TWENTY-FOUR
“How’s it going?” There had just been a knock on Neil’s door, and the skinny kid had found both Moose and Sarah waiting when he opened it. Moose was holding an extra large pizza, so Neil grinned and opened the door wide.
“Well, our illustrious leader has already bought enough heroin to kill off every addict in the greater Chicago metro area,” Neil said. “The deal goes down in a couple of days, and the guy who set him up with it is working on hooking him up with other deals, too. I’d say he’s got his cover working pretty solidly. Is that a supreme?”
“Supreme with extra cheese, extra sausage and extra pepperoni,” Moose said. “Your little bugs are working okay, then?”
“Take a look for yourself,” Neil said, pointing at a monitor on his desk. Moose and Sarah leaned close, and saw Noah sitting at a table with a pretty young girl.
“Who’s the girl?” Sarah asked.
“Hooker,” Neil said. “He just arranged to take her back to his hotel for the night.” Neil watched Sarah out of the corner of his eye, and saw her jaw clench for just a second. “Do I detect a hint of jealousy?”
Sarah cut her eyes to him. “Maybe a little, but it’s not what you think. Don’t worry about it.”
“I’m not worried about it. Things are about to get a little dull; he and the girl are leaving, so all we get to do is watch the Eduardo’s Tavern reality show.” He rolled his eyes around Moose. “Unless you want to listen to the audio from his hotel room tonight?”
Moose looked at him. “Why don’t you let me take the tavern, and you can listen to the hotel room, okay?”
Neil shrugged. “Fine by me, it’s going to be boring either way.” He shoved a slice of pizza into his mouth and took a huge bite, then handed a large tablet computer to Moose. He tapped a few keys on his computer, then reached over and touched an icon on the tablet, and the video and audio feeds from the Tavern appeared on the tablet screen.
They watched Noah and the girl walk out the door of the Tavern, and sat there and ate as they waited for him to arrive back at his hotel room. The bartender and a couple of other men in the Tavern had a short conversation about Noah, and seemed to come to agreement that he was exactly what he claimed to be, nothing but a buyer for other people.
A sound suddenly came from the microphones in the hotel room, the sound of the door opening. The girl’s voice could be heard proclaiming that the room was fantastic, and then Noah said he was glad she liked it. The next sounds they heard were not as verbal, and slowly built from an occasional moan to screams of pure delight.
All three of them were sitting there staring at the speakers, their eyes wide. After a moment, they heard:
“Se?or John, you are the most amazing man.”
“Felicita, you’re pretty amazing yourself.”
A moment later, the moaning began once more. Neil looked over at Sarah, his eyes as big as they could get.
“Is he really that good?” Neil asked, and Sarah slapped his face. She stood up and turned to walk out of the room without a word.
Moose stared after her, then turned to look at Neil, who was rubbing his cheek. “If I were you, I think I’d take that as a yes. Looks like our wheel girl has it bad for the boss man. If she can’t get that under control, he’ll have to get rid of her.”
The action in the hotel room built up to another crescendo of happy screams, and the two men heard Noah suggest that he and the girl go down to the restaurant for dinner. Things got quiet a few minutes later, and then Moose took the tablet and its charger and went to his own room.
The next few days were more of the same. Each afternoon, Noah would head down to Eduardo’s and hang out there, occasionally making a deal. Once in a while, he would call Neil to arrange for one of the phony money transfers, such as when the heroin arrived in Chicago on schedule. The undercover DEA man confirmed that he was taking delivery of some top-quality product, and less than ten minutes later, Raul Delgado was able to confirm that a million dollars plus had been deposited to his Cayman Islands account.