Miami's Forgotten

by Matt Lincoln

  Musik nodded at me. “Understood.” That put a little trust between us on her end, it seemed. “Well, I think I’ll ask you about the other matter we’ve become interested in. You and LaShawn have been doing some… work on the overdoses hitting the city lately. I’m guessing that you don’t feel as if it's just a big city crime, homeless, junkie problem ticking up, do you?”

  I wasn’t sure if I should answer her or not, but I took a chance. “I don’t, but mostly because LaShawn brought it to my attention. If he hadn’t, I probably wouldn’t have given it another look.” That was the sad truth of the matter.

  “Yeah, normally, we wouldn’t either, but as you know, there’s been some witnesses to those…” She stopped herself and started on a different tack. “Some people have survived the overdoses, and they claim that they were injected against their wills.” She was walking a very thin and dangerous line by telling me any of this. I respected the risk she was taking by speaking about this with me.

  “I’ve heard that too. Sounds… problematic.” I still wasn’t sure which side she was going to land on with all this, and I wanted to be careful. “Not many people would come forward, I wouldn’t imagine, to admit that sort of thing.” I also didn’t want to show too many of the cards about the case that I’d been gathering. The more she’d share, the better chance I had to find the trio and figure out for certain who was behind all this without more people getting hurt.

  “You’re right about that.” Her eyes glanced down, and she shook her head solemnly. “In fact, we lost a witness yesterday.” She raised her eyes to meet mine. Her stare got very intense. “A street musician, a local kid around where LaShawn works. Found dead in his apartment. Another overdose, if you can believe it.”

  No, I couldn’t. I turned my head to avoid her eyes. That had to be Colby Tamez, the one LaShawn had tried to help and the one who started all this off for us. He had been the one survivor who had recognized the trio. Damn, I thought to myself.

  “When was this?”

  “Yesterday morning,” she informed me. “As a matter of fact, it was Mr. Caris that alerted us to the scene. He had the young man’s address in his phone, and we may assume that…” She didn’t finish, but I could see where this was going.

  Colby Tamez died of an ‘overdose’ in his own apartment not long after he’d been forcibly injected by the trio. And now, one of those in the trio knew exactly where he had lived. It didn’t take much to realize that they were cleaning up their survivors and those that could ID them if a criminal investigation were getting closer.

  That left LaShawn and me with two other possible witnesses that might know who the trio was or how to find them. I looked over at Detective Musik and calculated the risks in telling her what Xavier had found. “Do you have any other known associates of this Mr. Caris that you think might be involved, or is he working alone with the DEA, do you think?”

  She was having a difficult time with this case. I could see it in her eyes and in the way she talked about it. Whether that was emblematic or personal, I didn’t know at this point. Her answer didn’t clear any of that up, either.

  “You know that I can’t tell you that. Even if I wanted to.”

  “Well, I am kind of involved, Detective,” I pointed out. “That man assaulted my friend in broad daylight and would have attempted to kill me and possibly others if I hadn't stopped him. So, perhaps, I need to be in on the loop in case his friends come after me for, you know, reasons…” I grinned at her, and I was pleased to see that she returned it. She knew what I was getting at, thankfully.

  She placed the notebook from her lap onto the sofa and sighed. “Could I use your restroom, Mr. Header?” She was already standing and waiting for me to point it out.

  I knew that she was giving herself an out by leaving the room. “Down the hall, first door on the left.” I waited until I heard the door close behind her. I stood up and walked over to the sofa to look at the cover of the pad. It was a plain college-ruled notebook that you’d find in any department store anywhere. The cover was red with no other distinguishing features. She wouldn’t be in there long, but I assumed that this was the plan.

  Before I knew it, I heard the front door open of my condo and close. I glanced at it, but I knew what had happened. Detective Musik had done the one thing to help LaShawn and me out that her conscience would probably forgive her for. People forgot things all the time, right? Not a big deal. It was just a notebook.

  But just to be on the safe side, I went to the front door, opened it, and checked down the hall in both directions. Yeah, she had gone. So, I came back in and locked the door behind me. Then I grabbed a beer and headed for the sofa.

  I picked up the pad of paper and went through it. Inside the notebook were a lot of handwritten scribbles and even a few well-printed tidbits of information. The thing was, they weren’t all in the same style of penmanship. Some were in pencil, some in red ink, others in black. There was very little rhyme or reason as to how the intelligence was arranged. It was just ‘there.’

  At first glance, I had hoped that this would be about the drug overdoses and the people involved, murdered, or left as witnesses. But the more I flipped through the pages, the more I began to see other things that I recognized. In fact, I knew one of the scrawled notes to be a shipping line heading from Florida to South America. It wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to see it heading to Colombia.

  The more that I looked through it, the more I realized that this wasn’t about the murders at all. It was a collection of intel gathered about what and who was doing it. Not by name, but just hints and ideas about where the dumps of cargo were placed in the water and how to find them, for starters.

  There was a lot of stuff that had been written down and then drawn through, which I took to mean that the information didn’t pan out or was just plain wrong. Then my suspicions got the better of me, and I started to wonder why Detective Musik had left this here for me. I didn’t feel as if it were a setup. And if she’d wanted help, surely, she would have just asked.

  No, this felt like something else altogether. I kept going through the notebook which was almost half-filled. I looked to see if pages had been torn out, but I couldn’t find evidence of that. I found a list of names, and there was one in particular that stood out as it was lined over.

  ‘Nace’ was listed along with a lot of others, all in the same handwriting. His was the only one marked out, though. Then I saw the word ‘Caris,’ and that coincidence couldn’t be ignored. Lower down, I saw the word or name ‘Astreya.’ It stuck out, for some reason. Maybe I had heard it before, but I wasn’t sure.

  I was going to have to hand this over to Xavier to figure it all out. I glanced at my watch and saw that it was too late to bother him with it now. I’d take it by tomorrow and let him work it out. But that shipping line was still bothering me. If someone was bringing in goods or supplies, a nighttime drop-off just made more sense. And George had said that some drugs had non-US manufactured substances.

  I couldn’t wait until morning. I had to take Wraith out tonight, if for no other reason than to prove myself wrong about that shipping lane. If I was wrong, then it was just one more lead I could mark off. But if I was right… then I was closer to tying Judge Fu, the DEA, and the overdoses all together in a neat, tidy bow.

  16

  Jake

  The night was cool, and it felt like an entirely different world to be out on the open water again. I’d gotten Wraith out of Miami with little effort, which put me in a better mood than I had anticipated. I had thought once again about bringing Xavier along, but for this last time, I wanted to go it alone. Plus, this would give me the time I needed to think.

  For the first hour or so, my thoughts dwelled on that notebook that Detective Musik had left at my condo. I had brought it with me and had it open on the console so that I could continue to look it over and see if there was more that would prove useful to me.

  I was a little fixated on the shipping lane coordina
tes, as that’s where I was headed at present. I kept the coms open on a broad wavelength to catch any chatter that might pop up. I was also recording it, just to be on the safe side. I was becoming more grateful for that added feature Xavier had installed a while ago.

  I skimmed over the pages in the notebook, finding little bits here and there to lead me to other things. With so many handwritings and styles, it was easy to see that this collection of information had been a long time in the works. I would say probably no more than a year, but that was just a guess, as very little was actually dated.

  What was dated almost always had a question mark alongside it, which told me that nothing was final or set. They were guesstimates, and that was all. At least the authors were trying to pinpoint a timeline in their own way and methods. It did appear that all of them had been trying to give the other readers and authors all the intelligence they could when they recorded their findings. That had to amount to something.

  My main concern was, why did Musik leave this for me in the first place? I had texted her before I left Miami on Wraith, but she had ignored all forms of communication from me. I even tried to get a hold of LaShawn to give her a message for me, but that hadn’t led anywhere, either. I got the distinct impression that I was on my own.

  Of course, then I may have gotten a little too into my head and started to think about the notebook as stolen evidence from these overdoses cases or another one that might be connected. The latter seemed most likely. I still hadn’t found anything truly about the murders in the notebook. So, at my best guess, it was only vaguely connected somehow.

  I didn’t know enough about Detective Musik to have a clear idea of what kind of person she was, and certainly not with her stance as a police officer. Sure, she and LaShawn got on like a wildfire, and he was known to be a good judge of character. However, his mind was more occupied with romantic notions, rather than law and order and justice type of plots. His feeling couldn’t be an unbiased opinion at the moment, which was what I really needed. This was all going to be on my shoulders to figure out.

  So, if this wasn’t about the ODs, but they mentioned that Caris guy, then what other parts was he playing with the DEA? Only one thing came to mind. The schemes that Judge Fu was working with the Yabut. But how and why would Miami drug overdoses be involved now? Surely they weren’t still importing the designer drugs now that my team and I were holding the damning evidence over them? I tapped into everything that I could remember since this had started.

  Arik Fu’s kidnapping had been done by a double-crossing pirating goods ring, the Yabut. They were running the fix with the DEA in Miami to weed out and turn over other known drug dealers, runners, and shippers. Judge Fu was one of the Task Force Leaders using the Yabut and the DEA to her own ends, probably for future help in a campaign or career advancement.

  A Federal Judge who was tough on drugs and doing what she could to clean up the nation was a perfect and satisfying step for anyone with big ambitions. We’d already figured that her son, Arik’s, own personal history with Adderall addiction and failed Rehabilitation stints was enough to put a damper on her spotless image. The Yabut had planned to expose that and leverage him against her for more power, money, or something else altogether. But she’d let it be known that Arik was not a priority to her, and that had left them with that leverage.

  Even now, it left a bad taste in my mouth that Judge Fu seemed to care so little about her son and his health and safety. She’d left him to the kidnappers and never even alerted the proper authorities, trusting a mercenary like Kippy Ozoa to find him instead. And then she went on the word of a friend of hers to reach out to my team and me. She wanted everything done under the radar, and in her particular case, that just seemed off. I still thought that we had been about to be set up to take the fall for Arik’s kidnapping and probable murder or death. I wasn’t going to put anything past Judge Fu anymore.

  So, as I flipped for the umpteenth time through the blue-lined notebook, I wondered if this had less to do with who and what was mentioned and more glaringly about who and what wasn’t written about. The deceased DEA Agent Nace and the overdose culprit and now DEA ‘witness’ Caris were mentioned. There was also a shipping lane from Miami to South America, which was where I was cruising now. With such limited intel, the one and only thing I could see was the drug cartel Yabut. So, that was what I was going to go with until I found out more.

  I checked the sonar as I cruised ahead, but nothing was pinging there. I verified that the radio was working and picking up, and still, everything was just silent and lonely out there. There wasn’t much to go on, and there wouldn’t be for quite a distance.

  I was thinking of heading back as I couldn’t even see any lights or hints of vessels out on the black, clear water. I thought that I’d stay out for maybe another half an hour and then call it a night. I didn’t even know what I was looking for, but it gave me a momentary pleasure to at least try to do something.

  As I was ten minutes away from my self-imposed goal, I heard a small crackle on the radio. I turned it up and made the obligatory request for them to repeat their transmission. It might not have been anything, but I didn’t want to leave this unexplored anyhow.

  There was another broadcast, and I could hear the ‘…---…’ of Morse Code, signaling ‘SOS.’ I called out for a location as I fixed the GPS and radar onto the signal. Then within a few minutes, there was a location and heading given that we could follow. I changed course and smoothed the throttle just enough for a burst of speed.

  I found a boat not too far off, with dimming lights. I radioed them, asking for confirmation and a call sign. The voice on the other end was a man’s, and his tone was all but panicked. A few words that he did manage to get out had a South American blend of Spanish and English with a heavy accent.

  I called out again for the vessel’s sign, number, ID, anything to help me identify them. But they simply weren’t going to give that information up, which told me very plainly that while they needed and wanted help, they didn’t want to get registered. That usually meant piracy on some level—illegal goods, at the least.

  “Can you at least tell me what the trouble is? Are you stalled, taking on water, what?” As I got closer to the boat, I couldn’t see any visible damage, although it didn’t appear to be moving. It could have been something as plain as engine trouble or, it could have been a trap. It wasn’t unheard of for an SOS call to be a dupe in stealing goods, cargo, people, or entire ships. I was right to be careful.

  A reply came back that didn’t explain too much. It was the same guy from before, I assumed, with the same panic in his voice. “Everyone is enfermo. We’re all sick. Juan’s not breathing. Josef is coughing blood. Madre de Dios!” There was another crackle and then a thump. Maybe he’d dropped the com or just fallen down.

  I called back. “What are you carrying on board? What is your cargo?” That might give me a better idea of what this was. This sounded like some kind of chemical or toxin exposure to me. Something severe and dangerous. My mind raced through the possibilities, but without more info, I was guessing blind.

  A new voice came back on, a very young-sounding man, with a similar accent as the first. “Help! Ayuda! Anyone, please! Manny is shaking! He’s---" The guy coughed, then followed that with a string of profanities. “Please… help us…” The static took over, and no one else came on to respond to my repeated transmission and questions.

  I helmed Wraith around the boat to find the numbers, and I recorded them. I placed a call in to the Coast Guard, giving the bearing and latitude to this location. Then, I pulled up alongside and cast my ladder onto the boat. I donned some protective gear, including gloves, glasses, and a filtered breathing apparatus. I didn’t want to take any unnecessary chances.

  I boarded the boat and found the deck to be unlit except along the walkways. That was never exactly a great sign of friendly, legal behavior and purposes. I had my Ruger out and ready just in case I ran into something… unsafe. I c
hecked the gauges of the exposure monitor and got no reading. If there was something contaminated here, it was below the deck.

  Each step I took was careful and deliberate in keeping me quiet and unnoticed. I still hadn’t heard or seen another soul. By their admission, if it could be believed, there were at least four personnel on board. I had no way of telling how true that was until I saw each and every person for myself.

  I went for the bridge first, figuring that since this was where the communication port was, this was where I’d most likely find crew members. The door leading into it was open, and I saw two dark, unmoving forms on the floor. I stopped and waited, listening and scanning for movement of any kind. It was dark in here, too dark unless you were helming for stealth.

  I looked over at the gauges and radar, seeing nothing out of the ordinary. The throttle was stationary, and the boat was pretty much dead in the water. Whether that was from engine trouble remained to be seen, though. I glanced down at my monitors and saw that the air quality was starting to tick up, just a little. That gave me an idea, but first, I needed to check on these guys.

  Cautiously, I tapped the shoes of the one closest to me with my foot. There was no reaction from him. I grabbed my mini flashlight out of my jeans pocket and flicked it on, right at the guy’s face. He had a gruesome stare to his dull eyes, and there was a pool of blood collected at his mouth. That wasn’t all, as there were chunks of other stuff I didn’t want to identify right then.

  The second man had lost control of his faculties, too, it seemed. As I got closer, I could hear the very loud knocking of a cooling unit beside the captain’s chair. My air gauge monitor vibrated, a sign that the surrounding atmosphere was hazardous and that I needed to get away from it.