The Traffickers boh-9

  The Traffickers

  ( Badge of Honor - 9 )

  W. E. B. Griffin

  W. E. B. Griffin

  The Traffickers

  There came a time when there were assignments that had to be done right, and they would seek Zeb out.

  These assignments included police shootings, civil-rights violations, and he tracked down fugitives all over the country. He was not your average cop. He was very, very professional.

  — Howard Lebofsky, Deputy Solicitor of Philadelphia

  I

  ONE

  7522 Battersby Street, Philadelphia Wednesday, September 9, 1:55 A.M.

  Tony Harris returned to his bed, silently cursing himself for not having hit the john before he’d crawled under the sheets two hours earlier. Harris-a thirty-eight-year-old homicide detective in the Philadelphia Police Department who was slight of build and starting to bald-then clicked off the lamp on his bedside table. As he put his head on his pillow and sighed, wondering when-or even if-he’d start to drift off back to sleep, a monstrous BOOM shook the house. It reverberated through the darkened room, knocking loose a picture frame from the wall, its glass breaking when it hit the floor.

  “Holy shit!” he said aloud, sitting bolt upright and clicking on the lamp.

  He looked toward the front window.

  What in hell was that?

  Did a damn gas leak just blow up the middle school?

  Austin Meehan Middle School was a half-block down the tree-lined residential street.

  Harris quickly got out of bed, crossed the room, and pulled back the curtain to look out the window. On either side of Battersby, the Northeast Philadelphia neighborhood had a series of nearly identical, neatly kept comfortable two-story brick duplexes with large lawns. The homes-some of which now with their lights flicking on-had stone facades on the front and garages in the rear, on a common alleyway. Because Harris’s garage served more as a storage unit than a car park, he left his city-issued Ford Crown Victoria sitting at the curb in front of his house.

  It took Harris no time to locate the direction of the source: In the sky some blocks to the east, he saw a bright glow that he recognized as that from an intense fire.

  Maybe a gas station on Frankford went up? he wondered as he automatically started picking up his clothes from the chair where he’d tossed them at midnight. He quickly pulled on his wrinkled pants and short-sleeved knit shirt, then slipped on socks and shoes. He watched as the glow from the fire seemed to pulse even brighter, as if the fire were being fed more fuel.

  “Jesus!” he said aloud.

  Harris double-checked that he had his wallet and badge and pistol, then ran down the stairs as fast as he dared and out the door.

  He drove the Crown Vic up Battersby, turning right onto Ryan Avenue, then followed it the seven blocks to Frankford Avenue, where Harris could clearly see that the intense glow was to the south. He was about to make the turn when he heard the wail of sirens-and then the huge horns blaring-of two fire department emergency medical vehicles. The red-and-white ambulances flew up on the intersection, braked heavily as they lay steadily on their horns, then accelerated through it.

  Harris checked for any other vehicles headed for the intersection. He saw that it was clear and turned to follow the ambulances.

  As he went south on Frankford, the sky became a brighter orange-red mingled with black and gray smoke. And then, down on the left side of the street, he saw the first of the flames. They were coming from the back of the Philly Inn, an aging two-story motel that had been built long before Anthony J. Harris had been born at Saint Joseph’s Hospital.

  He pulled into a parking lot to the north of the motel, to where he had a better view of all the activity. He also enjoyed more than a little of an olfactory assault from the awful smell filling the air and now entering the car via the dash vents.

  That’s the smell of burning wood, for sure, and plastics.

  But I’d bet that’s also a bit of human flesh… you can damn near taste it.

  Philadelphia Fire Department Engine 36, from the station just up Frankford, already was on the scene. It had hoses snaking everywhere and the firefighters were laying down an impressive amount of water. Other firemen were going door to door, methodically clearing the motel’s rooms and herding what people they found inside to a parking lot to the south. Doors that no one answered were busted open with twenty-eight-pound metal battering rams and the hammer-headed pry bars called Halligans.

  The pair of ambulances that had flown past Harris at the intersection were parked close by, their paramedics pulling out equipment-first-aid kits, backboards-with a well-practiced efficiency. A minute or so later, Engine 38 came roaring in from its station a mile away on Old State Road-followed by an articulated ladder fire truck, which Harris thought a bit of overkill for a lowly two-story structure.

  But, hell. Can’t blame them.

  Everyone loves a little adrenaline rush, especially these guys getting to play with all their toys.

  And this damn fire seems to offer plenty of excitement.

  It’s got my pulse beating. No way I could go back to sleep now.

  Harris noted that the Philadelphia Police Department was well represented, too. Cruisers practically surrounded the place. There was even a flatbed wrecker from the Tow Squad, which was being waved toward the back of the motel.

  Harris looked to where the wrecker was being routed and saw a half-dozen firefighters working feverishly at an SUV. It was on the backside of the motel, at a room with its door blown outward, where the flames appeared to be the hottest.

  And where the blast took place.

  The firemen were in the middle of a row of vehicles parked outside the motel rooms, and were inserting a heavy fire-resistant blanket in through the framework that once held the SUV’s front windshield.

  The wrecker raced up to the back bumper of the SUV, and a heavy-linked stainless-steel chain was quickly slung from the SUV’s bumper to a tow hook bolted on the front frame of the wrecker.

  The driver ground the gearshift into reverse and carefully took up the slack in the chain. At a firefighter’s rapid hand signals and shouts of “Go! Fuckin’ go, go, go!” the diesel engine then roared and the wrecker started tugging the SUV away from the fire.

  The wrecker didn’t slow until it had slid the SUV practically in front of Harris’s Crown Vic, leaving a trail of black tire marks across the parking lot.

  That’s one of those really fancy Mercedes-Benz SUVs.

  What the hell is it doing here?

  And how the hell is it connected to that explosion?

  There’s absolutely no question it has to be…

  One of the emergency medical vehicles then pulled alongside the passenger side of the SUV. Floodlights mounted on the side of the unit were switched on, brightly illuminating the SUV. Two firefighters almost instantly appeared, carrying a heavy metal device with hydraulically powered pincers that Harris recognized as the Jaws of Life. The rescue tool proceeded to cut the right side of the Mercedes to pieces as other rescuers worked feverishly from inside the left-side doors to stabilize whoever was unlucky enough to be in the vehicle.

  There suddenly was more shouting at the motel, and when Harris turned his attention to it he saw the impossible-a man on fire came staggering out of the motel room that had the blown-outward door.

  One fireman rushed to the man. As he tackled him to smother the fire, a fire hose was trained on the both of them, instantly flooding the flames. Then the fireman stood and seemingly effortlessly slung the man over his shoulder. He ran with him-slipping twice-to the second ambulance, where the paramedics waited, ready to go to work.

  Forty-five minutes later, twenty minutes after the motel f
ire had been brought under control if not put out, Harris watched the emergency medical personnel remove from the SUV someone they’d strapped to a rescue backboard. The victim looked to Harris to be a young woman. She had IV hoses dangling from her arm and wore an oxygen mask.

  Five minutes later, the doors of the ambulance slammed shut, and its siren wailed as the unit began to roll. As if on cue, the other ambulance did the same only a minute later.

  Harris scanned the motel and saw that the firemen were putting what Harris thought of as their toys back in their trucks. And he saw that the yellow and black POLICE LINE-DO NOT CROSS tape was being strung up, signifying the scene was being turned over to the police.

  Well, now that all the excitement’s over, Harris thought, reaching for the door handle, professional curiosity overwhelms me.

  TWO

  The Philly Inn 7004 Frankford Avenue, Philadelphia Wednesday, September 9, 1:15 A.M.

  Forty minutes earlier, Becca Benjamin, despite having to wait in her silver Mercedes-Benz G550 at the back of a lousy Northeast Philly motel, had just reminded herself that she could not believe how much her luck had changed.

  Becca-a trendy twenty-five-year-old brunette with olive skin who was five-foot-seven and just under 140 pounds, having recently started winning her battles to keep the bathroom scale from tipping 150-not only had reconnected with her prep school boyfriend two months earlier but they had found that they still enjoyed what first had brought them together: partying, mostly booze-fueled but with the occasional recreational drug.

  They had first dated nine years ago when in the Upper School at Episcopal Academy. She had been a voluptuous sixteen-year-old in IV Form (tenth grade) and J. Warren Olde, known as “Skipper,” then eighteen and in VI Form (senior year), had begun flirting with her in the back row of an International Politics class. He was taking it for the second time, having yet to meet even the lowest threshold of the academic standards for passing the required course.

  Skipper had a slender athletic build-he was a star player on the academy’s championship lacrosse team, a midfielder who seemed to float effortlessly from one end of the 110-yard field to the other-and stood five-ten. His sandy hair was cut to his collar, with long bangs that he regularly swept out of his eyes. He was genuinely gregarious, quick with a laugh. And Becca, herself outgoing, had been immediately taken by his attentions.

  Their relationship had lasted, though, only until the end of the school year. It had been a wild ride-literally-as an inebriated Skipper, driving Becca home after a graduation party, had misjudged a Dam View Road curve-actually wound up going down an estate’s driveway at a high rate of speed-and put his little Audi in Springton Reservoir. Becca wound up with a broken collarbone and a trip to the Riddle Memorial Hospital emergency room in Media.

  The Benjamins and Oldes-both families of significant means and, accordingly, connections with which they arranged to get the incident forgotten in the legal system, if not in their own tony community-were not amused. His parents declared Becca a wild child, albeit one in a woman’s body, while her parents deemed the older boy a bad influence, unfit for their impressionable sweet sixteen-year-old-and thus absolutely off-limits.

  Neither Becca nor Skipper was thrilled about the forced separation. But then, while Skipper’s angry old man was still dealing with the lawyers and having the sports car fished from the reservoir, Skipper’s mother had sent him off early to the small private university he’d been set to attend in Texas-her alma mater in her hometown of Dallas. And so neither teenager had been prepared to fight the inevitable. They’d agreed to stay in touch, but even that turned out to be short-lived. They simply lost contact.

  Then, two months ago, at a Fourth of July party on the Jersey shore thrown by a mutual friend from their prep school days, they’d run into each other. Becca had first noticed Skipper-who’d been standing beside the beer keg cooler on the beach-mostly because he wore, in addition to flowery Hawaiian-style surfer shorts and aviator-style sunglasses, a frayed straw cowboy hat and a white T-shirt emblazoned with a running red horse and block lettering that read S.M.U. MUSTANGS LACROSSE.

  They had found that their outsized personalities were still in sync-with their appetites somewhat matured-and they damned near immediately picked up where they’d left off years before.

  The party was back on.

  Now Becca sat in the front passenger seat of the boxy Mercedes SUV; she’d had Skipper drive because she’d been shaking too much from the drugs. She hated that downside, which included her being stressed, as she was now. But she told herself there was no question that the upside’s euphoria was worth it, not to mention the added benefit of a killed appetite that helped her finally lose-and keep off-those damned ten-plus pounds.

  Despite the night, she stared through dark bug-eyed sunglasses at the motel door to Room 52. Then she punched the map light switch in order to read her wristwatch. The white-platinum diamond-bezel Audemars Piguet had cost her parents more than most of the battered work trucks and cars parked near the Mercedes were worth, never mind the six-figure sticker of the SUV itself. Her arm twitched a little, but she could tell by the position of the watch’s hands-there were no numbers, just four dots of diamonds, twinkling in the map light, to represent the 3, 6, 9, and 12 on the face-that it now was just after one-fifteen.

  Her hands and feet were cold-another side effect from the drug-so she sat with her feet tucked under her thighs, her arms crossed, with her hands resting and warming in her armpits. She wore cream-colored linen shorts and a tan silk blouse that was cut low in the front, revealing her ample bosom, which now was rising and falling more rapidly than normal.

  He’s been in there fifteen minutes.

  He said it’d take only one: “In and out, baby.”

  What’s taking so long?

  Is he okay?

  Should I go in?

  Hell no, I shouldn’t go in-who knows who’s in there? — and I sure as hell don’t want to go in that fleabag room.

  But what if he’s not okay?

  What if- Her cellular phone, resting on her lap, simultaneously vibrated briefly and made a ping sound, announcing the receipt of a text message.

  “Damn!” she said, startled. It caused her to uncross her arms and kick out her feet.

  She quickly glanced at the phone’s screen, thinking the text might be from Skipper. She saw-barely, as her sleep-deprived eyes had trouble focusing on the backlit small print-that it was from her girlfriend Casey, who was asking WHERE R U??

  Becca threw the phone onto the leather-covered console between the front seats and sighed loudly.

  She looked back at the motel door, wondering if she should shoot Skipper a text message. Maybe something along the lines of WTF???

  Yeah, Skipper-What The Fuck?

  The only movement she saw was from the motel room curtain, which was pulled closed over the open window and gently swaying, as if being blown by a breeze.

  She crossed her arms and tucked her feet back under her and closed her eyes. After a while, she glanced at her watch again.

  One-thirty!

  That’s it. I’m going in there.

  She had just clicked off the map light and reached for and found the button that would release her seat belt when the door of Room 52 swung open. Out came Skipper Olde, holding a white handkerchief over his nose and mouth.

  Olde wore a baggy navy blue T-shirt, khaki shorts, and sandals, and his aviator sunglasses hung from the front of the collar of his T-shirt. At twenty-seven, he still had his athletic slender build and his sandy hair collar-length, but no bangs, as he was thinning noticeably on top.

  He pulled the motel door shut, then stuffed the handkerchief in his pants pocket. He glanced at the Mercedes, and Becca saw him flash his usual happy-go-lucky grin at her.

  He quickly walked to the driver’s door of the SUV and got in.

  She then hit the button that simultaneously locked all the doors.

  “What happened?” Becca said softl
y. “I was worried. I was just about to come after you.”

  “Sorry, baby. They were having a little trouble in there.” He reached into his T-shirt pocket and pulled out a white plastic bag, heat-sealed at each end, that was about the size of a single-serving sugar packet. “I should’ve brought this out to you first, then helped them.”

  She pulled the bug-eyed sunglasses from her face and slipped them up on the top of her head.

  Skipper Olde placed the white bag beside her cellular phone on the leather-covered console. She looked at it, then at Skipper, then nervously glanced out the darkened side windows, then the rear ones, to see if anyone was watching them.

  “Go on,” he said, smiling. “It’s yours.”

  She smiled back weakly, then leaned over in her seat and kissed him quickly on the cheek.

  “Thank you,” she said, picking up the packet, then biting off a corner and removing the cut stub of a plastic drinking straw from it. She looked at Skipper. “What about you?”

  He looked a little embarrassed, then nodded toward the motel room.

  “I had a bump when I first went in. And there’s more cooking. That’s what they were having trouble with.”

  He nodded at the pouch she held and said encouragingly, “Go on, baby. It’ll take your edge off.”

  She smiled slyly and said, “You don’t have to tell me twice.”

  Becca Benjamin-who at age fourteen had been the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania’s top Girl Scout cookie salesgirl, which she later listed under ACCOMPLISHMENTS on her University of Pennsylvania application to the Wharton School’s master of business administration program-straightened herself upright in her seat. With the effortlessness of one who’d had some practice, she cupped the white packet with her hand so that it could not be seen, then took the straw stub and slipped an end in the hole she’d bitten, then placed the other end halfway up her right nostril. She pinched her left nostril closed and snorted.