Chapter 3: The Woman in the Shadows

The next day, Ohio reported they’d already detained all possibly related senior execs, salespeople, and production heads from Heritage Chemical. After urgent interrogation, it was all but confirmed Autumn Evans had orchestrated the smuggling. Heritage Chemical was licensed to produce piperonal-type chemicals. For profit, Autumn Evans had staff make extra, lower-quality products and stash raw materials to make piperonyl methyl ketone, which they exported to Southeast Asia through intermediaries. The company still had 13,400 pounds of piperonyl methyl ketone in its warehouse, 3,300 pounds unregistered as controlled substances—probably meant for smuggling. They’d already sold 2,600 pounds through other ports to Ukraine, Cambodia, and Indonesia. The investigation was still rolling.

I remember staring at the numbers in the report, trying to wrap my head around just how much that really was. This wasn’t some back-alley operation. It was industrial—big money, big risks, and a whole lot of moving parts. The old-timers started swapping war stories, but nothing quite matched this scale.

After hearing the briefing, I was stunned—it was the first time I’d seen drugs measured by the ton. These chemicals could be used to make MDMA (ecstasy) at about 70% yield—a huge business. The preliminary report said Autumn Evans had already earned over $900,000 in profits, with more payments pending. I caught myself thinking, the profit margin for precursor chemicals is way higher than for imported drugs.

I leaned back in my chair, rubbing my face. The numbers just kept echoing in my head. It’s one thing to bust a few kilos, but this? This was on a whole different level. No wonder the higher-ups were so invested.

Another day passed, and we heard Autumn Evans had confessed even more, but my clearance wasn’t high enough for the details. That evening, Director Little called a meeting to relay her confession to the higher-ups and lay out the next steps. At the meeting, Director Little said, “Although Autumn Evans committed a major crime, her family didn’t know, and it’s basically confirmed her husband was unaware. With her family’s and Ohio’s efforts, she’s agreed to work with us as a special agent to help us expose the entire drug manufacturing and trafficking network. This may be the biggest cross-border drug case we’ve ever seen. From now on, our working group will be under the command of the higher-level task force and the federal anti-smuggling bureau. There will be daily case briefings, and information is limited to group members only. Please remember to maintain confidentiality.” Special agents are what we usually call undercover agents online—just a little inside baseball.

The room was dead quiet. For a moment, you could hear the hum of the AC and the shuffle of papers. When Director Little looked up, her eyes were sharp. “This is the real deal, folks. We’re on the front line now.”

Once everyone understood, Director Little continued, “Overseas contacts don’t know Autumn Evans has been detained. Ohio will let her resume normal communications and life under strict control, waiting for the intermediary who travels between Vietnam and Hong Kong to reach out. All we had was a name—‘Mr. Sam.’ No other details. Autumn Evans has never met him, only his people. We believe he’s a Hong Konger of Vietnamese descent. When we have more intel, we’ll update you. But the key isn’t just catching this intermediary—it’s taking down the whole transnational trafficking group. Autumn Evans doesn’t know how ‘Mr. Sam’ makes external contact, so we need to work together, tight. Our main responsibility is the Southwest region, since ‘Mr. Sam’ is active here. If he pops up in Texas, we’ll team up with our folks there.”

I scribbled notes, my pen flying across the page. The enormity of what we were up against was finally sinking in. My pulse was racing, but there was this strange sense of unity in the room—a feeling that, together, we might just pull this off.

We all agreed. I’d worked plenty of drug cases, but this felt like something out of a movie. Still, I wasn’t as green as I’d been on my first undercover job. I was curious to see how it would play out. We held onto the shipment a little longer, using insurance and customs checks as our cover. If the delay dragged out, the supplier would definitely reach out to Autumn Evans.

I could almost feel the clock ticking. We were playing a high-stakes waiting game, and every day the pressure mounted. My phone was glued to my hand, always on vibrate.

Sure enough, four days in—September 21st—Autumn Evans finally got a call from “Mr. Sam,” asking about the shipment. Following instructions, she told him the delay was due to issues with the freight forwarder, insurance, and manifest paperwork, so customs had held it up. “Mr. Sam” urged her to resolve it quickly and, to show his sincerity, paid another $30,000 as a deposit for the next deal. His call came from a Vietnamese number, dialed in Hong Kong. In Vietnam, SIM cards are easy to buy—no ID needed. Just another way to stay off the radar.

I jotted down the phone number, the international codes, the time of the call—every little detail. It felt like we were finally getting somewhere. The pieces were starting to fall into place, and my gut told me we were close.

Two days later, the shipment still hadn’t gone out. “Mr. Sam” was getting angry, pushing Autumn Evans to ship quickly. He said he had a new order for 5,500 pounds of piperonyl methyl ketone for next month, and if the Ukraine deal went well, the buyer would order more at a higher price. Following our plan, Autumn Evans told “Mr. Sam” that such a large order required an in-person meeting and asked him to bring samples of a new, higher-purity product. He agreed. We figured he didn’t have any other options, so he agreed. It felt like the big fish was about to bite.

I remember the surge of excitement when the word came down: “He’s taking the bait.” It was like watching a poker game where you know you’ve got the winning hand, but you still have to play it just right.

We soon got further instructions: to lure “Mr. Sam,” the higher-ups ordered us to remove all the piperonyl methyl ketone from the shipment, repackage the herbal supplements, and ship the goods as originally declared. We did this fast. The container was reloaded and scheduled to ship the next day, but we all knew it would take about 35 days by sea to Ukraine, plus local customs, giving us only 40 days before the recipient realized the goods had been switched. If that happened, “Mr. Sam” would know, and the whole operation would go up in smoke. Since a new order was due next month, the higher-ups made the bold call to use this shipment as bait. Let’s call September 24th—shipping day—day one.

The logistics team worked late into the night, sweat beading on their foreheads as they resealed every barrel. The whole operation ran like clockwork—everyone knew what was at stake. I could feel the tension in the air.

On September 24th, the goods left port, starting the 40-day countdown to crack this major cross-border drug case. On the fourth day, September 28th, Autumn Evans and “Mr. Sam” agreed to meet on October 5th during the Columbus Day weekend. We were all nervous, since this meant wasting another week. Our Ohio colleagues asked Autumn Evans to try moving the meeting up, but “Mr. Sam” refused, so we set it for October 5th. The meeting place was decided—after some back-and-forth between “Mr. Sam” and Autumn Evans—in our border city, since “Mr. Sam” only wanted to meet in Houston or these Southwest border cities, and Houston was too crowded and complicated.

I could feel the tension in every briefing. Waiting an extra week felt like torture, but there was nothing to do but play along and hope our luck held. Columbus Day weekend—when the city fills with travelers and nobody looks twice at a new face in a hotel lobby.

So the operation focus shifted back to us. We made a detailed plan. From the moment Autumn Evans flew in from Ohio, our team would take over, with Ohio colleagues assisting. The operation was coordinated by our superior customs, but we were in charge of the main tasks in our city. Director Little, briefing us, said, “This is a major case; there can’t be any mistakes. The investigation section will handle full surveillance and technical work on Autumn Evans. The anti-smuggling section is responsible for arrests. My team at the port will handle external security, like monitoring around the meeting place.”

We broke out the dry-erase boards, mapping every possible scenario. There were diagrams, lists of license plates, even contingency plans for the weather. I drank more coffee that week than I care to admit.

We all agreed. I’d done this kind of support work plenty of times and knew the drill inside and out. Still, I had a feeling this one would be different.

Still, there was a buzz in the air—a sense that this time, the stakes were higher. Every little detail mattered.