“A bullet to the back of their heads,” I replied. “Execution style.”
“And others have been reported missing, you said?”
“Yeah,” I replied. “Maybe half a dozen or more.”
“They’re dead,” Paul said flatly. “The gangbangers just did a better job of disposing of the bodies.”
“What makes you think that?” Tank asked. “Some psychological profile or something?”
“Simple economics,” Paul replied. “If there’s a turf war between rival gangs, ultimately it’s going to be about money. Whether that money comes from drugs, prostitution, or a bake sale doesn’t matter. Each gang will try to cut off the revenue flow of their rivals.”
I thought about that a moment. From what I’d learned about MS-13, they were ruthless and used murder and intimidation as tools. I didn’t think it would be beyond them to just kill off prostitutes who worked for a rival gang.
“If you can’t raise the bridge,” I said. “Lower the river.”
Tony looked over at me, swallowing a bite from his biscuit. “You mean take the hookers out of the equation?”
I nodded. “And the drugs, too, if we can figure out how.”
“And just how do you figure on doing all this?”
“Cash,” I said.
I saw the light flicker in Tony’s eyes. “You mean we go into these seedy neighborhoods and proposition hookers?”
“Most of these women are drug addicts,” Paul said. “Many come from broken homes and abusive relationships. And most addicts don’t want to be one. They can’t stop using on their own and just don’t have the wherewithal to get treatment.”
“Call Chyrel,” I said to Tony. “While they’re at the Anchor, she can use Rusty’s Wi-Fi to find the nearest drug rehab center around Fort Myers. We’ll grab the hookers and take them there. Even if they don’t complete the treatment, they’ll be safe for a few days.”
“Do you really think they’ll go willingly?” Tank asked.
I thought about that a moment. “While you have her, tell her to send two hundred thousand dollars from my account to me at the BB&T on McGregor in Fort Myers.”
They all looked at me, surprised.
“We’ll give each one an incentive,” I said. “Five grand when they complete the treatment and relocation to another town.”
In a squalid, abandoned apartment building, Maria Gonzalez huddled in a corner of what had once been a second story unit’s small living room. She was done, spent, used up for the night. But she had cash in her pocket. Just what that meant to her these days, she really couldn’t comprehend.
Across from her, a black woman named Shanice sat cross-legged on the floor. Both were high on meth, but it was from the night before and they were starting to come down—tweaking.
The initial rush of methamphetamine produced a feeling of euphoria that lasted for hours, sometimes all night. After that, the high slowly subsided as the user’s body began to shut down, unable to handle the continuous rush. It was during this post-euphoric high stage that a meth user was most lucid, but usually argumentative. Once the high was gone, nothing else mattered except finding more meth.
Both women knew of the missing and dead hookers and both had taken precautions, as best they could, to not be picked up by someone in the rival gang. Yet, there they were, sitting across from one another in the same room—a Hispanic MS-13 prostitute and a black one who worked for the Lake Boyz gang.
Maria drew her knees up and pulled her sweatshirt down over her legs. It wasn’t terribly cold, but there was a chill in the early morning air.
“I don’t think my people can protect me anymore,” Maria said.
Shanice looked over at her. How the two had ended up in the same room, neither of them knew. It had just started to get light outside, and like vampires hiding from the daylight, they’d wandered into the same hiding place.
“Your people started this,” Shanice argued.
“My friend was killed a week ago,” Maria said. “And her son kidnapped. Your people ransacked Razor’s place and took the boy. So, Razor hit back.”
Shanice looked down at her ankles. She’d heard Bumpy bragging about killing several Hispanic working girls. “Bumpy killed her.”
“Huh?”
“He’s Lake Boyz,” Shanice said. “I heard him bragging about killing a few chicas and trashing that Razor guy’s place.
Maria was horrified. “Why would he do that?”
Shanice lifted her head and glared at the other woman. “You don’t belong here,” she spat vehemently. “Before your posse came, Lake Boyz ruled and everything was good.”
Maria didn’t want to argue with her. She was right. The Hispanic population in the area had slowly grown over time. It wasn’t her fault that her parents had brought her to Florida. It was where her dad could find work. Up until he was killed in a drive-by shooting several years earlier.
“Look around,” Maria said. “You call this good? Neither of us is safe. What can we do?”
“I started turning tricks to get out of this hellhole,” Shanice said. “I didn’t have no job and got evicted from my shithole apartment. I thought I could do it for a few weeks and save up, ya know. I never wanted to smoke it.”
“Me neither,” Maria said, a tear trailing down her cheek. “But it made things easier. Now I can’t stop.”
“So, what’s left?”
“I don’t know,” Maria said. “Just die, I guess.”
“Nobody gets out alive.”
“My mom’s forty,” Maria said. “I used to think she was young. But I know I’ll never get to be her age.”
Shanice rose and went to the window. It was boarded up, but there was a small crack between the two sheets of warped plywood.
“It’s getting lighter,” she said, peering through the crack.
“You got someplace to go?” Maria asked.
“No. Do you?”
“I was staying with a friend,” Maria replied. “But he kicked me out two days ago. Said it was too dangerous.”
The location of the abandoned apartment building was between the two neighborhoods controlled by Lake Boyz and MS-13—neutral turf. But since this latest war had started, working girls weren’t safe anywhere.
“There’s a Popeye’s across the street,” Shanice
