Brutal August heat held them like a fist. Allison Jacob turned her back to the hot wind that peppered her with dirt and debris and ducked behind her vehicle with two of her agents.
“What’s taking them so long?” Grace grumbled beside her while they waited for the Milwaukee Police to enter the house across the street. Bonnie stood at the back of the SUV, adjusting her vest and swiping at her face.
Allison squinted down the elegant street with its manicured yards, flowers, and century-old trees. How had they ended up here? It had mostly been back streets, condemned houses, and alleys with Chief William Whiteaker’s Special Forces during their temporary summer assignment. Worse, if this wasn’t the headquarters of the trafficking network they’d been chasing, they’d be out of the loop after today. Her new ATF task force began tomorrow.
Finally, the police went through the front door, and it was quiet for a few minutes. Then there were shouts, and two people ran from the back, across the yard. It looked like an adult woman holding a kid’s hand as they ducked into the alley. Skidding on loose stones, Allison and her two agents moved right, guns drawn. Grace led the charge as they rounded the corner.
“He was falling before he hit the garbage cans…like he was fainting,” Grace said, hands braced on her knees as she caught her breath. “The woman ahead of him just disappeared.”
Heart racing, Allison went to her knees by the young boy and checked for breath and a pulse, but there was nothing. She shook her head at Grace.
“Bonnie, get the medics. Look at his skin. It’s yellow.” She shoved the hair off his forehead. “He’s just a kid.” An ambulance squeezed down the alley toward them.
“What the hell, AJ?” Chief Whiteaker called out, walking around the EMTs working on the young boy. “Did you shoot?”
“No shots fired.” AJ watched them work on the kid, still hoping. “Is the house under control?”
“Yes, but the freakin’ place is like a furnace. Only four kids in there, but they look well fed and healthy. I saw a woman’s touch to the place.”
“There was a woman leading this one, but she disappeared at the end of the alley. Was it the right house?” AJ pulled in a breath when he nodded. “Good.”
The medical team shook their heads and stepped back from the body.
“Wait for the ME. I’ll get him identified,” the chief said as they walked back up the alley.
“Poor kid.” Grace tossed her sweat-soaked vest into the back of AJ’s vehicle and pointed at the clock tower. “Look at that.” The LED thermometer sizzled at ninety-five degrees.
“God.” AJ threw her light body armor on top of Grace’s and Bonnie’s. Black clouds were building up to the north. “Go help Bill process that house and make sure they call CPS for the kids. Catch a ride back with his cops, and I’ll wait for the medical examiner. I want to know what happened to this boy.”
* * *
At home, AJ braced herself against Katie’s car in the garage as she tried to get her wet boots off. The storm had broken while she and the ME stood over the body in the alley, and she was soaking wet.
The boot finally came off, and she hurled it against the kitchen door. The noise was sudden and loud, followed by complete silence. She looked around the garage. A few months ago, she’d known exactly what her job was, but now she was out of the drug world, chasing sex trafficking. Worse, she couldn’t get the young dead boy out of her head.
She picked up the boot just as the back door flew open. Katie stood there, wrapped only in a towel with a stunned expression. Her wet, black curls hung across her face. “What was that?” she said.
AJ held up the soaked boot. “It wouldn’t come off. When it finally did I—”
“Threw it?”
“Um…yes. You were in the shower?”
“What do you think? Drop everything in the garage and go to the shower.”
AJ looked down at her sopping, dirty clothes. The pants and shirt were salvageable. Maybe. “I have to go out again.” She dropped the boot and began to pull off her clothes. “Is this how you open our door?” she snapped.
“Hey.” Katie looked hurt.
AJ strode past Katie toward the shower wearing only a frown. She turned the water on and stepped inside. Katie followed, slipping an arm around her.
“Here, stand still. Let me wash your hair. I assume you got caught in the rain?”
“The storm broke while I was outside.”
Katie’s warm, strong fingers calmed AJ, but when she closed her eyes, the dead boy was still there. She grabbed Katie’s shoulders to steady herself.
“I’m sorry for what I said,” AJ murmured against Katie’s ear, starting to explain why she didn’t know how the boy had died and neither did the ME. Katie kissed her, long and slow. She said something else, but AJ was beyond listening. The world was manageable in Katie’s arms.
* * *
Later, lightning painted the sky over Lake Michigan as AJ sped north through dark city streets, water licking at her tires. They’d eaten dinner, both wrapped in big robes, and afterward, she’d fallen asleep in Katie’s lap. The temperature had dropped into the low sixties, and she now wore dry boots, a clean black hoodie, and jeans.
She stopped at a red light. Milwaukee had been a battlefield since May, including two full-blown weeklong riots. The city was struggling with drugs, guns, and car thefts. The house they’d taken down today might solve the murder they’d chased all summer, but they were just beginning on the human trafficking operation they’d stumbled into. In all of her years of law enforcement, she’d never seen anything like it. It was huge. She’d fought to continue working with Chief Whiteaker’s group, but her bureau chief, Lawrence Kelly, was dead-set on his new task force in northern Wisconsin. He’d hardly paid any attention to any of her requests.
She pulled over to the curb in the quiet, dark neighborhood and checked her time. Right on schedule.
A full August moon hung in the sky behind the retreating storm but began to fade behind thick patches of Lake Michigan fog that turned the ancient brick church ahead of her gray and silver. Her boots scraped on the old stone steps, and she settled into the dark doorway. The wood vibrated against her shoulder as the church revved up for its single night song, the stroke of midnight bell. One deep note rolled out through the air, trembling across the city.
She jammed her hands into her black hoodie and waited for her confidential informant. Last fall, she’d found Frog, homeless and selling drugs on the streets, the orange jacket with the frog on it catching her attention. For a couple of months, Frog was invaluable for the drug task force until AJ had found her almost dead from meth after a winter blizzard and gotten her into rehab. Frog had gotten a job and gone back to school. Then everything had gone to hell.
They’d met right here three weeks ago when Frog had told her about human trafficking at the group house. AJ had immediately taken it to the Department of Justice as part of the FBI’s ongoing national investigation. The next day her bureau chief had surprised her with an order to take a week’s vacation. Katie had been thrilled with their first-time-ever time away but AJ had been puzzled at the timing. Then, when they returned, she’d found she had a task force on her hands and Frog was going north, right in the thick of the trafficking. She hadn’t intended on Frog going anywhere and was still angry.
Steps sounded to her left, and a young voice said, “AJ?”
“Here, Frog.”
“Damned fog. Can’t see more than two feet in front of me. Hurry, they’re leaving soon.”
AJ pulled the girl into the doorway. “How many are going with you? Be careful. This is dangerous.”
“Eleven girls and two women, brought in this afternoon in a big box truck. We’ll ride in that on the trip up north.” Frog impatiently shuffled her feet, looking every bit of her nineteen years, her spiked hair weaving shadows in the fog.
“Here’s the phone. Leave it on but toss it after you settle.” AJ shoved it into Frog’s light jacket. “Greg and Jeff will be about twenty minutes behind you. Any idea where you’re going?”
“No, but here’s the bank card for the money they gave me.” Frog handed her a debit card. “You know…just in case.”
Her heart lurched and she grabbed Frog’s arm. “Someone gave you money?”
“The two cops that hired me to go with the girls.”
“How do you know they were police?”
“What the hell, AJ? I’ve known cops for years. They had IDs and badges.” She backed up. “I gotta go,” she said, fading into the fog.
AJ gripped the bank card and moved back into the dark doorway. She didn’t know anything about someone paying Frog to do this.
An owl hooted in the trees behind the church. The fog lifted for a moment, and she stopped. She thought she heard footsteps. Suddenly, there was a sharp gunshot. A bullet lodged right above her shoulder with a jarring thud. She went down, ears ringing, and crawled forward, trying to get to her weapon.
The second shot hit the wood just above her head, and she sprawled on the wet stones. Heavy footsteps moved away into the fog. She took a breath so deep it hurt and dialed her team.
* * *
Chief Whiteaker sank down on the church steps beside her. His police and her ATF group were still going through the side streets.
“We’ve got the brass,” he said over a tired breath.
“This is crap. My task force’s not even official until the meeting tomorrow, but look.” She held out Frog’s bank card. “She said two policemen gave her cash to go undercover. She put it in the bank.”
He gave her a stunned look. “I don’t know of any police that have contacted her.”
“She’s dealt with police for years and believed them, right or wrong.”
“I have Frog marked everywhere as ours. There isn’t a cop in this city that would have touched her. That money’s off, damn it.” He stood and started toward his car. “My team’s waking people up, and I’m going to finish the neighborhood. Go home. Get some sleep. We’ll talk tomorrow.”
AJ pointed her agency SUV toward home on back streets, sliding carefully through patchy fog. She’d argued when Frog told her about the undercover scheme, but the kid never said a word about money. The kid. She thought about the young boy this afternoon.
“Damn this day.” She hit the steering wheel with her hand. For the first time in her career, she wanted to fight an assignment but she was busy. There was the meeting in the morning to pull Chief Whiteaker’s group into her new task force, the press conference to announce the new Milwaukee human trafficking task force, separate from hers, and then pick up the surprising new member of their group at the airport tomorrow afternoon.