SLACK FRIDAY: NOVEMBER 28, 2014
Avoid crazed shopping crowds!
Keep calm and carry on at home with these great
Merr-E Holiday Treats from Pocket Star eBooks!
BLOND CARGO
John Lansing
October 20, 2014
$5.99
The second Jack Bertolino thriller by John Lansing
“An unyielding pace, vigorous
characters and explosive ending.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“A fantastic read…This extremely fast and well-thought-out
thriller will remind some of James Patterson’s early works.”
—Suspense
Magazine
“Blond Cargo an extraordinary, must-read detective thriller…Look
out Patterson,
someone’s gaining on you!”
—Amazon Reviewer
SUMMARY:
Blond Cargo is the
highly anticipated second Jack Bertolino installment from New
York native and now Los
Angeles
Jack Bertolino is back…in the sequel to John Lansing’s bestseller The Devil’s Necktie!
Jack’s son, Chris, was the victim of a brutal murder attempt and
Vincent Cardona, a mafia boss, provided information that helped Jack take down
the perpetrator of the crime. Jack accepted the favor knowing there’d be
blowback. In Blond Cargo,
the mobster’s daughter has gone missing and Cardona turned in his chit.
Jack discovers that the young, blond mafia princess has been kidnapped and
imprisoned while rich, politically connected men negotiate her value as a sex
slave. John Lansing taps into the real life world of cops, crime, drugs
and murder in Blond Cargo to deliver another sizzling whodunit.
EXCERPT:
Jack Bertolino moved briskly down the polished terrazzo floor of
the American Airlines terminal at San
Francisco International
Airport
Jack had his game face on. One thought only: take down the manager
at NCI Corp who was dirty.
Todd Dearling had been hired as one of five project managers,
developing a new generation of semiconductors meant to challenge Intel’s
control of the market. Yet the new engineer was plotting to steal the
proprietary architecture for the company’s most advanced technology and sell it
to an Argentinean competitor.
Jack had done a thorough background check on Dearling and found no
skeletons in the man’s closet, no gambling issues, no drugs, no priors; it was
greed, pure and simple. Cruz Feinberg, Jack’s new associate, had arrived in Silicon Valley two days prior and wirelessly inserted a
program onto Dearling’s iPad while the stressed-out manager was sucking down
his daily chai latte at the local Starbucks. Any text or e-mail sent to or from
Dearling was cloned and sent to Cruz’s laptop. A piece of cake to pull off for
the young tech whiz. Jack was being well paid to catch the thief in the act—let
the money and the technology change hands, and then drop the hammer.
Todd Dearling had made reservations at the Four Seasons Hotel in East Palo Alto . A car would be waiting at SFO to ferry
his Argentinean counterpart to the suite where the exchange was scheduled to
take place.
Jack had booked Cruz into that same suite two nights earlier,
where he had set up wireless microcameras and wired the room for sound, to be
routed to the suite next door, where Jack’s team would document the crime.
Jack lived for these moments. Outsmarting intelligent men who
thought they were above the law. Badge or no badge, Jack loved to take scumbags
down.
Ten minutes ago, Flight 378 from Buenos Aires
Jack reached out a hand toward the driver, who was forced to lower
his placard, shake Jack’s hand, and make quick work of grabbing up Jack’s bag.
Jack headed quickly toward the exit, explaining to the driver that he was
traveling light and had no checked luggage.
As soon as the two men exited the building, Jack’s second
employee, Mateo Vasquez, dressed in a black suit, moved into the same spot,
carrying a sign that read Emilio bragga.
Jack and Mateo had once been on opposite sides of the thin blue
line, Jack as an NYPD narcotics detective, Mateo as an operative for a
Colombian drug cartel. When Jack busted the cartel, he made Mateo an
offer—spend thirty years in the big house, or come to work for the NYPD as a
confidential
informant. Mateo had made the right choice and Jack had earned
himself a loyal operative when he became a private investigator.
Thirty seconds later, the real Emilio Bragga walked up to Mateo,
stifled a yawn, and handed off his carry-on. He was short and stocky with a
rubbery face.
“Buenos días, Señor Bragga. I hope your flight was
acceptable?” Mateo asked deferentially.
“Barely. First class isn’t what it used to be.” Bragga’s accented
English was spoken in clipped tones. “Take me to the First National Bank. I
have business to attend to.”
Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars’ worth of business, Mateo
might have added, but refrained.
Jack arrived at the Four Seasons, generously tipped the limo
driver, and hurried up the elevator to the suite where Cruz was waiting. Once
Jack stripped off his suit jacket, he joined the young genius by his array of
monitors.
“They should make these baby ketchup bottles illegal,” Cruz said
as he tried to pound the condiment out of the room service minibottle of Heinz.
Growing frustrated, Cruz shoved a knife deep into the viscous ketchup and
poured a heaping red mound onto his fries. Happy with the results, he chowed
down on three drenched fries before wiping his hands on his jeans and returning
his gaze to the computer.
“It looks like he’s getting ready for a date,” Jack said as he
took a seat. Cruz kept his eyes trained on the four screens corresponding to
the four different camera angles of the room they were covering.
“Guy’s squirrelly,” Cruz said, biting into his cheeseburger.
They watched as Todd Dearling twirled a bottle of champagne in the
ice that had just been delivered from room service, along with a tray of finger
sandwiches and crudités. He was a slight, pale, middle-aged man with thinning
hair that he kept nervously brushing back off his forehead. He shrugged out of
his tweed sports jacket, but when he saw the sweat stains in the armpits of his
blue dress shirt, he slid it back on. He hurried over to the thermostat near
the door, appearing on a new screen, and turned up the air.
Jack checked his watch and then his phone to make sure he was
receiving enough bars to communicate with Mateo. “I’m getting a little nervous.
You?” Cruz asked before sucking down the last of his Coke. He crumpled the
aluminum can with one hand and executed an overhand dunk into the bamboo trash
bin.
Cruz’s mother was Guatemalan, his father a Brooklyn Jew who
founded Bundy Lock and Key. That’s where Jack first met him. Cruz, who took
after his mother’s side of the family, looked taller than his five-foot-nine
frame. Darkskinned, intelligent brown eyes, a youthful angular face, and at twenty-three,
he could still pull off the spiky short black hair.
“I’ve got some energy going,” Jack said, “but it’s all good.
You’d have to worry if you didn’t feel pumped.”
Just then Jack’s phone vibrated and the number 999 appeared on his
text screen, code for It’s a
go. Mateo and Emilio Bragga had just pulled up to the front entrance of the
Four Seasons Hotel.
“We’re on,” Jack said with a tight grin.
In another minute, a loud rap on a door made Cruz jump. “Is that
here?” he asked, and glanced over at the door to their suite.
“No, it’s next door. Great sound, Cruz,” Jack said, trying to keep
his newest charge calm.
Jack and Cruz watched as Dearling’s image moved from one screen to
the next, went over to the door, unlocked it, and ushered in Emilio Bragga. The
man of the hour wheeled his carry-on across the white marble floor, pushed the
retractable handle down into the bag, and gave Dearling an unexpected bear hug,
lifting the thin man off his feet. Once the blush faded and he had regained his
composure, Dearling was all smiles. He could smell his fortune being made.
“First, tell me you have them,” Bragga said brusquely, his smile tightening.
“I have them and more, Emilio. There are even some preliminary
renderings for the next series of chips. Consider it goodwill,” Dearling said.
He lifted the champagne bottle out of the melting ice with a
flourish, dripping water onto his dress shirt. “A celebratory drink and then
business.”
“No, business first,” Jack said.
“No. Show them to me. Now,” Bragga ordered, his voice unyielding.
“Now we’re talking,” Cruz said to Jack, barely able to control his
excitement.
The next knock was more subdued than the first, just a quick
double knock.
“That’s here,” Jack said as he slid out of his chair and opened
the door. Mateo was thirty-nine years old, tall, handsome, with striking gray
eyes, long brown hair, and a thousand-dollar suit. He beamed at his old friend
as he walked in, bumped fists, and moved into position behind Cruz, eyes
trained on the computer screen.
Emilio Bragga placed his carry-on luggage on the couch as Dearling
pulled a slim buffed metal briefcase from behind the table and snapped it open
on the tabletop. Inside was a series of blue, red, silver, and gold flash
drives, seated in foam cutouts next to three bound technical binders.
Bragga leafed quickly through one of the binders, visibly relaxed,
and placed it back inside the case. He looked at Todd Dearling and nodded his
head. Then he smiled.
“This is the money shot,” Jack said. “Make it the money shot.”
Emilio Bragga walked over to the couch, ceremoniously produced a
key, and opened the lock. The sound of the zipper ratcheting around the
circumference of the bag got everyone’s full attention. And then Bragga flipped
open the canvas top.
Two hundred and fifty thousand, in crisp, banded hundred-dollar
bills. Jack’s team could almost hear Dearling’s breath catch in his throat.
“You see those appetizers?” Bragga said, gesturing to the tray of
crudités. “That is what this is.” He turned his gaze to the thick stacks of
money like it was nothing. “Antipasto…before the meal.”
The two men shook hands. The deal was consummated. It was all
gravy now, Jack thought. He would contact Lawrence Weller, CEO of NCI, who
would have Bragga quietly arrested at the airport and Dearling picked up
outside his condominium, thereby avoiding any negative publicity regarding the
security breach that could affect the value of NCI’s stock.
“Start taking sick days as we get closer to the rollout date,”
Bragga advised. “Then you’ll take a forced medical leave. I’ll set you up with
a doctor in San Francisco Mendoza
Bragga’s speech was interrupted by another knock on the door.
“Room service,” a muted voice said.
“We’re good,” Dearling shouted as he moved toward the door while
Bragga instinctively closed the lid of his bag, covering the money.
Jack gave his team a What
the hell? look. “Who are
these jokers?”
“Complimentary champagne from the management of the Four Seasons,”
intoned the muffled voice.
“Don’t open the door,” Bragga hissed.
“Don’t open the door,” Jack said at the same time. But Dearling
had already turned the handle.
Three men dressed in navy blue blazers with gold epaulettes pushed
a service cart draped with a white cloth into the room with a bottle of
champagne in a silver ice bucket and a huge bouquet of flowers in a crystal
vase. “Three men on one bottle,” Jack said as he pulled his Glock
nine-millimeter out of his shoulder rig and headed for the door.
“We weren’t the only ones who hacked his computer,” Cruz intuited.
“Don’t leave the room,” Jack told him over his shoulder. He
quickly exited the suite, followed by Mateo. Cruz nodded, but his wide eyes
never left the computer screen.
The lead man pushed the cart toward Dearling, but instead of
slowing down, he muscled the cart up against the timid man’s waist, picked up
speed, and forced him to backpedal across the room. Dearling’s eyes bugged, his
face a mask of terror. The flowers and champagne tumbled off the cart, and the
crystal vase shattered on impact. The champagne bottle exploded. Flowers and
glass and water and bubbly flooded the slick stone floor. Dearling’s body
slammed into the television set on the far wall; his head whipped back and
splintered the flat screen. Glass rained down on the Judas as he slid to the
floor behind the cart.
Bragga placed himself in front of his bag of cash and took a gun
barrel to the side of his head. The gash spurted blood, drenched his shirt,
turned his legs to rubber, and took him down onto one knee. The gunman made a
fast reach past him for the bag, but Bragga grabbed the thug around one thigh
and tried to bulldog him to the ground.
“I’m gonna shoot you, you dumb prick,” the gunman grunted, rapidly
losing control of the situation.
“So much for keeping it on the QT,” Jack said to Mateo as he
kicked the door open and followed his gun into the room.
The third uniformed man spun as the door smashed against the jamb
and Jack’s fist exploded into his face. The man’s head snapped back, and blood
streamed out of his broken nose. His arms flailed, and his gun was suspended in
midair for a split second before the man and the gun hit the floor.
The man who’d pushed the cart turned his weapon on Jack, who fired
first, blasting the man in the shoulder. The force of Jack’s bullet propelled
the gunman’s body backward onto the cart before he flopped to the stone floor,
landed on his shoulder in the broken glass, and cried out in pain. The gun
discharging in the close confines of the hotel suite stopped the action. The
room smelled of cordite, the only sounds heavy breathing and Todd Dearling’s
whimpering. Mateo picked up the third man’s pistol and covered Jack’s back.
Jack turned his Glock on the second man. “Give me your gun or your
friend’s going to bleed out,” he stated with extreme calm.
Before Jack could take control of the weapon, Bragga stripped it
from the gunman’s hand and smashed him in the temple with surprising violence.
Then he swung the confiscated Colt back and forth between Jack and Mateo,
stopping them in their tracks.
“Nobody move and nobody follow,” Bragga said as he half-zippered
the suitcase with one hand and picked up the carry-on bag.
“Drop your weapons,” he ordered Jack and Mateo through clenched
teeth as blood continued to drip down the side of his face. They complied,
knowing he wouldn’t make it as far as the lobby. Bragga walked around the couch
on unsteady legs, muscling the heavy bag. His eyes bored into Mateo, the
“driver” who had betrayed him, and ordered him to clear the doorway with a
sharp wave of his gun barrel. Mateo took a half step to the side, gave the
short man just enough room to pass, and pistoned with his full two hundred
pounds of muscle, leading with his elbow and hitting Bragga in the back of the
head, just above the neck. The Argentinean went down hard.
The overstuffed bag bounced on the floor, the luggage’s zipper
split open, and a green wave of banded hundreds cascaded out onto the polished
white Carrara
“That was insane.”
Jack turned around and found Cruz standing, wild eyed, in the hall
directly behind him.
“Call 911 and lock the door. Did we get it all?”
“I copied Lawrence Weller and you on your cell, iPad, and laptop.”
“Good man,” Jack said.
“No, really, you, Mateo . . . man.” Cruz shuddered as he pulled
out his cell and dialed the emergency phone line. Jack was not one normally
given to second-guessing, but at the moment he found himself seriously
questioning his new career choice as a private investigator.
Muttering a curse, Jack holstered his nine-millimeter, crossed the
room, and proceeded to snap plastic flex-cuffs on the broken assembly of
thieves.
AUTHOR:
John Lansing spent five years writing for TV hit Walker, Texas Ranger, and
another three years studying the life of an NYPD Inspector. What emerged from
his combined writing about a cop and time spent with an actual cop was Jack
Bertolino—a fictional character with very real-life stories. Lansing Los
Angeles
This book may have been received free of charge from a publisher or a publicist. That will NEVER have a bearing on my recommendations.
No comments:
Post a Comment