Chapter 4

Remy’s back thumped against the interior wall of the operations van as the vehicle made a right turn off the main street, then bounced a little as it crossed some train tracks. He closed his eyes and visualized the map that had been taped to the whiteboard during the tactical mission briefing. Crossing those tracks meant they’d just turned off Chartres and were only a couple of blocks from the river. In a few minutes, they’d reach the docks, the cargo ship, and the warehouse owned by a man named Aaron Lee.

Remy had already been familiar with the name before sitting through the briefing that Drew and the lead detective from the narcotics squad, Lorenzo Claiborne, had conducted earlier. Remy had run across Lee’s name more than a few times when he’d worked in the sheriff’s office years ago. The man had been a long-standing criminal fixture in the city, a heavy hitter in nearly every illegal activity going on along the Mississippi River. Drugs, prostitution, gambling, fencing stolen property, protection rackets—the man was into all of it. Remy thought for sure someone at the local, state, or federal level would have been able to pin something on the man a long time ago, but clearly Aaron Lee was too good a criminal for that.

If the informant Detective Claiborne and his narcotics crew had inside Lee’s operation was right, all that was about to change. Because they were about to serve a warrant on one of Lee’s ships just in from Mexico, which was supposedly carrying over three hundred pounds of high-quality crystal meth. If they found that stash of drugs, Aaron Lee was finally heading to prison.

Serving search warrants on drug operations was always a risky job, which was why SWAT was so frequently asked to go in the door first. Going up against a man who’d been running his drug operation for decades made it even worse. With a shipment of “ice” having a street value of close to five million dollars, Lee was bound to have dozens of heavily armed men covering the ship and the warehouse. The chances of this operation turning into a shoot-out were extremely high. But with the memory of that young girl on the ambulance gurney from last night still fresh in his mind, Remy knew there wasn’t any other way to do this. They couldn’t let a shipment this big make it onto the streets of New Orleans, or the girl he and Triana had seen would be just one of many people ending up in the hospitals—and the morgue.

Remy watched as his pack mates and the NOPD SWAT officers checked their gear and weapons again, then went over the plan one last time. As they murmured softly to each other, his heart began to beat faster. Around him, everyone else’s did too. But while Remy’s and his pack mates’ did so out of excitement, that wasn’t the case with the cops on the NOPD SWAT team.

The officers he and his pack mates had spent the morning training with knew they were going up against people who had no qualms about shooting cops. To be blunt about it, the men and women on the NOPD SWAT team had no way of knowing if they were even going to be alive an hour from now. Their adrenaline was pumping because they were nervous, even a little scared. Remy didn’t hold that against them. They were only human.

That limitation didn’t apply to Remy and the other members of his pack. Getting shot wasn’t that big of a deal for them. Werewolves could survive just about any kind of wound imaginable, as long as it wasn’t to the head or the heart. Getting shot hurt, sure. But knowing you weren’t going to die from it tended to give the Dallas SWAT team a completely different outlook on danger—it probably wasn’t an outlook a mental health professional would approve of, but it was definitely unique.

Remy and his pack mates were amped up because this was the shit alpha werewolves lived for.

He knew he’d never be able to explain the concept to a normal person, but feeling that surge of adrenaline when his werewolf senses went on hyperalert, experiencing the tension that rippled through his body as his inner wolf attempted to come out to protect itself… There was no better feeling in the world. For an alpha werewolf like him and the Pack, it was the feeling of being alive.

“We’re approaching the west gate. Thirty seconds out,” Detective Claiborne’s voice came through over the radio in Remy’s ear. “Drew, you ready on the east side?”

“Roger that,” Drew replied. “Gate personnel in position. The operation is a go. Move in.”

“Weapons hot,” Brooks murmured.

As one, the charging handles on eight M4 carbines were yanked back and released, loading the weapons with a familiar and soothing clatter. At the same time, Remy felt the operations vehicle accelerate. He pulled down his ski mask along with everyone else.

Lee’s warehouse complex had a tall fence around the entire property, with two gates, one to the east and the other to the west. Both of them were normally secured with locked chains. Now that Drew had given the word, two other members of the team dressed in plain clothes would be heading toward the gates with small explosive charges ready to blow the locks. The timing would have to be perfect, though—too early and they’d alert the people on the ship they were coming, too late and the operations vans would smash into the gates.

The driver of the operations vehicle Remy was in backed off the gas a little. No doubt he was worried the gate wouldn’t be open when they got there. But a moment later, the driver floored it, and they were racing through the gate so fast Remy bounced off the seat as they crossed over the entrance bump.

Remy tensed, ready to move the moment the operations vehicle came to a stop. It was only about a hundred feet across the west gate parking lot. Any second now, the driver would swerve to the side and they’d exit out the back of the van. Then, he and the other members of the Dallas SWAT team, along with the NOPD officers, would head for the cargo ship moored at the dock. While Remy and his pack mates began sweeping the ship, NOPD SWAT would head to the ship’s bridge to make sure no one tried to start the engines.

While all this was happening, Drew’s team would move into the warehouse from the east and gain control of the structure. Lorenzo and his men from the narcotics squad would hang back until the whole area was initially secured; then, they’d come in with dogs and personnel to do the detailed search for the drugs.

Remy was still visualizing exactly how much ground he and the others would have to cover to get to the ship when the truck slid sideways and Brooks shoved the doors open. Then he stopped thinking and started moving, jumping out of the truck and running for the southwest corner of the building and the ship docked just beyond it. He told himself to hold back a bit, so he wouldn’t blow past the NOPD SWAT officers, but that was damn hard to do when every instinct he had screamed at him to go as hard as he could, to attack ferociously before Lee’s people had a chance to react.

Off to Remy’s left, the warehouse was a giant metal structure with lots of rust and even more dents. Outside of it, pallets of steel oil pipes and heavy-duty equipment for drilling platforms out in the Gulf were scattered haphazardly along their path. It was almost as if someone had gone out of their way to convince people this was a legitimate warehousing operation.

Just ahead of him, Remy could make out the wide, slow-moving expanse of the Mississippi lined almost entirely with docks along this part of the river. He reached out with his senses, straining to pick up any sight, sound, or smell that would indicate Lee’s people were about to start shooting at them. To be truthful, he’d expected to run into resistance by this point. That they hadn’t didn’t make him feel any better. In fact, it worried the hell out of him. You could never trust criminals who didn’t play their proper roles.

As he raced around the building, Remy got his first real look at the coastal merchant vessel tied up at the pier. It wasn’t as huge as some of the container ships that plied the waters of the Mississippi, but it was still large enough to hide a football field in, not to mention a buttload of armed thugs.

Still not running into a single person—armed or otherwise—he and the others reached the metal gangway attached to the side of the ship and raced aboard. Remy’s gut told him something was off here, but they had no choice except to keep going.

The four NOPD SWAT officers peeled off and headed toward the rear of the ship and the elevated bridge positioned there, while Remy and his pack mates split up into pairs and headed down into the cargo hold. Even though they moved fast, they covered each other the whole time. While they weren’t worried about getting shot, it was a standing wager in the Pack that the first wolf who got hit would have to buy the beer for the next team cookout. The pain of getting shot might not be a big deal, but the pain of buying beer? Now that was excruciating.

Remy ducked through a rounded door, then moved down a flight of stairs, Max on his heels. Somewhere off to the right, he heard Brooks and Zane moving along an adjacent set of stairs. As they descended, he let his eyes shift to see in the rapidly darkening depth of the ship. One level down, and it was already getting dark as midnight.

Coastal vessels like this one were true multipurpose workhorses, with some parts of the hold set aside for neat pallets of anything from computers to clothing to food, other areas designed for loose storage of grains or coal, and still other spots where tractor-trailer-sized containers could be placed and locked down. Down in the hold, a regular human could quickly get turned around in the dark, bewildering maze of partitioned spaces and the confusing corridors created by the cargo itself.

Remy wasn’t worried about that for himself or his guys, no matter how dark it was. Their werewolf senses made up for their lack of experience in places like this. His biggest concern was that they’d get into a running gunfight in the middle of a ship full of who knew what kind of hazardous cargo. Having the ship burn down to the waterline because some idiot accidently started a fire in a hold full of coal wasn’t what they were looking to do today.

But as they moved farther down the stairs and into the first section of loose cargo, it quickly became apparent there wasn’t going to be a gunfight, running or otherwise.

“Guys, I’m not picking up any active scents down here,” Brooks whispered. “No one has been in this part of the ship for at least a half hour or so. That doesn’t make a damn bit of sense.”

Remy cursed silently. Something was definitely off with this raid. It was like there was no one home, which was crazy since the ship was obviously still fully loaded. There should have been tons of people down there, prepping the stuff for off-loading. Not to mention the fact that there should have been some armed guards protecting the drugs that were supposed to be here.

He and his pack mates weren’t the only ones thinking there was something wrong. The four NOPD officers who had split off and headed for the bridge came on the radio with a status report, saying the bridge was secure and that even though the captain and several of his men had been there, they hadn’t resisted.

“Same in the warehouse.” Drew’s voice was terse in Remy’s earpiece. “There were two guards on duty, but they were just sitting at a table playing cards when we came in. I swear, it was like they knew we were coming.”

A moment later, Lorenzo came on and announced he was bringing the drug dogs in, but Remy already had a sinking feeling it was going to be a waste of time. Either the drugs had never been here, or somehow Aaron Lee’s people had known the police were coming and had gotten the drugs out before they’d even arrived.

“Guys, over here,” Brooks said.

Remy looked up to see Brooks standing near an open door in the darkness on the far side of the cargo hold. No doubt it led to a storage room, but from the look on Brooks’s face, it wasn’t pallets of potato chips that had attracted his attention.

As he got closer, Remy picked up the slight chlorine-like chemical smell coming from the room. This was where the drugs had been hidden.

Remy stepped past Brooks into the room and followed his nose over to the far wall. Eyes narrowing, he looked closer and realized one section of it was a removable panel four feet high and three feet wide. He ran his hands along the edges until he found the cleverly hidden grips. Grabbing hold of them, he moved the section of wall away.

The chlorine-like odor wafted out, stinging his nose and making his eyes water. Meth was a simple chemical formula, so it could be difficult to pick up sometimes. In theory, the smell could belong to any of a hundred different industrial compounds. But a person didn’t go to all the work of creating a hidden storage compartment on a ship to conceal pool cleaner. Combine a chlorine-like odor with a secret contraband space and you get a meth shipment.

While the compartment was big enough to hold three or four large duffle bags, it was empty now.

“They knew we were coming,” Zane said from behind him. “Bloody bastards moved the crap right before we got here.”

“Put the wall back,” Brooks said. “We’ll let the dogs find the hidey-hole.”

Remy replaced the section of wall with a muttered curse. He’d hoped like hell they’d be able to take down Aaron Lee and his operation. In some stupid way, Remy had convinced himself that sending Lee to prison today would set things right with the poor young girl who’d overdosed the night before. Unless they had better luck in the warehouse, they were going to have to wait a little longer to take down the scumbag.

* * *

Remy and his pack mates spent over two hours down in the cargo hold helping Lorenzo, his narcotics team, and the drug dogs with their search. As expected, the K-9 team alerted on the back wall of the equipment room, finding the empty hidey-hole. Lorenzo was just as disappointed as Remy and his pack mates had been, especially when a thorough search of the rest of the ship turned up absolutely nothing. The warehouse had come up clean so far too.

“I don’t know how, but that son of a bitch Aaron Lee knew we were coming,” Lorenzo said as they headed out of the ship to meet up with Drew. Stocky, with close-cropped black hair, the Hispanic police officer looked like he was ready to blow a gasket. “The asshole saw this coming from a mile away.”

Lorenzo was probably right, considering that when they stepped off the ship, they had found a large black Cadillac parked in front of it with Lee and a couple of his goons leaning casually against the fenders.

From what Remy remembered, Aaron Lee had grown up working the docks of the Mississippi. Even though he must be approaching his late fifties and there was some gray in his otherwise dark hair, the man was still built like an ox. He had the bearing of an extremely confident man and the aura of a criminal who’d thumbed his nose at the police in New Orleans longer than most of the cops on this scene had been alive.

Seeing the arrogant glare Lee threw their way as they approached him, not to mention his slow and relaxed heartbeat, Remy could understand how the man had maintained his grip on the city’s criminal enterprises for so long. It was obvious the guy had absolutely no fear of the law. Hell, it wouldn’t have come as a shock if they’d discovered the man was a complete psycho who didn’t even know how to feel fear.

“Ah, Detective Claiborne,” Lee said, giving Lorenzo an insincere smile that was somehow able to convey both amusement and violence. “I should have guessed it was you violating my civil liberties.”

Lorenzo’s eyes narrowed. “No one is violating your civil liberties, Mr. Lee. We have a search warrant signed by a judge.”

“I saw.” Lee’s lip curled. “One of your fellow jackbooted thugs waved that little piece of paper in my face. Signed by Judge Thibodeau, wasn’t it? Isn’t he running for reelection soon? Seems like a strange campaign plan, sending police to harass a potential voter like myself.”

Lorenzo crossed his arms over his chest. “We’re not here to harass you. We’re conducting a search for illegal drugs.”

On either side of him, Lee’s goons let out derisive chuckles. Lorenzo had shown Remy and the other SWAT cops photos of Lee’s personal-security-slash-lieutenants during the mission briefing, and while both men wore similar amused expressions on their ugly mugs, the two couldn’t have been more different.

There was Shelton Quinn, a muscle-bound guy easily as big as Brooks. The man had a shaved head and a couple tattoos showing on his arms and neck that looked like they’d been done in a prison or someplace equally primitive. According to Lorenzo, Quinn specialized in physical intimidation and breaking everything from kneecaps and heads to spirits. From the looks of him, it was obvious the guy spent a good portion of his life in the gym, though the sour scent coming off him seemed to indicate at least some of those gains were the results of steroids or something more exotic.

The other guy, Chad Roth, was whipcord lean with wiry muscles he liked showing off under a tight athletic shirt. His dark hair was trimmed close to his head, with three parallel lines etched in it above his right ear. The man seemed to have a thing for gold earrings, too. He had three in each lobe that glinted brightly against his dark-brown skin. It wasn’t the unusual hairstyle or the earrings that caught Remy’s attention though. Instead, it was the man’s calculating eyes. As he watched, the thug scanned every cop in front of him—not in a quick, shifty manner, but with an intent look that told Remy the man was memorizing every detail he took in.

When Roth got to Remy and his pack mates, his eyes narrowed at the sight of the DPD patches on the front of their tactical vests. He locked gazes with Remy, staring straight at him. Remy stared back.

Lorenzo had said Roth was the smarter of the two lieutenants, and even though he’d only been associated with Lee’s organization for a few years, it was likely he’d take over running the show someday, assuming Lee ever stepped aside.

Remy listened with half an ear as Quinn ribbed Lorenzo about how the search for drugs was going, asking if maybe the cops needed some help looking, since it was obvious they didn’t know what the hell they were doing. All the while, Aaron Lee stood there with a smile on his face, letting his lieutenant have his fun with the narcotics detective.

Roth slowly slid his gaze from Remy, casually taking in Max, Brooks, and Zane. Remy watched the man’s open perusal, trying to understand the funny vibe he was getting off the guy. Whereas Lee was calm and serene inside, sure the cops weren’t going to get anything off him, and Quinn was a pile of juiced-up energy, getting off on his chance to stick it to the cops, Roth wasn’t putting off anything. He wasn’t merely calm; he was shut off. Like a dead man walking. Remy had never experienced anything quite like it and couldn’t help but wonder if maybe it meant the guy was a cold-blooded serial killer.

“Search as long as you like, Detective Claiborne,” Lee finally said, interrupting Quinn’s fun. “You’re not going to find anything, but you can be sure that my lawyers will be talking to the city about the damage you’ve done to my property, as well as the amount of income lost waiting for you and your cop buddies to finish here. I wouldn’t be surprised if some of the reimbursement came out of your paycheck.”

Lorenzo’s jaw tightened, but he didn’t say anything as Roth opened the back door of the Caddy for Lee. Before climbing in, Lee turned to regard Remy and his pack mates thoughtfully before looking at the narcotics detective.

“I always thought you and your people were incompetent, Detective Claiborne, and bringing in outside muscle isn’t going to help you pin something on me.” Lee’s mouth twitched. “Not unless they can sniff for drugs better than your dogs.”

With that, Lee climbed into the backseat of the car. Roth went around to the passenger side while Quinn got behind the wheel.

As he started the engine, Quinn gave Remy and his pack mates an amused look. “Ruff, ruff, little doggies. Ruff, ruff.”

Beside Remy, Max growled under his breath. “You wouldn’t be laughing if I sank my little doggy fangs in that steroid-filled ass of yours,” he said as Quinn drove away.

“You can bite his ass if you want,” Remy said softly. “Me? I’m going for his fucking throat.”