Caballo Security Box Set

by Camilla Blake

  I blushed, jerking my jaw from his hand. It wasn’t something I was terribly proud of.

  “If not for Ox Winn, she wouldn’t have been employable in this town. Lot of people loyal to the military around her. Taking a gun to a base where a lot of locals have friends, lovers, and family members… well, it wasn’t the smartest move in the world.”

  “Doesn’t that sort of thing happen a lot?” Ahsan asked. “What do they call it here? Post-trauma… something.”

  “PTSD. But sympathy only runs so deep.”

  The stranger touched my face again, but I jerked away. He laughed, a sound that lacked humor, as he turned to Ahsan.

  “Get rid of her.”

  “I don’t think—”

  “Caballo is one of the biggest security firms in this town. Ox Winn has a reputation for being a bulldog when he gets his teeth into something. He’s the last person you want on your tail, especially when we’re so close to getting out of here scot-free. Get rid of her!”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And make sure you dispose of the body somewhere that it can’t be found.”

  “I know the perfect location.”

  The man glanced at me one more time. “Too bad, too. She would have brought in tons of money.”

  He walked out, slamming the door behind him.

  “Who was that?” I asked.

  “Don’t worry about it.” Ahsan stood, wiping his hands on the legs of his pants before he came around the desk. “Get up. We’ve got to go.”

  Before I could even move, the sound of wood breaking and heavy footsteps reverberated through the house. Ahsan paled.

  “It’s too late,” I said.

  “Get up!”

  He grabbed my arm—and fuck if he didn’t have a way out!

  Chapter 22

  Max

  Ox sat at the bank of computers in the back of the van, studying images that were beginning to filter in through security cameras and body cameras. I moved up beside him, my hands itching to grab my weapon and head in with the advance teams. I wanted to be in there when they found James. I needed to be in there.

  “We’re going to have her back in just a few minutes,” Ox said, almost as if he could read my mind.

  “It’s my fault. I should have never let her get out the door without me.”

  “James is a stubborn one. We all knew that going in.”

  “Yes, well, if I’d been there, they wouldn’t have gotten her.”

  “Or they’d have both of you in there, and I doubt they would have kept you around for long.”

  “At least she would have had a better chance with me.”

  “We don’t know that.”

  “I should have been there!”

  Ox sat back and stared at the screens for a long moment, acting as though all that mattered was what he was seeing. But then he glanced at me.

  “If it’s anyone’s fault, it’s mine. I knew she wasn’t going to want this assignment. I knew she would fight it. I knew I should have picked someone else, but… I forced her. I threatened to fire her if she didn’t take the assignment.”

  “She was the only one available.”

  “No. I could have pulled Alicia off her case, but I wanted James. I trust James and I knew she could take care of herself in a tight situation. I forced her.”

  “It comes with the job.”

  “No. Not this time.” Ox crossed his arms over his chest as he studied the monitors. “If anything happens to her, it’s on me, not you.”

  At that moment, Brock’s broken voice came over the radio.

  “Team One going in.”

  I leaned forward and watched from a camera stationed outside the back door—it was part of Ahsan’s private security, but we’d hacked it—as Brock approached the back door. He checked the handle, then gestured to two of his men to bring up the battering ram. It only took a second for the door to crack under the pressure. Seconds later, they were pushing their way through the open doorway, swinging their guns back and forth as they cleared the room in front of them. They cleared the living room next, then a back hallway.

  Akker called out that his team was entering the house.

  We could see from the body cameras as they walked into the living room. Brock’s team had dragged two men into the room and were cuffing them with flexicuffs. Akker’s team headed straight up the stairs. I leaned close and watched, anticipating the moment they would find the hostages. They checked two rooms and a bedroom before they finally came to the master bedroom. Inside, rather than furniture, they found around a dozen people, mostly girls between the ages of fourteen and eighteen, passed out on the floor. Akker moved from person to person, reaching down to check their pulses.

  “That’s Chaz Porter,” Ox said, touching the computer screen that showed the boy’s face.

  “We’ve got the target,” Akker said into his mic at about the same moment.

  “Where’s James?”

  Ox didn’t respond. He just kept studying the monitor as closely as I’d done. But she wasn’t there. I already knew she wasn’t there.

  I jumped out of the van and ran toward the house. Ox called after me, but I was already halfway up the front walkway. I pulled my sidearm and burst through the front door, my gun down at my side. Brock’s team was mostly gathered in the living room. They now had three men down on the ground with flexicuffs around their wrists. One of the men looked up at me and spat.

  “You’re the chauffeur,” I said, reaching down to grab a handful of his hair. “Where is she?”

  The man just sneered at me. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

  I kicked him in the ribs. “You better hope we find her alive, asshole!”

  I backed away as a couple of Brock’s guys came toward me, worried I might hurt the poor guy. What difference would it make if he showed up at the police station with a few bruises? They wouldn’t believe him if he told them who did it.

  I walked toward the back of the house, peeking into various rooms as I made my way through to the rear. Brock was in what looked like a study, checking through the drawers in a desk.

  “Anything?”

  He picked up a cut cord that had clearly been used to tie something—or someone—up. “Just this. And a bloody rag.”

  I studied the cord a moment, remembering the picture of James walking up to the front of the house. “There’s nothing else?”

  Brock shook his head. “Sorry, man. But we’re not done looking.”

  I headed back to the front of the house. Ox was just entering with a pretty brunette. He was explaining to her about the pictures of James we’d gotten from the surveillance team next door.

  “We had good reason to believe she’d be here. And the fact that we found eleven other people unconscious upstairs seems to support that belief.”

  “Okay, Ox,” she said, holding up her hands. “I believe you. I’ll see if we can get a warrant for Ahsan’s other properties.”

  As she stepped away, Ox’s eyes cut to my face. I shook my head just enough for him to understand. As I did, I could see the burden settle back on his shoulders.

  Where the hell could she be?

  “Did the team next door see anything?”

  Ox shook his head. “They left as soon as we arrived. Didn’t want anyone hurt in the crossfire.”

  “Then they could have gotten out a side door? A window?”

  “It’s possible.”

  An ambulance pulled up outside. Akker came down to escort them to the victims upstairs. I looked around, studied the faces of the men on the floor.

  “It’s over now. You can see that, can’t you?”

  None of them responded.

  “There’s nothing left to protect. Your boss is going down!”

  Still nothing.

  I walked over to the chauffeur, prepared to do just about anything I had to do to get his attention, when my pants began to ring. I always kept my phone on vibrate, so it confused me a little. But then I remembered the burner
phone.

  I snatched it out and connected the call without bothering to see who it was.

  “This is Ahsan.”

  “Where is she?”

  There was a momentary silence. Then he surprised me by saying, “I want to make a deal. I’ll testify, sign a statement, do whatever you want, but I want immunity. You give me that and I’ll make sure you get her back safe and sound.”

  I stared at Ox. He came over, gesturing to everyone to shut up as I put the call on speaker.

  “I want to hear her voice. I want to know she’s alive.”

  “I’ll let you talk to her in a second. But first, I want you to promise me that you’ll get in touch with whoever you have to in order to make this deal. I want to speak to a person who has this authority within an hour. If not, I will kill her. Do you understand?”

  “Do you understand that I’m standing in your living room right now with three of your men?”

  “They won’t talk. All you have right now is eleven unfortunate souls who don’t remember a thing about how they ended up in my home. For all you know, they came there of their own free will.”

  “In less than an hour, we’ll have Collin McFadden and all your other henchmen.”

  “Collin would lie about his own grandmother to save his ass. They can’t give you the things I can. I can give you the entire operation.”

  I glanced at Ox. He nodded.

  “All right. Let me talk to her, and my boss will get in touch with his contacts at the attorney general’s office. We’ll get your deal.”

  “I want to talk to the person in charge when I call back in an hour. I want assurances.”

  “You will.”

  There was a moment of silence, and then heavy breathing.

  “Max?”

  “It’s me, James. Ox is here, too.”

  “Listen, my mother used to tell me not to cry over spilled milk, but this is more like crying over a burnt pie, isn’t it? Or a damaged engagement ring?”

  Ox shot me a hard look, but I didn’t know any better what she was talking about than he did.

  “James, are you hurt?”

  “Just my pride. You know, it’s not as rock hard as I once thought.”

  “An hour,” Ahsan barked into the phone after a bit of rustling, clearly him snatching the phone away from her. And then the call ended.

  “What the hell was all that?” Ox asked.

  I didn’t know, but I knew James. She wasn’t one to speak nonsense. It had to be some sort of code. But what did it mean?

  Chapter 23

  James

  He pushed open the windows and grabbed my arm, forcing me to go first. I fell, landing hard on my side. My ribs were already pulsating from the blows Collin had delivered. I moaned as I rolled away from the pain, but that just made the other side hurt.

  Ahsan grabbed my arm and pulled me to my feet. He pushed through a gate that connected to the neighbor’s yard. We ran across the yard and out into the alley. Several blocks up there was a car parked conveniently on the street. We escaped without seeing any of Caballo’s men.

  “Where are we going?”

  He didn’t answer.

  I reached over as we sped down a side street and made a jab at the ignition button. Ahsan backhanded me, forcing me back against my seat. Then he pulled a gun out of the glove box.

  “Stay still and we’ll both be better off.”

  I crossed my arms over my chest, my head spinning as I tried to figure out what my next move should be. I had to get out of the car. My only chance was to get as far from this man as I could possibly get. The problem was, we were traveling ninety miles per hour up the highway and he had a loaded gun pointed at my gut. I might survive a gut wound. I wouldn’t survive a car accident at this speed.

  It was late in the afternoon, nearly rush hour. I prayed we’d run into traffic, but by some miracle, we missed it. Maybe because we were heading north on a back highway rather than the interstate. I knew where we were headed.

  Round Rock.

  “What’s out here, Ahsan? I thought your farmhouse was in the other direction.”

  He shot me a look. “You know about the farmhouse?”

  “We know about everything.”

  “You don’t know about this place. I just bought it a few weeks ago. There hasn’t been time for the deed to transfer yet.”

  He might be right.

  I watched the landscape, preparing myself for a run back to San Antonio. If I managed to get away from him, I’d have to find a way back to the road. Round Rock was a well-populated suburb of San Antonio, but the part he was taking me to was fairly secluded.

  Damn these high heels—again!

  I was still working out a plan in my head when he suddenly veered off the road and drove into the center of a barren field. He stopped, the shuddering tires causing a cloud of dust to rise behind us. He was out of the car in a second, leaving the door open. I slid across the seat and hopped out myself, running toward the road before he saw that I was gone. He chased after me, grabbing the back of his own suit jacket to stop me, yanking me back against his chest.

  He shoved the barrel of the gun against my bruised ribs. “Don’t do that again.”

  He dragged me back to the car, forcing me to my knees beside the open passenger-side door.

  “Tell me what it means to work for a security firm. What kind of power do you have?”

  “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “Can you make deals for people?”

  I glanced back at him, one second convinced he was about to put a bullet into the back of my head, the next realizing that he was no more interested in shooting me than I was in being shot. He had the gun dangling from his hand as he stepped back and rocked on his heels.

  “What kind of deals?”

  “Legal deals!” he said sharply, like I should have known that.

  “My boss has contacts in law enforcement. He could arrange something.”

  “Could he get me immunity?”

  I rolled over onto my ass and looked up at him, squinting in the high sunlight. “You want to turn on your partners?”

  He backed up a few steps, pacing in a little circle. “I never wanted to be a part of this. I just wanted to come to America and make my fortune like everyone else. I wanted my American Dream! But then I discovered that there was so much competition in the business world that you had to be unique to do well. And I’m just not unique, you know?”

  “Most of us aren’t.”

  “I just fell into this one night. I was at a club and I hit on the wrong girl. This guy… he threatened to kill me, but then he said I could work off my crime against him by helping him collect a small harem of girls. And then the money was so good…” He sighed. “I never thought I would stick with it this long. But I’m tired and I just want to go home and take care of my ailing mother.”

  “Ox can help you. He has friends who owe him.”

  “Yeah? Will they set up some sort of deal for me? I’ll tell them anything they want to know.”

  “I’m sure they will.”

  “Then what do I do? How do I get this going?”

  “Call him?”

  “Who?”

  “Max. My partner. He probably still has the burner phone on him.”

  As he placed the call, I struggled to find a way to tell Max where I was. I still didn’t know what Ahsan was going to do. If Max didn’t say all the right things, he might decide to kill me anyway. I had to get out of there. If I could hint to Max about where we were, maybe he could come get me before this got too out of hand.

  I didn’t know that he would understand it all, but I was hoping he would.

  Chapter 24

  Max

  Round Rock.

  I paced outside, James’s message running around and around in my head while Ox argued with Detective Salazar in the living room. James’s mother was dead, and she knew I knew that her mother had died before she could teach her any sort of lesson, let alone
one about spilled milk. So what did it mean?

  More like a pie…

  Pies were round.

  And engagement rings. What was another word for a diamond?

  A rock.

  And then I remembered the property Cheryl had found just before we got word that James had been spotted. I hadn’t thought about it again because it had seemed irrelevant, but maybe it was very relevant now. He’d taken her to his property in Round Rock.

  “You got a car?” I asked an operative coming out of the house.

  “Nobody does. We came in the vans.”

  “Do you know who has the keys?”

  “No one. They leave them on the visor. Not smart, if you ask me.”

  Not smart because someone might steal one. Like me.

  I ran toward the back of the property, aware that Brock would have parked his van close enough that no one would notice the unit of dark-clothed men running toward a residential home, but far enough away to not alert the target. Bingo! I found the van in an alley a block away. I jumped in and found the keys right where the guy said they’d be. For easy escape, I supposed.

  Wasn’t that what I was doing?

  I sped off before anyone could notice me, headed toward the highway.

  “What’s the address of the Round Rock property?” I shouted into the phone the moment Cheryl picked up on the other end. “The one Ahsan owns?”

  “I thought you guys were still at the house. I heard they just raided the strip mall and arrested Collin McFadden.”

  “Who did?”

  “The cops. It was on the police scanner.”

  “Good. The address, Cheryl.”

  She read it out to me and I quickly entered it into my GPS, trying hard to drive and use the phone all at the same time. It wasn’t a good combination and I nearly rammed into the back of a white sedan. Traffic was picking up, but the GPS instructed me to leave the interstate for a back road that was nearly deserted.