Road to Darkness Read Free Page A

crazy while crossing the border.”
         “Good to hear. Set him up for a trial run this weekend. See how he does. If he works out, then we’ll keep him on board for however long.”
         “Great boss. He’s a smart guy and not a tweaker like Spider.”
         “Ok. Set up that trial run and keep me posted ,” Slade said and hung up. That was one less headache. He arrived at the warehouse and parked in his usual spot. The big sign out front read “Ramos Medical Supplies.” It wasn’t a fake. The boss did own Ramos Medical supplies.
    They produced things like neck braces, knee braces, wheelchairs, crutches and the like. They made their real money from their other shipments. In the years Slade had worked for Ramos, they had tried different products. In the early days, it was drugs. Back then he’d pick them up in Mexico and bring them back. It started with cocaine, but they had switched to crystal meth. It wasn’t long, though, before it got harder and harder to cross the border with a truckload of meth.
         After they’d lost too many shipments and too much money, they tried out human trafficking. That turned out to be much more profitable. The Mexicans would pay top dollar for young American girls. Sneaking them into Mexico was incredibly easy. The only hard part was rounding up enough girls without causing a big stir. Runaways were always a good start, and picking up girls in different states ensured they didn’t bring attention to one area in a short time. It was a very efficient and lucrative operation.
         Slade grew up on the south side of town and spent most his childhood on the street. Now he owned a huge home in a gated community and drove a BMW. He climbed out of the car and walked into the warehouse. Several trucks were lined up getting ready for shipments. There’d be no girls going out today. There were a few girls in the cage, though. The cage was behind the main office through a hidden door. Three girls sat there staring back at him. One was asleep. The other two just stared into space. They’d only been there a couple days, but it never took long to break them. They were still kids, easy to break.
         “What brings you here boss man?” A man said to him. It was Jose, the warehouse manager.
         “Hey Jose. Just met with the big guy. Getting things in order for this month. Got a new driver doing a test drive tomorrow.”
         “Oh sweet. He got experience?”
         “Not sure. Domingo says he’s good though, so I’ll go with that. I need to just listen to him from now on. Will save me a lot of headaches,” Slade said.
         “I know what you mean. Speaking of headaches, Spider hasn’t been in today or yesterday.”
         “He won’t be coming back,” Slade said flatly.
         “Right.”
         It was easy to forget sometimes that this wasn’t a real job. You work for Wal-Mart and your truck gets stolen or you wreck and destroy a bunch of merchandise, worse that happens is they fire you. Here there were no firings. Usually it was a body bag, but Slade figured he’d try something new with Spider. One of his friends in the Cartel had told him about it. He’d never seen it done first hand, but it worked pretty well. No body to hide, and made the guy a retard. Toss him to the street and he looked like any other homeless burnout.
         “What’s the word with these girls?” Slade asked.
         “They’re all fourteen or fifteen. They answered a Craigslist ad for Bieber tickets. Was like shooting fish in a barrel. Hector and his guys brought them in.
          “Nice. Need to be careful with Craigslist though. Cops skim those ads too and do stings.”
         “Yeah, I heard.”
         “Oh well. We need about twenty more in the next couple of weeks, so I don’t care how he does it.”
         “Shit. Twenty?” Jose asked.
         “After Spider’s fuck up, we have to make up the cash. If not, there