Chasing the Dragon Read online

  Sliding into the passenger’s seat, she looked straight ahead though she could feel all three pairs of eyes on her as she played her role and timidly tucked her hair behind one ear. Glancing over at the car, she noted the man’s arms moving about as he swung the flashlight from his cellphone over the exposed engine.

  “Looks like you have low oil … let me keep checking around,” he yelled out, then resumed his tinkering.

  “It’s not safe to travel out here alone,” a deep voice from the backseat said. “Especially a woman.”

  “Yeah?” she cracked a tilted smile, but didn’t make eye contact. “I suppose you’re right.” Just then, the man with the rosy cheeks closed the lid of her car. The sound cracked against the quiet making her heart beat a mile a minute. On cue, Gable came into view in a blur of frantic movement, wrapped his arm around the man, and gripped him in a full nelson while simultaneously holding a gun to the bastard’s head. In a flash, she snatched her skirt up, grabbed her gun, and shoved it hard into the driver’s temple.

  “Don’t move!” she screamed. “You!” She turned towards the man in the back, “Empty all of your pockets and strip down to your underwear! If you even look like you’re thinkin’ about doing anything stupid, we’ll kill both of ’em!” The man’s eyes turned to slits as Gable approached with his collateral. The guy removed his jacket, shirt, pants, shoes and socks and slid two revolvers through the open back window into Gable’s hands.

  “Fuck! I knew it!” the driver hissed.

  Wrapping her arm around his neck, she drew him close to her in a vise grip, keeping the gun jammed against his skull. She shot a glance at the back of the car.

  “Everybody be cool!” Gable screamed out. “Anybody do anything I ain’t tell you to do and I’m blasting his ass away, no questions asked!”

  She pushed the barrel harder into the chauffeur’s cranium, making him moan in pain while applying even harder pressure to his neck. He struggled in her grip and tried to speak, but only choked and garbled.

  Out of the corner of her eye, she took note of the fucker in the back slowly moving his arm.

  “Final warning! Move again and you won’t move again.”

  “Put yo’ mothafuckin’ hands up!” Gable barked until the guy placed his palms atop his head and interlocked his fingers. “Open the door and step out!” The guy reached towards the handle, then jerked back and rammed his hand into the back crease of the seat as if grabbing for something.

  BAM!

  “Shit!” Tiffany screamed out, her shrill voice echoing into the night. Still, she didn’t lessen her grip on the driver’s neck. The man slumped slowly back; the clean shot in the middle of his forehead glistened deep red before he fell back in a slump, mouth hanging open and death dancing in his hazy eyes.

  “Ahh! Fuck!” Gable gritted his teeth as the rosy cheeked man in his clutches began to struggle violently in his grip.

  BAM! BAM!

  The man dropped fast to the ground from the two gunshots to the back of his head.

  Her brain was buzzing from all of the commotion. Pure panic set in and wouldn’t turn her loose.

  This is all wrong! This is all fucked up!

  “Now, we got two of you gone. You’re the last white hope!” Gable yelled. “Tell me, mothafucka, where is the supply or you’re gettin’ popped, too!”

  Tiffany slowly released her grip on the man’s throat, and he leaned slightly forward, coughing violently as he ran his fingers along his undoubtedly burning esophagus. She kept the gun pressed to the back of his head, in case he got any grandiose ideas.

  “You’re Gable Johnson … Southside of Chicago’s finest.” Through the reflection of the window she could make out Gable’s tense grin. “I’m not telling you anything, Mr. Johnson. You know the dope is in a case and there’s a lock on it. You need me in order to get it open.”

  Gable swung the driver’s side door open and snatched the man up by his collar. He shoved the gun hard against his ear, his teeth bared as he snarled. “Tell. Me. Where. The. Fuck. It. Is!”

  “You’re going to kill me either way … so, that’ll never happen.” The man’s demeanor was eerily calm, as if he’d already accepted his fate.

  “You have the code. Tell us where the heroin is and the code for the case. We won’t shoot you; just give us what we want!” Tiffany yelled out, not wanting a third body on their hands and more wasted time.

  “There’s a tracker on this car and the police are already on their way.” She frantically turned away and looked here and there, practically tearing the car apart with her bare hands. Sweat broke out on her face. Gable pistol whipped the man, beating him into a bloody mess.

  “The police are coming. Don’t believe me? Check my phone! It’s too late. You’re fucked!” he blurted behind hoarse chuckles.

  Tiffany stepped out of the passenger’s side, gun in hand, and marched up to the man. Sliding her hand in his right pocket, she retrieved his cellphone and looked down at it. Sure enough, there were several missed calls, back to back, from the same number.

  “Anywhere this car goes, the government and CIA knows within a matter of seconds.” The man’s face parted in an unnerving smile as blood dripped down his chin. Rain soaked his hair and clothing until they were practically molded to his body. “You’ve shot and killed one DEA agent and a valuable informant that’s been with us for over ten years. Life sentences, consecutive. Guaranteed…” The man knew he was doomed; he wasn’t getting out of this alive, so he simply talked, spoke his mind with little to no regard for his survival.

  “We’ll let you live. I can promise you that.” She looked the man in the eye, certain she appeared convincing with the rain webbing in her lashes, making her vision slightly blurry. “Just tell us where it is in the car, all right?! Just fucking tell us!” The damn DEA cars were like mazes when they prepared for some of their drug stings. They primed themselves exceptionally well for such an incidence as robbery, and Tiffany realized at that moment she’d been naïve in considering the efforts it would take to truly get what they needed.

  This heist involved a little over twenty-five kilos of heroin that was to be used to gain trust and establish business with the notorious gang, the Gangster Disciples, so that the DEA could infiltrate. She’d found out all about the sting after establishing faux friendships with several of the Disciples. It had taken months of preparations to intervene in the drop, orchestrate it just right, and get her hands on the loot. This venture was going to easily bring in more than a million dollars, split only two ways. That was a damn good payday, and no one but she and Gable would be the wiser. Tiffany got back inside the car, her arms flailing about as the passing time threatened her with a prison sentence that would ensure she’d never see the light of day. She shoved and kicked the dead body in the back of the car to the side. Reaching out, she scanned the fabric with her fingers, searching for the bonanza. She felt a slight difference in the back of the passenger’s seat versus the same behind the driver’s seat.

  Carefully, she ran gloved hands over the upholstery, looking for strange stitching along the thing. The odor of spilled blood permeated the air, but she pushed it out of her mind, focusing on the task at hand. Popping out a knife from her jacket pocket, she sliced the damn thing open, and there was the black briefcase.

  “Found it!” she hollered out as she feverishly wiggled and wrangled the thing, tearing the seat up. The number wheels of the lock looked tedious to figure out and she nearly bit her lower lip in frustration as she ran her gloved finger over the thing. She shook the bag and panicked. “It’s got a tracker on it, too! We have to get in this and dump the case!” She heard something sliding inside the thing, more than likely an electronic device that not only tracked the bag but the contents, as well.

  “Give us the goddamn codes!” Gable demanded once more, but the man wouldn’t talk. He only stood there, shaking, bleeding and fading away before his time was officially up.

  “Give me his wallet!” Gable looked at
her with confusion, but did as told.

  “You heard ’er. Give it to me!” The man reached into his pocket and placed it in Gable’s palm. He tossed it in the back seat next to her; the damn thing landed on the dead man’s body. Plucking it from his chest, she rifled through it. She tried the man’s birthdate, his social security number, but then smirked as something she’d heard came to mind. She’d read that sometimes the codes for the cases were a mixture of numbers from various sources but more times than not, they were something simple, so that in case of an emergency, the information could be relayed in code to another DEA.

  Men love their cars…

  “Yo’ Gable, read off the license plate to me!” The man dragged their victim to the back of the car and shouted out the numbers.

  “FUCK YES! WE’RE IN!” she hollered when the gorgeous, perfectly wrapped packages poured out. Then, she put the license number in backwards and removed the smaller device from the bundles of heroin. Bingo … it worked.

  A big smile on her face, she dug inside, the thin plastic feeling like melted sweet dreams as it slid against her skin. However, her jubilation was short-lived. She screamed out, then ducked down as shattered glass sprayed the dead body in the back seat and riddled through the vehicle. Barely able to breathe, she grabbed bountiful bags of heroin and held them close to her chest, then raced towards her car and tossed it inside. Gable did the same and within seconds, they were speeding down the road in the opposite direction.

  Her euphoria soon morphed into horror when the reality of what had just happened seeped into the equation. She’d now become an accomplice to multiple murders, one of which was that of a top ranked agent…

  She’d prided herself on her low body count record. She simply witnessed from afar, gave orders, but now, her hands were dirty, despite the fact she’d not directly pulled the trigger. Bodies, in her mind, were always a last resort. Not because she gave a shit about death, but because bodies meant a trail. The human form doesn’t lie. Forensic science was a motherfucker, and though she was skilled at her chosen field, no one could outsmart DNA. A trail meant Hell … and Hell had no bail.

  “Gable … we weren’t supposed to kill anyone unless it was a last resort, and why the fuck didn’t you have your mask on?! No one in their organization knows who I am, but everyone knows who you are, he even called you by name!”

  “It was too late! The motherfucker fixin’ the car saw me as I was tryna pull it over my head, so I knew at that point, I’d have to take all of ’em out. And since you’re in the mood to ask questions, I have one for your ass. You said there were only supposed to be two, but there were three! We were outnumbered. Who tha fuck was the guy in the back, huh? Tell me that, goddamn it!” On a heavy sigh, she shook her head, praying her nerves would settle as she monitored her speeding around the bends in the road.

  “Apparently their runner. He was supposed to be escorted to another car,” she answered in almost a whisper. “These types of things change sometimes. They must’ve made a last-minute decision.”

  Neither said another word for quite some time and she breathed a sigh of relief when they emerged from the wilderness, basking now in the lights of the city. The highway was eerily quiet and almost desolate. Chicago was up at all hours of the night, just like a colicky baby. She replayed the heist in her mind, the way she and her cousin had jumped through unplanned hoops; though there’d been some hiccups, they’d worked as a team and accomplished the impossible.

  “We did it…” She smiled as she reached over and shook his shoulder. He smiled back, clearly unmoved by the blood that covered his jacket and stained his face.

  “Yeah, we did … we’re set.” He leaned back in the seat, removed a clean duffle bag from the floor of the car, and tossed the sacks of dope inside.

  “We’ll repackage them tonight, get them out to the guys tomorrow morning. It’s a brand-new day, Gable … a brand new motherfuckin’ day…”

  CHAPTER TWO

  His clapping hands made a thunderous boom, the kind that rounded up Zeppelin and Metallica, Phoenix’s two pit bulls, in an instant. They galloped across the lush, freshly cut yard, their tongues flapping out of their mouths and jiggling with each hearty sprint in his direction. They landed before him, playfully tumbling over one another, breaths mingling as they roused each other up.

  “Settle down.” He smiled at them and drew quiet, enjoying the cool breeze. The blades of grass tickled his bare ankles. Phoenix sniffed the air, peered up at the sky to see the dark clouds gathering around the sun like some lynch mob. “Yeah, it’s definitely about to rain. So much for that park visit. Sorry guys, let’s head inside.” The furry duo got to their feet, Metallica on one side of him and Zeppelin on the other. Metallica raced ahead towards the side door of the Spring Valley, Washington D.C. house. She was the smaller of the two, a female with at least twenty pounds less than her brother, Zeppelin, but her strength proved that size didn’t matter. A raindrop pitter pattered against the top of his ear, and then another as he drew closer to the door where the two canine companions awaited. He swiped his palm against his lobe and made haste as the precipitation increased within a matter of seconds.

  With a swoosh, the door swung open and the scent of the fresh coffee he’d just made permeated the air. Closing and locking the thing behind him, he walked towards his study while Metallica and Zeppelin made a beeline for the kitchen, certain to demolish their fresh bowls of food and spring water. As soon as Phoenix sat down to go over some work files, his phone rang. Snatching the cell phone off the expansive, cherry wood desk, he propped it under his chin and typed in the password on his computer.

  “Phoenix, it’s Rick. I … I can’t believe this. I’ve got some bad news.” Phoenix smirked, knowing Rick all too well. The guy was a habitual prankster, playing practical jokes on him and the rest of their colleagues every chance he got.

  “What? The H-Street Festival ran out of pretzels and beer, you lousy son of a bitch?” He placed his thumb on the identification placement of the computer to get into a sealed, highly confidential document.

  “No, Phoenix. I’m serious.”

  “Yeah?” Phoenix chuckled. “This is the part where you tell me to hold on and then play a bunch of farting noises loudly into the phone, right?”

  “This isn’t a joke. Price is dead … he’s gone.”

  Phoenix felt an instant tightness in his chest and fell back against his chair in shock.

  “What did you just say?” He bunched the material of his shirt in a tight fist.

  “John is dead, Phoenix. You know that sting they went out to in Chicago? They got ambushed and he, Dennis, and Vlad are all dead.”

  “Who did this?!” He sat straight in his chair and ran his fingers roughly through his hair, teeth gritted.

  “So far, there are no concrete leads but it’s highly probable it was some members of the Disciples gang. That was their target with the operation. They’ve been under investigation for the past two years by Price. He just got close enough to run a deal with them.”

  “I’m flying to Chicago on the first plane out of here.” Phoenix slammed his computer shut and got to his feet.

  “You know you can’t do that, Phoenix. You’re not a part of the DEA any longer and your involvement could hamper the investigation. Not to mention we’re knee deep in the Recovery Acts Program. We have to meet with the President tomorrow and then—”

  “Jesus Christ!” He slammed his fist against the wall, causing his dogs to erupt in deafening barking and come racing towards his study. “Not John, no! Damn it! What the hell happened? He came over with his family as immigrants from Ireland, survived the war in Iraq, countless undercover shakedowns … This wasn’t supposed to happen. I can’t believe this…” His chest rose and fell as he slid back down into his chair, his face dangerously close to the desk.

  And he broke to pieces.

  “I’m sorry, Phoenix…”

  “Where?” he asked, swiping his hand across his brow. “H
ow long ago did this happen? I need to speak to Krystal. Does she know? For God’s sake…” Waves of fresh grief merged with the soupy concoction of disbelief and anger.

  “It happened about two to three hours ago, they estimate. They are flying his body back here. His wife has been notified.”

  “Send me the photos…” Leaning back in his seat, he crossed his arms and dropped his chin to his chest.

  “Phoenix, there’s no point in—”

  “Send me the photos, now. I want every single one of them, you hear me? I want video. I want aerial views, I want any audio that’s been obtained and I want interview transcripts, and I want them before the end of the goddamn night.” He disconnected the call and pivoted back and forth in his chair. The study was swallowed by darkness and all that could be heard was the panting of the dogs. The large brick colonial style home felt cold and empty now, the residual life and colorful memories sucked from it like a vacuum.

  The house boasted seven bedrooms, an indoor swimming pool, and a full bar, all of which dearly departed John and his host of old colleagues enjoyed parties, summer barbecues, winter football revelries, and the occasional good game of cards. He’d known the man for over ten years; once he and John Price had met, they’d become thicker than thieves. Now, the man’s life had been stolen…

  In fact, everything Phoenix knew had been turned upside down and inside out. He was left alone. His divorce had been finalized two years ago, and he and Lillian had no children. She’d drawn a line in the sand, making him choose between her and work. She’d grown tired of his gallivanting around the country, talking to the press about the latest substance abuse findings, and being the fall guy for when the latest drug hit the streets and no one had a damn clue as to what it was.

  When he’d worked as a DEA agent, the harassment and death threats never ceased. Now that he held such an important position for the country, things had gotten remarkably worse. But, he couldn’t let go; his work meant too much to him, and everything he did on the job went so much deeper than what appeared on the surface…