Thriller Thursday - Excerpt from the next Kelli Storm Novel - No title

Thursday August 29^th – 3:22 P.M. - Manhattan

Federal Plaza – FBI New York Field Office

Kelli felt her anger welling up, and yet she had no one to blame but herself, at least that’s how she felt. Even though she felt responsible for his death, she also knew that Greg was right, she couldn’t blame herself. The question is which of them ordered his death; Misha Glinka or Sasha Yemelin? Or were they both been involved?

Porter rapped on his desk and brought her back to the present. “Are you listening, Detective Storm? Look, I know it’s a lot to deal with, but we have to focus on the task at hand. We’re dealing with two of the deadliest drug cartels to date, and there is no room for mistakes. These sons of bitches play by their own rules, and will not hesitate to kill anyone who gets in their way, including law enforcement officers.”

Kelli bit her lip and took a deep breath. “I know exactly what we’re dealing with, Special Agent Porter. Hell, I had the Medellin Cartel after for the past two years, and they came at me with everything they had. They even had their Russian friends trying to kill me, and I’m still here. So, yes, I know what we’re dealing with and I know that they don’t fuck around, but neither do I.”

He looked at her, cocked his head to one side and nodded. “Good. Now, tell me what you know about this case you were working on.”

“Well, I know that before you pulled me into this, I had a few good leads I was working on. Now, it’s all in the hands of two detectives from my PDU,” she said and crossed her arms.

“No need to get defensive, we’re all on the same side. I just want to know if you have any information that will help the team. Martinez told us that his cousin, Miguel Garcia, not only ran the drugs up here, he was also involved in smuggling young girls back into Mexico and South America. If he can be believed, the main partner in the trafficking operation is a Russian diplomat working out of the Consulate here in New York City.”

“And did he give you the name of this Russian?”

“Not yet,” he said and let out a deep sigh.

“Don’t tell me, he’s holding out for some kind of special concession, right? What does he want? Time off for good behavior?”

“That I could probably get, but no, nothing that simple. Right now we have him at Hazleton, high security. He’s asking to be transferred to a medium security prison in Atlanta. I asked him why Atlanta and all he would say was that he wanted to be in the south before winter. The thing is, there is no way in hell any judge is going to sign off on a transfer order. He might as well be asking us to cut him loose and give him a ride back to Colombia.”

“So if he’s holding out on this, why give up the Mexican cartels? Or did you make a deal with him for that information?”

“As a matter of fact, we’re working on a deal right now. It seems Martinez has a cousin that got into some trouble back in Colombia, and now his mother and aunt are begging him to help. Since Colombia decriminalized cocaine, anyone caught with less than one gram gets a pass, but anything over that and it’s off to prison. So, Martinez wants us to use our influence with the Colombian government, see if we can either make the charges go away, or at least keep him out of prison. I’ve seen La Modelo prison, and that is not a place you want to go.”

“I’m sure, but are you serious? This man is a murderer, he’s responsible for I don’t know how many deaths, even if he didn’t hold the knife or pull the trigger. But what’s worse is that you actually believe him.”

“No I don’t, at least not one-hundred percent, which is why we’re going to check out every lead he’s given us before we work a deal for his cousin. I’ve been doing this for a long time, Detective Storm, and I’ll admit that I’ve made some deals that turned my stomach, but you do what you have to do to get the job done. And if that means making a deal with Martinez gets us the Mexican cartels, then that’s what we do.”

“Well, you do what you have to do, but my focus is on finding out who killed Irina Senkin and shutting down this sex trafficking ring. And as for Martinez, he can keep his information, and stay locked up in Hazleton. Irina found a book with names, dates and shipments, enough to put these people away for a long time, and that’s why they killed her. The only problem is, is that she hid the book right under their noses, in Glinka’s club.”

“Well, that does complicate things. But it was smart; they’d never think to look for it there. Do you know where she hid it?”

Kelli felt a grin creeping across her face and she nodded. “Some place a man would never think to look.”