⋆° დ ༄ RISKY BUSINESS
chapter fourteen. the docks.

Jay, Maxine, Erin, Adam, Mickey and Hank stand in the waiting room waiting for any news on Antonio. Adam puts an arm around his best friend who sniffles and says, "he's gonna be alright"

The doctor then walks out and Antonio's wife, Laura walks over to him who says, "Mrs Dawson"

"How is he?"

"We're gonna monitor him closely, but he may need a second surgery. He's not out of the woods yet"

"Can I see him?"

"Of course" the doctor says. Laura looks behind her and nods for them to join her.

As Jay and Erin go to follow after Laura, Hank sees Maxine just standing there and he says, "Max"

"I-I can't"

"He's gonna be alright"

"You heard the doctor. He's not out of the woods yet. I can't see him"

"Okay" he says then walks away to Dawson's room who is pale as a ghost and hooked up to a bunch of wires.  

"Antonio" Laura says, brushing her hand through her husband's hair.

"Hey baby" he says all groggily.

"Hi honey"

"Hey big guy" Jay says.

"Hey" Erin says, then looks around for her friend, "Where's Max?"

"In the waiting room. Said she couldn't come in yet" Hank says.

"Belden?" Antonio asks. Voight shakes his head and says, "gone"

"Those guards?"

"Both dead"

"Find him"

"We will"

Hank, Erin and Jay walk back out to the lobby, where Maxine has her head in her hands, Adam rubbing soothing circles on her back, trying to comfort her. when they hear Antonio's daughter, Eva ask, "dads gonna live right? He gonna be okay"

"Absolutely. He's gonna be fine" Hank tells Eva and Diego, "you know, when I was your age, my father was in this very same hospital. Your dad is one of the toughest cops I know. He's gonna walk out of here stronger than ever."

Mickey walks over to Maxine, and kneels down in front of her, his hands on her knees ( which Adam didn't like at all ) and says, "hey. He's alive and breathing"

"Yeah, until he's not"

"You can't give up hope, Max"

"I didn't give up hope when Jules was struggling to live. I held her hand in the ambulance. I was there for her. I prayed and I didn't give up hope and she still died!" Maxine says, standing up and leaving the hospital.

🪩🪩🪩

"Listen up" Hank says, as the intelligence team is back on the unit, "what Pulpo did downstairs was an attack on our family. First Willhite and now Antonio. So let me be clear. Forget warrants. Forget the rules. It's on us to catch him. And when we do, he's to be handed off to me and Alvin."

Everyone looks at each other in shock, knowing what that statement meant when Jin walks onto the bullpen and says, "they found a possible getaway vehicle up on division."

"Any sign of Pulpo" Adam asks.

"One dead male, no confirmation on the body yet"

"Alright, let's go" Hank says.

"Hey, Sarg? I'm just looking for a little clarification on what you just said" Jay says.

"Pulpo ain't making it back to a jail cell. That clear enough for you?" Hank says, then walks away. Jay looks at his partner and asks, "are you okay with this"

Maxine shrugs, getting up from her desk and walks away, catching up with Erin and asks, "hey, I heard Charlie's back. You okay?"

"Yeah. Nothing I can't handle"

🪩🪩🪩

"What'd we got?" Voight asks the officer as they walk onto the scene.

"All fake. They took a regular van and put the decals on it so it looks like a paddy wagon." The patrol officer says.

"The prison transport van that Pulpo escaped in was found six blocks from the district." Jay states, "he ditched it and switched to this"

"Alright. Where's the body?" Hank asks.

"Over here" the officer says, shining his light at the dead man in the driver's seat.

"Drivers wearing a mall security badge someone bought at an army surplus store" Mickey says.

"Forensics ID'd the prints. His name's Carlos Guevera. He's a known bagman for the Colombian cartel" Sumner says.

"Pulpo couldn't let that guy live to talk" Al says.

"Hey guys, Pulpos girlfriend and son were with him" Maxine says, as she and Erin look through the back of the van, holding up a kids glove.

"How much you wanna bet he's taking his family unit and high tailing it back to Colombia?" Erin says.

"We got his name, his mug shot at every border checkpoint, train station, airports." Ruzek says.

"If Pulpo planned this far, you better believe he planned for a way to get out." Hank says, walking away along with the team.

🪩🪩🪩

Erin and Maxine walk down the hall by the locker room when they get stopped by Jay, Mickey and Adam who are talking and Halstead says, "so, we're all willing to just go off book for Voight?"

"Look, I'm four months out of the academy, man. I just do what I'm told" Ruzek says.

"Even if that means being part of a lynch mob?"

"If you're asking if I'm gonna turn over my shield in protest? No. I'm not. Are you, I mean..."

"What I'm saying is, 'what do we do?' If we find Pulpo, are we just gonna turn him over to Voight?"

"Yes" Maxine quickly responds.

"Alright. Everybody relax. What we do is find Pulpo and then we can figure it out" Erin says, then walks away, followed by Maxine.

"While I have you guys here. Have either of you heard of a guy named Joey?" Jay asks.

"You got a last name?" Mickey asks.

"No last name. It's something to do with Max. He stopped by here yesterday I guess looking for her. And when Platt told her, she went pale"

"If she didn't tell me. Then something serious is going on there" Adam says, "I'll talk to her about it later" then he walks away followed by the other detectives.

"Hey. We get anything from Lina's house?" Voight questions, standing by the board.

"Marshals stormed it. Came up empty" Adam says, taking his coat off.

"Alright. What about Lina's family?"

"Her moms got a place on the southside, came up clean, and so did her cell phone records. But I think it's worth a drive by" Erin says.

"Alright. Good. Take Sumner" Hank says, and Erin and Mia leave the unit, "So, last guy loyal to him, he kills. No friends, no family. Who else do you have?"

"What about Pulpos lawyer?" Mickey says, taking a paper from a file, "Anthony Timpone?"

"Timpone. He reps half the criminals in the city." Al says, pushing himself off the desk, "he didn't get that rep by cooperating with the police, I'll tell you that"

"I got an idea. When my parents got divorced, my ma had this guy call in a threat to my dad's office. He was checking for bombs underneath his car for months" Adam says.

A couple minutes later, Ruzek walks back onto the unit with patrol officer Garcia, so he can call in the threat.

"That convincing enough?" He asks, handing Jay the phone.

"I bought it" Adam says.

🪩🪩🪩

Maxine and Hank walk down the hall to Timpone's office when a security guard tries to stop them. Max shows him her badge and says, "CPD buddy"

"Wait. Wait! You can't go in there!" The secretary says as Hank and Maxine walk into the office.

"What the hell" Timpone says.

"Whoa. What's with the hardware, Timpone?" Voight asks, pointing to the gun on the lawyer's desk.

"I have a permit"

"We're looking for Pulpo"

"Yeah apparently he's looking for me. I just got a call from him."

"Hmm. What do you make of that?" Hank asks his detective.

"A call from Pulpo? That ain't good" Maxine says.

"They don't come cheap. So what happened? Pulpo spend his last chunk of change on you, got life, and now he wants a refund?"

"Yeah, that's why I got him" Timpone says, pointing to the security guy behind them.

"You think that you and some rent a cop are gonna keep him from getting in here if he really wanted to? I don't think so" Max states.

"I've arrested a lot of scumbags, you've put back out on the street. So I gotta be honest with you. I don't give a damn what happens to you, but if you got anything that can help me find Pulpo, it might be good for both of us"

"During Pulpos trial, he asked where he could buy sets of new identities. Top of the line papers. So, I referred him to an old client of mine." Timpone says.

"What's his name?"

"Neil Bunker. He's a notary public. He's got a camera joint on north clark" Voight says into the walkie as they leave the lawyers office.

🪩🪩🪩

"Bunkers been arrested for everything from bogus passports to counterfeit bulls tickets." Mickey says, looking at his phone as he and Al walk down the street to the camera joint on north clark.

"So, let's see if Pulpos left any breadcrumbs"

"Hey there. Welcome" Bunker says, when he sees Jacobs and Olinsky walk in, then his smile turns into a frown when he sees Mickey show his badge, "officers, how can I help you?"

"Recognize him?" Mickey asks, showing Bunker a picture of Pulpo. Neil shakes his head and says, "nah"

"You sure?" Mickey asks as Bunker turns to watch Al walk past them to look around, "don't worry about him. We heard if someone's looking for clean IDs and credit cards they come to you."

"You want to get some pictures developed, great. But, otherwise..."

As Al checks out the back Mickey asks, "you sure you don't recognize him?"

"Yeah"

"What kind of shop is this?"

"It's just a photoshop. It's what we do. Photos."

"Bring him back here!" Al calls out, after he unlocks the lock with his knife to find what could only be described as a side operation.

Mickey locks the front door and brings Bunker to the back.

"So, what is this little operation?" Al questions.

"Oh, I...no, I..it's..." bunker stutters. Mickey looks around to see hair on the ground and says, "looks like somebody got a haircut." Then he looks through the photos on the camera, "got Pulpo"

Al takes Bunker by the collar and shoves him to the ground and says, "Alright. Let's start over. Where's Pulpo?"

"I know who he is. I'm not having him coming after me. You're gonna have to arrest me" Bunker says.

"Who said anything about arrest? I mean, all I know is you...you took a shot at a police officer."

"What?"

Al takes out his gun from his ankle holster and tosses it on the ground next to bunker then tucks his shirt behind his 9 mil and says, "pick it up. Go ahead. Pick it up"

Bunker looks at Mickey who puts up his hands and says, "don't look at me"

"Listen, you have two choices. You can shoot your way out of here, or you can tell me about Pulpo."

"Alright. I made...I made him 3 sets of ID's and a couple of credit cards to match." Bunker says, hesitantly.

"Was he with a woman and a kid?"

"Yes"

"And you have no idea where they're going?"

"No"

"Of course not"

"No, I swear."

Al sighs then says, "get him up. Book him. Aiding and abetting"

Bunker gets up off the ground and says, "yeah but I talked"

"Not fast enough" Mickey says, going to cuff him.

🪩🪩🪩

"Uh Huh. Alright, keep us posted. Thanks" Maxine says, hanging up her desk phone.

"Anything on Lina's mom's house?" Jay asks, sitting on the edge of his desk.

"No. Zip. But I've got a couple of undercovers parked down the street." Max says, then looks up at her partner who sighs, "what Jay?"

"At, uh, the hospital. I've never heard Voight talk about his father. What's the whole story?"

"Nothing you can't find in the sun times archives"

"You were partners with him"

"Look, all I know is that every time a cop gets shot in this city, Voight gets that same look in his eye." Max says, then looks down at her phone, indicating she had gotten a message, "I need some air" then she grabs her coat and leaves the unit.

Maxine leaves the district to see the familiar black mustang and she sighs before going over to it and gets into the passenger side. "What's up?"

"You haven't been answering my calls and texts"

"I've been busy. One of my partners got shot"

"I'm sorry to hear that."

"Yeah"

"I want to take you out for dinner"

"Why?"

"To catch up"

Maxine looks at the tall man next to her in confusion, "did you forget what happened when we were undercover? Because I didn't."

"Of course I didn't. Listen, we said it was us against everything, right? We swore to each other, that we would never talk or relive that day"

"I know. I know"

Joey cups the side of her face, dragging his thumb across her cheek, "you still love me, right?"

~~~

Maxine walks back onto the unit at the same time as Jin who says, "hey. Okay. We've got a hit. Lina's fake ID, Maria Esposito was just used along with her fake credit card to rent a vehicle from midway 20 minutes ago"

"You got eyes on 'em?" Voight asks, leaving his office while putting his jacket on.

"Even better. It's got a GPS tracker on it. I got it's exact location, heading north on Pulaski."

"Beautiful" Hank says, as everyone gets up to leave, "Uh, Sumner, you're out"

"Oh, okay. I'll stay back and watch.." she says.

"No, you're out of my unit" Hank says, making everyone look back in shock, "you're transferred. As of tomorrow, you work in narcotics."

"You can't transfer me"

"Already made the call"

"You're making a mistake"

"My mistake was letting you stay around this long. You got the day to pack your desk and pass off your files."

~~~

After finding Lina and her son at the gas station. Maxine and Adam take said mother to interrogation to question her.

"So how did you think this was gonna work out, Lina? You guys were gonna leave and just be a big, happy family in South America?" Max asks.

"I want to see my son" Lina says.

"You tell us where Pulpos headed, you can see him" Ruzek says. Lina sighs and says, "Adres told me to rent a truck, and then pick him up at a taqueria at fifth and Pulaski, off the highway at 5"

"Anything else?"

Lina leans her head back on the blue cement wall and says, "he said if anything changed, he'd call me"

Jay opens the door to the viewing room to see Voight and says, "this throwaway phone we found on her has zero calls"

"Pulpo ain't gonna be at fifth and Pulaski. He used her and the kid as a diversion. He wanted her to get caught to throw us off the scent" Hank says, leaving the viewing room and goes to walk into interrogation, "hey, just hand her over to major crimes and notify child services on her kid. Let's go"

Jay and Maxine follow Voight back to the bullpen who says, "everyone go back and check every scrap of paper we have on Pulpo. I don't care if it's a jailhouse lunch wrapper he left in the cage. Every known associate, rival, anything you can find" then he walks into his office and shuts the door.

Max walks over to Sumner who is packing her desk and says, "I'm sorry things didn't work out"

Mia sighs then says, "I didn't get a chance to look at them, considering..." then she hands Maxine a file, "catch this guy. For Antonio"

Max looks through the file Sumner had given her and says, "hey guys. It's a motion for assets petition filed on behalf of Adres Dias. Someone tried to bond Pulpo out"

"His bond was set at a million dollars. He never made bail." Adam says, walking onto the bullpen and grabs the paper from his best friend.

"Yeah. But somebody tried. Stepan Nestrov put his nightclub up as an asset, but it wasn't worth enough"

"Nestrov? A Russian." Al says, then looks at Hank, "Come here"

"Nestrov is part of the Elston Avenue crew. Fresh off the boat Russians shipped over to do dirty work for the old timers, but they decided to break off on their own." Mickey says.

"Yeah. And the Russians hate the Colombians." Erin says.

"Alright. Then why'd they try to bond Pulpo out?" Ruzek asks.

"Just get the address of that club" Hank says.

~~~

After heading to the club and finding Nestrov and two of his guys but no Pulpo, they bring them back to the roll up where Jay is patting Nestrov down and says, "so why would you put up your nightclub to bond out a Colombian drug lord who's wanted for murder, huh? Somebody's dating somebody's sister?"

"They pay me for your sister, sucker"

"What was that?" He says, putting him inside the cage.

"Hey you guys" Jin says leaving his office, "this laptop confiscated from his club? I cracked the password, but I can't read any of the emails. They're all in Cyrillic. It's gonna take me forever to translate this"

"Great" Erin sighs.

"I don't suppose we have a cop on shift that reads Russian, too?" Adam says.

"I know a guy" Hank says.

~~~

"So, it looks like most of these are back and forth to his girlfriend in Moscow" Otis says, sitting at Jay's desk reading through the emails, "Uh, wait. Here's one about a shipment on Aeroflot."

"What's that?" Ruzek asks.

"It's a russian airline"

"Do you think it's about shipping coke?" Jay asks.

"I don't know. There's an attachment, though. Um, it's for a transport trailer."

"Well, you don't need a transport trailer to move a couple of gym bags of coke" Al says.

"Yeah. But you do need one for SUVs. This is a bill of lading listing two vehicles being shipped on an Aeroflot cargo plane from O'Hare to Moscow"

🪩🪩🪩

After getting the information that they needed for Nestrov, the intelligence team finds Pulpo in the back of a truck inside of an SUV, where Al and Hank then take him away. Max and Jay head to the hospital to see Antonio, when Jay walks inside the room, Maxine just paces back and forth in front of it.

"Hey. How are you doing?" Jay asks.

"I'm dying of thirst" Antonio says and Jay grabs his water cup from the table and holds it up to him for Dawson to sip it.

"Thanks. What is Bishop doing out there pacing for?"

Jay looks over his shoulder at his partner and says, "she's scared to come see you"

"Why?"

"Because she thinks that she'll lose you like when we lost Willhite"

"That's crazy"

"I know"

"Bishop" Antonio calls out. Maxine peaks her head around the corner and says, "yeah?"

"Come here, kid"

Maxine slowly walks into the room with tears in her eyes and says, "how you feeling, Toni?"

"I'm good" he says, holding his arm out and Maxine goes to give the detective a hug.

"We got him" Jay says. As Max and Antonio detach from the hug, he says, "I didn't see it on the news"

"I'm not sure you will"

"Oh. The guy who killed Olinsky's partner, Browning. Supposedly, they took him to the docks on river road."

"And did what?"

"Took him for a boat ride. Guys, I want Pulpo punished for what he did. But I don't want that on my conscience. Do you?"

Maxine looks at her partner and says, "Go. I'll stay with Antonio"

🪩🪩🪩

Maxine sits across from the heavily tattooed man at a restaurant that he promised he'd take her too. She sighs, taking a sip of her wine when she feels a hand on hers.

"Max, I know what we went through, put a lot of weight on your shoulders and I'm sorry about that. But you know it had to be done. You did what you had to, for me. Which made me love you even more"

"Joey,—I"

"I'm gonna change the subject before things get too emotional. You know I hate that"

Maxine chuckles, "don't I know it"

"Hey!" He laughs, "remember when you made me go on that hike when we first met? And you got us lost"

Maxine laughs and says, "I did not get us lost. How many times have you told that story? The map just confused me"

"The map confused you? That's a new one" he laughed, "this is nice. Seeing you enjoy yourself"

"Yeah, well. It's been a long few years since we last saw each other"

"Sorry about that. My fault. I shouldn't have left you. I should've taken you with me to California"

Maxine clears her throat and says, "yeah. You should've"

"I'm sorry. I was scared"

"You, Joey Masters, scared? I don't believe it"

"You needed to get back to a semi normal life. Which is hard after being undercover for so long. You needed Adam. And I needed to get out"

"Yeah and look how well that turned out"

authors note;

again . . . chills
also, who is this joey character ???