Isabel's Run (35 page)

I watched the ambulance round the corner onto Sixty-Fifth Street. I didn’t say it, but I was thinking,
Better out there than in the back of that thing.

* * * *

“The house is all yours,” Gary Radovich said to Dave Bryant. “Ready to be searched. Pretty sure we didn’t miss any bad guys.” He had a sly grin. “You should be alright.”

“Oh, thanks a whole hell of a lot,” Bryant said.

Radovich laughed. “Happy to be of service,” he said. The SWAT officers were all out of the house now and on their way to the SWAT truck at the CP. “We’re going to head out. We’ve got three more of these scheduled today down south.”

“Thanks, Gary,” Nancy said. “You guys were total pros, as always. We’ve got two more houses to take down.”

“We aim to please,” Radovich said. He turned to Toni and me. “Sorry we didn’t find your sister here,” he said to Toni. “But judging by the condition of the other girl, maybe that’s a good thing.”

Toni nodded. “Thanks,” she said.

“You ought to have enough to charge these guys, though—right, Nancy?”

“Absolutely,” she said. “At this point, even if the search doesn’t turn up any dope, these idiots are all going to jail,” Nancy said, pointing to the men sitting against the wall. “If nothing else, we’ll charge them with assault, and I think we can charge them with trafficking, as well.”

“You don’t need to worry about finding dope,” one of the SWAT team members who’d been in the house said as he walked to the truck. “It’s like a pharmacy in there.”

“Yeah,” his partner said, “the kitchen pantry has about twenty-five pounds of high-grade pot inside.”

“You should be able to stick them with some sort of firearms charge, too,” the first officer said. “There’s a regular arsenal in the basement. And, from the looks of it, several of the guns down there aren’t exactly what you’d call legal—some of ’em even look like they’re full auto.”

“And some of the shotguns are sawed off,” the other officer said.

“Jackpot,” Dave Bryant said, smiling. “So we’ve got ’em for possession, possession with intent to distribute, trafficking, ag assault, ag battery, firearms violations—and maybe more. Who knows? Not their lucky day.” He turned to his crew. “Let’s go, boys,” he said. He led his eight-man team inside to begin the long task of thoroughly searching the house.

“I want to go inside, too,” Nancy said. “Have a look around. But we only have a minute. I want to roll to the house on Nineteenth—,” she looked at me, “I think you guys call it the ‘girls’ house.’ Then we’ll swing on up and hit the house on Fortieth—the ‘big’ house. Also, hopefully, I’ll be able to talk to Isabel at the hospital later this afternoon. I’m hoping she can give us information on Donnie Martin, DeMichael Hollins, and Crystal Wallace. Even if she can’t, though, based on everything that’s going on around here, I’m sure I can get arrest warrants for the three of them. Ty—why don’t you call the office and get that started.”

“Got it,” Ty said.

“Meanwhile,” Nancy said, “maybe Kelli will find out about this bust some way and just decide to walk away now. She’ll figure out that Isabel was rescued. And with Isabel safe, there’s no reason for her to hang around with Donnie Martin anymore.”

“
If
she finds out about the bust and
if
she’s allowed to simply leave,” I said. “Neither of those is automatic—at least not right away.”

She thought about this. “Where else would they be?”

“My guess is if they find out about the bust, they’ll either run past the house on Fortieth—it’s Donnie Martin’s residence—or else they may hightail it to the neighborhood where they’re originally from.”

“Central District?”

I nodded. “Yeah. They might figure that they need to lay low. Someone over there would probably take them in.”

“They wouldn’t take Kelli there, would they?”

I shook my head. “I can’t see why they would. They’d probably just jettison her when they find out what’s happened.” I didn’t want to consider the fact that in the event they decided they didn’t want any witnesses, things could go badly for Kelli. The thought made me shudder.

Nancy nodded, thinking. Then she said, “That makes sense. I’ll tell Ty to alert the East Precinct. We can get—.” Suddenly, my cell phone rang, interrupting her. Caller ID: Doc.

“What’s up?” I said.

“They just pulled up,” Doc said. I turned and whispered to Nancy. “Donnie Martin just drove up to the house on Fortieth.”

Everyone turned to me and froze.

“Who all is there?” I asked Doc.

“Martin, Hollins, Crystal, and Kelli.”

“Outstanding.”

“What?” Nancy said.

“Donnie Martin and DeMichael Hollins plus Crystal Wallace and Kelli.”

“Dude,” Doc said. “They’re moving shopping bags.”

“They’re what?”

“They’re moving shopping bags,” he said.

I turned to Nancy. “They’ve been shopping.”

“Do they seem nervous or alarmed?” I asked Doc.

“No. They’re just standing around talking, shooting the shit.”

I turned to Nancy. “They don’t even seem to know there’s been a raid here. We need to move fast before they put in a phone call and figure it out.”

She nodded. “Got it.”

“Good work, dude,” I said to Doc. “We’ll be right there. If Donnie Martin leaves before we get there, follow ’em. But we’ll be there in under ten minutes.” I hung up.

Nancy put two fingers in her mouth and gave a surprisingly loud whistle. “I need everyone who’s scheduled to take part in the next takedown to assemble here, now!” She shouted. “We have new information. If you’re not involved in the search or the transport of those guys, we need you over here real quick,” she yelled out to the officers.

“Ty! Call in and get these guys some more backup to help process this gang.”

“Right!” Ty said.

Nancy assembled her troops. There were twelve officers in six patrol cars. She pointed to three patrol teams. “We’ll all head out of here north on Brooklyn.”

“We’re in the park,” one of the officers said. “Shall we just shoot through?”

“Absolutely,” Nancy said. “You all use the park if you’re blocked. We’ll all shoot across Sixty-Fifth together. We’ll go in Code 3 until we get to Thirty-Fifth but after Thirty-Fifth, lights only. This is important—I want no sirens east of Thirty-Fifth. Everybody understand?”

The nine men and three women nodded.

“Good. We’ll make two groups.” She pointed to three patrol officer teams. “You, you, and you—approach from the south. Tyrone and I will lead you guys in. Our group will turn on Thirty-Fifth, go down the street and around the block so we can come up on Fortieth from the south. Last guy in, seal off the street. You, you, and you—,” she pointed to the other three patrol teams, “you approach from the north. Come in off Sixty-Fifth and turn right on Fortieth—straight shot in. Last guy in, seal the street off. You guys coming in from the north—you have a shorter way to go, so don’t come around the corner until you see me pulling up. The subject house is only three or four houses from the corner.” She turned to me. “Is that right, Danny?”

“That’s it,” I said.

She turned back to the officers. “I don’t want you getting there ahead of us. We have confirmation that Donnie Martin, DeMichael Hollins, and Crystal Wallace are there, along with another female who is not part of the investigation. And all of you—remember—assume that they’re armed and dangerous. Be careful. Any questions?”

There were none.

“Let’s go,” she said. We all sprinted toward our cars.

NANCY AND TYRONE gave the patrol officers a few seconds to make it back to their cars and get going. Then, the two of them jumped into her silver Crown Vic and burned rubber pulling out—she drove. She hadn’t made it clear where she wanted us. Since we were civilians, most likely she wanted us in the back, safely out of harm’s way. But then again, she hadn’t actually said anything. Since we were parked right behind her, I took off as soon as she left and fell in right on her bumper. I never liked being in the back.

The patrol car that had been blocking traffic onto Brooklyn from the north had already swung out across Sixty-Fifth and stopped, blocking traffic for us. Nancy took advantage of this as she switched on her lights and siren and rounded the corner onto Sixty-Fifth. “Hold on,” I yelled to Toni as we blew around the corner behind her. Six more patrol cars followed, right behind us, all with lights flashing and sirens on. Talk about an adrenaline rush! I hadn’t been “Code 3” since my earliest CID training days. Part of the curriculum was serving six months as an MP—for me, this meant at Fort Lewis near Tacoma. Occasionally, we’d been involved with a chase—usually of a soldier who’d had a little too much fun at one of the local drinking establishments. The MPs on gate detail take a dim view of soldiers who crash through without clearance.

As we hustled eastbound, I noticed that Northeast Sixty-Fifth Street gradually changed character from almost pure residential where we started to almost pure commercial by the time we crossed Twenty-Fifth Avenue Northeast. We picked up speed. Ten blocks later, we slowed again as we reached Thirty-Fifth. It had taken about two minutes to cover the mile between Brooklyn and Thirty-Fifth. As we reached the intersection, I hit the speed dial on my cell phone for Doc. I put it on speakerphone and when he answered, I said, “How we looking?”

“They’re all still inside,” he said.

“Good. We’re only a few blocks away now.”

“I know. I can hear you. You guys gonna turn them sirens off?”

At that moment, Nancy turned her siren off, and everyone else followed suit. I smiled. “How’s that for service?” I asked, as we made the turn southbound on Thirty-Fifth.

“Cool. See you in a minute.”

I watched in the rearview mirror as three patrol cars followed us onto Thirty-Fifth while the other three went straight through the intersection.

“You ready to go get Kelli?” I asked Toni.

She nodded. I saw her hand gripping the door, tightly.

I reached over and put my hand on her shoulder. “She’ll be fine, Toni. Those guys don’t even know we’re coming. They won’t know what hit ’em.”

She nodded. “I hope so. I’ll be glad when it’s over.”

I glanced at her. I don’t think she gets scared—or at least, not to the point where it incapacitates her. I’ve seen her in action plenty of times. Focused? Yep. Pissed off? Sometimes. Scared? Never. That said, having her little sister in a threatening position was clearly getting to her.

“It’ll be over soon,” I said. “Just a few minutes now.”

Our group reached Sixty-Second Avenue and turned east off of Thirty-Fifth Street. Suddenly, the street narrowed considerably, and we had to slow down to no more than twenty miles per hour. After our high-speed run, it seemed like the minute-long drive down the five blocks to Fortieth Street took forever.

Just as we turned onto Fortieth, my phone rang. Caller ID: Doc. I hit the button to answer the call on the speaker.

“They’re coming out!” Doc called.

Oh, shit. Nancy was already around the corner, heading north toward the house, no more than 150 yards away from them. I needed to warn her. I pulled up behind her and started flashing my lights like crazy. I didn’t want to honk my horn, figuring that that would alert Donnie Martin. Unfortunately, while I was trying to flag down Nancy, she and Tyrone were looking for the house—she wasn’t looking in the rearview mirror. I didn’t have her number on speed dial, but it wouldn’t have mattered anyway. Five seconds later, she drove right up to the house and stopped in the middle of the road. I pulled up and stopped not far behind her.

From my vantage point behind her, I saw Donnie Martin walking from the front door of the house, following Kelli and Crystal. DeMichael Hollins was already in the maroon Expedition, waiting for the others. At the same time I saw him, Martin looked up and saw Nancy and Tyrone drive up and stop in the middle of the street with their red-and-blue flashing lights turned on. He didn’t hesitate.

Martin reached behind his back and pulled out a handgun—looked like a full-size Glock. Without pausing, he opened fire.

Martin’s first shot blew out the side window in the Crown Vic right behind Nancy. She reacted instinctively and put the big car back in gear and floored it. Just as she started moving forward, Martin fired again. This time, he blew out the driver’s side window right beside her face. Immediately, the big car veered off the road and plowed into a tree with a
bang! Holy shit!
The hood sprung and the airbags deployed. There was no movement from the car—I couldn’t tell if Nancy and Tyrone had been hit or were simply dazed. From the corner of my eye, I could see the patrol cars at the top of the street just round the corner from Sixty-Fifth, unaware yet that Nancy was under fire.

Martin began walking toward the car. He started to raise his handgun. He was moving in to finish them off. Instinct kicked in.

“Hey!” I yelled, as I opened the door and started to get out.

This surprised him for a moment. He’d apparently been focusing on Nancy so much that he hadn’t even noticed me behind her, or maybe the Jeep had thrown him off. “Toni, get down!” I yelled. Her door flew open, and she dove out the right side as I finished getting out on my side. I now became Martin’s more immediate threat, so he turned to face me. We were probably one hundred feet or so apart, so I wasn’t too worried that he’d be able to hit me from that distance. Which, I suppose, is the reason I was so surprised when one second later, he opened fire on me, and the driver’s side mirror on the Jeep blew up. Damn! That was a lot closer than I’d expected. I heard the sound of the gunshot a split second later.