Clark bore down again.
“Seriously, man,” Flaco whined. “I never been to his house. I been places where he does his stuff, though, and it’s pretty damn sick.”
“Who would know where to find him?”
“On my mother,” Flaco said, “I got no idea.”
Clark looked at his watch. “There’s a Chinese guy been hanging around. What’s his name?”
“Eddie.”
“Another Chinese guy.”
Flaco began to hyperventilate. “Man, since the triad moved in, there’s like a hundred Chinese guys hanging around. I’m not tryin’ to lie to you, man. I swear it. I’m just not sure who you mean.”
“Coronet?”
“Okay, okay,” Flaco said. “I only heard him called that once, but I know who you’re talking about now. Sharp dresser. Likes his girls fresh and young. That dude’s weird. Acts like he’s James Bond or somethin’, but I heard he just sold Christmas cards. His name’s Chen. Vinnie Chen . . . or Vincent, I think. Hey! He would know where Matarife is.”
“That doesn’t help,” Clark said. “Describe Vincent Chen.”
“Dude, I can do you one better,” Flaco said. “I got his picture on my phone.”
Clark nodded and Ryan retrieved the cell from Flaco’s hip pocket. Fortunately, he’d been facedown when he wet his pants, sparing the phone and Ryan’s hand.
“Password?” Ryan said.
“Eleven-eleven,” Flaco said.
“Want me to do it?” Ryan said, thumb hovering over the touchscreen. “He could have a distress signal preprogrammed.”
Clark scoffed. “Does this look like a guy who plans that far ahead?”
“Right,” Ryan said, and punched in the number. He opened the photos and, after scrolling through some seriously gut-churning pictures of girls that would be enough to put Flaco away for a very long time, he found a photo of a nattily dressed Asian man. Rather than leave a virtual trail by sending the image anywhere, Jack used his phone to take a photo of the screen.
“How about his phone number?” Clark asked.
“It’s in my contacts,” Flaco said. “But he was here a day and a half ago. He dumps his phones every few days and gets a new one.”
“Every few days?”
“See what I mean?” the gangbanger said. “Weird shit for a Christmas card salesman.”
“Where is Chen now?” Clark prodded.
“No idea,” Flaco said.
“Who gets the girls for Cantu?”
Ryan shot a glance at Chavez. This was outside the scope of their mission. They had what they needed on Coronet.
Caruso’s voice came across the radio again.
“Want me to let everyone know we’re less than ten out?”
Callahan’s muffled voice followed. “They’re all behind us,” she said. “Pretty sure they know already.”
Chavez twirled his index finger in the air, reminding everyone that they needed to hurry.
Flaco nodded, unaware of the conversation going on in their earpieces.
“A guy named Parrot.”
Chavez raised both palms to the sky. “Seriously, boss. We need to haul ass.”
Clark nodded. “Okay.” He pressed down on Flaco’s neck with his boot one last time before stepping back. “Dump his body by the gate.”
“Wait, wait, wait,” Flaco pleaded. “You don’t have to kill me.”
“We never had this conversation,” Clark said.
Flaco’s head wagged so hard it looked like it might roll off his skinny neck. “Never, man. I swear it.”
Clark hooked a thumb toward the Dodge without another word.
Ryan and Chavez dumped the sobbing gangbanger alongside the road, bound hand and foot and gagged with a piece of tape so he couldn’t warn his buds about the approaching parade of vehicles coming down FM 644.
Ryan kept his lights off and his foot off the brake until they were well over a mile away. He smiled to himself when he heard Callahan’s voice gasp.
18
Special Agent Callahan put two Ellis County ambulances on call when she was two minutes out from Naldo Cantu’s farmhouse. The headlights of her Bureau-issued Expedition played on the grassy ditch as she came around a slight curve in the road. She nodded toward Caruso. “Jump on the radio and tell Ellis County where we are. I don’t want them to— Oh, shit!”
Callahan yanked the wheel hard left, narrowly missing a slender Hispanic man kneeling in the middle of the gravel road, just in front of the gate. His arms were fully sleeved with tattoos and his hands were taped behind his back. A pillowcase had been pulled over his head.
Sergeant Bourke and Special Agent John Olson were in the car behind her. Bourke had turned his lights off earlier on the approach, and narrowly avoided rear-ending the Expedition.
Callahan reached for the radio in Caruso’s hand, snatching it away.
“Listen up,” she said, at the same time she pressed the gas to drive around the hooded man.
Ellis County Sheriff’s Office came back. “Unit calling?”
“Damn it!” Callahan said. “Disregard, Ellis County.” She pressed the button on her radio, flipping it back to the encrypted frequency. Leading a task force made up of many different agencies made secure communication problematic. Instead of 10-codes or other unique signal language, she employed plain talk and relied on encryption.
“Listen up!” she said again when she was back on the secure channel. The Expedition bounced across the rutted field as she drove around the bound man. “Caution as you come to the gate! Hispanic male, tied and hooded. Olson, you and Winston peel off and scoop him up. You’re gonna have to stay back and babysit. The rest of you haul ass to the house with me. I’m sure they already hear us coming.” She tossed the mic to Caruso. “Now you can call Ellis County with our location.” She wheeled around to the far side of the house, out of the line of fire from the front door. “Leave it on the open channel this time, just in case we’re walking into a whirlwind of shit.”
Naldo Cantu and his cousin Reuben were so engrossed in Dancing with the Stars that they had not heard the approaching vehicles. Flaco, who blew a .14 on the PBT, had left the door unlocked when he’d gone for beer, so Jermaine Armstrong didn’t even get to use his ram.
Now Caruso stood in the yard, just outside the pool of light from the yellow porch bulb. A Rock River Arms LAR-15 with a collapsible stock hung from a single-point sling around his neck. Pistols were well and good, but he always felt better when he had a long gun in situations like this, so he’d borrowed one from the field office. He pressed a cell phone to his ear.
John Clark filled him in on the roadside interrogation of Flaco.
“Wish I could have been there, boss,” Caruso said. He refrained from using names, just in case any member of the task force had better-than-average hearing. “Things went off without a hitch here. Two in custody plus the one bagged at the gate.”
“The girls?” Clark asked.