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     Johnny Lam was the Special Agent in Charge of the FBI’s Dallas Division. But he kept getting asked the same question, “Why Michigan?”

     Even had POTUS and the ultra-secret K-KEY Group authorized him to answer the tiresome probe, Michiganders would’ve been shocked and frightened: shocked to know a hallucinogenic-form of methamphetamine, called Rapture, was in their good state; and then frightened to learn the drug had been converted to a deadly poison by a madman from a secret underground facility in Texas.

     The 2012 case of a naked man in Miami, Florida, attacking and eating his live victim was believed to have been the appalling result of a single dose of the new designer drug. Luckily, the source of the Rapture was discovered in a tiny town in East Texas, and then destroyed before it could be dispersed to targeted American cities.

     But not all.

     One tanker truck of Rapture had somehow slipped through the government’s robust nation-wide dragnet and remained unaccounted for. Cellular phone signals captured by the National Security Agency revealed that the rogue cargo was diverted to the Wolverine State by Angel Gallina, the head of the notorious Gallina Drug Cartel. Regrettably, the Fed’s overwhelming collection of electronic data muddied the SIGINT stream. By the time the NSA processed the signal intelligence, analyzed the content, and then released an intel report to Homeland Security, ten thousand gallons of the deadliest drug the world had ever known simply disappeared, Angel Gallina was dead, and the trail gone cold.

     It was believed no one outside of the K-KEY Group actually knew of the drug’s poisonous nature. Regardless, the President had made it abundantly clear upon promoting Lam as SAC in Dallas that he was to seek and destroy the Rapture, “No matter where. No matter what. No matter how.”

     So where in Michigan?

     Nearly a year had elapsed since he was assigned to the case and he still had no clue where the drugs could be. Furthermore, it was a mystery why the missing shipment hadn’t been released into the market yet. Once crystallized and then broken into individual doses, Rapture could be worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

     Maybe the cartel chemists hadn’t figured that out yet, since Gallina got blown to bits before he could provide more information. Or maybe Angel Gallina had been double-crossed by Joseph Wiggins, and never knew the drug no longer promised untold wealth, only death. After all, Wiggins had screwed over Kim Jong-il on the matter, so why not Gallina.

     Too bad Joseph Wiggins had met his end before the government could interrogate him, or Lam wring the bastard’s neck for kidnapping his daughter Katie. Wiggins' body was never found, so Lam's only consolation was that his daughter was safe and the evil prick was fish scum at the bottom of the Loma Reservoir by now.

     So many questions, so few answers. But he was sure about one thing––

     The Rapture was coming.

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     Unless he located the missing tanker soon, the good citizens of Michigan could find themselves vexed by a nightmare of demonic proportions from thousands of drugged-up Miami-like zombies ripping and clawing their way through unsuspecting towns and neighborhoods. No one would be safe.

     So it was true he was in Michigan on a seek-and-destroy mission. That was the where. Locating the dangerous Rapture drug was the what. But it was POTUS’ no matter how statement that troubled Lam to his core.

     He was conflicted––safeguard the public from villains and lone-wolf terrorists seeking to rape and raze America . . . but do so while stretching the nation’s Constitution like a cheap rubber band.

     Simply put, the how of his mission could tear a free society apart. He’d always believed it best to separate military and the police. The one fights enemies of the state, the other serves and protects the people. When the military becomes both, then the enemies of the state become the people.

     As a federal law enforcement agent, Lam had always held sacred the notion that he served the public and not the other way around.

     But for some, that belief had changed.

     During the desperate hours following the terrorist attacks on 9/11/2001, a select group of scientists, businessmen, and military leaders assembled. They were the elite of the elite, the best and the brightest, patriots one and all. Their sole interest was the survival of the United States––no matter how.

     They called themselves the K-KEY Group, men and women authorized by their Commander-in-Chief to operate beyond the bounds of common law and without regard for the nation’s Bill of Rights.

     Lam now doubled as a K-KEY Group operative, and carried two forms of identification. One was his traditional FBI wallet and badge for police work and general identification. The second, and more formidable leather case, to be used whenever necessary, identified him as a K-KEY agent. It proclaimed AUTHORITY OVER ALL in ghosting scarlet type and used a peculiar trident insignia that pointed down at a photo of the President.

     Lam found the symbol's arrangement quite disturbing.

     Who could be higher than POTUS?

     Nevertheless, it was this second ID that empowered him to act without warrant, conduct enhanced interrogations, and terminate belligerents with extreme prejudice when deemed necessary.

     He’d been an Army Green Beret before joining the FBI and knew full well how to conduct hybrid warfare. Indeed, he and his Special Forces unit had been highly decorated for performing those very functions.

     But he was a cop now, not a jungle fighter. Pursuing missing drug shipments and chasing down bad guys shouldn’t require a wholesale suspension of the nation’s Constitution.

     Could he even bring himself to fire against his fellow citizens?

     Lam’s internal discord was interrupted by the loud buzzing of his Blackberry phone.

     It wasn’t the Rapture.

-12-

     The incoming call was police work, actual crime-fighting. The message read 187 followed by the letters H and T. One-eight-seven was the police designation for homicide, while HT was his own shorthand for human traffic.

     It was the third victim in five days. Local authorities suspected a serial killer at-large, due to a repeating M.O. of Latin woman stripped naked, signs of sexual abuse and torture, and no forms of identification beyond tattoos, scars, and dental work.

     Lam disagreed with that assessment, believing instead that the women were victims of human trafficking rather than females chosen and murdered by a psychopath.

    He stared at the message. Doing so served to remind him of one immutable fact: he was a cop first, last, and always, not a secret extra-constitutional operative.

     Battling the shameful crime of human slavery had become his own personal war since the very day Wiggins ordered Katie's abduction at the hands of the late Angel Gallina––made forever late by a well-placed rocket propelled grenade fired by his friend Billy Ray Jenkins.

     If not for that assault on his family, he surely would have told the K-KEY Group to take a hike. But now he could tap into the K-KEY Group's assets to bring the trafficking scum to justice . . . as a cop.

     He keyed the GPS coordinates into his phone. A map appeared.

     Port Sheldon . . . Pigeon Lake.

     Lam put the rented Crown Vitoria in gear and drove away from the FBI resident agency headquarters on Ionia Avenue in Grand Rapids.

     While departing the downtown area, he was struck by how different the city looked from his first visit years earlier.

     The world had changed. And so too had Grand Rapids, converting from reliance on heavy industry to that of medical science, research, and higher education. Impressive new buildings ringed the once world-renowned Furniture City like glittering jewels, including an arena and downtown plaza. Century-old factories had been converted to modern uses. Even the downtown culture showed new life, transforming from dingy limelight districts typical of dying factory towns to that of art museums, restaurants, microbreweries, and blues music venues.

     His favorite kinds of fun!

     He accessed the Gerald R. Ford Freeway and headed west toward the coast of Lake Michigan. An hour later, he arrived at the Port Sheldon public boat launch on Pigeon Lake, a body of water formed where Pigeon Creek widened before emptying into Lake Michigan through a channel lined by quarter-mile-long jetties.

     Waiting at the water’s edge in a 25-foot Boston Whaler was an Ottawa County Sheriff detective in a business suit, accompanied by a uniformed marine officer.

-13-

     Lam boarded and said to the detective, “I’m getting tired of us meeting like this.”

     Lieutenant Keith Talsma responded, “So are the victims, Agent Lam.”

     “Good point, Tals.”

     It hadn’t taken Lam long to gain respect for the tough Sheriff Lieutenant. In sharp contrast to Lam's own dark features and flashy clothes, Talsma was pure Dutch, all business, and owned a thick mane of blond hair to go with piercing blue eyes.

     The boat sped off.

     “What do we have today, Lieutenant?”

     “Same as the others. Naked Latina, throat cut ear to ear, deep water submersion.”

     “Chains?” asked Lam.

     Talsma nodded. “Yup.”

     The devil’s baptism. Lam shuddered. 

     Talsma continued, “But there’s a difference with this Jane Doe.”

     “Like what?”

     “No signs of sexual abuse prior to her throat being cut.”

     Lam thought a moment. “Conclusions?”

     “Too early, Lam. But I can offer you a theory.”

     Before Talsma could answer, the marine officer banked hard right to avoid a Jet Ski driven by a lobster-red cowboy chugging a beer. The officer toggled the siren. Bronco Bob’s expression went from rapt pleasure to dread, then slowed his water toy in the no-wake zone.

     “Dumbass,” Talsma said under his breath.

     The marine officer righted the Whaler and motored along the calm waters of Pigeon Lake. The sky was blue, the sun hot, and the crystal waters inviting . . . the very pleasantness that lured so many families to the sandy shores of Michigan.

     Then they rounded a bend and all that changed.

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     A collection of boulders and concrete slabs lined the north side of Pigeon Lake forming a breakwater. While a massive steel discharge pipe from a nearby power plant traversed atop the bank for a half-mile until submerging into the depths of Lake Michigan in the distance.

    In a tiny cove formed where the breakwater bent toward open water, a group of police boats idled as investigators and CSI staff in white Tyvek suits climbed among rocks ringed by yellow crime scene tape. Their attention centered on a set of swollen brown legs protruding from a clump of sea grass and bare sun-blistered feet twisted at unnatural angles.

     Lam turned to Talsma. “I’ll hear that theory now.”

* * *

     Tami Tafoya snuck another peek under the table at her cell phone.

     She should’ve been paying more attention to her date, a handsome butcher named David or Donald or . . . well, whatever.

     She didn’t get many dates.

     Not that she wasn’t shapely and pretty, or lacked interest in men. Hell, she had those attributes in spades. Rather, it was her reputation as a workaholic.

     But so what!

     She loved being an investigative reporter for Channel 13 News. And she was damn good at it, too. She ate, drank, and slept crime reporting.

     Though sadly, that also meant she ate alone, drank alone, and slept alone. Talk of murder had a way of punking intimacy.

     “Are you listening to me?” asked Whatshisname.

     Tafoya looked up from her phone. “Sure. Veal cutlets––”

     “No. I asked what kind of drink you’d like.”

     “Oh, sorry. A hurricane.”

     Dale . . . or Dan’s eyebrows danced. A hurricane was a strong drink. He flagged the waitress and placed the order, his voice full of hope, like so many men before him hoping the rumors about the foxy Cuban reporter babe weren't true.

     The dinks came, interrupting Tafoya cycling through her text messages. But the rum felt good going down. It warmed her body.

     Her date drained his beer and said, “Shall we have another?”

     Tafoya looked from her phone to her empty glass. “Sure . . . Darin. It’s five o’clock somewhere.”

     “The name’s Douglas. And it’s five o’clock here.”

     Tafoya gazed out the window of Captain Jim’s Bar and Grill at the clear waters of Lake Michigan. The evening promised another glorious sunset. Maybe this would be her lucky night. It was obvious by her date's happy expression that he felt the same.

     “So it is, Douglas. Perhaps one more before the drum sounds.”

     Douglas grinned real big.

     Tofaya gathered her purse. “If you'll excuse me a moment, I need to powder my nose."

     Just as she reached the ladies’ room, the chime on her cellphone blinged. It was a text message that read 187, Port Sheldon, Pigeon Lake.

     The police code for murder!

     She looked back at her happy date now placing an order with the waitress. Then she looked out the front door and spotted a taxi cab idling near the entrance.

     Without a second thought, Tami Tafoya headed for the door.

-15-

* * *

   Lieutenant Talsma pointed to the macabre scene at the breakwater. “You can draw your own conclusions, Lam. The Medical Examiner is about to move the body.”

     The marine officer slowed the police boat in anticipation of mooring to a stationary pontoon.

     Suddenly, another boat sped past, beating them to the landing. Then without any hesitation, a thirty-something woman with long dark hair and shapely hips leapt onto the pontoon and jumped to the rocks.

     Lam could hardly believe his eyes. “Who the hell invited J.Lo?”

    Talsma said, “That, my esteemed federal agent, is Tami Tafoya. She’s a news reporter.”

     “What’s she doing here, this is an active crime scene.”

     “She’s an investigative reporter.”

     “So tell her to go investigate at the library. I don’t want unauthorized persons mucking around our crime scene!”

     “Can’t do that, Lam. She’s connected with everyone from the Governor on down. But I do share your sentiment.”

     Lam transferred onto the breakwater, keeping mindful of his footing. The last thing he needed was to slip and break a leg. It only took a few minutes scouting among the rocks to determine he wasn’t looking at the actual crime scene, merely where Jane Doe’s body had washed up after the recent thunderstorm. Weather on the Great Lakes could be as dangerous as the world’s oceans, with waves rising as tall as a three-story building and then reaching down to churn the depths.

     As with the previous bodies, this Jane Doe had been wrapped in chains then  dumped into the lake, only to be wrenched from her liquid purgatory sometime later and returned from the dead.

     There was little hope of finding evidence at Pigeon Lake. But Lam squatted low and searched among the stones anyway, hoping against hope that some clue, some stroke of luck, might reveal Jane Doe’s identity or that of her killer. Police work was like that.

     It took hope.

     As he searched, thoughts of his daughter Katie came to mind, and how fortunate she'd been to be rescued from her abductors. So few victims of human trafficking were ever rescued or even heard from again.

     It was as if the ground opened up and swallowed them whole.

-16-

-16-

     A silky voice behind him said, “Hello, Johnny Lam.”

     Lam turned to face the woman who’d raced past him to the crime scene.

     “I’m told you’re an FBI agent,” she said.

     “And I’m told you’re not a cop,” Lam replied coldly. “That makes you unauthorized to be here.”

     The woman didn’t flinch. “That depends.”

     “Depends on what?”

     “On who’s authorizing.” She held out a business card. “Tami Tafoya.”

     Lam ignored the woman’s offering. He hopped to another rock and resumed the search.

     The site investigation was coming to an end. Despite his raw hands and aching kneecaps, the area failed to produce any evidence. A dead body remained the only proof that a terrible crime had taken place. Soon the yellow crime tape would come down. The area beneath the giant pipe would return to its former serenity. And another precious soul would vanish forever into obscurity.

     The Medical Examiner and CSI staff showed great care handling the remains. After dozens of photos, the corpse was gently placed into a body bag. The ME began zipping the bag shut.

     Something caught Lam’s attention . . . a mark on the victim’s left shoulder. It was the size of a child’s fist and had the color of port wine. The mark resembled a butterfly.

     He pointed. “Is that a tatoo?”

     The Medical Examiner said, “Nevus Flammeus . . . a birthmark.”

     Lam lifted his Blackberry to snap a photo of Jane Doe’s shoulder, but another flash lit the area and spoiled his shot.

     He turned to see the reporter holding an expensive camera. “You can’t do that.”

     “Can’t do what?” Tafoya asked innocently.

     “You can’t post that picture without authorization.”

     “Oh? Not a big believer in the First Amendment, I see.” Tafoya turned and hop-scotched to the pontoon and then her awaiting boat.

     The Medical Examiner zipped the bag shut.

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