“What do you mean? What are you talking about?”
“Petra, there have been two different raids in the previous week. These operations were at locations you guys could never have discovered on your own. And I know that scumbag in detention with you doesn’t even know of the existence of those cartels,” I explained, waiting for my words to sink in before proceeding with the actual blow. “That makes me wonder how these guys’ businesses got to the authorities.”
“That’s…that’s above my pay grade. The ministers just laid out the information, and we had to strike. We don’t know who the informant is, either.”
“Call me when you do,” I told him, ending the call.
“If he doesn’t know, it must be higher-up than we thought,” Sergei mused, retrieving his phone from the table.
“Sergei. Just leave. I need to think.”
“Okay, boss.”
**********
I was walking along the hallway of my suite when I saw her.
Through the half-open library door, I could see her neck bent over some white paper sheet that almost covered the whole table. Not wanting to startle her, I stepped in quietly and approached the table. Her hair was in a loose bun, and the scent of her perfume was sweet and simple, pulling me in. From where I stood a few feet to her side, I could see that it wasn’t just paper.
It was a map.
Not just any map. It was a map of shipping routes, and she traced them with her fingertips.
I took another step closer to her chair so she could see me, asking, “What are you doing?”
Her head whipped to the side, and she looked up.
“Konstantin.”
I moved around her chair to the left, where the second chair was. As I settled in the chair beside her, she turned to me and calmly said, “Trying to understand the war you’ve dragged me into. If you want me to clear my name, I need to know what I’m accused of.”
Wow.
I didn’t say anything as she returned her attention to the map. I didn’t need to ask where she got the pencils, rulers, and other supplies from; Hans must have helped out. The girl knew how to wrap people around her fingers.
Her audacity stunned me.
Shifting closer, I placed my hands on the map, making her stop what she was tracing.
“The routes we use depend mainly on how heavy the shipment is,” I started to explain.
“Heavydoesn’t imply actual weight here, does it?” she inquired.
She’s smart.
“No, it doesn’t,” I answered, chuckling. “It’s about the cost and…well, I’d say magnitude of what we’re sending. A shipment of heroin won’t pass the route as a container of arms, regardless of the size.”
She nodded in understanding.
“This is the Baja route,” I explained, tracing one point to another on the map. “Mostly, it’s for drugs. Other mafias move almost anything through the route, but we don’t. The reason is that our customers and clients are quite segregated from each other. So, using the same route for arms clients and drug customers means setting them up to meet.”
“And they should not meet,” she pointed out.
“You got it,” I confirmed. “Sometimes, we use the California route as an annex,” I told her, tracing another line on the map. “If we have a reason to smell suspicion from the forces, or the client personally requests it.”
“If any client can request that their goods be moved through a particular route, they can pair with the government forces and sabotage or implicate you,” she said, shrugging.
“That would be possible if every client knew they could make such requests. Those who dictate routes are not ordinary clients.”
