reed, but he shook his head. Not nearly enough.

  Melrose got busier. It went under an overpass for 101 and ended at a T junction with Hoover. Between there and the Echo Park section of Sunset was a tangle of residential streets.

  “He’ll go up Hoover and come into Sunset from Santa Monica,” Reed said.

  Bryant didn’t. The Tahoe crossed to head through the residential area.

  “Swap out,” I said.

  Number three turned up Hoover, and Bob moved into the first car spot thirty yards behind the Tahoe.

  Number one car was already waiting on Sunset, where we predicted the Tahoe would join. Randall was behind us. We had two new cars waiting in Echo Park.

  It should be enough.

  The Tahoe turned south onto Sunset, with Bob too close. Our van pulled out about a hundred yards behind him.

  This end of Sunset was quieter than the Strip. No huge billboards spilling light into the streets, less neon. Darker streets, smaller restaurants, bars and clubs. Hip. Edgy.

  “I used to know a cool bar around here,” Dante said. “It was called…hell, now I can’t remember. What’s the name of the place we’re heading to?”

  “Second lesson. Don’t ask the boss where he’s going. When you need to know, he’ll tell you.”

  “Paranoid or what?”

  “Paparazzi make his life hell.”

  “Well, there’s some of us wish the paparazzi would take notice.”

  He grunted. “Third lesson. Drop the smart attitude, real quick, or get out now.”

  Dante had slipped out of her airhead persona.

  “Sorry. Sorry,” Dante said. “I’m just playing around.”

  “You aren’t playing now.”

  “No. I’m not playing,” Dante said. “I’m out for a drink with a big, hot guy and I’m feeling all warm and wet.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Oh, yeah. But I think maybe you need a little relaxing.”

  Noise. Skin against denim.

  My stomach churned. Dante, no!

  “Oooh. Looks like you’re feeling pretty hot, too.”

  “Oh, man,” Bryant said, his voice low.

  “Y’know, all that rough talk, it really gets me going,” Dante said. “Sort of scared and turned on at the same time.”

  “You like it?”

  “Yeah, baby. I like the thought of that stuck-up doll finding out what it’s really like for the rest of us. I guess I can’t ask the boss, but you said you’d tell me stuff, didn’t you? You said you were there, didn’t you? So tell me—”

  “You keep—”

  There was a burst of frantic music.

  “I thought you turned it off,” Dante said.

  “Shut up,” Bryant said. “That’s the boss’ cell. That don’t get switched off.”

  Shit.

  “He’s turning around,” Bob said.

  “What’re you doing?” Dante’s voice had edged up. I could feel the fear rising in her.

  Call it off, Dante. You have the code word. Gnarly. Say it. Say it. Say it.

  “You wanted to party with the boss? This might be your lucky night. Gotta pull over and call. See what’s up.”

  The Tahoe cruised back past us, bleak and ominous.

  “Turn at the next block,” Reed told the driver. “Randall, turn if he can’t see you, and wait for him.”

  Dante: “But you haven’t told me–”

  Bryant: “I’ll make sure you’ll know everything you need when you meet him.”

  The signal was getting fainter. Then there was nothing but static on the wire.

  “Out of range. Turn now,” Reed said to the driver.

  I’d had enough. “Shit. Close it—”

  “I see him.” Randall’s voice.

  “Wait,” Reed said. “Just a minute or two.”

  We turned in the road. Car horns blared at us.

  “We can’t hear what’s going on,” I said. “This is useless.”

  “The bug keeps a record of the last fifteen minutes or so,” Reed said, “and we’ll be back in range soon.”

  The loudspeakers hissed.

  “He’s turning toward Angelino.” That was Yelena. Angelino Heights was the small area west of Sunset, bordered by the 101.

  A new voice came on the walkie-talkie. “We’re on Bellvue. Get someone on Glendale and we’ve got him in a bottle.”

  It was our two missing cars.

  “I got Glendale,” car number one said.

  “On Bellvue with the others,” Bob called out.

  “Echo Park Avenue now.” Randall.

  “Close in and take him now,” I said. “No way is Forsythe thinking of partying tonight. I don’t trust calls coming in that we can’t hear. It’s gotten too dangerous. Stop it now.”

  The wolf was thrashing inside me. Wrong. Wrong. Pack. Threat.

  “No. One minute.” Reed put his hand up. He cranked up the volume on the wire. Still nothing but noise.

  “Eyes on.” That was Randall. “He’s stopped on a side road near the parking lot.” He paused. “Maybe he’s getting some action. I’m driving around the b
lock.”

  “Where?” I shouted. “Randall, where’s the Tahoe?”

  “Parking lot off the Avenue,” he replied. “Half a block west of Sunset.”

  I tore the van door open.

  One of the buildings just ahead was covered in murals. That was the junction with Echo Park Avenue.

  The intersection was blocked by traffic.

  The traffic lights were against us and the loudspeakers were still hissing.

  We were in range. The wire had gone dead.

  “Yelena!” I yelled at the walkie-talkie. “End it now.”

  “On it.”

  I ignored the shouts from the van behind me as I sprinted across the road.

  Cars skidded and horns blared. I vaulted a sedan, landing on the sidewalk with my legs already pumping. People scattered in front of me and joined in the shouting.

  How long had the wire been out of range?

  Four minutes? Five? Too long.

  That call Bryant had taken was bad news. I could feel it in my gut.

  I’d said I would be there for her.

  I hadn’t been.

  I’d failed Tamanny, and now I’d failed Dante.

  The side alley. Nearly empty parking lot. The Tahoe halfway along. Lights off. No movement.

  The Kawasaki skidded in at the far end, ignoring the one-way sign, and came screaming down the road.

  We got there at the same time.

  Yelena dropped the motorcycle and launched herself at the mirrored window on the passenger side, her bulky boot crushing the glass.

  I smashed the driver’s window with the HK.

  All wasted effort.

  Willard Bryant wasn’t going anywhere. He was slumped forward over the wheel, shocked eyes staring at me and a small, neat hole with dark edges in his forehead. The sort of hole you’d get from a .22 at close quarters.

  The passenger seat was empty.

  I backed up.

  A belt on the ground.

  Dante’s belt. Sliced open, and the bug, with its recording of the last fifteen minutes, had been torn out.

  Chapter 60

  “Yelena! What cars did you pass coming in?”

  Only a couple of minutes. There’s a chance they passed us on the way out.