Rainy nights in Chicago always seemed to give crime scenes a cinematic atmosphere.
Red and blue emergency lights flashed across the wet street outside an aging Victorian-style house, reflecting off the pavement and nearby windows.
Most of the Intelligence Unit was already on scene except for Al Olinsky, whose eighteen-year-old daughter Lexi was dealing with trouble at school, so Hank had told him to handle his family situation first.
Jack Stacy stood outside the deteriorating house and listened to screams and cries for help coming from somewhere inside.
Patrol officers, paramedics, and curious neighbors crowded the rain-soaked street, creating a constant background of voices and radio traffic.
Despite everything happening around him, what Jack noticed most was the cold, uneasy feeling hanging over the property.
“Patrol locked down the perimeter,” Catherine Hayek said as she hurried toward him, her damp hair sticking to her face beneath the hood of her raincoat.
“A neighbor called after hearing screaming and breaking glass.
Dispatch says there’s at least one female hostage inside.”
Jack adjusted the radio attached to his ballistic vest.
“Why did Intelligence get called?
Sounds like a standard hostage situation.”
“Because Dean Masters is already on our radar,” Sergeant Hank Voight said as he approached from behind them.
His expression looked even darker beneath the streetlights.
“Failed painter, history of drug abuse, and several large unexplained deposits recently.
The department thinks he may be involved in some kind of illegal printing or art operation.”
They moved toward the house, where Antonio Dawson and Jay Halstead were waiting near the porch.
Antonio looked toward Hank.
“We tried calling him out, but all we’re getting is crying and shouting.
Curtains are closed on every window.
Thermal shows two heat signatures on the second floor, so the hostage is probably still up there.”
Hank nodded and quickly assigned positions.
“Jack, Catherine, you’re with me through the rear.
Erin and Jay take the front.
Antonio and Ruzek find an overwatch position.
Hostage comes first, but I want Dean alive too.
He knows something we need.”
The last part was clearly aimed at Jack.
Jack gave Hank a helpless look, and Catherine answered by punching him lightly in the shoulder.
The rear entrance was an old wooden door with a rusted lock.
Jack pushed carefully, and the rotten frame cracked open with almost no resistance.
The smell inside immediately hit him—mildew, turpentine, oil paint, marijuana, and other chemical odors, but nothing suggesting a gas leak.
The house was almost completely dark.
A weak light came from upstairs, accompanied by muffled sobbing.
Jack signaled that the entry was clear and moved first, Catherine close behind with her weapon ready while Hank followed.
They reached the staircase and linked up with the others before slowly climbing.
Every step made the old wood creak beneath their weight.
At the top, light spilled through the partially open door of a second-floor art studio.
Jack moved against the wall and looked through the narrow opening.
The scene inside was disturbing.
A thin, pale, disheveled middle-aged man stood near the center of the studio.
Dean Masters held a Colt 1911 with trembling hands, the muzzle pressed against the head of a terrified young woman.
She had apparently been posing nude as his art model, and the room around them was filled with canvases, paint tubes, drug paraphernalia, and an unfinished portrait.
“They’re coming to kill me,” Dean muttered, tears running down his face.
“I know it.
He’s already dead.
I’m next.”
Hank signaled the team to prepare.
Before anyone could move, Dean suddenly noticed the officers outside the doorway.
His expression twisted with panic.
“You came!” he screamed.
“It’s over!
Everything’s over!”
His finger tightened on the trigger.
Jack moved instantly.
With Gun Duel Lv.3, the distance felt almost meaningless.
His weapon cleared the holster, aligned with the target, and fired in one smooth motion.
The gunshot thundered through the studio.
Dean’s Colt flew from his hand as Jack’s round struck his wrist.
Blood sprayed across the nearby easel, and Dean screamed before stumbling backward, knocking over a canvas stand, and collapsing.
“Paramedics!” Hank shouted as he moved inside.
Catherine immediately reached the hostage, pulled off her own jacket, and wrapped it around the shaking woman.
Jack kept his weapon ready while scanning the rest of the studio for another threat.
Once the tape was removed from her mouth, the woman struggled to speak between breaths.
“He’s crazy.
He kept saying somebody was coming to kill him.
He said he was next.”
Paramedics rushed upstairs and carried the unconscious Dean out.
Hank crouched near the woman.
“Ma’am, I’m Sergeant Voight.
What’s your name?”
“Nadia.
Nadia Decotis.” She was still trembling as she tried to calm herself.
“I model for Dean sometimes.
Tonight he was worse than usual.
He kept smoking and saying weird things about how ‘the ink will never dry’ and that there was ‘too much green.’ Then he started breaking things.”
Jack looked toward her.
“Did he ever say who was coming after him?”
“No names.” Nadia swallowed.
“Just ‘they.’ But he did mention someone named Noel.
Noel Ares.
I met him once before.
He supplied Dean with his drugs.”
Hank immediately raised his radio.
“All units, start looking for Noel Ares.
White male, possible connection to Dean Masters.”
Jack’s attention shifted toward a safe sitting in one corner of the studio.
“Hank.
Safe.”
Hank looked at it and then toward Antonio.
“Get it open and document everything.”
A short time later, Antonio managed to open the safe.
There was no money or stash of narcotics inside.
Instead, they found several carefully arranged copper plates, chemical reagents, and stacks of unusually high-quality paper.
Jack lifted one sheet and held it toward the light.
The paper had a distinctive texture, faint watermarking, and clean professionally cut edges.
Catherine leaned closer.
“That isn’t normal art paper.”
“No,” Hank said, his expression hardening.
“It’s banknote stock.”
He looked at the engraving plates.
“Dean isn’t just a painter.
He’s making counterfeit money.”
The following morning, the Intelligence Unit’s whiteboard was covered with photographs of everything recovered from Dean’s studio.
Al Olinsky had returned and stood studying one of the evidence photos.
“Forensics confirmed the plates were made for counterfeit U.S.
currency.
Mostly twenties and hundreds.
Quality is high enough that whoever made these knew exactly what he was doing.”
Erin Lindsay looked down at her report.
“Dean Masters, forty-two.
Attended the School of the Art Institute of Chicago but dropped out.
Long history of alcohol and drug problems.
Almost no legitimate income for the past five years, but more than eight hundred thousand dollars moved into his accounts over the last six months.”
Hank stared at the board.
“What do we have on Noel Ares?”
Antonio pulled out a photograph of a storefront.
“Noel Ares, thirty-eight.
Owns a western clothing and leather store on 64th Street called Cowboys Heart.
No criminal history, but tax records say the business loses money almost every year.
Somehow, the doors stay open.”
Jack raised a hand slightly.
“If Noel is part of the counterfeit operation, he could be supplying the materials.
Specialty paper, inks, chemicals.
A clothing store would give him a legitimate business to hide shipments behind.”
Hank nodded.
“Makes sense.
Antonio, Al, take Forensics back to Dean’s place.
Search everything again.
Walls, floors, storage areas—I don’t want a single piece of paper missed.”
He turned toward Jack and Catherine.
“You two find Noel.
Start with a narcotics angle and watch how he reacts.”
At ten that morning, Jack and Catherine arrived at Cowboys Heart on 64th Street.
Leather jackets, cowboy hats, belts, and riding boots filled the front windows, but the store itself appeared strangely empty.
Jack pushed open the door.
A small bell rang overhead.
Nobody answered.
Jack and Catherine exchanged a look before drawing their handguns and beginning a cautious search.
They found Noel Ares inside a fitting room.
He was lying in a pool of dried blood with a gunshot wound to the torso and a terrified expression frozen on his face.
The smell suggested he had been dead for close to a day.
Catherine immediately called Hank and requested the crime-scene team.
Jack continued scanning the store and noticed a surveillance camera mounted high in one corner.
Judging by its angle, it covered both the entrance and a section of the street outside.
“Catherine.
Camera.”
They went behind the register and worked through the store’s computer system until they found the footage from around the time Noel had been killed.
The murder happened around noon the previous day.
A blue van stopped outside.
A fully covered man stepped out carrying a suppressed handgun, walked directly into the store, fired a single shot, and left almost immediately.
The entire attack lasted only a few seconds.
His face was completely hidden.
Catherine leaned closer to the screen.
“Professional.”
Jack was studying the van instead.
“Wait.”
He pointed toward the rear section of the vehicle.
“See that symbol?”
Catherine enlarged the frame.
A white fish-shaped emblem was visible on the van.
“The Ichthys,” she said.
“Jesus fish.”
“Church vehicle,” Jack replied.
“Or someone wants us to think it is.”
They saved images of both the killer and the van before turning the scene over to arriving forensic personnel and heading back to Intelligence.
Hank’s voice was already tense when they briefed him.
“Another body?
Middle of the day?”
“Professional hit,” Catherine said as she attached the photographs to the whiteboard.
“Fast entry, suppressed handgun, one shot.
Shooter arrived in a blue van carrying a Christian fish symbol.”
An hour later, Forensics finished searching the basement of Cowboys Heart.
They found exactly what Intelligence had been looking for.
Boxes of specialty paper, rare printing chemicals and inks, and a small intaglio printing press filled part of the basement.
More importantly, investigators recovered a ledger Noel had kept detailing counterfeit distribution routes and how profits were divided.
Al studied the entries.
“Three-man operation.
Dean does the engraving and printing.
Noel gets the paper, chemicals, and other materials.
Then there’s somebody listed as Green handling distribution.”
He tapped the ledger.
“Green might be the one running the whole thing.
Whoever killed Noel could just be hired muscle.”
Jack looked toward the surveillance photographs.
“And the church-marked van could be nothing more than cover.
Or the killer really does have some connection to a church.”
Hank immediately turned toward the tech station.
“Jin, start checking church-associated vehicles that could match that van.
Erin, Jay, pull traffic-camera footage and trace where it went after the murder.”
Everyone moved.
The blue van had become their next lead.
[Reader Support Milestones]