The Yakuza Gambit Read online

  “With what?”

  “The flash drive Kwon wanted. Did you tell him where it was?”

  “No. Never. Mr. LaSala would’ve killed me. But it doesn’t matter. It’s gone.”

  “Gone? Gone where?”

  “To the bottom.” Palmer waved his damaged hand. “The bottom. It’s gone, man. My hand really hurts. And I’m tired.”

  “Billy.” Bannon gently shook the man’s leg to get his attention. “Billy. The flash drive? Are you saying it was on your boat, the Bottom Line?”

  That got Bannon a nod.

  “Where? I searched your boat. We didn’t find it.”

  “Aoi. Aoi ikimono.”

  Bannon looked at Singleton who shrugged. “Gibberish,” the cop said.

  Was the young man going into shock? Becoming incoherent?

  Tara frowned, then she snapped her fingers. “Wait. That’s Japanese. Ao is blue. Aoi ikimono is blue creature. Blue creature. That’s a cartoon character. An anime character.”

  Bannon came to his feet. “You’re kidding.” He smiled, excited. “That’s it.”

  “Did you both get knocked on the head, too?” Singleton asked.

  “No. Well yes, I did, but that’s not the point,” Bannon said. “I know what he’s talking about.”

  “Don’t leave us in the dark,” Kwon said.

  Bannon glared at him. “Shut up. Chief, we’ve had the flash drive the whole time.”

  “We have?”

  “Yes. In evidence. The little blue cartoon figure on his keyring. It’s the damn flash drive.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  Twenty-four hours later, Bannon and Tara sat in the dark, in the front seats of a dark gray van he’d borrowed from the DHS, used for surveillance purposes. Tucked out of sight on an old gravel service road under a street light Bannon had disabled earlier, they watched the entrance to the Ocean Gate Container Terminal in South Boston.

  The seaport terminal, in continuous operation since World War II, though owned and run by various operations and corporate entities over the years since, served as the primary container facility for the Port of Boston. With its entrance channel dredged to forty-five feet, the terminal could handle panamax and new panamax-size container ships, transferring over a quarter of a million cargo containers per year. They operated on a twenty-four-hour, seven day a week cycle, only closed on Christmas Day and Thanksgiving.

  A lot had happened since they’d taken Kwon and those of his crew still alive into custody on the sub-chaser the night before. Bannon first made a call to a friend: Chief Petty Officer Johnson. Shane Johnson commanded a Maritime Safety & Security Team, a Coast Guard anti-terrorism team that had helped Bannon out recently on another venture. Now, he needed them to work with Singleton to keep Kwon’s capture under wraps until the rest of the operation was done.

  Singleton wasn’t happy about being sidelined to babysit Kwon and his men, but after hearing what Bannon had planned, he reluctantly agreed.

  Now, with everything in place, all they had to do was execute the plan without anything going wrong. Bannon ignored the niggling little voice in the back of his mind that said good luck with that.

  A black town car sped past them. A black SUV followed.

  Bannon called McMurphy on his cell phone, putting the call on speaker. “LaSala just showed up. I’m putting his entourage at nine.” He glanced at Tara.

  Watching through a pair of binoculars, she nodded. “Four in the lead vehicle, including LaSala. Five in the trailing SUV.”

  “You all set on your end?” Bannon asked McMurphy.

  “Good to go, but let me just say it’s a good thing I’m not claustrophobic.”

  “I hear you,” Bannon said. “We’ll update you as soon as we can. Until then maintain radio silence and sit tight.”

  “What the hell else am I gonna do?”

  “Good point.” Bannon disconnected the call. To Tara, he said, “Ready?”

  “Can’t wait.” She climbed out of the van and quietly clicked the door closed. Even with her sun-drenched dark skin the bruise under her eye looked ugly and painful.

  Bannon joined her at the front of the van. They would be going into the shipyard on foot.

  Armed with their 9mm, and Blades with her haladie of course. A heavily armed assault was not the game plan. Dressed in black, they followed the two vehicles into the port facility, darting unseen from container to container, hugging the shadows.

  Robert Duckett, McMurphy’s undercover DEA friend, had told him they had Rafael Solis, the leader of the Boyacá Cartel, under loose surveillance. He’d arrived in the U.S. the day before, traveling under an assumed identity. Over the past twenty-four hours, he’d met with several local Boyacá gang affiliates, and from confidential informants associated with the gangs, they’d learned of a scheduled meeting Solis was to have at the terminal that night but they didn’t know with whom.

  Bannon did.

  The DEA’s plan was to allow Solis go about his business, gather as much intel, then nabbing him before he had a chance to leave the country. Bannon had a better idea. Through Duckett, McMurphy had run it by the New England Division special agent in charge, who refused to sign off on the plan.

  Bannon played his trump card and called Elizabeth Grayson. She cut through the red tape and shut the DEA down. Then she warned Bannon, “Don’t screw this up.”

  “Why would Solis risk coming here in person?” Tara asked.

  “This is Solis’ big shot. A gambit to bigger and better things. Dominate the New England market with LaSala’s help then expand the operation through the New York crime families.”

  As the time for the meeting between LaSala and Solis drew near, Bannon’s phone had been blowing up all day with messages from LaSala, who still believed Bannon and Tara were working on his behalf. He left dozens of messages, each growing more frantic and desperate throughout the day. Bannon ghosted him, letting the man stew. “I’m sure Solis is here to make sure nothing goes wrong.”

  “He’s in for a big surprise,” Tara said.

  “More than you know,” Bannon said. “LaSala’s going to have to explain to him face to face why he doesn’t have the money needed to complete the deal.”

  “That’s sure to go over well,” Tara said as they jogged passed a corrugated warehouse building. They circled to the front of the building, then stopped as a forklift carrying a pallet full of drums passed.

  Across the way, LaSala’s two vehicle convoy slowed. The vehicles’ brake lights flared before making a left turn between two rows of containers.

  Bannon had studied the terminal’s layout beforehand, committing it to memory. It was laid out in a grid pattern of three sections. Each section contained six rows of containers lined up one against the next called blocks. These blocks were the designated areas where cargo containers were stored. Either imports after unloading and waiting for pick up or exports to be loaded onto waiting container ships. All right on the waterfront, providing ample room for the large ships coming into port to deliver and pickup freight.

  Across the harbor, planes taking off from Logan Airport could be heard. Their twinkling lights seen as they ascended at an angle into the dark night sky.

  Duckett’s intel suggested Solis’ drugs had arrived in the port within the last two or three days, but that was all they knew for sure. Any bill of laden and cargo manifest records would be counterfeit. The shipment’s point of origin lost in a sea of shell corporations, fabricated companies, and a web of fake transfers and lost documents. In a sea of containers occupying over one hundred acres of land, the only way to learn which shipping container held the Boyacá Cartel drugs would be for Solis to lead them to it.

  Bannon and Tara remained out of sight, hopscotching from the shadowy aisles between containers, advancing their way to the slow-moving vehicles while avoiding the knots of workers strolling to or from their work assignments. Many of them carrying metal lunchboxes. All of them wearing hard hats.

  The SUV took a righ
t turn. Two rows further up, the town car made a left.

  “They’re separating,” Tara observed.

  “LaSala’s thugs getting into position,” Bannon said. “They’ll cover the meeting from the top of the containers, gain the high ground and surveil the entire area.”

  He texted the information to McMurphy, keeping him in the loop.

  “And if things go sideways,” Tara suggested, “sharpshooters will turn the place into a killing field.”

  Bannon thought the same thing. “You can bet Solis has got men doing the same thing. Come on.”

  He led her to the left.

  They’d have to be doubly careful now to avoid any gunmen setting up to cover the meeting from either group. Not to mention arousing the suspicion of drivers, longshoremen, and others going about their usual business.

  They moved down a row of containers until they were across a roadway between blocks. Ahead of them, the town car pulled to a stop. It faced a second car, a dark gray Toyota Highlander.

  The Highlander flashed its headlights twice.

  Around them the terminal continued to operate. Nearby a crane lifted containers off a five hundred foot long handymax bulk carrier. The crane stacked the containers on a yard tractor.

  Elsewhere, toplifts—a forklift-type vehicle—unloaded the yard tractors, stacking the containers they pulled into assigned blocks. The beeping of warning bells and backup alarms was constant amid the shouting of workers. Lights flooded the working terminal, illuminating it like a night game at Fenway Park, but creating deep shadows around the containers as well.

  The back doors of the Highlander popped open. Two men stepped out and strolled to the front of the vehicle. In the wash of headlights, Bannon got his first look at Rafael Solis.

  In his thirties, he had thick black hair slicked back and swarthy dark skin. Handsome, clean shaven, with dark eyes. He wore casual clothes with a striped blue and white shirt open at the collar under a black North Face winter coat.

  LaSala and Dominick Bonucci stepped out of the town car. With a click, the trunk’s lid popped open. LaSala closed his suit jacket button and squared his shoulders. He wore no winter coat. He glanced over the car’s roof at Bonucci, nodded, and the two of them advanced joined Solis and his man.

  Bannon assumed him to be Solis’ second in command. His lieutenant.

  In the wash of car headlights, LaSala extended his hand. Solis removed his leather glove. The two men shook hands.

  Bonucci and his counterpart remained a step behind their bosses without extending a greeting.

  “It’s too cold here in your Northeast,” Solis complained, hurriedly putting his glove back on.

  “This ain’t nothing,” LaSala said. “Try being here in January.”

  Their voices carried on the crisp air. Bannon and Tara were close enough to hear them clearly.

  “It wasn’t necessary for you to travel all this way,” LaSala said.

  “My brother, Raul, he worries,” Rafael Solis said, “This is an important opportunity to us, all of us. We felt it best to ensure nothing goes wrong.”

  “Yeah, well, as it turns out I’m glad you’re here,” LaSala said. “We have something needs discussing.”

  Solis glanced around the terminal. A forklift motored by them. “I am not comfortable out in the open this way. I feel…exposed.”

  “It’s better than acting all clandestine like,” LaSala said. “That’s what causes suspicion. I pay the people who work here, including the port police, more than enough to keep their heads turned and their mouths shut.”

  “Then let’s us get on with it. I have a boat to catch. I’ve risked too much being here already.”

  “Agreed,” LaSala said. “Is the shipment here? I wish to inspect it.”

  Solis’s lieutenant handed him a piece of paper. Solis glanced at it and nodded. The lieutenant turned and walked down a line of containers. One stacked tightly besides the next. He stopped at a blue one at the end of the line.

  “Here.”

  “This way,” Solis said.

  Bannon smiled. They had it.

  LaSala, Bonucci, and Solis strolled over to the container. His lieutenant pulled a key from his pocket and unlocked the two padlocks securing the containers doors. He lifted the latches. The heavy metal bars squealed loudly. He pulled the doors open. The hinges squeaked loudly.

  Bannon tapped Tara on the shoulder, waving her to follow him. He ducked behind the containers concealing them and moved further down the row. He kept a careful eye overhead, looking for any spotters positioned by either side. They remained in the clear.

  From their new position they had a clear view inside the container as Solis’ man opened it.

  “Javier,” Solis called out. “Get the light.”

  His lieutenant returned to the Highlander and came back carrying a large, halogen lantern. He snapped it on. The light floored the interior of the container. Inside were a dozen pallets. Shrink wrapped on each were stacks of burlap covered bundles the size of hay bales.

  That’s a lot of cocaine, Bannon thought.

  With a flourish, LaSala snapped open a switchblade knife. “Shall we?”

  “Be my guess.” Solis followed him into the container. Javier and Bonucci remained outside, standing guard and eyeing each other as if waiting for a wrong move to be made.

  Bannon pulled a collapsible brass spy glass from his pocket.

  At Tara’s bemused expression, he whispered, “What?”

  “Binoculars aren’t good enough for you,” she asked.

  “I’m old school.”

  She shook her head.

  Through the eyepiece, he watched LaSala cut through the shrink wrap and then the burlap with the tip of the blade. Under the burlap there was a second layer of green plastic and then duct taped clear plastic around bricks of white powder that Bannon doubted was flour.

  “How much do you think’s in there?” Tara asked.

  Over his years in the Coast Guard, Bannon had conducted more than his fair share of drug interdiction operations, seizing some quite large quantities. This one could be one of the largest. “Hard to say. Five tons. Give or take.”

  “What’s that worth?”

  “Street value? One hundred and twenty-five million. Give or take.”

  Tara suppressed her urge to whistle. They both knew a seizure like this would be one for the record books.

  LaSala grabbed a single brick. He and Solis stepped back out of the container. Javier swung the doors shuts, relocking it. LaSala handed the cocaine to Bonucci.

  “Looks good,” LaSala said, clapping his hands as if to rid them of dust.

  “Then let us conclude our business so I can get out of this cold.” Solis shivered. He pointed at the car, telling Javier, “Get the computer.”

  “Hold on a minute,” LaSala said.

  Solis expression clouded. “Is there a problem?”

  “Not a problem, really,” LaSala said. “More a need to change the structure of our deal.”

  “No. There will be no changes,” Solis said firmly.

  “Here we go,” Bannon said.

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  Bannon sent a text to McMurphy, giving him the identification number and block location of the drug-filled container. Then he returned his attention to the heated conversation between Vincent LaSala and Rafael Solis. Enjoying the show.

  “Look,” LaSala said. “I just need a little more time.”

  “Time?” Solis said. “Time for what?”

  “I’ve got a small…internal matter I need to deal with. Once its dealt with, we’re good to go. Back on schedule.”

  Solis took a threatening step forward. “Are you reneging on our deal?”

  LaSala didn’t move but Bonucci moved his hand under the open overcoat he wore.

  Next to him, Tara stiffened. Bannon silently placed a hand on her arm. Wait.

  “Not at all,” LaSala said. “It’s simply that I don’t—technically—have all the money immediat
ely available that we agreed to. I have it. I just don’t have access to it. At the moment.” He forced a smile. “I know this is troubling news, and not the way I do business. In light of that, I’m willing to compensate you for this minor inconvenience.”

  “This is unacceptable,” Solis said.

  “I agree, but it couldn’t be helped.”

  “Our agreement was for a ten percent cash deposit—”

  “Which we have,” LaSala said. “More than that.”

  Solis ignored him. “For the product,” he waved toward the container, “which I have delivered.”

  “Which I have,” LaSala said again. “Fifteen percent actually.” He pointed to the town car’s half open trunk.

  “Then the problem is with the rest?”

  “Yeah. That part. I’m prepared to—”

  The rest of LaSala’s response was cut off by the sound of a beeping alarm. Both men glared down the roadway created between the rows of containers. A toplift approached with an orange container held high in the air. The vehicle rumbled closer until it ground to a stop behind the Highlander. The container rocked precariously over the vehicle.

  A longshoreman wearing a white hard hat leaned out from the toplift’s cab. “Hey, fellas, you gotta move them vehicles outta the way.”

  Javier rushed toward the toplift waving his arms. “It is you who must back up, pendejo. Go. Go!”

  “Pal, I’ve got a container to get stored,” the toplift operator said. “And I’m on the clock. Move the damn cars or I’m running ’em over.”

  Few things are tougher than a longshoreman, Bannon thought. Especially an angry one.

  Solis’ lieutenant pulled a small automatic from his waist. He pointed it that operator. “You move or you die.”

  The operator ducked inside the cab, not to hide or back up the toplift. Instead he leaned out again, this time armed with a sawed-off pump shotgun. He racked it and aimed it at Javier. “I don’t know what shady crap’s going on here, pal, and I’ve worked these docks long enough to know I don’t wanna know. But, unless you wanna start a shoot out and get the port police down here, I suggest you get those damn cars out of my damn way. Por favor, pendejo.”