Chapter Twenty #2
Corbin made him face him, and stared into his eyes. He knew that fear.
“We have to do what we have to do, EJ. Let’s get moving, and as we head there, we can talk this out. If you legit found the hidey-hole, we can be there before it’s too late—but we have to go now. Trust yourself, and trust me. Gene is going to put his faith in you.”
He slowly nodded.
That seemed to work.
“Will, I need you to stay here. We’ll get back to you. Make sure the mob people all stay here. Stall them, and tell them that you’re with us. Ask them to sit with you. It won’t be them. I saw all of his bodyguards. He didn’t lie. They were being set up,” he said, eliminating suspects.
Will nodded.
“On it,” he said. “You’ll find him. I know you will,” he added.
Ethan wished he had that much confidence in himself, but his brain was a scattered mess.
Then, when Will headed in, he focused on Corbin.
“I’m going to need you to drive. I have to call Greyson and see if he spoke to Gene,” he said. “Maybe he told him something that will tell us who this is.”
He didn’t want to touch Gene’s phone too much, so he planned on using his own. There might be fingerprints, and he didn’t have an evidence bag to protect it.
Plus, that blood could be from a fight.
Corbin held out his hand, and Ethan passed him the keys. Then, they started jogging toward the car.
Once in it, it came to life, and Corbin hauled ass.
“Which way?” he asked.
Ethan was struggling.
His brain was information dumping all they knew about this case in an effort to figure out what the hell they missed.
What he’d missed.
Because this was on him.
“Left,” he said. “Straight past the resort, on the highway, and toward the coast.”
Corbin did as he asked, and as he drove, Ethan made a call.
To Greyson.
“Hey,” Greyson said, answering the call. “I’m still processing and looking,” he admitted. “Tell Gene having you call won’t make it go any faster. The ME isn’t on duty, and I can’t bug him at home. The techs are moving as quickly as they can—or so they say.”
Ethan said nothing.
At first.
“Ethan?” Greyson asked.
That’s when it all came out.
“I went outside to check on Gene, and he was gone. I found his phone, and it’s damaged and has blood on it. The killer took him. We have a very small window.”
Oh.
Holy.
Shit.
“Okay,” Greyson said, regrouping from that little newsflash. “Tell me what you need.”
Ethan knew this was about him and Gene already finding the most important part of this. They didn’t know the who, but he believed they knew the where.
That might save him.
“We hit up that sugar cane processing plant on the water that Rodrigo owns. We’re heading there. Can you be our backup?”
Greyson was planning on it.
“I can call in help. Lucas is on duty, and I can grab him to go with me. Let me call him.”
Ethan stopped him.
“We don’t know who this is. All we know is they had to be able to get close to Gene. Even if they snuck up on him, he would have immediately fought. He knows them. I’d bet my gut that Gene saw them, and knows.”
Greyson would trust him.
Gene and Ethan were damn good agents.
“Okay, Ethan.”
The man made up his mind.
“It’s safest with us. I have Corbin. Meet us there. We’re going to have to run in. I don’t want whoever this is to know that we’re coming, or he might kill Gene,” he said, that feeling gripping him by the throat.
If he lost Gene…
He was done.
There was no way he’d be able to stay with the FBI. He’d never trust himself as an agent again.
“I’ve got you. I’m on my way out the door. I’ll meet you there. Text me the location,” he said. “And Ethan?”
He waited.
“We’ll get to him before he’s dead.”
Blackhawk hoped so.
Because if he was hurt…
He’d never forgive himself.
Never.
* * * Blackhawk & Cantrell * * *
The Sugar Cane
Processing Facility
Monday Night
Eight P.M.
Jesus.
Christ.
This dude was heavy, and dragging him in here to the place he did all of his interrogations was no easy task. He’d broken out in one hell of a sweat.
Now, he needed to wake him up, and make sure he didn’t know too much, or he was going to have to go after his partner, too.
Yeah, this was getting messy.
When he’d finally gotten him into the trunk of his car, he’d chloroformed him, just to be sure.
It was time to wake-up from his nap.
With the smelling salts, Gene bolted awake, his fight or flight kicking in. Only, he was already strapped down to the metal table where the sugar cane plants were pulverized to get out their sugars.
As he looked around, that’s when he saw him.
“What the fuck, Lucas?” Gene asked, putting the pieces together. “Are you out of your goddamn mind?”
His head hurt, and Gene needed to keep this man busy for as long as he could. Ethan would eventually realize that he was missing, and come for him.
They had the location on lock, but clearly missed that this man was involved.
But then again, it made sense.
They’d written everything on the whiteboard, and this man had been privy to it if he walked by the room, or talked to Greyson.
On top of that, he’d touched a dead body barehanded to put his DNA on him—just in case he’d fucked up.
Oh, he wasn’t nearly as incompetent as they believed.
Lucas was crazy like a fox.
Now, as it came to surviving, it was sick, but Gene knew he was going to have to prioritize torture over a quick death.
He needed to stay alive for his man.
For the only person he loved.
That meant enduring torture—which was going to suck seven ways to Sunday.
“Gene, buddy, normally, I’d have a costume on, and we’d play a game, but I’m sure you and Ethan already are on that track,” Lucas admitted.
He held up the plague doctor’s mask for him to see.
“Why did you guys have to investigate? All I wanted was this case dumped into my lap so I could cover. You could have just enjoyed your vacation, and said ‘fuck you’ to Gabe. He never would have known.”
Jesus.
It was time to stall.
Oh, and most importantly, he needed to protect Ethan. He would be next. This sick fuck would go after him after he ended his life.
There was no doubt what was to come would be to get information out of him to figure out how much they knew.
There was no way he’d risk Ethan.
NONE.
“We weren’t even close,” Gene said, bluffing.
He began making shit up to stall and save his lover.
“We thought it was the ME. If I had to make an arrest, it would have been Ben Crowley.”
Lucas paused, and Gene could see the curiosity in his eyes. Well, never let it be said that law officers weren’t curious.
Granted, curiosity this time just might kill the Gene.
“Really? Talk me through it,” Lucas said, leaning on the table.
Jesus.
This dude was batshit insane.
That he wanted to have a conversation before he tortured him?
Like they were buddies?
Well, when in Rome, stall.
Yeah, someone skirted by FBI testing because he wasn’t playing with a full deck.
For.
Sure.
Because he was making shit up, and trying to piece it together, he tried his best. Only, Gene’s head was groggy, and he wanted to throw up. Someone gave him a concussion, and some drugs.
No.
Doubt.
“We knew this wasn’t Esmeralda,” he said. “It was over the top. It was way too much Voodoo bullshit,” he said, slowly wiggling his wrists to see how much leeway he had so he could get free.
He was going to have to fight for his life if Ethan didn’t find him missing.
Quickly.
Lucas sighed.
“Okay, I may have gone overboard on that. I panicked. After I tortured Jaden, I had to cover it up, and I saw those markings on the wall, and knew his ex was into that kind of garbage. He’d fired her, and he hated her guts.
I figured that was a good enough reason.
You know how greedy assholes can be—present self-included.
Gene had to keep him talking.
“So, we started looking at how it could be someone who knew basic forensics. You left no trace. Let me guess, when you barehanded Samuel Padilla, it was to put your DNA on him, in case you fucked up and left some.”
He laughed.
And laughed.
And laughed.
Only, for Gene, this wasn’t the least bit funny.
“Goddamn it. You’re smart,” he said. “Yeah, I did just that. I wanted to drop him in the water, but he was a fat ass, and I couldn’t get him there in a timely manner. So, I had to let the chips fall where they would.”
Yeah, he bet.
“We thought it was Ben because I needed trace done, and it seemed like he was blocking us. Did you take Jarod from his house?”
He nodded.
“Yeah, I did. He was at home, and I got him before he could go inside. The cop I took outside in his backyard. He had some people over, and when they left, I took him.”
Gene knew they’d only been a day in. Given another day, he would have worked through a lot of what Lucas was saying.
“I didn’t have enough time to figure this out.”
He sighed.
“And your partner?” he asked.
Gene played that off.
“He’s just a profiler. He doesn’t solve shit. That’s my job. He’s screwed without a partner who solves. You know that profilers don’t do the heavy lifting.”
Gene had to hope the man had little experience with the FBI offices outside of this one because Ethan was a force to reckon with in his own right.
Profilers also solved.
They did double duty.
The man went over to a hole in the wall, and reached in. The whole time, Gene was watching him. Someone had stashed his tools of the trade inside it.
“Do you want the whole effect?” he asked.
“Or do you want this fast? I have nothing against you, so torturing you sickens me a little bit. Like I said, Gene, this isn’t personal.
I really wish you would have stayed out of it.
Jarod couldn’t either. I tried to talk him out of investigating, and even tried to distract him by hanging out. The man wouldn’t give up.”
He wanted anything but fast.
“I’d like to know why you’re doing this,” he said. “Did you steal his laptop?” he asked.
Lucas pulled the bag out, and began dumping it out on a counter not far away.
And there was the laptop.