Chapter 29

Things calm down and return to normal for the next few weeks. Before I realize it, Christmas break is upon us. That Saturday, I am spending a rare day relaxing at home when there is a knock at the door. Zlata and Dahlia are gone Christmas shopping, and Sam is up the hill, working on restoring his car with Gramps. I answer the door. To my surprise, it is Paul.

“May I come in?”

“Yes, of course.”

“I told you that my guy would come through. He found Grace, but he can’t get her out.”

“Why not? What’s wrong?”

He hands me a file and says, “It’s all in there.”

I quickly flick through it then say, “Set up a meet. I want to talk to your guy, whoever he is.”

“I don’t think that is a good idea.”

“Why?”

“He isn’t the sort of guy you want to be associated with. On top of that, he may be working for you so he can get closer to you. With some of the things you have come up with, the number of people who would want you for themselves makes it too big of a payday for him to ignore.”

“Noted. It is too important to me. Set up the meet for some time early in the new year.”

“I really must insist you reconsider.”

“You can make me swallow a tracker, scan him for listening devices and bring as big of a security team as you want, but he and I are going to sit down to a private conversation that nobody else will be a party to. Do you got that?”

“I don’t like it at all, but you’re the boss.”

Paul doesn’t hide the fact that he is upset with me, so we don’t continue the conversation. He leaves me so I can go over the file. I head back to my spot on the couch and start reading through it.

The good news is she is alive. Before I left, there were a few organizations in Fort Grand that could have taken her. The most ruthless is the Meno Mob. They are the most brutal of the underground in Canada. Nobody ever suspects the Mennonites to be heavily into organized crime because they profess to be pacifists. The truth is much different. They are into drug smuggling and distribution, so they were taken off the list of suspects.

The next most vile is the Hells Angels. They have a big clubhouse just outside of Fort Grand. They are into drugs and human trafficking, but they tend not to hide what they do, and she wasn’t in their stable. The chances of them having her are slim. They could have killed her, but they had no reason to.

Next is the small human trafficking ring that was split apart by all the investigations taking place, thanks to the media being involved. By all accounts, they have all been arrested, so they are unlikely.

There are the Filipinos and the Dutch Mafia, but both organizations are too small and not organized well enough to take a kid in the custody of Child Welfare.

That leaves one place for our friend to look, the RCMP. They don’t do a good job of hiding their criminal activities. Why would they? The only people that can arrest them are higher ranking RCMP.

Once he realized that it was the police that took her, it didn’t take long for our operative to track her down. The RCMP doesn’t have permanent safe houses in the west, and they can’t keep her locked up in a jail cell.

That brings us back to the Mennonites. The police and Mennonites are partners in the drug trade. Since the RCMP don’t hide their corruption in the north, it wasn’t difficult for our operative to track her to the Mennonites. Then it was just a matter of him staking out each of the many Mennonite colonies to figure out where she is being kept.

The problem is the majority of all illegal opiates that come into North America come in through Alaska. They travel south, and just outside of Fort Grand, the Mennonites split it up to be distributed throughout North America. They may not look it, but the Mennonite colonies can be heavily guarded.

In the folder are pictures of Grace being transported from one colony to another, where she currently is. They have her in rags, with her parts exposed, being led around on a chain. She is now locked up in a barn. That same barn is used to store and redistribute drugs and is likely on their most fortified colony in the area. According to the report, she is in a hidden basement. There is no way to search the barn to find the entrance. If our guy tried to rescue her, by the time he located her, the Meno Mob would have reinforcements, and he would be captured.

There will be no help from the police or the media on this. They both already know about what happens up there. There will be no rescuing her without there being a lot of people ending up dead.

It may be a bloodbath, but I think I know how to rescue her, and at the same time, make the RCMP look bad. To do it, I need to be in Fort Grand. And there is no way I can pull that off without drawing attention to myself until spring break at the earliest.

Just before supper, Zlata and Dahlia come home, and right away, Dahlia sees that there is something wrong. She asks, “Is it something I can help with?”

“I think I need to talk with the family. When I have things worked out, I will call a family meeting. Then we will talk with your sisters...”

By the time supper is ready, I have my plan sorted out. I’m still sombre and miss most of the supper conversation. Everybody is used to me having big problems on my mind, so they leave me be. It is when everybody is done eating that I say, “We need to have a family meeting.”

Zlata asks, “Do you want us to leave,” referring to Dahlia and herself.

“No, you are part of the family now, whether you like it or not.”

“What is it you need to talk about,” asks Gramps.

“I know you remember me talking about Grace and how using a private investigator wouldn’t work. I found a way around that and hired a guy that works outside the law. He found her, but she is in a place where he can’t get to her.”

Dahlia leans over and hugs me.

“I know I promised to go on vacation with the family for a week and spend the second week of spring break with my girlfriends. That isn’t going to happen. I need to take care of this personally.”

Sam questions, “If it is too dangerous for your friend to handle, isn’t it too dangerous for you?”

“It would be if I was taking on the problem directly as he would. I need to be in Fort Grand to move some pieces into play, which will cause one criminal element to take care of another, in a place where innocents will not be hurt.”

“That still sounds dangerous. It sounds to me like several things could go wrong, and then you would be in trouble,” Zlata comments.

“I can’t tell you my plan, but the chances of that happening are slim. I just needed to tell you so you would know why I won’t be coming with you and why a 16-year-old is going on vacation with his bodyguard.”

Dahlia lets out a sigh of relief, “At least you are taking somebody for protection.”

“Don’t worry. I will not take any unnecessary risks.”

Sam comments, “I think it is up to Dad and me to discuss if you go or not.”

“I appreciate the fact that you are my guardian and that you are only looking out for me, but we are talking about the life of somebody I care about. If it were you, I would be going. Even if you tell me I can’t, I will be going.”

Grandpa adds, “One bodyguard isn’t enough to protect you around the clock. You need at least two, but I would prefer three or four.”

“The more people we add, the more likely that I will be found out. I need a woman to help me with Grace, so Jane will be coming, and I will take one other bodyguard that Paul chooses.”

“Fair enough,” says Gramps.

Nothing more is said. Gramps and Sam both don’t want me to go, but even as a 16-year-old, they know that there is no way they can stop me. It is the defining moment when they realize that they are my guardians in name alone.

That evening, Sam comes into my room to find me working, and he asks, “What is the sense of being your parent if you are just going to ignore what I have to say?”

“I’m not ignoring you. What if it was you that was taken and had unspeakable things done to you. Grace has nobody else. Either I help her, or nobody does. Even if her Mom could help her, she is dead now. She died in police custody before her trial. They claim she was trying to escape. From what I gather, that is a lie.”

Sam sulks as he isn’t getting his way, then snaps, “Why don’t you just move into one of your lake homes then? You don’t need us.”

“You are family, and I respect your opinion. There is no need to move just because we had one disagreement. We are family, and you know you want me here as much as I want to be here. Go, sleep on it before you say something you regret. ZLATA.”

“Why are you calling her in here?”

She opens my door and asks, “What is it?”

“Sam is about to say something he shouldn’t. Would you mind helping to convince him to end the conversation?”

She gives me a pleading look but turns to Sam and says, “Come on. Fighting isn’t going to do anybody any good. Let’s sleep on it and talk about it in the morning.”

Sam turns to me and says, “This isn’t over.” Only, it is over. Sam doesn’t have the backbone to come at me again, especially since he knows I am right. He is just afraid that something might happen to me.

Typically, for lunch, we either go to one of the restaurants down the road, or we head to Mr. Mike’s. Today, instead, I have Gun drive us to Kim’s favourite Chinese place, in town. He doesn’t come in after parking the SUV.

As we are being seated, Moira comments, “This must be a special occasion.”

Dahlia blurts out, “He found Grace.”

As we take our seats, Carol asks, “What does that mean for us?”

I glare at Dahlia then smile at the rest of the girls as I explain, “Nothing, we are all still dating and she won’t come between us. There is a good chance that she can’t stay in Canada. It was the police that took her, and they can’t let her story get out.”

We quieten down because the waitress comes by to take our drink order. Like most Asian restaurants in Victoria, there are two menus. One for the stupid white man and one for anybody that can speak the restaurant’s language. Since it is 1989, that could be the language of the cuisine or Cantonese. When Hong Kong reverts to China, the Mandarin-speaking Chinese flood Canada and the primary language of the Asian restaurants in Victoria switch to Mandarin.