Page 106 of Assassin

He shook his head.

“Not much,” he admitted. “I will say this. There’s no clothes back here being worked on. This is most definitely a front for the Chinese Mafia.”

She stared down at the cops.

“Well, then, we got lucky. They most likely weren’t the good guys,” she said, patting them down.

When she found rolls of money in the pockets of their ‘dirty’ clothes, she knew what they were really dropping off.

“Someone is putting pressure on business owners and cops to get kickbacks for Fang. He’s embedded deep here,” she admitted. “This is going to take a while to get rid of that mess.”

They knew she was right.

As for them being dirty…

Thank God.

She didn’t want to kill decent cops.

Not good ones anyway.

“Take their personal phones,” she said, glancing over at Heath. “Then, drag them into the back. I’ll finish talking to these people.”

He did as she asked, and tossed the phones to Dimitri.

As she crouched down, she said his name all over again, hoping it would work this time, now that they saw they weren’t playing.

Alexsandr Dominik.

They all looked afraid. As they began chattering between themselves, MATE was recording and translating to a document.

“What is being funneled through here?” she asked, then asked in Chinese.

Maura could hear her husband asking her questions, MATE telling her what they had been chattering about, and their answers.

Okay, there had to be an easier way.

She needed EVERYONE speaking English.

NOW.

“In English,” she said.

When they wouldn’t speak English, and her Chinese was limited, MATE came to her rescue.

“Major, may I suggest just shooting them in the heads?” MATE asked. “We already have a timer going before the good guys get here.”

MATE was right.

Not only that, but the women looked scared.

“So you do understand English?” she asked. “Thanks, MATE.”

“You are welcome.”

The women began pushing backward to try and move away from Maura.

“I’m going to count to three. Then, I kill you. I’m done playing. One, two, thr…”

---