Black Brick - Chapter Eighteen

This week’s episode features Chapter Eighteen of Black Brick. Here is an excerpt from the show:

Cherry let me into their hotel room a short time later. It was cramped for three people, but the windows were facing the direction we needed. It smelled of cigarettes, and the bedspread had to have been twenty years old. There was a television, but it looked like one of the first ones ever made. The walls had probably been white once upon a time but were now varying shades of yellow and covered in grime.

Tom was sitting at a small table and monitoring the video cameras we’d set up earlier. The bed was covered with guns, computers, and cameras.

Cherry had rings underneath her eyes, but she greeted me with a tight smile. Shannon's kidnapping had been hard on her for multiple reasons, not the least of which was Martinez. Beltran was cracking the whip, and everybody was running on less sleep.

“Did it work?” I asked, glad to have the hotel door shut behind me. I’d been looking over my shoulder since the club. Cole Gurley was part of the Fifteenth Street gang which was known for its creative brutality. It wasn’t uncommon for them to mutilate their victims.

We didn’t know for certain that they were connected with Martinez, but security camera video from that night had shown Gurley and a few others entering the headquarters a few minutes before Martinez and Payne.

In addition to keeping an eye on this place, there was a bookstore in a mall several blocks from here that had a connection to the gang. We didn’t know what the connection was, but members of the gang frequented the place. Beltran had set up surveillance over there as well.

My actions at the club were intended to flush Gurley out. I was hoping to either prove that he was working with Martinez or that he was unrelated.

“Yep,” Cherry said. “The bug picked up Gurley calling Martinez, and he’s on his way back to their lair now. Any hiccups?”

“None.” I didn’t tell her about Kris and the problem she posed. I knew that my contact with her was something that Beltran would expect me to report, but I didn’t think that Kris would cause me any trouble.