The planning for the takedown had begun the moment she and Maddocks had gone out to pick up Norton-Wells. Fitz and Vedder were overseeing things from a command post.
She panned her night-vision scopes across the lot as a black town car drew slowly in. Three men alighted. The vehicle pulled out. The men, laughing and stumbling a little, made their way along the dock to the shining white ship. Others had come and gone earlier, via cab, limo, private cars. Those who left the marina were being stopped at roadblocks that had been set up along the exit roads.
Angie tracked her scopes across to theAmanda Rose. Behind the yacht, MVPD harbor unit boats were sliding into view—black shapes out at sea. Two high-speed boats hung back around the point, ready in the event theAmanda Rosecrew might try to flee in the smaller boats they’d seen aboard the yacht. A chopper waited on standby. Anticipation crackled into her veins as she caught the shapes of the ERT guys moving like black ninjas toward the vessel, assault weapons at the ready.
Medical and social services were on standby.
Gunshots cracked suddenly into the night. A shrill scream sliced the air. Men started yelling, the sounds carrying across the water.
“They’re swarming the decks,” she said to Maddocks, who watched with his own binoculars. Shadows moved fast, men running. A flash of light exploded the darkness, and thewhumpfof a small blast reached them. Another scream rent the air—female. More gunfire. Then things began to settle. She could hear the sharp bark of orders being given. Arguing. More men yelling. The sounds came in snatches on the night breeze.
Then came the all-clear signal. She and Maddocks surged to their feet and ran in a crouch down the embankment and along the dock toward the vessel. At the top of the gangway an ERT officer in full gear directed them toward the companionway stairs. The opulence inside the yacht was breathtaking—all burnished wood, fixtures of gleaming white and chrome, high-end art on the walls. Music was still being piped throughout. She could smell pepper spray.
Down one flight of stairs they found ERT guys cuffing crew members. Women wrapped in blankets were being brought up the stairs to be taken into a staging area on the upper deck. Several were crying. Men were being flushed out of the lower deck boudoirs, too, in various stages of undress. Some still wore grotesque, baroque-looking carnival-style masks to hide their identities—long, hooked noses, devil’s horns, a bull’s face.
As Angie and Maddocks reached a lower deck, ERT guys directed them afore, toward a cabin where “Madame Vee” and her bodyguard assistant were being held. An officer with an automatic weapon stood guard outside the door. He opened it for them, showing them into a cabin with a gleaming wood desk. Behind the desk another officer stood watch over a woman clearly into her sixties. She was seated with hands cuffed behind her back. Sitting beside her, hands also cuffed, was the transgender assistant whom Jayden Norton-Wells had described—a person who appeared as if from another dimension with silver-white hair, colorless eyes, and a strange ashen-hued complexion.
That colorless gaze met Angie’s but gave no hint of emotion or tension. The woman’s eyes, however, flashed in defiance, her bloodred lips tight with anger. Angie noted that beside her, a paper shredder had been stopped mid-shred.
“Give us a moment,” Maddocks said to the ERT guy, who nodded, exited, and shut the door. While the ERT guys had been tasked with handling theAmanda Rosetakedown, Angie and Maddocks had one goal—to get information on the carpenter. He was still out there, and the clock was ticking down fast toward his next kill if Grablowski was right.
“You can speak to my attorneys,” the woman snapped, raising her chin. “You have no right to do this. You’re disrupting a legitimate business—I run an exclusive gentlemen’s club that facilitates encounters between paid members. They come for the cuisine, entertainment, and what they do in the privacy of their cabins is between consenting adults.”
“I need an employee list,” Maddocks said.
The woman flattened her mouth, turned her face away. Her bodyguard remained expressionless—a cold and dangerous animal, thought Angie.
“What is the name of the carpenter who recently worked for you?” Maddocks said, going through her drawers, seeking to unsettle her. “What’s your legal name?”
“I repeat, you can speak to mylegalcounsel.”
He swung her swivel chair around violently, shocking her. And he brought his face close to hers. “Just the carpenter’s name. Withholding this employee’s information is going to cost you in the courts. Big-time. Believe me. Whatever your operation is here.”
Silence.
Frustration bit through Angie, and she had to tamp down a rush of mounting rage, a fierce urge to tear this female pimp apart limb from limb. Maddocks turned to Angie and jerked his head toward the door, indicating that they were done here—clock was ticking. Fast. He made for the exit. She followed him out.
“We’re wasting time in there,” he said, then turned to the man guarding the door. “Where’s the rest of the staff being taken?”
“Being rounded up and corralled in a holding area on the lower deck, sir.”
They ran down the stairs to the lowest deck. Outside, they found ERT guys leading crew members toward an area near the ship’s stern. A female cop summoned Angie and Maddocks over.
“I got someone here who’s willing to talk—one of the cleaning staff.” She pointed out a female who looked to be in her early twenties. Quickly, they drew the young woman aside.
“I didn’t know what was going on,” she said, breathless, eyes wide with fear. “I swear. I’m new. I—”
“What’s your name, hon?” Angie said, handing her a tissue from her pocket. Wind was cold off the sea on this side of the yacht, and it was picking up again as a new weather front mounted beyond the horizon.
The woman blew her nose, trembling like an aspen. “Katie Collins. I ... I’m new on the yacht,” she repeated.
“How new?”
“A month.”
“Not too new, huh, to understand what was going on. You cleaned up the rooms?”
She nodded.
