Framed Shadows: Shadows Landing #6 Read online

  Tinsley had to think fast. They knew about Paxton and she was afraid she was going to have to give him up. However, she needed to keep her cover. If they knew she’d been helping him, she was dead.

  “When did this Paxton Johnson start working for you?” Curtis asked. Now was the time to sell her story. She sniffed and looked as if she were thinking. She was, but not about Curtis’s question. She needed a solid story to sell. “Not long. About a month.” She dropped her voice and leaned forward so her face wasn’t far from Curtis’s face. “I’m sorry, I don’t know the proper terms for any of this, but am I right in thinking you’re a criminal?”

  Curtis smiled with amusement and Tinsley knew she had him. “You could say that.”

  “Did this FBI agent, Paxton whatever, try to arrest you and now you think it’s the same Paxton who works for me?” Tinsley asked, keeping her voice low so Mark would struggle to hear.

  “That’s exactly what I think,” Curtis told her.

  “So you sent one of your guys after me, pretending to be an FBI agent, to . . . well, sir, now I’m lost.” Tinsley sighed and looked flustered. “I thought it was to see if it was the same Paxton, but you could have just taken him. What do I have to do with any of this? I’ve never broken the law. I do charity work. I babysit in my free time.” Tinsley let her lips tremble and drew in a shaky breath.

  Curtis was clearly amused by her rambling. Good. It was just what she wanted. “You were recently tasked with selling some very valuable art.”

  Tinsley nodded. “Yes, I’m selling a private collection.” She wrinkled her brow and really played it up. “You kidnapped me because you want to buy some art?”

  Curtis chuckled. “Maurice was right about you.”

  Tinsley looked excited. “You know Maurice? So you do want to buy the art. I have a whole day of buyers coming in tomorrow. I can add you to the list.”

  “Where is that art collection, Miss Faulkner?” Curtis asked. Behind the amusement was danger.

  “I told this guy. It’s in my vault at my gallery.”

  Mark shook his head and then struck out. Tinsley hadn’t seen the hit coming. Mark’s fisted hand smashed her cheekbone. Pain exploded and tears streamed from her eyes. She gasped, trying to catch her breath from the pain. No acting was required for this reaction. It had surprised her and hurt like hell.

  “I told you it’s not there.”

  Tinsley let the tears come. She cried hard now, nearly sobbing. “It has to be there. It was there last night when I got home from researching some of the paintings.”

  The men watching baseball were now casting glances at her. Curtis hadn’t reacted to the hit, but Mark looked as if he wanted to hit her again.

  “Can,” sniff, “I,” sniff, “have a tissue?” sniff.

  Curtis ignored her question but motioned for Mark to step back. “Do you know this man?” Curtis held up his phone. It was Paxton’s FBI employee picture. She couldn’t deny it. Mark had seen him in Shadows Landing.

  Tinsley nodded. “That’s Paxton Johnson, my employee.”

  “That is FBI Agent Paxton Kendry,” Curtis told her.

  She shook her head. He was watching her closely. “No, that’s . . . oh no.” Curtis raised his eyebrow, waiting for her to finish her thought. “He has the combination to the vault.” She swallowed hard as Mark cursed. Tinsley flinched and whimpered.

  Tinsley didn’t need to fake the flinch. Mark looked ready to kill her. Tinsley started to plead with him, but the hit came anyway.

  “Enough.” Curtis said to Mark, standing up from his chair. “We need to talk.”

  Tinsley struggled to slow the tears. She waited until they were a few steps away before she spoke again. “Paxton mentioned a place to me. Maybe he moved the paintings there? I was working when he told me about it so I have to admit I wasn’t paying close attention. I’ll try to remember it,” she lied.

  Curtis looked her over and gave a little nod. “Thank you, Miss Faulkner. Remembering would be a big help to not only me, but to you as well.”

  Tinsley let out a shaky breath as the men moved away and left her alone. Now all she had to do was buy more time. She had a couple of ideas that played into her delicate sensibilities to use to get free. Because, she reasoned, if there was ever a time to fake a case of the vapors, this was it.

  27

  Faulkner Shipping was a sprawling commercial port in its own right. It took up at least two miles of coastline. Massive cargo ships lined the piers as cranes worked to pull the containers from the holds and move them into the shipping yard.

  Men and women swarmed the area, working on the unloading, loading, and the mountains of paperwork that went into each shipment. There was a central, stadium-sized parking lot where Granger and the caravan from Shadows Landing parked to wait for everyone else to arrive.

  Ryker had told them they could go inside and use one of the conference rooms, but no one wanted to take even one step farther away from the Myriad headquarters than they had to.

  Whitlock and his team had arrived five minutes after Granger had pulled into the parking lot. A large map that highlighted known Myriad houses and businesses had been produced and spread out across the hood of a car. Now they were looking at the map and waiting for the Davies family to arrive.

  “Which one is the headquarters?” Paxton asked.

  “We’re not entirely sure,” Whitlock answered and Paxton frowned. What he really wanted to do was to hit something but instead he saved his anger for Curtis.

  “Then what are we doing here, Whitlock?” Paxton snapped.

  “Waiting and preparing. I have informants coming in. This is the area where they’ll have Tinsley. We need to get our supplies ready because I can guarantee they’ll be heavily armed.”

  “Peter’s on his way with weapons,” Paxton answered. More waiting.

  “I have some you can use,” Ryker said as he shoved his suit coat off and rolled up the sleeves to his fitted button-down dress shirt. “The shipping business is a very dirty business to be in. Lots of ports are run by organized crime or have deals in place for free rein of them. Containers are stolen. Drugs, stolen goods, and people are imported and exported. Intimidation, theft, and embezzlement happen everyday. The mafia hasn’t gone away. They’re still here. They’re just not the new kids on the block anymore. These street gangs are. Where do you think Myriad gets their drugs to sell?”

  “South American mafias,” Paxton answered.

  Ryker nodded. “Who work deals with the mafia groups who have control over the ports in New York and New Jersey. But with more shipping companies using East Coast ports, there are now three more large ports on the coast—Virginia, Savannah, and right here in Charleston. So yeah, I have weapons. I protect what’s mine.”

  A kid on a bike, a twenty-year-old chipped gray sedan, and a newer minivan all pulled into the lot. Right behind them was Peter in an SUV and then two other SUVs Paxton didn’t recognize.

  “Here are my informants,” Whitlock said.

  “Here’s our boss,” Paxton said.

  “And our family,” Ryker told them, answering the unspoken question of who was in the last two SUVs. “They caught a private flight here from Atlanta.”

  Cy was the first out and was already shaking hands with Peter. Paxton wanted to demand they hurry up. He wanted to demand they get to work to save Tinsley, but he knew they had to have a plan first. They weren’t moving slowly. They were already walking toward him as they all eyed each other, not knowing who the others were.

  The Faulkners embraced their uncles and their friends from Keeneston. Before Paxton could tell them to hurry up, Robyn was pawing at his leg. He looked down and swore he saw sympathy in her whiskey-colored eyes.

  “That’s my dog,” a low, gravelly voice said.

  “Ahmed, I’m Paxton. Thank you for coming.” Paxton looked at the scary man with his own vizsla in a baby sling across his chest. “Who’s that?”

  “This is my baby, Nemi. She’s Robyn’s
daughter. Robyn is trained in tracking, but I have trained my Nemi for much more than that.”

  Joining them, Bridget said, “Robyn isn’t our dog. She’s our friend’s dog. So if we’re going into a shootout, I have to keep Robyn in the car. It’s not what she’s signed up to do.”

  “She’s done her tour of duty, haven’t you, my sweet girl?” Ahmed baby-talked to Robyn who wagged her tail. Even though she responded to Ahmed, she kept her paw on Paxton’s leg and her eyes on his. It was as if she were reading Paxton’s thoughts and even his soul.

  Cy approached him and Paxton hoped he waited to kill him until he’d saved Tinsley. “You brought danger to Tinsley.”

  “I know. I’ll accept the consequences of it, but first we have to save her.”

  “Or die trying?” Cy asked.

  “Without hesitation.” Cy stared at him for a moment and then nodded. “Let’s get to work,” Paxton said to the group. “I’m Agent Paxton Kendry. This is Agent in Charge Peter Castle and this is Agent Whitlock of the drug unit. Then we have Granger Fox and Kord King of the Shadows Landing Sheriff’s Department. Lastly, we have the Davies family who are related to the Faulkners.”

  “Y’all are some scary-ass mother—” The teenage boy who’d ridden a bike there got cut off when the woman who had driven the minivan smacked the back of his head.

  “I’m Kendis. My son was killed by a drive-by in our neighborhood a while back. We’re good people here. We work hard and try to make a better life for our kids, but then the Myriad moved in,” she told them.

  A fortyish man with perfectly trimmed hair and some faded prison tats spoke next. “I’m LaVaughn. After my arrest for drugs twenty years ago, I turned my life around. I own a barbershop in town and try to help mentor the men who sit in my chair.”

  “I’m Roshaun,” the boy told them. “My brother’s part of the Myriad.”

  Paxton looked at the boy who couldn’t be more than fourteen. “You’re very brave to help us. You know there’s a chance your brother will be arrested today, right?”

  Roshaun nodded and LaVaughn clasped his shoulder in support. “He was my hero. Then he started dealing. He sold to my best friend and he died of an overdose. I begged my brother to stop. My mom begged him to stop. He won’t. He likes the money and power. Well, I’m taking back that power. If I can get them off the street, I can save lives. I wasn’t able to save my best friend, but I’ll be damned if I let my brother kill anyone else with these drugs. I have a little sister to look out for. We’ll work our way out of the neighborhood so I don’t have to worry about sleeping next to her on the floor in case of a drive-by like the one that killed Miss Kendis’s son.”

  Kendis took a deep breath and nodded. “My son wasn’t part of the gang. He was at home, watching television. But the Myriads were fighting for a corner and shot up the whole area. So you tell us what you need and we’ll help you in any way we can.”

  “Thank you all. Curtis Engle, the head of the Myriad from Atlanta, has the woman I love. These are her family and friends and we’ll do anything to get her back safely. Now, here’s what we know.” Paxton filled them in on Tinsley, the Myriad, and Agent Mark Trevino. Then he turned to the map of the area. “We know they came this way, but we don’t know anything else.”

  “They’re not at Robinson’s place,” Roshaun told them as he pointed to a house marked on the map. “I live down the street. He’s the second-in-command here.”

  Kendis nodded. “Brown is the leader here and I passed his house on the way here. There were no cars there.”

  LaVaughn’s lips pursed as he looked at the map. “They weren’t at any of their normal hangouts when I drove here. There’s here,” he said, pointing to some of the commercial areas.

  “What about the Tin Can?” Roshaun asked and both Kendis and LaVaughn nodded.

  “That’s where they have to be,” LaVaughn said as he pointed to an area right on the river. “It’s an old abandoned biker bar. The gang took it over and no one dares kick them out. It’s the largest building to hang out in and it’s far away from anyone. It has one long drive into the place so they can see who is coming.

  “Do they watch the river?” Paxton asked as he pulled up satellite images of the property.

  “Exactly what I was thinking,” Miles said as he looked over Paxton’s shoulder at the satellite images.

  “If they do, it’ll only be one person. They’d be able to hear boats,” LaVaughn told them.

  “There’s a long dock that goes over the marsh and up some steps to the first floor of the bar,” Wade said. “I’ve boated by there several times with the Coast Guard.”

  “Can we swim up?” Paxton asked and looked to Wade for answers.

  “Yeah. There’s probably some alligators in the marsh, but otherwise the grasses should help hide us, especially if we go during high tide.” Wade looked at his watch and nodded to himself. “It’s peak tide in two hours. We could go anytime and be able to swim most of it.”

  “I can cause a distraction,” Cy said with grin as he looked to his brother Cade. “Want to blow some stuff up?”

  “I always want to blow stuff up,” Cade said with a smirk.

  “Hey, I’m ATF. I live to blow stuff up,” Dare said.

  Cy turned to the three informants. “Which three locations would hurt them the most if they got blown up?”

  “Won’t that hurt their neighbors?” Kendis asked.

  “Don’t worry, ma’am,” Dare said with a big smile. “We’re really good at this.”

  “I believe you. I think you could just look at the building and it would explode from fear,” Roshaun said to Cy who grinned in return.

  “Here,” LaVaughn pointed to a house.

  Kendis still looked nervous, but she pointed to a warehouse-looking place. “Here. They store their drugs here.”

  “My brother always goes here,” Roshaun said, pointing to a business front. “I think they sell drugs from there. Can I come with you?”

  Cy shook his head but stepped closer to Roshaun so he could talk to him. “I don’t want any of you associated with this. You’ve all been very brave and anytime you need us, we’ll come.” Cy handed Roshaun a business card that only had a phone number on it. “But I want you with LaVaughn, sitting in his chair in full view of everyone while this goes down.”

  “Don’t worry,” Marshall said to them. “We’ll clean up the mess we make.”

  Roshaun tapped Cy on the arm. “Who’s the scary motherfu”—he glanced at Kendis and corrected himself— “guy with the dog strapped to his chest like a baby?”

  “I am Ahmed. This is Nemi. We take care of problems like the Myriad for fun.”

  Roshaun stepped closer to Cy, and Paxton couldn’t help but smile. They were a strange bunch that had banded together but there wasn’t anyone else he’d want having his back, even if it meant the Davies crew would kill him for putting Tinsley in danger.

  “You all can go. Don’t tell a soul what’s going on,” Whitlock told his informants.

  “I’ll make my cookies,” Kendis told them. “That’ll clear the street of any children. Just give me thirty minutes.”

  “You got it,” Paxton said as they waited for the three to leave before turning back to the group. “Cy, Cade, and Dare will blow things up in forty minutes. Hopefully, that will empty some of the Tin Can. I need a group to round them up.”

  “I can help with that,” Annie said. “Bridget should take the dogs into the building, but I can help round people up. I would think Whitlock, you, and your crew could help with that, too.”

  Whitlock nodded. “Yeah, we can do that.”

  “I’ll come in via the water,” Wade said.

  “Cy, Marshall, and I will, too,” Miles said, turning to Wade. “Have any equipment with you?”

  “I got you covered,” Wade told them.

  Peter nodded. “We need an agent with every group. I guess I’m water.”

  “Faulkners, I want you nearby—especially Gavin. I can�
��t have you in the line of fire,” Paxton said to the rest of the family. Everyone nodded, even Harper, but not Ryker.

  “I’m going with you,” Ryker told him.

  Paxton looked over Ryker and tightened his jaw. Ryker stood tall and strong with a look of pure determination on his face. Ahmed looked him over, too.

  “We’re the door-kicker team,” Ahmed said, pointing to Paxton and Bridget.

  “Us too,” Granger said as he and Kord stepped forward.

  Ryker didn’t look discouraged. Instead, he shook his head. “I have a better idea. One they won’t see coming.” Ryker pointed to the top of the office building where a helicopter Paxton hadn’t even heard was landing.

  “Is that—?” Paxton began to ask, but Ryker was already nodding.

  “A stealth helicopter,” Ahmed said with a big grin. “How did you get one? I’ve been trying to get one for years.”

  “We all have our secrets, don’t we?” Ryker shrugged and Paxton knew there was no way Ryker would tell Ahmed where it came from. “But I’ll put in a good word for you.”

  “Honey, if I get one, can we put a big bow on it like they do for new cars?” Ahmed asked Bridget who just rolled her eyes. “I can’t wait to see how she works. We can drop onto the rooftop patio at Curtis’s and he’ll never hear us coming.”

  Bridget looked down at Susi and smiled. “Want to go for a ride?” The dog barked happily.

  “Ryker, that’s perfect. With the distraction going off, they’ll be on edge. They’ll look out but won’t see us coming. We’ll come from the water and the air,” Paxton said as he looked at a picture of the rooftop patio that had clearly been set up for outdoor bar seating.

  “Let Kord and me take the front door. You have all the other doors covered,” Granger said, and Paxton nodded his agreement.

  “And we’ll clean up anyone who tries to escape,” Whitlock said as his team nodded behind him.