Best Laid Plans(47)

Brad asked, “You want to come to my office and look at the tape?”

“I can’t. I have my boys this week and need to pick them up at my mom’s.”

“How are they?”

“Good, thanks. I miss them. Divorce sucks.”

“It’s why I never married.”

Brad opened his car door. Before he could leave, Ryan asked, “You asked Juan for Lucy. Why?”

“It wasn’t personal.”

“That doesn’t answer my question.”

“I don’t know what you want me to say.”

“What happened in Hidalgo?”

Brad couldn’t give Lucy up—not only would she get in trouble, but he would be suspended for lying in a report. She’d already told him that Juan suspected she’d gone down to Mexico to help rescue him from Sanchez and Trejo, but she hadn’t admitted it, and Juan hadn’t said a word. Sam Archer had no clue what had really happened at Trejo’s compound, and Brad had no desire to fill her in on the details. He would only get reprimanded, but Lucy could lose her job.

“All I can say, Ryan, is that if it weren’t for Lucy, I’d be dead. So would those boys. Whatever she did or didn’t do, her motives were pure. The last two months have been rough on her.”

“I know,” Ryan said. “I’m partly to blame, I was hard on her. But, Brad—it’s hard to trust your partner when she isn’t honest with you.”

“Believe me, after what happened in my own operation, I get it.” One of his own people, someone he trusted explicitly, had been working with the cartel and was party to the murder of a band of Marines who were transporting recovered weapons back to the States. Nicole Rollins was now in jail pending trial, though word was that she wanted to make a deal. If Brad had his way, there would be no deal: Nicole would be tried for treason and murder and executed.

There was really nothing left to say on the subject. Ryan would come around—Brad thought he already had, it was just his ego that was still wounded.

“Speaking of your former partner,” Ryan said. “She might know something about this attack. She was high up in the Trejo/Sanchez organization. She might talk to you.”

“I hate that woman,” Brad said. “There’s no guarantee that she knows anything and, if she does, that she’ll tell us. The DOJ is still playing games with her, and I wish they’d just locked her up. Instead, she’s sitting in the county jail.”

“She’s not high up on my list of beer buddies, either.” Ryan frowned and glanced back at the crime scene. “If there’s a new player in town taking out the rest of Trejo’s gang, they could go for her.”

“And that would be a bad thing?”

“Murder is always a bad thing. They killed a kid, Brad. Don’t let your hatred for Rollins cloud your judgment.”

Ryan was right. But Brad didn’t have to like it.





CHAPTER SIXTEEN



Lucy had worked several cases related to the sex trade, but she wasn’t prepared for Mona Hill.

Rather, she was partly prepared because of the files Tia had sent over. She knew, for example, that Mona’s childhood was sketchy. She’d been raised by a single mom in Houston who’d been in and out of prison for prostitution and drugs. Mona appeared to have raised herself or lived with relatives during her mother’s imprisonment, because there was no record of her going into foster care. In fact, there was no documentation on Mona until she was eighteen. Everything Tia wrote was conjecture she’d picked up over the years, though Tia noted that there was no juvenile record, sealed or otherwise.

When Mona was nineteen, she’d pled guilty to attempted murder and had spent eighteen months in a California prison. There was no explanation as to why the sentence was so short, and Lucy made a note to look into it. There might be something there that would give her insight into the woman.

Mona had been arrested multiple times since her release from prison: California, Nevada and Texas all had arrest records. But she’d never served more than a night in jail—all the cases had been dismissed or pled out with a fine. She’d starred in legal pornography for years before moving to San Antonio four years ago, where she took over part of the sex trade. According to Tia, at least a third of the “working girls” in San Antonio worked for Mona at least part of the time. A client called a special phone number, told her what he wanted, and she got it for him—charging a premium. The johns paid Mona for the “referral” and paid the girls directly, so no girl ever gave Mona money.

Tia had listed Mona’s known associates, and in her notes wrote that she suspected at least one judge had been compromised—but if Tia knew who, she hadn’t put the name in the file.

The question Lucy most wanted answered was why Mona had sent Elise to James Everett. There had to be a specific reason, over and above that his regular girl Bella was sick. If she had been sick.

“Barry,” Lucy said as they were driving to Mona Hill’s residence, “I think we should talk to Bella first.”

“Why?”

“Because this whole thing feels wrong. Bella gets sick and Elise is sent to Everett instead—after she either killed Harper Worthington or witnessed his murder.”

“You’re jumping to a conclusion.”