6. Justice For All - Неизвестный

Rebecca pinched the bridge of her nose, trying unsuccessfully to back off the headache that was accelerating by the moment. “It’s not Immigration. It’s probably Justice, and it’s probably Avery Clark.

Immigration doesn’t have the pull to get in the middle of an operation like this. But Clark and the Justice Department do. God damn it. Every time we get close to inside information, he shuts us out.” She leaned her head back and closed her eyes. “Watts and I will track him down and see what we can squeeze out of him.”

As if tuned into her fatigue and frustration, Watts picked up the ball. “We know a lot more than we did a week ago. We know the Russians are bringing young girls in through the port in containers

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and we know where some of them were working. What we need is to connect the Zamoras to these girls, because if we can, that’s a federal crime and they’re going down for a long long time.”

“We need eyes and ears back in the clubs.” Rebecca straightened and looked at Mitchell. “Is your cover good?”

“Yes ma’am,” Mitchell said. “As far as anyone knows, including Irina, I was just at the wrong place at the wrong time. I’m pretty sure she saw me get cuffed.”

“Good. Then I want Mitch to reconnect with his drag king buddies and get back into the clubs. Jasmine too, for backup. There’ll be a lot of talk on the streets, and we’ll need our CIs working their sources hard.”

“Oh goodie,” Jason breathed in a husky whisper that was pure Jasmine.

“Yes ma’am,” Mitchell said stiffly. Sandy was one of Rebecca’s CIs. A friend of hers had been murdered just a few days before, when she’d gotten too close to some major players in the porn film business, and Mitchell wanted Sandy off the streets, but it wasn’t her call to make. If she pushed her, Sandy would get pissed and be less likely to tell Mitchell if she ran into trouble.

Jason leaned forward. “Somebody has to be doing fancy work with the computers at the port to reroute the containers with the girls in them and bury the shipping manifests. I don’t see anyone down there having the know-how for that.”

“Plus,” Sloan added, “someone injected a very smart Trojan horse into the City Hall system to hack into confidential files.”

“What are you saying?” Rebecca asked. “There’s a high-level hacker at work for the opposite side?”

“Undoubtedly,” Sloan said.

“Can you find them?”

Sloan grinned, her eyes darkening to indigo with the scent of the hunt. “Oh yeah. Now we’ve got two intrusion sites—at the port and City Hall. Even the best hacker leaves fingerprints.”

“Do it,” Rebecca said. “Watts, I need you to pave the way at the port for our people. And check in with the organized crime team and see if they’ve got any intel on Zamora’s activities that might help us.”

She took a deep breath. “Our target is the Zamoras. The feds will chase the Russians. If we happen to trip over them, all the better. But we need to clean up our own house first.”

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“The OC guys aren’t going to like us poking around on their turf,”

Watts pointed out mildly.

Rebecca shrugged. “The HPCU has cross-divisional jurisdiction.

We’ll be polite, but we’ll go where the trail leads.”

Watts chuckled again. The day just got better and better.

v

Michael turned the corner for home with a mental sigh of relief.

She’d gotten caught up in a project meeting that afternoon and hadn’t realized how very tired she was until it was close to six. Just the short drive across town seemed endless. Her eyeballs pounded as if she hadn’t slept in weeks, when all she seemed to do was sleep. As she slowed to pull into the garage, she noted a familiar figure leaning against a lamppost a few yards ahead. Sandy looked even younger than her eighteen years in the muted glow of the streetlight. She also looked like she must be cold in her very short skirt and her thin red faux-leather jacket. Hugging herself, Sandy strolled up as soon as Michael got out of the car.

“You can’t be waiting for a bus,” Michael said, “since none of them can get down these streets.”

Sandy smiled shyly, as if caught out doing something untoward.

“I might as well be waiting for some bus that will never come. Waiting for Dell when she’s in a cop meeting isn’t much different.”

“Ah.” Michael shifted her briefcase to her other shoulder. God, she ached all over. “Still at it, are they?”

“Either that or they’re up there sitting around drinking beer and watching television.”

Michael laughed. “I sincerely doubt it. You know they’d rather talk shop than anything else.” She touched Sandy’s shoulder. “Come on upstairs. I’ll make some tea.”

“Oh,” Sandy said quickly, “that’s okay. I’m good here.”

“I’d like the company, and this is perfect timing. I was going to call you tomorrow.” Michael knew that Sandy was sensitive about her history on the streets, despite being proud and self-sufficient and incredibly brave. Michael was fond of the young woman and admired her. The last thing she wanted to do was make her uncomfortable.

“There’s something I wanted to talk to you about.”

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Sandy looked concerned. “Is something wrong?”

“No,” Michael said, gently grasping Sandy’s hand. “Come upstairs. I’ll tell you.”

“Okay, sure.” Sandy fell into step with her, nervously smiling, her hand still in Michael’s.

v

Across the street and six floors up, Angelo DeVito stood at the darkened window, his video camera trained on the building he was supposed to be watching. He absently reached down and rearranged his crotch while he filmed the two blonde babes as they cozied up together.

The one he’d first taken for a hot little whore seemed to know the tall leggy one with the shoulder-length hair and movie star face. Man, he’d love to see them get it on for real. From what he understood about the targets, he just might get the chance. He flicked off the camera when the women disappeared inside hand in hand, and noted the time to mark the spot on the tape and the license number of the car. Then he settled in the chair in front of the window to wait.

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ChAPTER ThREE

Excuse me,” Sandy said to Michael when her phone rang out the melody to “I Kissed a Girl.” She fished it out of her jacket pocket and swiveled away from the breakfast bar where they’d been drinking tea and talking.

“Hi, babe,” Dell said. “I’m at Sloan’s. We’re just wrapping up, but I’ll be a little while yet. You anywhere nearby?”

“Like upstairs?”

“Oh hey, that’s good.” Dell didn’t sound all that glad.

“What’s up?”

“The lieutenant is here. She wants to talk to you.”

“In person? Now?”

“Yeah.”

“I’ll be down in a few.” Sandy disconnected and shrugged at Michael. “Sorry. Frye wants me.”

“Of course. I understand. Are you still…helping out?” Michael hesitated. “You don’t have to tell me, if you can’t.”

“I don’t think it’s a secret. I mean, Sloan probably tells you everything, right?”

Michael smiled, but said nothing.

“Dell tells me stuff. Not much. She’s really all about the rules when it comes to the cop stuff.” Sandy grinned. “She’s loosened up some since she’s been hanging out with Jasmine, though.”

“Sloan doesn’t like to talk about her work very much either,”

Michael said. “In fact, when she’s involved in a case, she pretty much forgets to eat, sleep, or do much of anything else except work.”

“That worries you, huh?”

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“Oh,” Michael said quickly. “I didn’t mean… She’s intense. I fell in love with her because of how focused she is, how driven. How…”

She blushed. “Passionate.”

“I get that part all right.” Sandy laughed. “Any girl with a beating heart gets that part about Sloan.”

“Apparently.” Michael laughed. “I had to get used to that pretty quickly. Fortunately I’m not really the jealous type.”

“I am.”

“I don’t think you have much to worry about from what I can see,”

Michael said softly.

“I didn’t know I was—jealous that way. Until her.” Sandy shrugged. “Dell is the first one who ever mattered, you know.”

Michael nodded. “I do know. Exactly.”

Sandy grinned. She had girlfriends, sort of. Girls she hung with on the street. Girls she looked out for and who looked out for her. But mostly they talked about what they needed to know to get by—which johns to avoid and which pimps were quick with their hands and which cops wanted favors. And the rare ones, like Frye, who didn’t. But she’d never talked to any of them about Dell. About being with her. About having someone of her own. “I should go. Frye gets cranky if you keep her waiting.”

“Does she now.” Michael chuckled. “She’s never been anything except completely chivalrous with me.”

They eyed one another for a few seconds, and then burst out laughing together. Michael draped her arm around Sandy’s shoulder and walked her toward the door.

“You’ll think about what I said?”

“I will. I should talk to Dell, you know?”

“Absolutely. Take all the time you need.”

“Thanks,” Sandy said, feeling so much more than gratitude but not quite knowing what to say.

“You don’t need to thank me,” Michael said gently. “We’re friends.”

“Yeah,” Sandy said with a sense of wonder as she stepped into the elevator. “We are.”

v

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“Hiya, Frye,” Sandy said as she plopped into a chair across the table from Rebecca in the conference room. On her way through the main room she’d seen Dell bent over a computer with Jason and Sloan, but Frye was alone. Frye never talked to her about street stuff in front of others, especially not Dell. “You look like crap.”

“I’ve heard that two times too many today.”

“You okay or just playing macho cop?” Sandy didn’t add that she’d been scared just about brainless when she’d heard that a cop had been shot in a raid, because Dell had been in on the bust, and she’d felt only a little less terrified when she’d learned it was Frye. Frye was special in a crazy kind of way she couldn’t explain. Frye was a hard-ass and pain in the ass, but she’d never lied to Sandy about what she wanted from her. Even back in the early days when Sandy was working the streets for real and Frye squeezed her for information, she never took advantage like some cops. Frye always paid and treated her like she mattered. She was the first person who ever had.

“I’m okay enough,” Rebecca said. “Everything quiet?”

“As far as I know.” Sandy picked at a chip on the red polish on her thumbnail. “I haven’t been out since things went down the other night. I wasn’t sure—” She glanced through the open door in Dell’s direction, but Dell was busy tapping away at a computer. Dell always got hinky when she was working for Frye. She liked that Dell worried about her, but she didn’t want her to worry too much. She liked that Dell got a little jealous. Okay, sometimes a lot jealous. She liked that feeling of being special and cared about. But she would never make her jealous on purpose. She’d played games to survive her whole life, and she would never do it with Dell.

Rebecca stood. “Let’s go for a walk.”

“Are you kidding me? You look like—”

“You said that already. Come on. We won’t go far.”

Sandy shook her head, but followed Frye to the elevator. Dell looked over once as they walked through the room, then quickly back to her keyboard. Sandy kept her distance while they rode down, aware of the cameras everywhere. But once outside on the street, she looped her arm through Frye’s without being invited.

When Frye gave her a raised eyebrow, she snapped, “You don’t look that steady. I don’t want you falling into the street and getting run

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over. I’ll never get any dinner, which is what I came here for to begin with.”

“Let’s go to the deli around the corner,” Rebecca said, moving her arm out of Sandy’s grasp to curl it around her shoulder. “Why the hell don’t you ever dress for the weather? You’re shivering.”

“I’m used to it.”

“That’s not what your body is saying.”

“I’m in charge of my body,” Sandy said flatly.

Rebecca said nothing. A few minutes later they slipped into a greasy spoon on the corner of Market and Fourth that smelled like fried onions, strong coffee, and tomato sauce. They claimed a booth at the back and a waitress asked them what they wanted, not bothering to offer them menus. Rebecca ordered a sandwich and coffee, then thought better of the coffee and switched to water. She still had a headache and maybe the caffeine wasn’t such a good idea.

“Just a Bud,” Sandy said.

The waitress cocked her head at Rebecca and Rebecca nodded.

Sandy was legal in all the ways that counted. She’d proved herself enough times to deserve a beer.

“So, what’s the deal,” Sandy asked.

“Things have changed,” Rebecca said. “We’ve put a crimp in the supply line by exposing the trafficking operation down at the port. I’m sure there’s plenty of those foreign girls still around, but my guess is whoever is running them is going to be very cautious for a little while.

That means a lot more action is going to come to your friends.”

Sandy sipped the beer the waitress brought her. “Don’t you mean me and my friends?”

“Not if you’re not hooking, which you aren’t. Right?”

“Jeez, don’t start sounding like Dell.”

Rebecca frowned. “Are you and Mitchell having problems about that?”

“No,” Sandy said quickly, afraid that she might get Dell in trouble somehow. “She’s just, you know…overprotective. Must be a cop thing.”

“Must be.” Rebecca waited until the waitress slapped a heavy white plate with a thick sandwich down on the table. She wasn’t really hungry, but she couldn’t remember the last time she ate. She knew she

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needed the food, so she forced herself to take a bite. “I want you to find me a replacement.”

“For Dell?” Sandy said, her heart rising in her throat. Man, Dell would lose her mind if Frye let her go.

“No,” Rebecca said in exasperation, trying not to shake her head and make the pounding any worse. “For you.”

“Why? I’ve got the contacts, I like the money, and besides—you know you can trust me.”

“Like I said, the situation is different now.”

Rebecca had thought long and hard about this while she’d been lying in a hospital bed. Any reliable confidential informant was invaluable, and Sandy was not only trustworthy, she was smart and street savvy. She was as much a member of the team as any of them.

But she was also the least trained and probably the least capable of taking care of herself. Rebecca had intentionally used her, put her at risk, more than once. It was necessary because she needed Sandy to get the job done, and the job was everything. The job had always been everything, more important than her lovers, more important than her life. But something had changed, and she wasn’t quite sure how or what.