2. Demin
DEMIN
Istand with my arms crossed over my chest staring out the open bay door of the loading dock at the warehouse, waiting for a shipment that was due to arrive seven hours ago and has yet to be heard of.
Mishka and Bart have given me a wide berth this afternoon, choosing to stay back in the offices while I stew, and I'm not happy at all.
Delays like this usually mean trouble, and with the product we have coming all the way from Spain—and the sheer volume of what we've ordered—I can't afford trouble.
I should've known better than to trust Solano's men.
I'm stark raving mad, absolutely furious that things are out of my control, and I won't stand for it.
"Where the hell is my fucking shipment!"
I turn away from the dock and stride back into the main warehouse area.
Mishka straightens up when he sees me coming closer, phone already in his hand.
Bart shifts his weight from one foot to the other, trying to avoid me, but there’s not enough space between us to cool the frustration that keeps rising.
"Call the contact again," I snap at Mishka. "Tell him if my crates aren't rolling through that gate in the next thirty minutes, I'll come down there myself and burn Solano's entire operation to the ground. I don't pay for delays like this."
Mishka nods and steps away to make the call, and I watch him go, noting the tension in his shoulders.
Bart moves toward the supply lockers on his own, gathering the scales and the testing kit in silence.
At least they are doing something useful instead of standing around watching me fume.
Never in my life have I had to wait on men to do what they promised.
I'm not the sort of person who sits around waiting, and everyone knows this.
If Solano thinks I'm going to kowtow to him, he's dead wrong.
This kind of delay is unacceptable. The product coming from Spain represents a major investment, and with the volume I ordered, any disruption ripples through my entire network.
Buyers expect consistency. Markets shift quickly if supply falters.
Solano's crew has been reliable enough in the past, but these repeated issues make me question whether that trust was misplaced.
I check my watch again as the minutes drag on, leaving me muttering under my breath as I pace. "Where the hell is my fucking shipment?" Grumbling doesn’t help but it releases some of the pressure in my chest.
The product coming out of Spain has been holding strong, which is why I committed to this large order. But if Solano can't deliver on time, that formula doesn't matter. I'll find another source, and make sure they understand the cost of failure, by teaching Solano a lesson he won't soon forget.
Mishka returns after a few minutes. "They say the truck hit a delay at the border, but it's moving again. Should be here soon." It takes balls to approach me when I'm this angry, but someone has to give the updates, I suppose.
"About fucking time," I grunt, fixing him with a hard glare. "I've been waiting all afternoon because of their incompetence. Get me something to drink."
He grunts and turns to go get me that drink as I notice Bart getting things ready for intake.
We've invested so much into this. If it goes sideways, Sebastian will never speak to me again.
But if we're successful, we'll own this whole city.
The hiccup of a long delay like this is hopefully just a tiny hurdle and after this, we'll be smooth sailing.
Finally, the low rumble of a heavy diesel engine vibrates up to meet me, and I step out onto the loading dock as the box truck turns into the drive.
Its headlights sweep across the pavement before it backs up carefully to the bay door.
Two of Solano's men climb down from the cab, faces tired from the long journey.
They look like they expect trouble, and they're right to think that.
"About fucking time," I snarl, glowering at them as they open the back door of the truck. Neither of them says much, and I'm not sure they even know English. Being Russian in a German city dealing with Spaniards means we speak a universal tongue, which they appear to ignore, anyway.
My men join them with a tow motor and a lot of noise, and I hover at the bay door watching them haul crate after crate of carefully packed product off the truck. Six in all, though it probably could’ve been put into five, but the masking agents probably took up space too.
"Is good?" one of Solano's men says, flicking his eyes nervously at my face and then over to Mishka's.
"Open it," I grumble as I glower at my men.
Bart pries the lid off to reveal large packages of coffee, ground and chilled by the refrigerator units in the box.
The grounds help mask the scent of meth, as do the colder temps, but it's the cleaning agent I smell—bleach or drain cleaner.
All efforts to keep this from being detected by border patrol dogs.
I reach in and pull out one of the sealed bundles, slicing it open with the knife from my pocket. I slice open the corner of the sealed package with my knife, careful not to tear it too wide, and watch as a small amount of the crystalline powder spills onto the glass plate.
The color looks right with that faint yellowish tint, so I rub a bit between my fingers, feeling the dry and slightly oily texture, then crush a few crystals to see how easily they break down.
Satisfied with the first checks, I drop a small sample into the testing vial and swirl it gently, waiting as the solution turns a deep blue before shifting toward purple, which confirms both the substance and the high purity.
"This batch is pure," I say, straightening and turning Bart and Mishka. "Unload the rest. Open every crate and run full inventory. I want confirmation on all of them before these two leave."
Now that my drugs are here and under my watchful eye, I'm ready to call this a day. Mishka and Bart will call in the rest and get this shit checked, unpacked, and ready to be portioned for distribution. All I have to do is go find that fucking drink I never got.
I'm halfway to the door when I hear a crate creak open and then the sound of Mishka’s voice.
"Boss." The call stops me in my tracks, carrying an edge that pulls me back immediately. I turn toward the second crate where they stand gawking and walk back over.
At first, the top layers of product look intact, but as my men lift more bundles out, the shortfall becomes painfully clear. Nearly half the expected volume is missing. This crate doesn't hold what it's supposed to, but what it does hold is shocking.
"What the…?" I ask, now reaching in with them to hastily pull more bricks of shrink-wrapped drugs.
Tucked deep in the corner under the remaining packages lies a woman, curled tightly in the cramped space, unmoving.
Her dark hair is clinging to her face in matted strands damp with condensation and her clothes are torn and stained, hanging loosely on her frame.
Thick swathes of bruises cover nearly every visible part of her skin, spreading across her arms and neck, along the side of her face and what I can see of her shoulders.
It looks like the result of repeated impacts, as if she had been thrown around inside the crate during the rough trip over roads and borders.
I have no clue who this woman is or why she's in here, but my guess is some sort of escape…
"Keep them back," I snarl, gesturing at Solano's men.
Mishka herds them farther away from the open crate where they can't see her, and I'm at a loss as to what the fuck I'm supposed to do with this.
A woman where my drugs are supposed to be? And where the fuck are my drugs?
She appears severely dehydrated, her lips cracked and dry, her complexion pale and waxy.
Her breathing comes in shallow, labored breaths that make her chest rise unevenly, and her eyelids flutter but don't open fully.
She's only half conscious, hovering on the edge of death if she doesn't get help soon.
"Escort Mr. Solano's guests back to their truck and tell them not to go anywhere yet, "I order, and Bart rushes off to help Mishka. I crouch, studying this woman. She's trying to say something, but her voice is hoarse, and she still hasn’t opened her eyes.
I shake her gently at first, then with more insistence. “Open your eyes,” I say. “Tell me who you are.”
She murmurs something incoherent, her head lolling to the side, but no clear words come out.
She's too far gone right now, weakened by the journey.
So I release her shoulder and stand up, clenching my hands into fists at my sides.
The missing drugs will cost me time and force adjustments across my network, but this woman's a larger complication, a puzzle dropped directly into my lap that I have to solve now.
When my men come back, I run a hand through my hair and glower at the back of the truck, now closed up as exhaust rises up from the tailpipe.
I don't think those idiots have a single clue that she was in there, and if she's trying to flee from them, I won't alert them.
But I don't know what to do with a stowaway. Turning, I look Mishka in the eye.
“Take her to the east safehouse,” I order.
“Lock her in the back room and post a guard outside the door. Call the doctor right away, and tell him to bring everything needed for severe dehydration and trauma, get fluids into her, and stabilize her condition. But make sure she remains secured until I arrive. No one speaks to her.”
They struggle to lift her from the crate as I walk over and hit the garage bay door button so we have some privacy. And when they have her loaded into the back seat of an SUV, I turn to Bart.
"Get the rest of these checks done. I'll call for more help and you'll have men here within the hour. We have to figure out what the fuck this is about." I'm not going to enjoy telling Sebastian about this, but it looks like I have no choice.
"Yeah, Boss… What about those mooks out there?" Bart nods at the door and I scowl.
"When the checks are done, pay them and cut 'em loose." Then I turn to watch Mishka driving off.
That woman survived a brutal journey hidden in that crate, and that alone suggests determination or desperation. I need to know why the hell she's in my shipment and exactly where the rest of my drugs disappeared to. Only she can provide those answers.
If she is some dirty trick being played on me, whoever is doing this is going to regret it. But something tells me she is just desperate enough to have done this herself. Which means she's going to want something from me.
She'll recover enough to speak. I'll make sure of it. And the answers she holds will determine her fate from here. Whether she becomes an asset or a liability depends on what she reveals when she finally opens her eyes.