“That’s really good work, Zach,” Noah said. “And fast.”
Zach grinned, both out of pride and embarrassment. “Um, yeah, thanks. But I’m not done. The property management company is just a one-room office-I called pretending to have a group of properties and asked about their policies and rates. They told me they are a private company and work only for a group of businesses. They wanted to know how I got the number. I had to do some quick thinking, so I said the Internet, then quickly created a fake page that listed a hundred property management companies in Texas and included them. If they dig deep, they’ll see it was created today, but hopefully they don’t.”
“Smart,” Lucy said.
“I need a warrant,” Noah said. “I don’t want to go in there and tip them off.”
“We have cause,” Lucy said. “One of their properties was a murder scene.”
“We don’t know she was killed there.”
“We don’t know she wasn’t.”
“The AUSA isn’t going to bite on that.” Noah snapped his fingers. “The brothel in Del Rio. Illegal prostitution. We have a confidential informant who gave us information, we need the property records and all information on the owner.”
“Who? Barrow? He’ll never agree.”
“Doesn’t matter, he already talked to us, he gave us the intel, and we have his investigative report. I think I can convince the AUSA to give us a little room on this.” Noah packed up the remaining food. “I’m going to talk to Rick first thing in the morning and we’ll work out a strategy. Lucy-follow up with the Kansas City field office about the memo we sent, see if you can find this Randall kid, and be ready to serve the warrant on DPH. Zach-I need you to quietly dig up everything you can about Jasmine Constance Ricardo, born in Corpus Christi, possibly goes by the name Jasmine Flores. Copy in only me and Lucy. Donnelly with the DEA is looking into her as well, and he’s making a bigger splash, but I need you to be discreet.”
“No problem,” Zach said. “Oh-one more thing, on those photos you sent. Finally got a hit late this afternoon on this guy.” He slid over the photo of Jasmine’s bodyguard. “Lance Dobleman. Dishonorably discharged from the Army six years ago for a variety of charges, including insubordination and assault of a superior officer.”
“Why wasn’t he court-martialed?” Noah asked.
“I hope you don’t mind, but I asked Agent Dunning to look into it, since he’s former Army.”
“And?”
“Dobleman was sleeping with his commanding officer’s wife. Commanding officer caught them in bed, fight ensued, Dobleman got the discharge. But apparently there were a lot of shady things with this guy. Nate couldn’t get the details, only that Dobleman was a ladies’ man, may have been abusive to the women he was with, and his unit didn’t like him. His bunkmate is the one who told their commander about the affair.”
Noah said, “Ask Nate to follow up on that, and I’ll work on getting his military records and see if we can work that angle. Find out what he’s been doing in the last six years and who employs him now.”
“I got that part,” Zach said with a grin. He handed over a slender file. “I don’t have a lot on him, but he works for Gold Key Enterprises, one of the companies in this big shell game.” He circled a business in the middle of the chart. “Title is security chief. And I have a residence-thanks to Nate. It’s all in the folder.”
Lucy opened it. Dobleman lived in Austin, Texas.
“Hold off on interviewing Dobleman until I hear from Stockton about how we’re going to handle Jasmine,” Noah said. “But Zach-keep working this. The more information we have, the better.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The bad news was that the stadium was crowded and sold out.
That good news was that the stadium was crowded and sold out.
The crowds could help Sean grab Jesse and slip away with minimal attention, but first he had to get in. That wasn’t the difficult part-bribing a guard at a back exit did the trick.
But now he had to find Jesse. And Jaye hadn’t called him.
On the ride to the stadium-Sean had hot-wired an old motorcycle that was easy to manuever and park close to the stadium-he considered all the ways his plan could go wrong.
In fact, he didn’t see it going right.
But what other choice did he have? Kane’s idea of appealing to Dante Romero may or may not work. And then they would have to breach the Flores compound, putting both of them-and Jesse-at risk. Grabbing Jesse now and explaining to the kid on the way home what was going on seemed the most logical-and easiest-of solutions.
Sean didn’t want to scare Jesse. Hell, that was the last thing he wanted to do. He considered how to explain to his son what was going on… and the best way was getting him to talk to his mother. Sean had Madison now programmed on speed dial and he suspected she’d pick up on the first ring. He hoped. After this morning…
Focus, Sean. Focus on finding Jesse, then worry about getting him out.
Sean arrived just after halftime ended. People were still moving back to their seats, some agitated, drunk, excited. Sean liked to play sports for fun, but he grew restless as an observer. What was the last major sporting event he’d watched? Was it the Super Bowl? No… he missed most of it. He caught one of the games of the World Series last year, only because he’d been with Patrick who loved baseball. How did people have fun here? There was a certain energy and excitement-that he understood-but Sean would much rather be playing on the field than sitting in the stands drinking beer.
He didn’t know how much time he had-an hour, take or leave. He walked the entire perimeter of the stadium to get the layout. There were food and souvenir vendors in several strategic locations. The credit card that Jaye had caught only gave the name of the business entity that ran all sales at the stadium, so Sean had no idea which clothing retailer had sold Carson the shirts.
Jaye still hadn’t called.
He called her.
“Jaye, I need something.”
“Sean, what the hell do you think you’re doing?”
“Funny, you don’t sound like Jaye.” Shit, it was JT.
“You’re acting on emotion. For a fucking genius, you’re an idiot.”
“It’s an opportunity.”
“You’re there without backup!”
“Kane is working his own angle, I’m working mine. If I can get Jesse tonight, we’ll be back in San Antonio before dawn.”
“I’m not saying the plan is bad-though it is because you don’t even have a plan-I’m saying you never go in alone. Kane is on his way. Do not do anything until he gets there.”
“I don’t even know where Jesse is!”
“Jaye is very good. Flores has season tickets, a box of eight-which means you’re not just dealing with some cartel lawyer and a kid; you could be dealing with bodyguards and one or more of the Flores brothers. Wait for Kane. He’ll meet you at the top of section one eighteen.”
“Okay.”
“I’m serious, Sean.”
“I said I’d wait for him!” He rubbed his face. He was so close… “Look, JT, I get it. But what choice did I have? What if Jesse were your kid?”
“This is why you bring backup-because emotions have no place in hostage rescue. Be safe-and smart.”
“I have no intention of dying tonight.”
“It’s about time,” Sean muttered when Kane came up silently next to him twenty minutes after he got off the phone with JT.