Three days later, Gray was so full he thought he might throw up.  He was also very close to finding the answers he needed.  Michaela had been cooking from the time she got up until she went to bed, since her brother, and the guys left. Gray hadn’t gone to bed, except for two hour naps on the sofa.  He was too determined to get this done before Dante returned, and wasn’t going to let her distract him.

Mac promised to get him the names of the principals of those two corporations to him today. Dexter promised to get him access to the receiver accounts.  Once he opened that can of worms, he knew he’d be in the home stretch.  But since it was nearly midnight, he knew he wasn’t going to get either of those things today.  He would be on their two-yard line in the morning, because they held the last pieces of the puzzle he needed.

He found the invoice used to transport the weapons under a protected shipment to Nogales, Mexico.  Who knew the good people of Nogales needed a 48’ tractor-trailer load of toilet brushes?  When shit hit the fan, they would definitely be prepared for the fallout.

With that description on the bill of lading, the shipment became household goods, and subject to far less scrutiny at the border.  He imagined a few palms were greased there, paperwork pushed through and voila, the gang had a new load of weapons to either sell to terror groups, or to keep to fight US authorities at the border and other gangs inside of Mexico. 

It was entirely too easy, but done every day.  These gangs had sophisticated pipelines and players to move illegal goods in and out of Mexico, virtually undetected, if someone didn’t look too closely.

Gray would be curious as to who did the greasing in this transaction, but he wasn’t wasting precious time trying to track that down. The gang had to have a broker here representing them in this deal.  It wasn’t Vinny—from all appearances, he was representing the mob.

The payment of the invoice for those toilet brushes was made prior to shipment into one of Vinny Girabaldi’s accounts, a domestic goods wholesale import/export company.

Ideally, in a perfect money laundering scheme, the mob’s many small invoices he found for parts to manufacture those brushes would’ve been paid to structure the money back to them over time, to pay for the shipment, minus Vinny’s commission. 

According to his accounting records, though, those invoices were still outstanding and had been for nearly a year.  That’s because the money was siphoned out of Vinny’s account, deposited into Michaela’s, then funneled into two other straw company accounts.  He’d just about guarantee when he got into those accounts the money wasn’t in them long. 

He could see it going into a non-resident alien’s account to be sent back to “family” in Mexico.  Perfectly legal, and a way to avoid tax consequences. 

If Gray was a betting man, he would take it a step farther to say that non-resident alien account probably belonged to Jose Romeros.  That meant this was a mob double-cross and Zetas used Teresa to help them retrieve their money back for the shipment to screw the mob.

Maybe Dante was wrong, and they had killed Vinny.  Or maybe Gray was right, and it was Zetas trying to take care of loose ends.  They would only know the answer to that when Dante, Hawk, Levi, and Caleb got back with Teresa.  If they got back with her.

He glanced toward the kitchen, where he heard Mickie humming while she washed dishes. For her sake, he hoped her cousin was still alive, because proving she wasn’t the one to kill Vinny was going to be tough with the evidence her brother said they had on her.  With what he had so far, he felt relatively certain they’d drop the other charges, if Teresa backed up his findings.

They would know in eight hours or so when they got back with her.  With a sigh, he stretched and yawned then rubbed his eyes. He was in a holding pattern until morning, so he decided to get some sleep. 

Pushing back his chair, Gray stood and walked into the kitchen. When he rounded the corner, he saw Mickie slumped over the sink, her shoulders shaking and her hair covering her face.  What he thought was humming had actually been sobbing.  Her mental grief slammed into his chest like a fist as he strode over to pull her into his arms.

“Aww, don’t cry. What’s wrong?” he mumbled into her hair, holding her tightly. “We’re almost to the finish line. What are you crying for? Teresa will be here in the morning, and this whole mess will be over.”

“What if she’s dead?” Mickie whispered against his chest, her tears soaking into his t-shirt.

“What if she’s not?” he countered, and she hiccupped and laughed.

“Just let me cry—it will make me feel better,” she said, with a sniffle.

“Well, it’s not making me feel better, so you need to stop. You’ve got to keep the faith, Jersey.  I haven’t worked this hard to fix this for you to give up.”  His eyes fell on the half-iced cake on a plate on the counter.  His stomach revolted, but his mouth watered.  “What kind of cake is that?” he asked, pushing her away to snatch up the dishtowel and dot her face with it.

“It’s Mascarpone and will be the last thing I cook, because we’re out of groceries.  Another reason I’m crying.  What in the world will I do tomorrow to keep my mind off of this?”

He had a few things in mind that they could do together to keep both their minds off of it until Mac and Dex came through and he could finish his research.

But not tonight—he was just too exhausted.

“Do we still have some milk?” he asked, and she nodded as she wiped her nose with the towel.  “Good—let’s have a midnight snack and then we’re going to bed, because we both need some sleep.  You’ll feel better tomorrow, and hopefully your brother, and the guys will be back early.”

“You’re going to sleep with me tonight?” she asked, her eyes perking up.

Tonight and every other night, if I have my way.  Where in the hell had that come from?

“Yes, and we’re going to sleep, so don’t be getting on a sugar high and wanting me to stay up all night doing something else.” Gray swatted her ass, squeezed it then reached up to grab plates out of the cabinet. “We’ll have plenty of time for that when this is over.” 

Unless Teresa doesn’t come back with the team tomorrow.

“Shut the fuck up,” he grumbled, as he set the plates down to open and close drawers until he found a knife.

“Are you telling me to shut the fuck up?” she asked with a disbelieving laugh, rubbing her hand at the center of his back. Her fingers danced up his spine, raising the hair on his neck. “Because if you are, I think I might reconsider giving you the back massage I planned to give you to work off my sugar high.”

Gray stopped with a huge slice of cake balanced on the knife to look down at her.  His cock swelled, he dropped the cake onto the plate, and laid down the knife. 

“Forget the cake then, let’s just go to bed.  I know where that massage is going to lead, and I really need some sleep.”

“Party pooper.” She laughed and swatted his arm as he dragged her toward the bedroom.

***

At five a.m. Gray was up eating Mascarpone cake for breakfast and having it with the last of the coffee to wake him up.  He flipped open his laptop and turned it on, but saw no notifications that he had a new email. 

Dex was not an early riser and Mac usually stayed up half the night, so he probably wouldn’t be getting emails from them until at least ten a.m.  Gray was only up because, even though he said he was exhausted, he’d been too tired to sleep.  Having the purring sex kitten who slept beside him wrapped around him like plastic wrap, hadn’t helped.  Gray thought about waking her up to tell her he’d changed his mind about that massage, but his body wasn’t fully on board.

He was just too worried about today. 

As much as he’d told her to keep the faith, Gray was as worried as he’d ever been in his life. The feeling of doom that sat on his chest like a concrete block wouldn’t leave him.  When it got heavier and heavier from the horrible scenarios his mind conjured of how this would play out, he finally gave up on trying to sleep.

No matter how much information he’d gathered, no matter how much that evidence pointed to Mickie not being involved, he still couldn’t make himself fully exonerate her yet.  The guilt that came with that realization was very difficult to bear.

If you don’t trust me, how can you help me? 

He would help her despite not trusting her, that’s how.  He would let the prosecutor and grand jury decide if she was guilty.  She wouldn’t be clear of this mess until that happened, and Gray wouldn’t be rid of his doubts until then, because Mona had broken him. 

Before her, he took most people at face value and trusted them until they proved untrustworthy. Now, it was the opposite, and there wasn’t a damned thing he could do about it. Maybe he’d feel better after he got the emails from Mac and Dex and saw everything he was fearing was just fantasy. 

Setting the cake aside, he washed it down with the rest of his coffee, then decided to examine Mickie’s account again.  His fingers hovered over the keyboard, but something rang and rattled near the front door.  Gray tensed as he got up and followed the second, third and fourth ring to a table beside the door. He lifted a magazine and found a cell phone underneath.

He picked it up, looked at the display then answered it. Evidently Mr. Stallone left them a form of communication other than his computer, but he didn’t tell them it was there, because he didn’t want them to use it.

“Very sneaky, stronzo,” Gray said, actually kind of in awe at his deviousness.

“I have your package. Do you have mine?” Dante asked gruffly.

Gray sighed.  “Almost, but I’m waiting on more info from my office. I should have it later this morning.  So you have Teresa? Are you bringing her here?”

“No—we had to take her and Levi to the hospital. She may not make it. Levi has a flesh wound.  I’m coming to get Michaela, but you are staying there until you have my package ready. Capisce?”

“Yes, Mr. Pacino—I’ll get Michaela up, so she’ll be ready when you get here.”

“Later, Mr. Dill,” Dante said with a rough laugh before he hung up.

Please let her make it, Gray thought, as he turned to run to the bedroom—and please don’t let this damned feeling I have be right.