Devil's Due: A Thomas Caine Thriller (The Thomas Caine Series Book 0) (7 page)

She leaned over and let her hair graze the side of Alexi's face.
 
She rested her hand lightly on his thigh, curling her fingers between his legs.
 
"You handsome man.
 
I like you.
 
You want go upstairs, short time?"

Alexi blinked.
 
His eyes no longer looked hungry.
 
They looked cold and distant.
 
But he stood up and wrapped his thick, muscular arm around her waist.
 
He looked down at her and smiled.
 
"Da. I thought you'd never ask."

Caine pounded on the apartment door.
 
Chips of red paint cracked and flaked off from the force of his blows.
 
"Satra, it's me.
 
Get up!"

Caine looked left and right as he knocked on the door again.
 
The dark, narrow hallway of the apartment complex was silent and empty.
 
If anyone was awake, they didn't seem inclined to poke their head out to investigate the noise he was making.
 
In this part of town, that's probably a smart call
, Caine thought.

He raised his hand to knock again but stopped when he heard footsteps from inside.
 
The sound of creaking wood grew louder as they approached the door.
 
He heard the rattle of a deadbolt turning, then the door cracked open.
 
A chain kept the door from swinging open all the way.
 
Satra's face hovered into view behind the door.
 
His eyes were half-closed, and his hair was mussed and disheveled.

"Waters?
 
What the hell, man?
 
You know what time it is?"

Caine slid his foot into the doorframe.
 
"We need to talk.
 
Let me in."

Satra blinked, rubbing his eyes.
 
He squinted at Caine.
 
"Why?
 
Thought you not interested in helping?"

"It's Naiyana.
 
She's missing."

"Who?"

"The girl at the bar.
 
My friend.
 
She's missing.
 
She cooks me dinner every week, but this time she didn't show.
 
The bartender where she works saw her go off with that Russian again, Alexi.
 
No one's seen her since."

Satra sighed.
 
He slid aside the security chain on the door and opened it wide enough for Caine to enter.

Caine scanned the hall one more time to make sure they were alone.
 
A nagging voice inside his head screamed at him that this was a mistake.
 
Cops, secret investigations, some kind of half-assed rescue ... all of this was madness.
 
He was in Thailand to lay low, not to court more death and violence.

Then he remembered Naiyana, smiling at him in the rain.
 
"You good friend to me,"
she had said.

Caine bit his lip to silence the voices in his head.
 
He made his decision.

He was operational now.
 
There was no more room for doubt.
 
He stepped across the threshold into Satra's tiny apartment.

The Thai cop rubbed the sleep from his eyes and shut the door behind him.
 
"Welcome to my office, partner."

A couple hours later, Caine paced back and forth inside the tiny apartment, sipping coffee from a stained yellow mug. There wasn't much room to walk, as the apartment was only a single room, with a small adjoining kitchen.
 
The windows were open, but no breeze stirred the threadbare curtains that hung over the sink.
 
The place smelled like old take-out food and sweat.

Satra sat in front of a sagging table that he had converted into a makeshift desk.
 
Its surface was covered with cardboard boxes and manila folders, all containing files related to the case.
 
He had told Caine that he had "borrowed" them from HQ, without Chief Battang's knowledge.
 

Satra spoke a rapid stream of Thai into his cell phone.
 
He listened for a second, nodding, then stood up and paced along with Caine.
 
When he ended the call, dropped down to a sitting position on the futon mattress that served as a bed in the tiny room.

"Anything?" Caine asked.

Satra rubbed his face briskly with his hands, then ran them through his hair.
 
"Word on street is new Russian Mafia family in town, looking to build pipeline to smuggle girls to the West.
 
I believe you know one of them.”

“Alexi Rudov,” Caine snarled.

Satra nodded.
 
“If he buy these girls, they will leave Thailand in few days.
 
No one has seen Alexi or Russians since they leave Ruby Club.”

“We have to find him.”

“I just talk to my contacts.
 
Street people, hustlers, they tell me the truth.
 
They see Rudov leave bar alone.
 
No girl, no men."

Caine nodded.
 
"Same story at the Hilton.
 
He checked out a couple hours before he was spotted at Ruby's.
 
None of my sources place him or the other men he was with at any new hotels in the last twenty-four hours."

"Maybe she left club on her own?
 
Like you said.
 
Bar girls disappear all the time."

Caine shook his head.
 
"Not this one.
 
She and I ... we're close."

Satra looked at Caine and raised an eyebrow.
 
Caine shot him an angry glare.

"Not like that," he said.
 
"We're friends.
 
I helped her out once.
 
That's all."

"But you risk your life in bar fights, and now you help me in illegal investigation?
 
All for this friend?
 
Battang was right.
 
You are strange."

Caine set down the cup of coffee on Satra's desk and picked up a file folder.
 
"I was betrayed once.
 
Betrayed by someone I trusted.
 
Took me a long time to trust someone again."

"And you trust her?"

Caine looked up, and his green eyes glittered in the dim light.
 
"I said she's my friend.
 
Now drop it."

Satra nodded.
 
"OK, well, I thank you for helping.
 
But it look like our lead goes cold."

Caine flipped open the folder.
 
It contained a series of photographs taken at the bombed floating market.
 
Incinerated wood beams, black with soot, had collapsed into the muddy canal.
 
The beautiful long tail boats that once darted across the canal's surface like dragonflies were now torn, mangled shreds of flotsam and jetsam.
 
The river water was stained black by ash.

And the bodies ... they were burned and mangled almost beyond recognition.
 
But to one who had seen such horrors before, their twisted, charred forms were instantly recognizable.

One by one, he flipped through the images of death and destruction.
 
He coldly processed the information each picture contained.

"The lead may be cold, but not the case.
 
If we can't find the Russians, then we work the other side.
 
You said the Russians are here to take delivery of human cargo.
 
So, who is the trafficker?"

Satra looked up at him thoughtfully.
 
"We've never seen anything like this website before.
 
But the most likely culprit would be a chao pho crime family."

"Then it stands to reason they were behind the bombings."

“Makes sense, sure.
 
But which family?
 
And where are they holding girls?"

Caine held up a picture. "When you investigate a crime scene, you dust for fingerprints, right?
 
Well, explosives leave their own kind of fingerprints.
 
See all these black burn marks on the wood?
 
That's excess carbon that didn't burn up in the explosion.
 
Characteristic of trinitrotoluene."

Satra sighed and glared at Caine.
 
"Also called TNT, yes?
 
Out forensic lab is not backwards, Mr. Waters.
 
We already investigated that angle.
 
TNT is very common industrial explosive.
 
Many companies use it here in Thailand.
 
Mining companies, chemical companies... could have come from anywhere."

Caine continued to flip through the pictures.
 
He stopped at one that showed a mangled, twisted scrap of aluminum, with wires and electronics protruding like black, burned tendrils.
 
He held up the picture for Satra to see.
 
"This is the detonator, isn't it?"

"We think so.
 
Too damaged to say for sure, but it was found near center of blast.
 
Not much left of it to go on."

Caine nodded.
 
"It's badly damaged, but look at this....
 
See this scrap of tubing here?
 
That's fiber optic cable.
 
It used a laser pulse to detonate the explosive package.
 
Highly reliable.
 
Whoever set this off probably used a remote signal keyed from a cell phone.
 
The signal triggers the laser, and detonation takes less than a millisecond."

Satra stood and took the picture from Caine's hand.
 
He examined it closely.
 
"We didn't catch that.
 
How you be so sure?
 
This just a picture of some scrap."

Caine looked Satra in the eye.
 
"I've seen these devices before.
 
Up close.
 
Trust me, I know."

"OK, so fancy detonator.
 
Hard to find.
 
Not many people that sell this stuff here in Thailand."

Caine shook his head.
 
"No, not many at all.
 
In fact, only one that I know of.
 
I'll take the detonator lead.
 
You keep looking for Alexi.
 
I'll need a weapon."

Satra opened a file box on his desk and removed a few dusty folders and stacks of paper.
 
Underneath was a slim wood case.
 
He lifted the lid and pulled out a battered old pistol, a Colt M1911.
 
He handed the heavy gun to Caine.
 
Caine gripped it and turned it side to side, hefting its weight.

"This my father's gun.
 
He carrying it when he killed in line of duty."

Caine tested the magazine eject button and slide.
 
The gun was old and battered, but its mechanisms were smooth and well-maintained.
 
The magazine slid out with a precise, metallic click.
 
He nodded his approval.
 
"You've taken good care of it.
 
Thank you."

"We need understanding between us, Mr. Waters.
 
I desperate; I come to you for help.
 
I see you have skills.
 
I see in your eyes, you dangerous.
 
That good, we face dangerous men.
 
But we face them, and bring them in for justice.
 
Not for revenge.
 
We good?"

Caine slapped the magazine back into the pistol.
 
He thumbed the slide release lever, and it slammed closed, readying the gun to fire.
 
He slid the gun into his waistband, and looked back at Satra.

"I'm not after justice or revenge, Satra.
 
I'm just trying to help a friend.
 
If you want my help, that will have to be good enough.
 
Otherwise, I do this on my own.
 
I'll call you if I find anything."

Caine walked out of Satra's apartment, shutting the door behind him.

As he strolled down the dark, quiet corridor outside, he wondered if his words had been true.
 
Finding Naiyana was his priority.
 
But if those who had taken her had hurt her in any way...

He thought of the devastation he had seen in the pictures, of the innocent lives these men had already taken, and the new lives they about to destroy.
 
Caine knew that, when he found them, he would make them pay a price for the suffering they had caused. The price would be paid in blood and pain.
 
But was that justice? Or revenge?
 
Caine wasn't sure what to call it.
 
He only knew it was a certainty.

That was good enough for him.

Eddy Ashikaga sighed as the beautiful young Thai girl standing above him pressed her fists into the knotted muscles on his back.
 
He grunted as she began to knead the tight, sore flesh.
 
"You know, you're stronger than you look," Eddy said, turning his head to smile at her.

The room was dark, and he could barely see the girl in the dim light.
 
She was wearing a tight pink T-shirt with an anime cat on the front and skin-tight spandex shorts.
 
The cat on the shirt was winking.
 
"I like your shirt," he said.

She giggled and stopped the deep, kneading motion.
 
Her fingers began to lightly dance over his tan skin.
 
"Thank you.
 
You strong man.
 
Sexy body," she said in a high-pitched voice.