In The Company Of Snipers: Zack Part 5

"Sorry. I'm moving." Dropping the binoculars to her lap, Mei replied even though the man couldn't hear her. She was so rattled she forgot to look for oncoming traffic. Horns blared. Brakes screeched. She kept going, hoping for one last glimpse of the black car in her rearview mirror as she pulled away.

The jerk was gone.

"I was kinda hoping you already saw something you liked," sweet Mabel Magee drawled in that cute, s.e.xy way she had.

"I might take you up on your offer one of these days," Zack rumbled through a convincing lie. Hooking up with a lady of the street was never going to happen. Still, Mabel was always offering, always helpful, and judging by the way she batted those green contact lens-colored eyeb.a.l.l.s, forever hopeful.

"I do like your ride, baby." She trailed a bright turquoise fingernail across the leather seat. Yeah. Most girls liked his car, especially girls in her profession. It was nearly as fast, hot, and pricey as they thought they were. "Black is my favorite color, you know."

He allowed a smirk. Usually, he tagged his CIs on the sidewalk in case he couldn't get them out of said favorite color ride once they got in. Zack was no dummy. He was familiar with the lingo of babes on the street, where tricks were cheap and talk was cheaper. The line of hers was only true unless the gentleman she was working happened to drive something red, yellow, or green. The only reason she was sitting inside now was the chilly November weather blowing up her skirt outside.

"You'll let me know if you hear anything, won't you?"

"Oh, absolutely." She had the fullest lips he'd ever seen. How do women do that, make their lips swell like they've used a vacuum nozzle or something on them? Mabel's seemed more p.r.o.nounced than most. Or maybe it was her odd choice of dark tan lipstick outlined with red. What was she going for, a chocolate cherry mouth?

"Here's a little something for your trouble." He stifled his opinion and offered a couple folded twenties, catnip to the prowling feline. She leaned toward him, her full cleavage on display and begging to be ogled.

"Why don't you stick those bills where no one else can find 'em, sugar?" She licked those full lips again, letting her tongue move extra slow like they weren't already glossed and dripping. Her chest jiggled beneath the tight knit, revealing the embossed impression of two distinct nipples and the lacy view of purple lingerie that wasn't concealing as much as revealing. As cold as it was, she should have been wearing a coat, but Zack knew why she didn't. Mabel used her feminine persuasion in all the best ways. The more that showedwell, the more that showed.

Of course he looked. He wasn't dead. Besides, guys called 'em headlights. Hers were on high beam. How could he miss them? Zack leaned in nearly close enough to touch the merchandise and paused right there. Flirting was one thing. She was another. "You keep talking like that and-"

The oriental gong alert sounded on his cell phone.

"Hey, David, what's up?" he answered hoa.r.s.ely, the bills between his two fingers, and Mabel still offering a show. He cast one last hungry look down the valley between her b.r.e.a.s.t.s and pantomimed a kiss.

She took the money and slowly extricated her long legs from his car, blowing a return kiss over her shoulder.

"I'm at the county morgue. Can you meet me?" Leave it to David to spoil a semi-good time.

"Sure." Zack's gaze lowered to the round backside still planted in the pa.s.senger bucket seat. She did fill it extremely well and the hem of her skirt was as high as her cleavage was low. Some kind of tattooed artwork kept peeking out between the top of her skirt and the bottom of her sweater, right above some kind of lacy strap that might have been a thong. The view offered too much enticement. Tattoo or underwear? How did a man not look?

"You need to get down here. I've found something."

"On my way." The tremor of concern in David's voice caught Zack's attention even as he kept an eyeball on the sh.e.l.l game going on with Mabel's derriere. The girl knew how to tease. "What'd you find?" he asked, his attention still wandering.

"You've got see this to believe it. Please hurry."

"Be right there," he said, but he thought, 'And you've got to see this'.

"Before you take off and leave me." Mabel waited, half-in and half-out of his car like the working girl she was - working it. "There is an old guy now I think about it. He hangs out around the rescue mission. Might be the one you're looking for. Name's Marty."

"He been talking about a little girl, has he?" Zack lifted his gaze to Mabel's face.

"Actually, he's always talking about a little girl. I thought it was his daughter, but I could be wrong. He might be worth checking into."

"Thanks, Mabel."

"Why don't you come back later and thank me in person, Zack baby?" She batted those luxurious lashes. "I'd give you a discount. Might put a smile on your handsome face."

"If you can find out something about those little Chinese girls, I just might." He revved the engine, listening to it purr for a few seconds before he engaged the clutch.

She pouted. "And if I don't? Will I ever see you again?"

Zack smiled. "You never know."

A bl.u.s.tery wind tossed her bright red hair as she got out of the car, looking forlorn. He pulled away from the curb, glancing in his rearview mirror. She got over her loneliness the minute another car pulled to the curb.

Too soon, he was looking down at a stainless steel tray with the remains of a very small body tagged, 'Jane Doe'. "h.e.l.l. She's just a baby."

"Two years old," David explained.

"Is anyone looking for her?"

"Not that the police are aware of. They're running a nationwide search."

Zack turned his face from David to gather his composure. The operation was becoming tougher than he'd expected. The morgue always gave him the creeps, but standing over a deceased child as young as the little girl in the tray created another feeling entirely. He wasn't so much disgusted as he was angry. How could anyone hurt an innocent baby? What made some people so evil? So twisted and so d.a.m.ned cruel? He didn't understand. Half of him wanted to punch something, the other half to throw up.

"I've been reading the ME's report," David continued quietly. "It listed an identifying mark on her arm, so I asked to see the body."

Zack peered through the magnifying gla.s.s, following the tip of David's ballpoint pen to what looked like a black splotch on the arm of the remains.

"What am I looking at?" As much as he respected his senior agent, David's method of always making a man come up with his own conclusions was aggravating, especially at times like this.

"What does it look like to you?" David persisted.

"I don't know." Just spit it out. I need to get out of here.

The longer Zack looked, the edgier he got. Fish had nibbled these tiny hands. The fingernails were gone. No toes remained on her feet. He couldn't even begin to look at her face. The cold smell of death in the morgue had thoroughly squashed any good feeling left from his visit with Chai. She could have ended up on another tray in the same morgue.

Tears blurred his vision. He gritted his teeth and willed them away.

Focus, Lennox. You're a Marine. You've seen worse.

"Look again." David pulled the magnifying gla.s.s closer. "Tell me what you think you see."

d.a.m.n it, David. Spit it out. Tell me what I'm looking at, so I can get- Zack looked closer. "What the h.e.l.l?"

"You see it now, don't you?"

"On a child this small? Why? How?" Zack looked again, disbelieving his eyes. This baby had been marked all right with what looked like a black dragon tattoo.

"Chai is very lucky you found her when you did." David nodded sadly.

"Does the ME have a COD?"

"Not exactly. This little one has been in the water too long. Agent Xing was right. There's no way to know cause of death for sure," David said. "I'm headed back to the hospital and then to the foster family who has Zhen Ting. I want to know if she and Chai have been marked, too. What about you?"

"I think I've tracked the gentleman down who pulled Zhen Ting out of the garbage. He hangs out at the men's rescue mission over in Anacostia. Thought I'd buy him dinner and see what he can tell me. Madam Mim didn't seem to think that was important, but I do. Who knows?"

David rolled his eyes at Zack's description of Agent Xing. "I'm surprised you know who Mad Madam Mim is."

"I've got a kid sister," Zack explained. "She's fifteen years younger. I watched a lot of Disney before I joined the Corps. Xing and Mim have a lot in common, only I think Mim might be nicer."

"We have another problem." David lowered his voice as the ME covered the small corpse and removed the tray. "Alex is on his way back from Seattle."

"Already?" Zack groaned. "Wasn't he supposed to be gone all week?"

"Apparently ATF Director Carducci has some clout in Congress after all," David said. "The boss has been targeted for a Senate investigation. He's scheduled to appear before a committee in the Russell Senate Building later this week."

"d.a.m.n." Zack didn't know what else to say. Alex was probably cursing him at this very minute. "He only left yesterday. When's he due in?"

"Seven-thirty tonight."

"d.a.m.n," Zack repeated. Could things get any worse?

"Be careful, Zack," David warned. "I have a very bad feeling."

EIGHT.

"Who wants to know?"

Marty was smelly, whiskered, tipsy, and suspicious. It seemed his entire face squinted, his lips pursed together like he was thinking real hard when Zack caught up with him. "Do I know you, young fella?"

"No, sir. You don't. Name's Zack Lennox." When the man didn't accept his handshake, Zack sat on the fold-up cot with him. "I was hoping I could buy you dinner in exchange for your story of how you found the little girl the other night."

"What little girl?" His s.h.a.ggy brows crinkled in suspicion. "Do I know you?" he asked again. "You look kinda familiar."

Zack sighed. Maybe this was a waste of time. Hagatha might be right. "The little Chinese girl you found in the dumpster behind the IGA store. Remember her?"

Another swipe over his face, and Marty blinked a few times. "Oh. Her. I get kinda confused. I used to have my own little girl, ya know. Leastways, I think I did. Sometimes, I ain't too sure 'bout nuthin' no more."

"Come on." Zack offered a hand up. "A good hot meal will help you remember. What do you say?"

Marty pulled his hand away like Zack had just bit it. "I ain't going nowhere. They'll give my bed to someone else. Where will I sleep then?"

"Nah." Zack pulled Marty to his feet. "I'll put in a good word for you. They'll hold it."

"You sure?" He looked across the huge room where a hundred or so cots were set up in rows for another night of shelter from the cold. "Boy, I sure hope you're right. It's awful cold to be sleeping on a park bench. A fella could get his fingers froze off, if'n he don't wake up dead."

"Don't worry." Zack helped Marty into the threadbare green and black plaid jacket laying on his cot. "They'll hold it or they'll have to answer to me."

"Eh, eh, eh." Marty's eyes twinkled. "You must be darned important if you think they's going to listen to you."

They were at the entrance door where a swarthy man stood checking the transients and less fortunate as they came in for a night of warm food and sleep.

"You'll hold my friend's bed until he gets back, won't you?" With those words, Zack pressed a couple bills into the man's hand. He nodded once, and Zack led Marty out into the frosty November night. An early winter storm was blowing in off the Atlantic, kicking the last of the autumn leaves out of the gutter. Marty was right. A man could freeze out here.

"Br-r-r." Marty pulled his jacket tighter. "Gonna be a cold one. Folks are gonna die tonight if'n they ain't careful."

Together they walked across the street to the Fishmonger's Diner where Zack knew he could get a decent meal and hopefully, a private conversation. It was one of Jake's hangouts, a train car-sized Mom and Pop joint right next to Fat Larry's Tavern.

"Howdy, Stan." Marty flashed a high-five to the man exiting the diner.

Stan grumbled and kept on going, flas.h.i.+ng nothing back but a whiskered sneer.

Zack steered Marty to the corner table farthest from the door. Setting diagonal to the corner, it avoided the draft while offering the best view of everyone eating, serving, coming and going. He took the corner chair and positioned Marty in the chair to his left, not that the old guy was concerned with covering his back. Zack lived by the simple rule of every sniper. Watch everyone.

The waitress was quick with their gla.s.ses of water, and quicker when Zack ordered a round of beers, two large bowls of Fishmonger's specialty, their homemade oyster chowder, and triple-decker sandwiches stacked high with cheese and turkey.

"Will that be all?" she asked politely after she'd delivered the spread.

"How about the biggest slice of pumpkin pie in the house?" Zack clapped a hand on Marty's shoulder. "My friend's a little hungry."

"Coming right up, Hon."

Marty chuckled, rubbing a quick hand over his thinning hair. "You keep being so nice ta me, and folks are gonna think you're my kid or something."

"You got kids?" Zack doffed his leather jacket, letting it slump to the back of his chair.

The old man nodded, working his jaw like he needed to keep his dentures in place. "Yeah. Two. Leastways, I think I only had the two." He scratched the end of his red chapped nose. "'Course, I been on the road awhile now. Ain't seen 'em much lately."

"Well, dig in." Zack sliced his sandwich in half, keeping an eye on Marty. The old man was hungry, licking his lips when he already had a mouthful. After the first bowl of chowder was nearly gone, Zack signaled the waitress for another.

It was at the end of Marty's first sandwich that he turned with his mouth half-full. "I wasn't always like this, ya know."

Zack didn't respond. Tonight was Marty's night to fill his stomach and talk.

"No, sir," he rambled as he tore off another chunk of bread and turkey with his teeth. "I was gonna be an engineer, was gonna be rich and work for NASA."

Empathy swelled Zack's heart. He knew this kind of man well. Marty was one of so many lost souls along the waterfront. His eyes might be rheumy from too many years on the bottle, but his heart was solid gold. Maybe around sixty or sixty-five, gray-haired and missing a couple teeth, he was no more than a scarecrow in a two-bit pair of worn out jeans that someone at the local rescue mission had probably given him. His thin jacket was worthless in the bitter North Virginia weather. Winter wouldn't be any kinder.

"That little gal weren't like you and me," he muttered between spoonfuls of chowder and sandwich. "She had real pretty eyes, kinda slanted like them boat-people back in the seventies. She only peeked 'em open once, but they was real purdy brown." Another couple spoonfuls and he continued, "And she had short black hair. Her lips were kinda blue, ya know, cuz she was so cold. When I first seen her, I just figured she was a doll someone throwed away. She was dirty and she weren't moving at all."

The baby at the morgue flashed into Zack's mind, another cold little body. At least he'd found Chai Yenn in time. Somehow, it didn't ease the fact that the other child had suffered. But why were they all Chinese girls? The Wicked Witch of the West might be right. The operation smelled more and more like a child trafficking ring at work.

"'Course, then she kinda cried." Marty stared across the counter, his mind a million miles away. "She reminded me of...another little girl who...I mighta known...." A drip of cream-colored soup spilled over his bottom lip. The moment stretched.

At last Marty shook his head. "There's just something about a little girl crying that gets to me right here, ya know?" He pumped a weathered fist against his chest, his voice tight and hoa.r.s.e. "That little baby doll needed me, and I was dang glad I was there. There she was with coffee grounds smeared all over her, and what was I gonna do, huh?"

Defiance glistened in the old man's eyes, as if he needed to justify who he was and what he'd done. Zack nodded, his heart full of compa.s.sion. Yeah. Marty had seen better days a long, long time ago. It was hard not to like the old guy. He could've walked away that night, and Zhen Ting would've never been found, but he didn't. That made him a hero. A drunk maybe, but in Zack's book a hero just the same.