Special Forces - 9. Chapter 9

Sam felt like shit for scaring Jorge. How the hell was he going to win back the little guy's trust?

“Maybe I should stay home from work today. You know, to make amends....”

“You can’t, Sam. You’ve got that meeting first thing with those guys from that big yacht company. That contract is really important. And you’re the best salesman that Gary has. Jorge needs to learn that your coming and going is a normal part of life.”

“Yeah, you’re right. How about if you drive me to work? Then Jorge will at least know where I am today.”

“And, Sam, you have to realize that Jorge and I can be hotheads. We get angry but we get over it fast too. I’ll bring Jorge over for a visit around your dinner time. That way he’ll know where you are when he goes to sleep. He loves you very much, Sam. He’ll get over his snit, and you guys will be tight as ever. It’s Saturday today, so I’ll be home with him all day, and I’ll work on something. Okay?”

“If you say so, Nicky. You seem to understand Jorge a lot more than I do.”

“I think we each bring our own thing to the table, Sam. Jorge has always trusted and relied on you. Hell, he idolizes you.”

Sam had a productive day. The meeting with the yacht guys went well, and he was close to closing a sale on a nice little Bayliner they had on consignment. But all day his heart had been heavy with worry. What would happen if Nick was wrong and Jorge remained aloof? It didn’t bear thinking about.

Nick and Jorge showed up at dinner time with homemade cupcakes and a very special drawing. Jorge had drawn himself and Sam holding hands and smiling. Nick had worked his magic. Jorge handed over the cupcakes and drawing looking a little contrite.

Sam squatted down and drew Jorge into a tight hug. “Papa loves you so much, Jorge!”

Nick whispered in Jorge’s ear, “What were you going to tell Papa?”

“I love you Papa.”

Later when Sam and Nick talked about it, they agreed that Jorge had unresolved issues about losing his mother. He never talked about her, but something was eating him, at least subconsciously. It was time to address the issue; a trip to the child psychologist was in order.

Nick took good care of Sam that night. He figured his man could use a bit of extra lovin’ after that stressful day.

*****************

Sam and Sandy had a solid lead on one of the jefes. From phone records they learned his name was Enrico Aguilar and he lived in a house up on Arbutus Circle in La Jolla.

They did a reconnaissance of the house. It was a large house—but not a mansion—on a spacious lot surrounded by a wall with solid gates. There was a camera at the gate, and no doubt others along the wall. They didn’t see a guard, but that didn’t necessarily rule one out. It was going to be impossible to sit surveillance in that neighborhood. It wasn’t an area where people parked on the street. Someone was bound to notice. But they spotted a manhole cover in the street about half a block from the house, and that gave them an idea.

At dawn on the first day they had off together they put their plan into action.

First they put false license plates on Sam’s truck, then they attached a magnetized sign to the door that read “West Coast Cable Engineering.” They dressed in coveralls and hardhats. Sam drove his truck over, and Sandy drove his motorcycle (also with false plates) parking it about a block away. Sam parked the truck adjacent to the manhole cover. Then they put out orange cones and stanchions, lifted the manhole cover, dropped a ladder into the hole and pretended to work.

They had a perfect view of Aguilar’s gates.

At 9 am the gates opened and a Prius exited, turned left and headed down the hill. Sandy quickly stripped off his coveralls and walked to his bike. He fired it up and followed the Prius which headed down the hill and over to the Whole Foods Market. At the market, a young Hispanic women got out and headed for the store. She was dressed in what could have passed for a maid’s uniform, but without the apron.

Sandy, pretending to talk on his phone, snapped several pictures of her. Then he followed her into the store snagging a shopping cart on the way in. At the produce isle he feigned ignorance on the ripeness of the honeydew melon and asked for help in Spanish. The sexual innuendo of feeling the melons was not lost on the woman. Sandy was a very handsome, well-built man and he’d soon stuck up a conversation. Beguiled, the woman answered several of his questions and he learned that she was a maid for a rich family, and her name was Lolly. But he didn’t push too hard so as not to arouse her suspicions. They parted on amicable terms, and Sandy thought she would be useful in the future.

Sandy was just pulling back onto Arbutus when a black Mercedes with heavily tinted windows pulled out of the Aguilar gates. He looped around and followed the Merc which picked up the San Diego freeway then the 5 and eventually pulled up to a warehouse in San Ysidro, not far from the Mexican border.

There was only one guy in the car, the driver, and he exited and headed to the door of the warehouse. From his body language, Sandy could tell the guy had no idea he’d been tailed. Of course, Sandy was an expert at covert surveillance, so it was very unlikely that the guy would have seen him.

Sandy managed to get several useful telephoto shots: the guy, the car, the warehouse.

He texted Sam the photos then spoke to him on the phone. They agreed they’d gotten enough valuable intel that day so it was time to head home to their families.

***************

Sam was home well before lunch, and Jorge was at school. Maria had the day off, so Nick and he had the house to themselves.

Nick greeted him by the door with a scorching kiss. Then he dropped to his knees and re-enacted the first date exploration of Sam’s equipment. God, the way Nick examined him, and felt him was amazingly erotic and affecting. Besides the lovely sensations, Sam sensed Nick’s devotion, and he felt loved and enormously grateful.

After a nice slow flip-flop session in bed they showered together. Then they rummaged in the kitchen and put together a picnic, planning to pick up Jorge from school and head for the boat for a little R & R. Jorge had become an enthusiastic fisherman, and he enjoyed catching perch from the dock with his little fishing rod. They’d catch and release using barbless hooks, and Jorge was a very patient fisherman.

At the school, Jorge enthusiastically greeted both his dads and proudly showed off a picture he’d drawn of the three of them smiling. Gregory, his little friend, and his mother were there also. The guys invited them over to the boat for a snack—it was only a few minutes away from the school by car. Luckily, they had bought an extra child’s life jacket that Gregory could use.

Jorge proudly showed Gregory the boat and asked Sam to start the engines so Gregory could hear them. When the engines started, Jorge made a surprised face, and both boys dissolved in a fit of giggles.

Jorge insisted on fishing with Gregory, so Nick supervised the catch and release of one perch each while Sam and Gregory’s mom chatted on the boat.

After that, Mom and son left with profuse thank you’s and, as they walked off the dock, Gregory could be heard begging his mother to let him come back to Jorge’s boat soon.

After the three guys had their afternoon meal, they all enjoy a long nap on the large forward berth.

********************

Sandy and Sam continued to monitor phone calls and Sam picked up another lead connected to Aguilar’s phone. He was called from a home in Spring Valley to the east of town by a guy named Juan Argentino. That neighborhood wasn’t as exclusive, and several cars were parked curbside, so it was easy to mount surveillance from a stationary vehicle. They tailed Argentino to the same San Ysidro warehouse that Aguilar had gone to.

At that point the guys decided to shelve the monitoring program and pursue the leads they had. Both felt that the Aguilar/Argentino connection would prove more fruitful than monitoring phone calls. (Not to mention that Sandy and Sam were both men of action, and monitoring phone calls bored them nearly out of their minds.)

Sam drove to the warehouse at night to check the general layout and assess the building’s security. It was in an older area with several other warehouses that looked like they were on their third or fourth lives. Generally run down. Most were about two stories high; likely with tar and gravel roofs. Sam found one with a good line of sight to Aguilar’s establishment that had a low wall around the roof making it perfect for concealment.

The back of Aguilar’s warehouse faced unused railway tracks that were overgrown and strewn with garbage. The back wall was windowless, but a door opened onto a crumbling cement loading dock with rusting exposed rebar. There were no lights back there, so Sam used night optic binoculars to check carefully for signs of activity, but the door looked like it hadn’t been used in a long time. A layer of sand was built up on the sill, and he saw no evidence of footprints on the dirt-encrusted dock. There was, however, a security camera mounted above the door. Sam could have used his silenced Glock 9 to shoot out the camera easily, but that would wait for another night.

The front door to the warehouse was lit with a bright vapour light. The housing was glass and it would be easy to take out when they needed to. The door was protected by a high-end Schlage electronic scramble keypad lock. There was an entry speaker next to the door and a camera mounted above. Sam noted that it was aimed at a fairly tight downward angle. Any visitor would need to look up into the camera for his face to be identified. But anyone entering with their head down, or wearing a hat wouldn’t have their face photographed. Smart. These guys weren’t taking facial pictures of themselves coming and going.

The last thing that Sam did that night was to launch his little drone to check the roof of the facing warehouse where he’d spotted a promising surveillance spot. The only problem was that there was no daytime shade. But it wouldn’t be the first time he or Sandy had lain in the blazing sun doing surveillance. There was good desert gear designed exactly for that purpose and camouflage cloth that would blend in with the tar and gravel.

Sandy volunteered to take the surveillance shift saying that it was his project so he’d do the work. With any luck, only one day’s watching would be necessary. The shift would be from before dawn until after dusk. Unfortunately, access to the roof was external, so anyone scaling the wall to get up there during daylight hours could be seen easily.

*********************

Nick had made an appointment for Jorge with the child psychologist. Both Sam and he had misgivings about opening Jorge’s psychological wounds but realized that in the long-run it was the right thing to do. Sam was particularly concerned. He wanted to protect Jorge. Nick patiently explained to Sam that they couldn’t always keep Jorge under a glass dome—he wasn’t Bubble Boy. Life was going to get in the way. Like any kid he had challenges to face: Bullying, raging teenage hormones, rebellion and the angst of his first unrequited love.

“Jorge, in his own way, is tough, Sam. It’s natural that he feels grief over the loss of his mother, but not allowing him to work through that grief is going to do more harm than good. I’ve read that when little kids lose a loved one and no one talks about it that it can cause serious problems in adolescence or later. Let’s face the music now instead of later.”

“I see the logic of all that, Nicky, but in my heart of hearts I don’t want him to suffer. I think I’m going to have to get my head around not being able to protect him from everything.”

“For a big tough guy you’re a real softy, Sam.”

“You didn’t think I was a softy this morning, did you Nicky?”

“Definitely not, Sam. This morning you were a real hardy, and I loved every inch of it.”

After a meet-and-greet at the psychologist’s office with the three of them, the psychologist asked if she could talk to Jorge alone for a few minutes. Jorge retreated to complacency—something that Nick had already talked to her about. She kept him in her office for about 20 minutes then called Sam and Nick back in. She complimented Jorge on his behaviour and intelligence then handed Sam a children’s book with the title “Sam is Sad.”

“It’s written to help a child through the grief process,” she said. “I think it will be really helpful for Jorge if you read it to him. Perhaps with the two of you taking turns to read. Then give him time to digest it, and if we’re lucky, he’ll view it from his perspective and ask about his mother.”

It was a touching story about a little boy whose grandmother, whom he was close to, died. It explained the finality of death as a child would perceive it. No religion, no angels, no heaven, but the concept that grandmother had been privileged to have known her grandson but now her body had ceased working. She no longer slept, ate, spoke or laughed. This was a permanent condition. Grandma had “died.” The little boy had to say his goodbyes, and he missed her but was so, so happy that he had the love of his grandmother, and she his, while she was alive.

Sam was concerned it was a little heavy for Jorge, but Nick promised him a spectacular blow job it he read the book to Jorge, so Sam capitulated.

About two days after reading the book, Jorge asked Nick about his mama, and if she had died. Nick wiped the tears that sprung to his eyes and told Jorge that yes, his mama was dead. He asked Jorge if he’d like to say goodbye to her. Jorge in his quiet way considered this for a few seconds and replied a whispered, “Yes.”

Sam and Nick worked together to help Jorge draw a picture of him and his mother, then one of a solo Jorge waving goodbye. They wrote “I love you Mama” on the first and “Goodbye” on the second. Although Jorge hadn’t yet learned to read and write he understood the concept of writing and seemed cognizant of what was on the paper. Then they attached the pictures to a kite that they took to SEAL Beach. When the kite was flying high they had Jorge let go of the string and say his goodbyes to his mama as the kite floated off into the sky.

After that the subject of Jorge’s mother was no longer verboten in the household. Jorge asked questions about his mother which Nick and Sam answered honestly. They were able to tell him that his mama was beautiful, just like him.

Sam and Nick felt comfortable about showing Jorge the sketch of his mother. Jorge reached out and touched it and said, “Mama.” And then the guys reminded him that they’d had to say goodbye to her, which he seemed to accept with his usual resignation.

Jorge wasn’t over his grief, but he was on the path.

*************************

Sam received a call from Sandy from his surveillance spot to report a development in their investigation. And even though he was nearly cooking from the heat on the roof he didn’t utter one work of complaint. You did the job and didn’t whine about it; that was the SEAL way.

A nondescript minivan had dropped two men and a woman at the warehouse. The driver escorted them inside then drove away. After that, Argentino showed up to collect the girl, and a little later another car drove up to collect the men. Sandy was able to get good pictures, including the license plate numbers of the vehicles.

Sam suggested that he and Sandy meet to discuss the latest developments and to brainstorm some strategy. So the guys met two days later for breakfast at a small diner up the hill from the airport.

They both ordered huge breakfasts from a flirting waitress, and when the food arrived both shoveled it into their mouths. Table manners were forgotten, and they just enjoyed chowing down with their comrade in arms.

Between mouthfuls of food Sam asked, “So what do we have here, Sandy? What’s your take on the situation?”

“First, I think Aguilar is middle to upper management. For one thing his house is nice, but not grand. And for another thing he drives himself. No bodyguard. Argentino and the other guy are further down the food chain.

“What I think is that Aguilar is running an agency. He responds to customer requests and orders bodies as needed. That’s what the minivan was doing dropping off three people. Probably a maid and two gardeners.”

“So he buys these people from a coyote, then places them, then what? He keeps a percentage of their wages?”

“Exactly, only he probably keeps most of their wages. Maybe gives them a hundred bucks a month.”

Sam frowned. “So these people work as his slaves?”

“Exactly, Sam. And there’s no doubt in my mind that he keeps them in line through threats and intimidation.”

“So how many people do you think he’s running?”

“My guess, five hundred or more throughout the metropolitan region.”

“Shit, so let’s say he gets a grand per person per month. He gives the slave a hundred and keeps nine hundred of that. Nine hundred times five hundred is four hundred and fifty grand a month.”

“Yeah, then he pays Argentino and this other guy, who are probably enforcers. And I strongly suspect he’s tied into a bigger organized crime syndicate, so he pays a territory franchise fee to them. But he’s still earning a decent living. Enough to keep him in a nice house in La Jolla and a new Mercedes.”

Sam let out a low whistle. “Holy shit. So do you think having a little chat with Mr. Aguilar is in order?”

“Definitely, but what’s our goal here, Sam? The whole illegal immigration thing is way, way too big for us to tackle. Let’s keep focussed on finding the murderer of these poor girls. My money is on one of the enforcers right now. The girls all died from beatings. I think Aguilar can point us directly to the murderer.”

“Yeah, you’re right, Sandy. Let’s keep some parameters around this op.”

“Tell you what, Sam. After we find the murderer and deal with him, why don’t we turn over all our intel to the FBI. None of what we will have discovered would be admissible evidence, but it might light a fire somewhere. Remember that guy, Dave Churchill, that was in training after you? He was on a different team than you, but he was good. And he’s a stand-up guy. If anyone can do something with this shit, it’s him.”

“Sounds good. What’s the next step?”

“Let me work on Aguilar’s maid, Lolly, first. I’d like to get some intel about Aguilar’s family. To give you a little leverage when you talk to him.”

“Okay, why don’t you ambush her at Whole Foods and use your charm. See if we can get something to use as leverage on him. If she’s scared of Aguilar she might be open to an offer of help. I’ll enjoy taking a run at him. I know it sounds immoral, but threatening harm to one of his kids is a lot better than shooting him in the kneecaps. He doesn’t have to know I’d never, ever harm one of his kids.”

Three days later, while Sam was at work, he saw Sandy walking down the dock towards him.

“You wanna buy a boat, Amigo?”

“Nah, I got a crazy buddy who has a boat, and I get free rides on his.”

“Did you find anything out, Sandy?”

“Yeah, poor Lolly was scared shitless. She’s illegal with a fake DL, so she reluctantly answered my questions. She’s been with Aguilar for about four years. She’s indentured for five. Apparently the carrot is a Green Card if they finish their service; the stick is reprisals against either her or her family back home. Fuck, the Green Card is probably a just lousy fake. And we were right about the money. She gets one hundred bucks a month. I told her that I was working on the murders of girls just like her. I gave her my phone number and asked her to call if she has any more information to give us.

“Anyway, Aguilar as two kids at college. A daughter, Rosalee, at Berkley, and a son, Arnando, at UCLA. They’re both on Facebook so there’s a shitload of information on them.”

“Guess it’s time to pay a visit to Aguilar at the warehouse, then.”

*************************

That night Sam explained the operation to Nick. Again, Nick’s concerns were for Sam’s and Sandy’s safety. He did, however, have one insightful comment. “It all sounds too simple, Sam. Remember Murphy’s law: Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong.”