The gemstone mining trip was a huge hit and over the course of the day, I helped almost everyone find a special gemstone. One of the grandkids found a nice stone all by himself and another would need to learn some manners before I’d even think about helping him. That one ended up sulking all the way home and everyone ignored him.
With the exception of Rose, Eva, and Mark, I managed to help everyone without making them aware that they were being helped. For some of them I merely suggested that they dig in an area that seemed to have more stones and then marked off the spot for them. For others, I had to slip the gemstone into their sifter while they were distracted.
My own finds were more modest than last year. I picked up several gemstones that would satisfy Howie’s unregistered auction house and help me bolster my Bitcoin account. Even if Gerry didn’t need me to invest further in his printing business, I was considering the idea of asking Howie to find other off-the-grid entrepreneurs that I could invest in. It still didn’t feel real that spending a very pleasant day out with friends digging for rocks could result in making other people’s dreams come true. It literally cost me nothing to invest in Gerry’s company. I just handed over a rock that I’d found. So bizarre.
School started the day after our return and I was back to being bored in class. Just a few more months and I’d be free. Being able to see the light at the end of the tunnel was the only thing that made classes tolerable. I was definitely going to travel. Travel for fun, to get more company information for my investment, to steal client information from banks, to personally go after some of the human trafficking customers that we were finding. Europe was also on my list. Maybe I’d take Alexander up on his offer to stay at his place for a bit.
Daydreaming carried me through to the end of the day and soon I was off for the clinic. We still had loads of police officers to scan and word was spreading. Sister Clara was taking calls from the firepersons union and the paramedics union. Their insurance company, which handled the police officers as well, was insisting that they enroll their members in the scanning program, stating that the savings in lost manhours and decreased hospitalizations were significant, not to mention the lives saved.
The upshot of all of this is that I was booked for two hours every day after school for the next few weeks. That meant that I’d be getting a lot of practice scanning people. It also meant that I was at Hannah’s Home when Kevin arrived with some disturbing news.
With fifteen minutes left in my shift, Shauna came over to let me know about Kevin’s unexpected arrival. I finished up the last few scans and walked over to the rectory where Kevin was waiting, along with Shauna, Jenny and Gabriel. Kevin barely made it through the pleasantries before dropping his news on us.
“We have a mole. Someone is tipping off the clients before we can get in and arrest them.”
“Shit!” Gabriel’s outburst was mild compared to Shauna’s and Jenny’s reaction.
“Two weeks ago, we were raiding the home of a lawyer in Tennessee. We had a man watching the house and just before we got there with our warrant, our guy sees the lawyer pull out of his garage and race away. We found the car abandoned several miles away from his house in a parking lot. We think he was picked up by someone at that point. Our search of his house found two women locked up in the basement. There’s a warrant out for his arrest, if he’s ever found again.”
“Yesterday, the same thing happened. Only this time the guy had more warning. About a half hour. He managed to pack up some of his things, including his computer, and empty his wall safe. He also killed the fourteen-year-old girl that was chained up in his basement.”
None of us said anything. I felt like I’d been kicked in the head. That girl was minutes away from being rescued. Minutes away from getting a second chance at life. One phone call had ended her life. Whoever the mole in the FBI was, he or she was equally responsible for her death and I wanted the mole to pay.
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
Kevin continued into the growing silence. “We have three clients left to go after from the list that you’ve given us. We’re going to set a trap for the mole. Outwardly, we’ll continue as we have before. Internally, my original team of three agents will conduct the raids a day early, without informing anyone, even our boss. The trickiest part will be obtaining the warrants without tipping anyone off. I’ve spoken to a judge about it and it can be done. So, unless someone is following my team, or if my team or the judge are compromised, then we should be able to raid the client and see who calls to warn him at the last minute.”
“I hope you catch the mole quickly, because until you do, I can’t give you any more client names.” I held Kevin’s gaze as I said this and he nodded his understanding.
“Abby, we were about to send over our latest list of clients. There are women and children that can be saved. You heard Kevin. He’s putting in new procedures. We can’t just sit on the information.”
“Jenny, Roger had me sit on the information for over five months, until Shauna was able to build up this team. The fact is that human trafficking is very profitable, and great wealth attracts people with power. Roger was worried that if the police or the FBI had the files, then these powerful people would apply pressure to make the files disappear or to at least make certain names in those files disappear. Roger warned me that something like this could happen. If Kevin’s trap works, then we can continue to send him information until someone else starts to interfere. My guess is that Kevin will catch the mole only to have one of his boss’s bosses get upset that they weren’t kept current and he’ll be ordered to follow normal procedures, at which point another mole will appear and another girl will die. If that happens, we will stop working with the FBI in a proactive way.”
“What does that mean?”, Kevin asked.
“Simply that instead of giving you information to act on, Roger will go after the clients himself and call you or the police once he’s secured the premises, if he feels like it.”
“Abby, that can’t happen. Each client gets us one step closer to finding the network that’s suppling the slaves. We’re getting close. If Roger goes in there and starts killing the clients or if he ruins the trail we’re following, we’ll end up with nothing and the traffickers will keep on selling slaves. Give us a chance, Abby.”
“I am. Find your mole and make sure that someone higher up doesn’t interfere and we’ll share all of the client information that we discover.”
“I’ll find the mole and I’ll do what I can about my bosses. You should be aware though that I’ve heard rumblings in some of the meetings where I make my reports. There are people at the FBI who don’t like the fact that we have to get all this information from an undisclosed source. They want us to tell them who our source is and take the information. This isn’t a threat. I’m just telling you things I’ve heard.”
“Thanks, Kevin. I appreciate your…information. I can assure you that if they find out who we are and come after our information, then Roger would go and get them back. From experience, once Roger is in your offices, he’ll copy everything on your servers and he might decide that you don’t need your copy anymore. This isn’t a threat. I’m just telling you what will happen.”
There really wasn’t much to say after that and Kevin left. He didn’t look very happy. That’s ok, because I wasn’t either. A fourteen-year-old girl was dead.
“Would Roger really do that?”, Jenny ask.
“Yes, he would and more. He’s going to be pissed when I give him the news about the girl.”
“Well, I have news that might cheer him up.” Gabriel wasn’t smiling, rather he looked determined. “Jenny and I do have a list of another eight clients ready, but we think that we also found another link in the supply chain. Another Serpentine!”
This was news to Shauna and she practically pounced on Gabriel. “Why didn’t you tell me before? Who, what, where? Spill it Gabriel.”
“Jenny and I just figured it out from the data before Kevin showed up. We haven’t even confirmed it yet. Remember Abby told us to keep an eye out for any company that had the initials MTC or PDC? Well, using the banking information that Roger got for us from Washington, we found a payment, a very large payment, from a Pearl Dragon Corporation. PDC. We think that it’s one of their suppliers. We looked them up and found out that they’re a freight forwarding company and that their logo has the same styling as Serpentine’s logo. Almost like the same person designed them both.” Kevin’s excitement was contagious and I felt elation coursing through me.
“One last thing, Abby. Pearl Dragon Corporation’s headquarters are located in a warehouse in Raleigh, about three miles from where you were found on the day that you were kidnapped.”