“Gambino is one of the main players behind this, who else?”
“I’m not sure, but he must have a lot of my bosses to have me holed up here like a rat.”
“So, who else can be involved and what are their addresses?” Francesca has her hair up in a ponytail that is wrapped around a baseball looking cap that hasItaliaon it.
She pulls a pen out and a small note pad, writes down names and addresses, and then keys them into the dark web to get the few details the intranet ironically doesn’t have.
“Who is Laura’s father? I see there are numerous pings off cell towers to a Paulo.”
“Son of a bitch, that’s Valentina’s best friend. Her father must be in on it as his future son in law just bought a house he can’t afford unless he had some ill-gotten gains.
“Okay, anyone else you can think of? Do you have any ideas where they might be holding Valentina?”
“It has to be a warehouse at the port where those bosses move contraband or one of their homes. I don’t know. I can’t think of any other place they could be.”
“Okay, sit tight. Do you need anything?”
“We’re fine now, but the sooner the better, as they say.”
“Of course. Trust me, no one wants your sister back more than me.”
“Thanks, I’ll wait to hear from you. I’d offer you more men, but I don’t know who is on my side. Some will wait it out until it’s over.”
“Of course, we’re on it.” I hang up the cell phone.
Francesca is writing down addresses as she goes and running checks on the businesses and holding companies in the area.
“Are we sure she’s in the area?”
“Let’s hope, we also have ships here too. I know you’re upset, but they want her alive,” Francesca takes a second to reassure me.
“Well, I have a list and we can tail Gambino and Laura and I have Ridolfo’s address. I’m thinking we can take his daughter Laura and we can play kidnap roulette,” Francesca shrugs as she takes a sandwich out of a decent size plastic bag, shakes the crumbs out, then stuffs the bag into her backpack.
“So it’s a possibility. Let’s meet up with Sal and Micro and see if they have made any progress on tracking down the addresses they have under surveillance.
“Sounds good. Dibs on that fuck Ridolfo,” I state, “I’m killing his ass.”
“You got it.” Francesca closes her laptop, unbothered. I’m still trying to figure out how she fits in with the group of us men, but her mad hacking skills are impressive. I never figured a woman would be inclined to do that, but then again, I grew up and work in a business dominated by men.
We walk along the beach and Savio picks us up at the road.
“I have the locations, but Sal said we need Francesca to hack into the video feeds. We found an old storeroom at the back of Gambino’s seafood shell company, and it could be a place to hold someone.”
“Great, let’s go.” Francesca climbs in first and launches programs on her phone.
By the time this is accomplished, it’s late in the afternoon, but we manage to get his place of ‘business’ done, and we go to a place that’s not close to where we’re staying to grab pizzas and beer.
“I’m concerned that Valentina has been gone a day.”
“In a usual kidnapping situation I’d say that’s a huge concern, but we know what we’re dealing with here, more or less. And we’re here. Faster than any other team could be, and we’ll find her,” Sal says.
I order pizzas to go so we have food back at the house we’re renting. We grab wine, vodka and limoncello from a grocery store.
Francesca sits at the dining room table and monitors her hacked system.
“Looks like we have activity.” We all crowd around her and see Gambino, as Valentina ID’d him for me from the Alps pictures.
“Yeah, that’s him. If we follow him, we’ll eventually track his people and find her. A hostage needs to eat and be taken care of.” I state the obvious. There is no way I can sleep tonight, or any night until I find her alive and well.