“Yeah.”
“And there’s this,” Jacobs said, handing him the paper Lee wrote on.
“What’s this?”
“Three other places that are supposed to belong to Mallette. I haven’t checked them out, but I’m thinking they’re like this place. Maybe not as big in terms of how much merchandise is inside, but I don’t know.”
“This come from the same source?”
“No, different one. I think he’s reliable just the same, though.”
“And you haven’t looked into these yet?”
“Nope. Just got the information an hour ago myself. Figured I’d give it to you to check out.”
“Why?” Buchanan asked. “Why not look into it yourself like you did here?”
“I don’t think it’s gonna turn up anything other than what this place did.”
“And that’s obviously not good enough for whatever you wanted. What were you looking for?”
Jacobs looked around to make sure nobody else could hear him. “The only thing I want at this point is walking on two legs.”
“And you don’t think Mallette will be at any of these places, so that’s why I get it.”
Jacobs shrugged. “If there’s drugs there, it’ll still be a good thing, won’t it?”
“Yeah. I guess it will.”
“But if you’re gonna hit these places, you’ll probably have to do it now. Once Mallette hears about this place, he’s gonna have those other ones packed up tight and fast.”
Buchanan nodded. He started making some phone calls. When he was done, he went inside to let Garza know what he was doing. Garza would have to take over there, while Buchanan went to one of the new spots. The police were going to raid all three addresses at the same time.
Once Buchanan was ready to leave, he gave one last look at Jacobs. “You wanna come with? Ride along for old-time’s sake?”
Jacobs grinned. “No, I’m good. Thanks for the offer, though. Good luck. Hope you find something good.”
As Buchanan drove away, Jacobs got back in his car. Thrower was waiting in the passenger seat.
“What if Mallette’s at one of these other places?” Thrower asked.
“He won’t be. I’m sure of that.”
“Sure would be nice to see his face when he finds out about all of this.” Thrower laughed. “He’s probably gonna throw a fit.”
Jacobs smiled. “Yeah, he will. We might not be able to see him, but we’ll be able to hear him.”
“What do you mean?”
Jacobs held up a phone. “I grabbed it from Lee when we first went inside.”
“Can you get in?”
Jacobs continued smiling. “Already am. There’s no password or anything.”
“Is Mallette in there?”
“Well, there’s a contact with the initials RM. Who do you suppose that’s for?”
Thrower smiled too. “Rich Mallette. You gonna call him?”
“Let’s get back to the house first. Give the police time to raid those other places. I don’t wanna give Mallette the heads-up and give him a chance to move anything before they get there.”
“This should be good.”
“This might be what we need,” Jacobs said.
“How so?”
“Depending on if this is all Mallette’s got, he’s losing millions and millions of dollars here.” Jacobs shrugged.
“He’ll really start feeling the pressure now.”
“Could make him really desperate. If he thinks I’m taking out his cash sources, he might have to come out of the woodwork sooner than he wanted in order to take me out. If not, he might be living on the street in a few weeks.”
“Or it could make him more dangerous.”
Jacobs shrugged that off. “Could he really get more dangerous? We already know he’s capable of anything, anytime. This just might make him come into the light faster.”
“Let’s hope it does.”
They drove back to Jacobs’ house, where Franks and Tiffany were waiting for their return. After telling them everything that had happened, Franks slapped his hands together and rubbed them.
“Oh, man, this is gonna be good! I can’t wait to hear what that old buttermuffin’s gotta say!”
“Butter what?” Jacobs asked.
Franks shrugged. “Just an insult that I made up.”
“Oh. Doesn’t really sound like much of an insult.”
“I’ll work on it. Anyways, you gotta put that on speaker so we can all hear what that windbag’s gonna say. I can almost hear him choking on himself, just thinking about it.”
“I will. But we need to wait until the police have done their thing,” Jacobs said.
“Tell them to put a rush on it, man.”
“I’m sure they’ll hurry just for you.”
“Well, we are kind of tight and all.”
“Yeah, sure.”
Even though it was a little agonizing, they did wait. About an hour. They figured that was enough time. Before calling Mallette, Jacobs dialed Buchanan’s number. The sergeant picked up immediately.
“Have any fresh new tips for me?”
“Sorry,” Jacobs answered. “All out for today. Figured four was enough.”
“I guess we’ll take it.”
“Just wanted to know how everything went. You get them all?”
“A clean sweep.”
“What’d you find in the other buildings? Anything good?”
“More of the same,” Buchanan replied. “Not quite as big a haul as the first one, but it’ll still put a dent into someone’s wallet.”
“Mallette’s.”
“Well, there’s nothing so far to indicate he’s the man in charge of it.”
“He is.”
“You may know it, and I may know it, but proving it is another matter. And right now, we don’t have it.”
“Sounds familiar. Sounds like something we talked about a long time ago involving another matter.”
“And it’s the same thing now. We’ll get him. It’ll just take time.”
Jacobs wasn’t going to argue the point. “Yeah. Time. Well, I’ll let you get back to processing everything. Just wanted to see how it went.”
After Jacobs hung up, he looked at the others, all of them eager to hear how it went.
“Well, don’t keep us in suspense, man,” Franks said. “Let us know what the dealio is.”
“Other three buildings are in police custody,” Jacobs replied.
“What about the stash?” Thrower asked.
“Same. Not as big, though. But similar, I guess.”
Franks rubbed his hands together. He was really eager to stick it to Mallette. “All righty now… let’s shove it inside that
