DANGEROUS PROMISES (THE SISTERHOOD SERIES Book 1) Read online

“Tank,” Leo supplied, scowling at her. “How did you plan on infiltrating the operation?”

  Toni arched an eyebrow, daring him to challenge their plan. “Monique invited me to come talk to her this morning. It was a step in the right direction.”

  “But you didn’t suspect her?”

  “I said I wasn’t sure. I planned to get into the Center, close to her and the kids living inside, and get them to trust me, eventually to confide in me. Then look around the place. If it's where these kids are being shipped from, there’d be evidence. I had to get in to find it.”

  “There can't be just one person. Not in an operation this size,” Jones pointed out. “It wouldn't be difficult for someone at the Center to work on the kids once they get them in the door. There’s a built-in coercion technique since they are offering them food, shelter, safety. How many has Wilson delivered?”

  “At least three and Monique has connections that the others don’t. From all over the world. How many big names were at that party last night?” Leo wiped his hand over his mouth. “She got pissed when I asked about her ‘bodyguard.’”

  “That big guy?” Jones asked. “He might be able to use her connections then make her a patsy.”

  “No.” Toni shook her head. “Leo's right. He's her muscle. He doesn't have the brains to manage an operation this elaborate. We’re not only talking about sex trafficking. They’ve stepped it up with guns and drugs. He doesn't have the money to back it up. It can't be cheap to shuttle these kids over the borders.”

  “There was a lot of money at that party last night and any of them might be who we're looking for. Suppliers, clients...who knows.”

  “Maybe.” Toni rose, biting her lower lip as she paced. “But then why go after Rose? My cover wasn't compromised, so they didn’t know my real identity. There was no way to find my family to retaliate for this morning. No time for all that.”

  “What if they weren't going after her in retaliation for Wilson? What if they assumed you noticed something today? When you left, Monique pulled Tank aside and pointed at your car. What if she was sending him after you and they found Rose instead?”

  Toni stopped pacing long enough to turn back toward him. “What?”

  “You’re identical twins, you both drive black Mercedes.”

  “With almost half a million people in Vegas and as many cars?” Jones asked. “How would they find her?”

  “Sunshine Market is only a few miles away. An operation this size has eyes all over this city. If they put the word out to find someone matching your description or car, then located her…” The more they bounced ideas off one another, the closer they were digging closer to the truth. Leo regretted they hadn't done this sooner. “These people knew what you look like, Toni. They couldn't tell you and Rose apart and they wouldn’t risk discovery by having a drawn-out conversation with her.”

  "But why?" Her voice was a weak breath of sound.

  “Maybe Monique or her thug panicked, or they decided they didn't like you asking questions today,” Jones suggested. “Snatching you and shipping you out of the country would shut down your questions, even if you were nothing but a harmless college student.”

  Toni cringed at the mention of what might be in store for her sister. Leo shook his head, his brows pinched together on his forehead. “No. As far as they're concerned, Toni is exactly that, a student asking questions about runaways and what the center offers. Did you ask anything specific? Something directly related to Monique or the missing girls?”

  “No, just observing Monique and getting a baseline for her responses. She was the one who offered a tour of the facility.”

  “Did you ask about any suspicious areas she wouldn’t show you,” Leo asked.

  Toni glared at him. “Not my first rodeo. I know what I’m doing.”

  “Fuck. We keep going in circles. The answer is right here for us if we could see it.”

  “Put a pin in Monique and Tank for a second. Who are you watching from the party last night?”

  “Who aren’t we following?” Jones rolled his eyes.

  “You were talking to the senator when I came up last night. Any reason?” Leo asked.

  “I told her to,” Jones offered. “He’s forked over a lot of money to the 4Teen Center in the past and, we’ve been able to link him to several underage prostitutes, although that story hasn’t broken yet.”

  He rolled his eyes. Folding his hands, he tapped them against his mouth thoughtfully. “It wasn’t a surprise he was schmoozing Gupta and Bolton. Bolton’s been donating a lot of money to Fitzpatrick’s campaign and he's suspected of insurance fraud.”

  “I heard something about that,” Toni reminded him.

  “ Gupta, on the other hand...” Jones' lip curled in disgust. “That man is scum. Crawford’s been after him for over a year now when an escort he was with turned up mutilated. So far, we can't touch him because of his diplomatic status.”

  “I wondered why Crawford was there. That little tidbit might be something you should have told me before I went in,” Toni said, disgust coloring her tone.

  Leo didn't give them the opportunity to bicker over last night's events as the pieces clicked together in his head, a picture – albeit abstract – forming. “You didn't catch the way he looked at you when you walked away, Toni. That man wanted to follow you. What if he asked Monique to get you?” Leo wasn’t one-hundred percent certain but enough he’d bet his badge that Gupta had something to do with Rose's disappearance.

  “Like placing an order to-go.” Jones shook his head.

  “That son of a bitch,” Toni bit out through clenched teeth, jumping up and starting for the door but Leo’s fingers wrapped around her wrist gently, stopping her. They had nothing but speculations. No proof, no clues and no indication of where they might have headed with Rose unless she showed up at the house the FBI was watching in Mexico. They needed to get her phone back from Forensics. Hopefully there was something on it or the SIM card that might point them in a general direction.

  “They could be anywhere. You don’t have a clue where to start.” His reminder was gentle but to the point.

  “Yes, we do.”

  There was a “suicide mission” tone in her voice. Leo shot Jones a warning glance. The man had to realize Toni would do whatever it took to get Rose back.

  “Toni, you don't go rogue on me now,” Jones warned. “If you go back to the 4Teen Center, you'll compromise the case and we’re too far in now. There are too many lives at risk if you blow your cover. We have video of the Center from all day today. We’ll go over it and see what we can find out. If they brought her back there, it’ll be in the film. Let Leo call in the locals to find your sister. In the meantime, you have to act rationally.”

  Toni closed her eyes and exhaled slowly. “Rational,” she repeated. “Yeah, okay.” Leo and Jones eyed her speculatively. “I said, okay.”

  Leo wasn’t fooled. The stiff shoulders, the way she refused to meet Jones’s gaze, the sudden shift in the inflection of her voice from panicked to calm. She wouldn't wait around for someone else to get her sister back. She would infiltrate the 4Teen Center on her own.

  Leo refused to let that happen.

  Toni tried to concentrate on the surveillance footage from the Center. She and Jones had set up several video monitors in the study but the problem was that there wasn’t anything to see. A few delivery vans entering, unloading boxes and leaving again. Even from the first of several angles, she saw they were nothing but supplies for the facility. She had absolutely no tolerance for watching drivers unload ten cartons of toilet paper.

  "Well, this is interesting." Jones paused the video for her.

  As she leaned toward the screen, Toni saw Wilson pull his now-wrecked truck into the shop behind the main building. Monique's bodyguard approached the back of the pickup and they appeared to argue for a few minutes before the asshole, looking pissed, got back into the truck and drove away.

  Toni pushed her chair back. “This is
a waste of time.”

  “That proves that kid is connected to the Center. He was there at--" Jones noted the time on the video. "Four-sixteen.”

  “So, what? He works for them. The only thing this proves is they don’t care about the truck being wrecked.”

  “It also proves that Tank was there at that time. We need to find out where he was before and after.”

  She looked across the study to where Leo paced as he talked on the phone. “I should be out looking for her.”

  “You’re doing exactly what you should be doing. Chill, T.” He tapped the screen, trying to refocus her attention on it.

  “Chill?” She glared at her partner. “Could you chill? If it was Angie or one of your kids?”

  Jones sighed heavily. “No, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t what you should be doing. Leo has several guys out looking for that truck, Wilson, Tank and Monique Bentley. Until we hear something—”

  “I’m just sitting here with my thumb up my ass. What the hell am I supposed to tell my mother? Especially after my father…” She dropped her face into her palm, guilt eating at her.

  “I know, T, I know.” Jones nudged her shoulder with his. “Let’s go through the next hour, see if Wilson returns or if Tank leaves. There’s got to be something in here.”

  She rubbed her hands over her eyes and rose, pacing the room. “This is my fault. I should’ve warned her. I should have called her from the airport.”

  “First off, you had no idea they had people out looking for you so you couldn’t recognize that she was in danger. Second, you had no opportunity there and, third, you’d have jeopardized the case.”

  “Instead, I put her life at risk because I didn’t make time. Hers and my mother’s. Maybe Leo’s right. I shouldn’t have taken this case.”

  “Toni?” She spun at the husky sound of Leo’s voice. “They’ve spotted Tank at a strip club. I’ve got eyes on him and they'll keep me posted if he moves. If that guy so much as sneezes in the wrong direction, we’re picking him up.” He looked at her expectantly and moved closer.

  Engulfed by the desire to rush into his arms and let him hold her, Toni wanted Leo to say that none of this was her fault. But the guilt was hers, all of it. Her rocky relationship with Leo, her sister being kidnapped. If only she'd listened to them instead of her own ego. She'd convinced herself she was making a difference but, in reality, she’d traded the lives of people she loved for those she didn't know. She didn’t deserve Leo's comfort. Toni stuffed her grief back behind the iron wall of her heart and turned away from him, unwilling to let him see her anguish.

  “What about the other guy? Wilson?”

  “We’re still trying to find him.”

  “Fine,” she turned, marching toward the doorway. “You guys keep searching. I’m going to look for Monique Bentley.”

  “She’s at City Hall. I’ve got eyes on her and she’s being tailed.”

  “Good, then I can take a look in that shop in the back of the Center.”

  “No one is there, T.” Jones stood behind her, like the two were boxing her in. “It's locked up tight.”

  “Which is why I’m going now, before someone shows up.”

  Toni went to her father’s safe behind the picture on the wall behind his desk and punched in the security code - her parents’ anniversary followed by the year she and Rose were born…the two most important days of her father’s life - then pulled out his .40 and the S&W 9mm. After loading both, she strapped them on and slipped her Glock into the holster on her hip. Today was the day she would bring her sister home. She wouldn't fail the people she loved again.

  Without looking back and before either man could stop her, she snatched the keys to Leo’s car from the table and headed for the door. She’d no more slid into the driver’s seat when the passenger door opened.

  “You really think we’d let you go in alone?” Leo asked, sliding into the seat, Jones on his heels.

  Toni twisted the key in the ignition. “I’m doing this alone. If anything happens, you two would both lose your jobs. Or worse.” She closed her eyes, bowing her head. The harsh reality of what she was doing threatened to make her pause. She was entering a property illegally, with multiple weapons, with intent to kill anyone who stood between her and Rose. “I can’t let you go.”

  “Okay.” Leo was far too amiable for her to take him seriously. “Let’s sit here for a while, arguing about this and then you can go only to find us there waiting for you? Or,” he continued, “we can head over together and Jones and I will still have your back.”

  “I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” Jones muttered.

  She glanced at him as he dropped into the back seat. “Yeah, me too,” she admitted.

  “We can turn back, T. You don't have to do this.”

  “Yes, I do.” Toni floored the pedal as she pulled away from the house, not caring she was about to break the law and risk her career, or that she was giving up her future if caught. Her only focus was rescuing Rose and, somehow, making sure that both two men came back safely. Even if that meant sacrificing herself to do it.

  9

  “Are you feeling better, Casey?”

  The woman opened her eyes, squinting against the light shining into her face, making it impossible for her to see who spoke to her. She absently rubbed a hand at the spot on her wrist where the zip ties had abraded fragile skin, leaving it raw and welted. “Why do you keep calling me that? My name is Rose.”

  A hard slap rocked her head to one side. She’d never seen it coming. “You can’t possibly expect me to be dumb enough to believe that.”

  Rage welled within as the woman cupped her cheek with her hand, tears filling in her dark eyes. A small cut on her cheek welled with a dot of blood and a sizzle of pleasure swirled within. Physically hurting someone was refreshing. Instead of always being “on,” performing for a crowd of people as insignificant as worms. The woman sniffed, bowing her head. When she lifted it again, she sniffed back the tears. Curiosity piqued, it only took a step to close the distance between them. Most women wouldn’t bother to stop their tears; some of the men couldn’t manage it. This one was tougher than she looked which could prove dangerous. Something none of them were prepared for.

  They were used to submissive women, women pleading for mercy, soliciting their next fix to help them quit thinking about the hollow inside, whatever that might be. An abusive boyfriend, parents who didn’t love enough. It didn’t matter. What mattered was giving each one what they thought they wanted until they became ensnared in the web of deceit, too far gone to ever leave on their own.

  “We’ve already met, Casey. I'm surprised you don’t remember. You introduced yourself to me as Casey. Were you lying then? Or are you lying now?”

  “I swear I’m not—”

  The crack of a palm hitting a cheek was invigorating. Fresh blood trickled down Casey’s chin from a fresh cut on her cheekbone. An angry red imprint glowed against her milky skin. Gupta would be livid about the marks but so relieved to receive his package that he’d overlook the damage caused in the transport. But, there was still a little time before delivery. Casey’s eyes widened as the needle drew closer before sliding into the vein. This time, she didn’t fight as the drugs entered her system. A good sign; it meant submission was taking hold. They might even be able to place her into the cage with another girl leaving this week. As long as she stayed quiet. As long as she continued to cooperate.

  “Just relax, Casey. You won’t be here much longer. Soon you’ll be on your way to that happily ever after with your prince.”

  Toni watched the building from a safe distance atop a hilltop. That was part of the problem. Even if her sister walked by, directly below her, she was too far away for her to do any good. Not that anyone was moving below. Stillness echoed over the landscape. No white pickups, no delivery trucks, not even a skittering leaf moved below. A light glowed outside the main entry door to the garage with both wide bay doors sealed with padlocks to deter an
y break-ins. It wouldn’t matter.

  She passed the night vision binoculars back to Jones. “Watch my back.”

  She stood and Leo jerked her down. “Where the fuck do you think you’re going?”

  “Inside.” She glared at his hand on her wrist and jerked her arm away. “If my sister is inside, nothing is stopping me from getting her out.”

  “T, let’s call for back up,” Jones suggested.

  “That sounds like a plan.” Leo let loose a sigh of relief at Jones’s logic. “We’ll stay out here until they arrive. Then we can head inside.”

  Toni glared at them. “I don’t need permission from either of you. I didn’t want you to come, remember?”

  “Wait a second,” Leo hissed, tugging her back toward him. “We need to, at least, come up with some kind of strategy. We can’t go in with guns blazing.” She arched a defiant brow making it clear that was her plan. “No. Not an option, Toni.”

  “Fine. Over there.” She pointed at a stand of ash trees hanging over the back wall of the lot. “We’ll scale them and drop over the fence. That will put us on the back side of the shop around the corner from the landing bay. The building looks like it’s to code so there should be at least one exit door on that wall.”

  “Anything – anyone – might be waiting.”

  Toni shrugged, indicating it didn't matter to her in the slightest. “I guess we’ll figure it out when we get there, won’t we?”

  She took off at a jog over the hills, keeping her body ducked low as she dodged the creosote and mesquite.

  Toni glanced backward. Leo and Jones were in a heated discussion, arms flailing until Leo followed her lead, leaving Jones to monitor the building from the outside. Under any other circumstances, she’d have smiled at how much faster and more nimble she was. But with her sister’s life on the line, her gut tightened at the mere thought that he might lack the stealth essential to get in and out without detection. Her feet as sure over the rocks as a mountain goat, Toni scrambled down the hillside and eased behind the group of ash trees before slipping through shadows that didn’t quite disguise Leo's larger form.