Walker (In the Company of Snipers #21) - Irish Winters Page 0,138
phone at his ear. “Ember. I’m sending photos of…” He looked down at Walker.
“Twenty-one women and girls,” Walker answered as he lined them up, so Stewart could take a better picture.
It took him seconds to send those pictures. “What else?”
Walker pulled the handwritten purchase orders out next.
“Jesus Christ,” Stewart hissed, when he leaned in closer to take a better look.
“Shit,” Sullivan growled.
Everyone was on their feet. Persia turned instantly hard. “I will kill this motherfucker, if it’s the last thing I do.”
Walker looked up at her. Man, he loved tough talk from this beautiful woman.
“I’m right there with you, sister,” Ryder muttered, his deep baritone somehow calming in the middle of this view of hell.
“You have no idea how many times I’ve dealt with similar cases,” Stewart breathed, as he snapped close-ups of several receipts. “Sex trafficking is the world’s current Black Plague. It’s everywhere. Interesting these are handwritten. That’s different.”
“Also interesting they’re legible,” Sullivan added darkly. “A handwriting specialist should be able to tell us who wrote them, provided we’ve got matching cursive. All the same penmanship. And they’re numbered. At least whoever’s behind this business kept records. Think your TEAM can narrow the playing field?”
“My TEAM works miracles.”
“Good. Let’s see how fast they can get answers, then.”
“I think Wallace Goff is behind this,” Walker offered. “Tell Ember to compare these receipts to his writing first.”
“Might’ve been him,” Sullivan drawled.
“No, sir, it is him. What I mean is, I’m sure he’s still alive. I think he faked his death.”
“Why would you think that?” Stewart asked, his sharp eyes scrolling over Walker like he’d been weighed and found wanting.
“Because there are just too many coincidences, Mr. Stewart—”
“Alex,” the alpha hardass barked. “For hell’s sake, if you’re not going to call me boss, just Alex.”
Alex it is. “First off, Renzo said something the night we… talked,” Walker explained. “He said his buyer was late because another transaction had gone sideways. I think I’m what went sideways. His other POC, Officer Bruno, must’ve warned Goff that I was snooping around. Which was why I was able to rescue all those women and girls. If he’d been smart, he would’ve sent someone else to grab this human shipment, but he didn’t, and he knew I’d recognize him. That’s the only reason I was able to get Emily Dooley out of there.”
“And…?” Alex prompted.
“And because…” Walker gritted his teeth, probably going to sound crazy, but still going full steam ahead. “Because this yacht’s still registered in Goff’s name. And the dates line up. The MPs were inside my house the morning after I returned from Guatemala. I was sound asleep. Hell, I still had jetlag, but there they were, arresting me for murdering my CO at 2100 hours the night before. Check my flight time if you don’t believe me. I didn’t arrive until 2030. Yet Goff’s neighbor’s testimony puts me at the scene before I’d even left the airport. There’s no way I could’ve been in two places at once. Who else could’ve stacked the cards against me that fast? Had to be Goff.”
“And…?” There went those sharp blue lasers again.
“I gave my leave request to Goff. He’s got to be behind the sabotaged Blackhawk demonstration in Britain.” Walker ran a quick hand over his too long for Navy hair. “And now that bombing in Jordan. Christ, I’ve been set up for every shit show that’s gone down since I set foot in Guatemala. They can’t all be coincidences. Who else could it be? Who else would’ve known?”
“You and he ever get along?” Sullivan asked sarcastically.
“Team 18 hated the son of a bitch, sir,” Ryder piped up, his dark eyes hard and fast on Walker. “He played by the book and followed rules, but he never once backed us up. Never had a problem hanging us out to dry if it made him look good. Goff was a pencil pusher. Isn’t that right, Boss?”
“Spot on,” Walker agreed. “I can pin two deaths directly on false intel Goff fed us on an op in Algeria. We lost two good operators that time.” Made him wonder what Goff might have had on them. Had they stumbled across his involvement in human trafficking? Was that why they’d died?
“And you…?” Sullivan pushed.
Walker didn’t know what else to say. “Goff was plenty book smart; he just didn’t connect with his teams like decent commanders did. He was too busy playing politics and kissing ass. None of us SEALs liked him.”