In the Blink of An Eye by Jerry Baggett (ebook reader for surface pro TXT) 📕

take some time, so we’ll do what we can to avoid endangering her life. You’ve done well, Grant. Now, about the other woman. We received the DNA report. Your brother was right all along. He wanted to take care of his daughter. Based on that evidence, you should go ahead with your lawyer’s recommendations. I suggest you not discuss this with her or let this get out until we finish our investigation into a possible connection to the drug epidemic on the island. There’s no way to know where things might go from here and we have too many innocent lives involved.”

Hunt sat down again, stretching his legs out. “We know there’s a connection to Marino and it’s important not to let that leak out until all other facts have been examined. There are too many moving parts to the investigation at this early stage. And, Grant, don’t count on finding the evidence you need to clear your record. Too many years have passed and nothing is ever the way you remember it.”

That’s easy for you to say, he thought. Kevin’s a good investigator, but I can’t let him deter me from persevering in my own best interest.

“We put four investigators on Maria’s information about Marino’s enforcer. She was dead on. Marino’s girls have every right to fear that man, Hans Hempel. There’s reason to believe that Hans is a man referred to in DEA reports as ‘Big Ugly’, a code name for an unknown individual, associated with dozens of drug related crimes including homicides. Furthermore, most of those reports were connected in one way or another with Marino’s clubs, in three or four states. Until now, we were unable to connect Big Ugly to a living being. The name’s been popping up in California for over ten years.”

Grant watched Hunt struggle for a comfortable position. He’s obviously in pain. He should have stayed in the hospital a few more days. “You’re having trouble with pain somewhere, Kevin, what’s wrong, the car crash?”

“It’s the ribs. I’m taped up tight. Mild painkillers aren’t doing the job. I’m beginning to understand how so many millennials get hooked on opioids.”

Hunt swallowed a hand full of pills. “Now, back to our problem here. This organization is much larger and better organized than we first thought. Everything we’ve uncovered tells me we have the head of the snake located right here in this part of California. Not only do we know the fentanyl’s coming into this area from China, we know that it’s broken down into small shipments. The stuff’s mailed to dozens of individual addresses, labeled as women’s makeup. The recipients have sophisticated equipment to press the powder into the size and shape of prescribed medications before fillers and dyes are added. In many cases, oxy and heroin are cut with a few flakes of fentanyl, often deadly. Dealers lack the ability to understand and measure the proper amount required for a desired high without turning it into a fatal overdose. These drugs have killed tens of thousands of Americans and the massive profit’s going to a few people at the top of the organization.”

Hunt coughed hard. He grimaced with pain. “I haven’t smoked in years but I’m still paying the price. How about another shot of that coffee you have in there? I might as well tell you this,” he said. “Agents arrested a twenty-nine-year-old man in San Diego yesterday with a still-running pill press in his garage. They also found more than a thousand pills in small packages, ready to be mailed, and over a million dollars were stored away in garbage bags. I questioned the man this morning. He’s scared to death, not from the arrest, but from the organization he works for.”

Grant said, “According to Maria, anyone caught moving drugs in the Happy Huntsman club is brutally punished and banned from the club forever.”

“That’s to divert suspicion. The real drug business is deep underground,” Hunt said. “Marino’s extremely smart. If he wasn’t smart, he wouldn’t have survived in that business for the last thirty years. Drugs and prostitution are his main business, buried behind the scene, and managed from within his clubs. He uses attractive young women to draw in lonely men with money to spend, making the clubs, themselves, highly profitable.”

Grant said, “Don’t under estimate what I picked up from the prison grapevine. A woman is definitely involved. The street pushers I talked with in prison were sure about the stuff being distributed by a woman who could arrange shipments to select individuals, anywhere in the country. It’s believed that she has complete control of the stuff hitting the streets. I was told, more than once, that a nurse, with access to a doctor, arranged the prescriptions for most mail order drugs.”

“We’re well aware of that. Prescriptions are ordered on the dark web and filled through the mail. Over four hundred thousand dollars’ worth, every month, is being shipped out of California by mail, as prescribed pills, costing less than a penny each to produce.”

“Hot damn,” Grant said. “Maybe I should think about getting into the drug business.”

Hunt laughed. “You’re too late, Grant. The millennials are starting their business by offering pills to their friends in the workout centers. Old guys like you don’t have friends in the gyms.”

Grant stood up and moved around some, then turned back to face Hunt. “That other thing about my brother. You looked into the accident that killed him and one other person in another pickup truck, right?”

Hunt held his gaze. “No! They were riding together. The accident was only listed as suspicious at first. I can’t tell you any more than that right now. I know what you’re thinking, Grant. This whole can of worms seems to be tied together somehow. That’s why I don’t want you discussing it with your niece, understand? She’s better off being kept in the dark until we have a few