Storm's Cage by Mary Stone (uplifting novels .TXT) 📕

Larson was a thirty-six-year-old federal agent with a womanizing mentality that would fit right in with an eighties hair band.

Amelia could handle herself, but he still lamented the fact that his friend was stuck working with a man who made her uncomfortable. Zane silently cringed at the thought.

Amelia was his friend. No, she was more than that. They were closer than the simple term implied. Something he felt but couldn’t put a name to. And on some level, he wasn’t sure if he wanted to risk putting a label on their connection. He hadn’t missed the look of contentment in her eyes when he’d touched her face that morning.

This morning. Feels like it happened a week ago.

Though his watch hadn’t even hit three o’clock, he felt like he’d been at the FBI office for an entire week.

When the elevator chimed, he almost jumped in place. Growling at himself, he stepped out onto the durable carpet of an eighth-floor hallway.

He and Amelia had bigger problems to face. There was a real possibility Carlo Enrico would die before providing them with the name or likeness of the detective who’d worked with Alton Dalessio. Zane had decided to hand the child exploitation case fully over to the Bureau’s Cyber Crimes Division. The task force hadn’t assigned a Cyber Crimes agent yet, but SAC Keaton had given him a point of contact.

Zane rarely had a reason to travel to the eighth floor. He’d collaborated with Cyber Crimes once or twice, but the interactions had always been part of a case review or a briefing.

Tapping a manila folder against his leg, Zane set off down the hall to a room full of cubicles arranged in much the same way as the Organized Crime Division floor.

He’d half-expected each agent to have their own Oculus Rift virtual reality headset or for their desks to be reminiscent of a sci-fi flick. But as he made his way to the lone man at the end of the second row of cubicles, he realized the only difference was that each agent had been given four monitors instead of two.

Zane cleared his throat. “Excuse me. Are you Agent Redker?”

As the man’s dark eyes flicked to Zane, he pulled one earbud free. His suit jacket had been draped over the back of his chair, and he’d rolled the sleeves of his white dress shirt up to the elbows. Zane admired the agent’s modern faux hawk. It gave the man an air of youth despite the salt and pepper color of his hair.

Despite the gray, his clean-shaven face was unlined. He’d either been gifted with good genetics, or he made a point to take care of his appearance. Based on the fine material of the discarded jacket and his fashionable hairstyle, Zane assumed the youthful appearance was a combination of the two.

The agent set the pair of white earbuds beside his keyboard. “Yeah, I’m Layton Redker. You must be Agent Palmer from Organized Crime, right?”

“I am, yes.” Zane extended a hand. “Here to talk about the Kankakee farm case.”

After he’d accepted Zane’s handshake, Agent Redker leaned to the side and wheeled over a mesh-backed office chair. “I’ve been expecting you.” He paused as his dark brows knitted together. “I’m sorry. That sounded less creepy in my head.”

With a chortle, Zane took the offered seat. He’d known Agent Redker for all of two minutes, but he already liked the man. “Don’t worry about it. It happens to the best of us.”

Agent Redker laughed. “True enough.” He gestured to the manila folder in Zane’s hand. “This is what you and your partner collected in your investigation?”

Zane slid the file across the laminate desktop. “Yeah, this is a rundown of what we found at the location, as well as everything our…informant gave us.”

“The informant who was stabbed in MCC Chicago earlier today, right?”

“Yeah, that’s the one.” Leaning back in his chair, Zane crossed his arms. “Carlo Enrico, a soldier in the Leóne family. His superior, Alton Dalessio, was the man in charge of the child exploitation ring they were running. And then there was another Leóne soldier, Matteo Ricci. There was a fourth man involved, a Chicago PD detective. Ricci and Dalessio are both dead, and Enrico’s prognosis is bleak, so we’ve got no witnesses capable of identifying him.”

Agent Redker cringed as he rubbed his chin. “And none of the victims can ID him?”

“No. Not that we know of so far.” Zane shook his head. “There were only three survivors in that warehouse. All three of them recognized Ricci, Dalessio, and Enrico, but we haven’t heard anything in their statements so far that indicates a fourth man. Could be that they hadn’t been held captive long enough to run into him. Carlo Enrico was supposed to identify the fourth perp in exchange for witness protection and a reduction in his charges, but…” He shrugged, leaving the statement unfinished.

“Now Enrico is on death’s doorstep.” Redker nodded to himself as he drummed his fingers on top of the desk. “And you’re preparing for the worst, right?”

Agent Redker seemed to have the measure of things, which gave Zane a bit of reassurance. “We need to find the fourth man in this operation. Not only is he a detective in the Chicago Police Department, but he’s a dirty cop who’s been affiliated with the Leóne family for god knows how long. And with Enrico out of the picture, there’s only one way to come close to identifying him.”

Agent Redker’s gaze shifted to Zane. “The videos that were recovered from the farm.” He blew out a long breath and massaged his temple. “I mean, theoretically, we could put together his likeness from the videos where he appears, and then we could go through the detectives in the CPD, but well…”

“It’s a stretch,” Zane finished for him. “I know. But at this point, it’s the only shot we have at finding him. I know that your department has been working on tracking down the buyers who paid Dalessio and his guys for