Hunt Them Down (Pierce Hunt Book 1)

by Simon Gervais

  “You served with the Seventy-Fifth Rangers?” McMaster said.

  “From ’95 to ’07.”

  “Tell me—why did you really leave the army?” In a heartbeat, McMaster’s eyes had grown cold. Gone was the warmth and sincere welcome Hunt had felt only a minute ago.

  Hunt was taken aback. McMaster had drawn him in with flattery and small talk and then fired the question without preamble. Does he know? No, that was impossible. Nobody outside his unit knew. Nobody knew what he had done to save his teammate, his best friend.

  “I’m not here to judge,” McMaster said, his voice somewhat softer. “But after what I’ve seen you do in Chicago, I can’t help but wonder if it’s a good idea to send you into the field again.”

  “I’m not sure I’m following you.”

  “Do you know who I had over to dinner yesterday?” McMaster said. Before Hunt had a chance to answer, McMaster continued, “Cole Egan.”

  Hunt felt the blood drain from his face. Cole Egan. So McMaster does know.

  “You look like you’ve seen a ghost, Pierce,” McMaster said.

  “How’s Cole doing?” Hunt managed to say, still in shock that his new boss knew the man he had saved in Gaza.

  “He’s doing well, thanks to you.”

  “How do you—”

  “He married my daughter three years ago.” McMaster grinned. “She’s the happiest she’s ever been. Cole travels a lot for work—he’s an international sales rep for a dental equipment company—but he takes good care of her. They’re expecting.”

  Cole—about to be a father. Hunt was glad to hear that. But one of the best operators he had ever served with was earning his living by selling toothpaste? War changed people’s ideas about life, and it was entirely possible that Cole had simply decided to walk away from it all and settle down with someone he loved. Cole had been through a lot, and he deserved to be happy.

  And what about Hunt? Did he deserve happiness? In 2007, he and Cole had been part of a small contingent of Rangers and Delta Force operators sent to Gaza to train and assist President Abbas’s Palestinian security forces in their underground fight against Hamas terrorists. But all hell had broken loose when two members of Hunt’s team were killed and Cole Egan was taken prisoner. Their team had been ordered not to intervene, but within two hours of Cole’s capture, Hunt, three other Rangers, and one Delta operator had mounted a rescue operation with intelligence Hunt had gathered through methods some might describe as unorthodox. The rescue had been deemed a military success, but the psychological scars of what he’d done—how far he’d gone to save a teammate—were still there, forever scorched in his mind.

  “From what he told me, he owes you his life,” McMaster continued. “I wanted to know a little more about the man who’d apparently saved my daughter’s husband, you know? But Cole wouldn’t say more, and when I reached out to my contact at the Department of Defense, I was told to back off. The only thing I was able to figure out was that you left the army a week after you shipped home. Why?”

  “It’s complicated,” Hunt said. He was certainly not about to volunteer any information.

  “Things often are. I’ve heard rumors about what happened in Gaza.”

  Hunt remained silent.

  “I wasn’t there. I don’t have all the facts. But if the stories are true, and I’m not saying they are, someone lost control over there and left carnage behind him. Whatever the reasons, a lot of people died. I don’t want to see that happen in the streets of Miami, Pierce.”

  “It won’t.”

  “You threatened to kill that reporter,” McMaster reminded him.

  “Not my interpretation of what happened, sir. I wanted to scare him, to make him understand that his actions had consequences.”

  “It wasn’t your job to do so.”

  “I know,” Hunt admitted. “And I paid for my sins.”

  McMaster thought this over. For a full minute, neither man spoke. It was McMaster who broke the silence.

  “Vicente Garcia.”

  Hunt nodded, happy to change the subject to one of his success stories. “What about him?”

  “Seems like your friend Vicente was recently transferred to FDC Miami.”

  Hunt sighed. Infiltrating the Garcia crime family had been his first and most important undercover stint and the real reason why Jasmine had left him. The assignment had lasted over two years and was recognized as one of the biggest DEA busts of the past decade. Thanks to Hunt’s work, they’d been able to arrest Vicente Garcia, the head of the crime syndicate. He was presently serving a life sentence in a maximum security prison—or at least he had been until recently. The federal detention center in downtown Miami was home to approximately fifteen hundred male and female inmates, but it wasn’t a maximum security prison. Hunt wondered whom Garcia had blackmailed to get transferred there.

  “That makes no sense whatsoever,” Hunt said angrily. “Vicente’s sphere of influence is right here in Miami. Why would anyone agree to transfer him?”

  “Because he agreed to tell us everything he knows about the Black Tosca,” McMaster said with a smile. “And once we have her in custody, he’ll testify against her.”

  Hunt nearly fell off his chair. Valentina Mieles—a.k.a. the Black Tosca—was the most powerful woman in the drug world. She was originally from Colombia, but her influence reached way beyond Latin America. The Black Tosca was allegedly responsible for the kidnappings and murders of at least thirty Americans in the past year alone. Scott Miller’s murderer, Ramón Figueroa, had been her man in Chicago. Having someone like Vicente Garcia testify against her was a big deal. But it also raised questions.

  “I wasn’t expecting this,” Hunt said, scratching his head. “What did you promise him? Vicente isn’t the kind of guy to betray his own.”

  “We didn’t have to promise him anything. The Black Tosca is making a move on Garcia’s entire network.”

  Since the DEA had put Vicente behind bars, his son, Tony, had taken over the reins. Under his leadership, the Garcia family had done very well and was raking in money like never before. Because of this, they had become a prime acquisition target for the Black Tosca.

  “So this is a defensive move on his part,” Hunt said.

  “Kind of. He wants us to do his dirty work for him.”

  “And we’ll just go along with this?”

  “For now,” McMaster said. “We need a win, Pierce. The DEA needs a win. Damn, the White House needs a win. People are looking at us and wondering what the DEA is doing to stop that fucking drug from coming into our country.”

  Hunt nodded. This was a difficult subject for him; it always brought up memories of his brother.

  McMaster continued, “Heroin is everywhere. People are able to get a huge high for less than ten dollars. Do you know who the new heroin addicts are?”

  Hunt’s thoughts drifted back in time to the night he had discovered Jake dead in the basement of his family’s house, a moment that had forever altered the direction of his life. He knew very well who the new addicts were.

  “Teenagers,” he answered.

  “Heroin used to be confined to hard-core drug users, but not anymore,” McMaster said. “The use of heroin among teenagers has risen one hundred percent in the last five years. More than fifty-five thousand people died from overdoses last year, and over sixty percent of those deaths involved an opioid.”

  Hunt was aware of that fact. More people were dying from drug overdoses than from guns and car accidents.

  “We’ve been fighting this war for too long,” McMaster said. “And we’ve been on the losing side. As I said, we need a win.”

  Hunt had heard this speech before, but the higher-ups always seemed to get cold feet when the time came to strike a huge blow.

  “And, of course, a catch like the Black Tosca would look really good on your résumé,” Hunt said.

  A flash of anger appeared in McMaster’s eyes, but it was quickly extinguished.

  “It would
look good on everybody’s résumé. You need a win too, Pierce.”

  Hunt couldn’t fault the DEA for wanting to arrest and prosecute the Black Tosca. She was dangerous. She had ruined the lives of too many families by providing a dirt-cheap product that even kids working for minimum wages could afford to shoot up their arms.

  “What’s my role?” Hunt asked.

  “We want you in on Vicente Garcia’s interrogation. You know him, and he knows you. You’re almost family, right?”

  Hunt shifted uncomfortably in his chair. He didn’t appreciate the jab. Anna Garcia—Vicente’s daughter—had been his way inside the Garcia crime family. The DEA had specifically targeted her, using Hunt as their weapon of choice. Truth was he had fallen hard for her, and she for him. It had been a mistake. A grave mistake that had cost Hunt his family. Still, it was true that Hunt and Vicente had, through Anna, shared a powerful bond for almost two years.

  “He hates my guts. He won’t talk to me.” Which was also true. When Hunt had put the handcuffs around Vicente’s wrists, Vicente had promised to one day kill him. And it wouldn’t be for the arrest but for breaking his daughter’s heart.

  “You won’t be handling the interrogation,” McMaster replied. “We just want you to listen in and steer our partners from Mexico in the right direction. You’ll know if Garcia lies.”

  Partners from Mexico? “So this isn’t an American operation?”

  “If the intelligence we get from Garcia pans out, we’ll need the Mexicans’ help if we are to conduct an operation within Mexico.”

  “I see.” Hunt wasn’t a fan of the Mexican police. The DEA had lost too many good agents due to the Mexican authorities’ inability to root out the corrupt officers within their ranks.

  “On that note, I’d like you to meet someone,” McMaster said, before turning on the intercom and instructing his secretary to let his guest in. “Play nice, Pierce. We need the Mexicans on this,” his new boss reminded him.

  A medium-size man dressed in a dark gray suit entered the office. He was in his late forties with thinning black hair. He smiled at Hunt and offered his hand. He had perfectly white teeth.

  “Special Agent Hunt, this is Chief Inspector Julio Zorita of the Mexican Federal Police.”

  “Nice to meet you,” Hunt said, forcing a smile he hoped looked genuine.

  “The pleasure is all mine,” Zorita said. His grip was strong and sincere.

  “The chief inspector—”

  “Please, call me Julio.”

  “Julio is the head of the General Directorate of Strategic Operations within the National Gendarmerie Division,” continued McMaster. “He’ll be our liaison with the Mexican government.”

  “I’m to be the eyes and ears of the general commissioner,” Zorita added.

  Hunt nodded. “What’s the time frame for Garcia’s transfer?”

  “It’s tomorrow,” Zorita said. “We’ve planned so it falls on a Sunday afternoon. Traffic should be much lighter.”

  “Indeed,” McMaster confirmed. “The US Marshals Special Operations Group will move Garcia to a safe house, where he’ll stay until we catch the Black Tosca.”

  That was a smart move. With the Black Tosca in play, even men like Vicente Garcia weren’t immune to her wrath. Starting tomorrow, solitary confinement or not, Garcia would have a huge target painted on his back. No one was naive enough to believe Garcia’s treachery would remain a secret.

  “I want in on Garcia’s transfer,” Hunt said.

  McMaster raised an eyebrow and looked at Zorita.

  “I don’t see why you couldn’t,” the Mexican said.

  McMaster didn’t look convinced, and Hunt thought he was about to veto his request, but instead he picked up his phone. “Let me call the deputy US marshal supervising tomorrow’s move. We’ll see what he says.”

  McMaster dialed the number by heart and gave the marshal a quick summary of Hunt’s RRT and Ranger qualifications. He listened for half a minute before he said, “Thanks, John. I’ll let him know.”

  “So?” Hunt asked once McMaster had hung up.

  “You owe me one.”

  But Hunt had a feeling that getting involved with the Garcias again was something he’d come to regret.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  2010

  Miami, Florida

  As the security officer signaled him to enter the courtroom, Hunt knew his life was about to take a turn for the worse. He had dedicated the past two years to the biggest undercover DEA operation of the decade. The arrest of Vicente Garcia had generated a tremendous amount of good publicity for the agency and had, albeit briefly, disrupted the flow of opioids coming through South Florida.

  But at what cost? Hunt asked himself as he looked up at the ceiling of the Wilkie D. Ferguson Jr. Courthouse.

  What ended up being a big victory for the DEA was nothing but a tremendous waste to Hunt. He was on the verge of losing everything. Hunt had no doubt he was about to get grilled on the stand. That was fine. Lawyers didn’t scare him. He was, after all, the main witness against Vicente Garcia, so it was normal they’d go at him with everything they could find in an attempt to destroy his character. It wouldn’t matter. The evidence against Garcia was solid. What terrified him, though, was that within the next few hours, his wife—whom he had seen only a handful of times during the past two years—would learn of his infidelity. That scared him to death.

  Anna Garcia, Vicente’s daughter, had been Hunt’s mark from the get-go. She’d been his way into the organization. The analysts had chosen her not only because she was smart but also because she didn’t seem to possess the criminal mind that was rampant within her family. And they’d been right. Her role within the Garcia crime family was trivial, and Hunt hadn’t bothered digging too deep because the focus of the investigation had always been her father. At least that was how he justified his decision not to prod too aggressively. The fact that he’d fallen for Anna within minutes of seeing her certainly had nothing to do with it, right?

  He’d been such a fool. He had played a dangerous game, and now he was about to pay the price.

  Hunt could feel Anna’s eyes on him. He didn’t dare to look in her direction, afraid of what he might see. His heart had never beaten so fast, and he couldn’t quite breathe. The courtroom was packed, raising its temperature a few degrees. Film crews were barred from the courtroom and had to make do with waiting in the hallway. He couldn’t even imagine the confusion Anna must have felt when he walked into the courtroom through the main door and not the one reserved for the accused. The last time she’d seen him was when the DEA had broken into their home and arrested him and Vicente, who’d stayed over after drinking too much wine during dinner. Unbeknownst to Anna, it was Hunt who had called in the cavalry. Vicente was well protected inside his own home. Not so much at the house Hunt had shared with Anna.

  “Are you okay, sir? You’re quite pale.”

  He looked at the prosecutor, an intelligent and stylish woman in her midthirties. Her form-fitting black dress showed off her slim figure as she made her way to the witness stand where he was seated.

  “I’m fine. Thank you.”

  “Please say your name for the court record,” the prosecutor requested.

  Hunt couldn’t resist. He looked in Anna’s direction. She met his gaze from the gallery. There was no emotion on her face, but a multitude of questions hovered in her eyes. He closed his eyes and exhaled, wishing he was anywhere but in this courtroom.

  “Sir, your name, please,” the prosecutor insisted.

  “My name is Pierce Hunt.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Hunt.”

  Mr. Hunt. There it was. His real name, out in the open. No longer a secret to the woman with whom he had shared everything for the last two years. Almost everything, Hunt reminded himself.

  Hunt caught Vicente Garcia staring at him. The man’s scowl made his intent crystal clear. Murder.

  “And what is your profession, sir?” the prosecutor continued.

/>   Hang on, Anna, this one is going to hurt.

  “I’m a DEA agent.”

  There was a collective gasp in the courtroom.

  “And is it true that for the last two years you infiltrated the Garcia family—”

  Hunt barely registered the prosecutor’s question. His attention was on Anna. The last hopeful gleam had finally vanished from her eyes. He had lost her, like he knew he would. Still, it tortured him to see her broken, utterly hopeless because of his actions. But the fact of the matter was that he had a job to do. People like Vicente Garcia thought the laws didn’t apply to them. They were wrong. Drug dealers had taken Hunt’s younger brother’s life. The least he could do to avenge Jake’s death was to send the Vicentes of this world behind bars. It was his sacred duty to do so. He owed it to Jake and to the thousands of families who had lost a loved one to illegal drugs. They were the true victims, not Anna Garcia.

  “Would you like me to repeat the question, Agent Hunt?”

  “Yes—”

  A cry of rage interrupted him. In shock, he watched as Anna sprang out of her seat and jumped over the next one. She took three quick steps and lunged at him. The security officer to Hunt’s left, taken by surprise, was slow to react, but the one standing next to the judge was quicker, and he intercepted Anna midflight. He slammed her to the ground.

  The courtroom fell silent. Even the judge didn’t seem to know what to do.

  Anna turned her head toward Hunt and yelled at the top of her lungs, “You fucking bastard! I trusted you! I trusted you!”

  Then, quieter, as if all strength had left her, she said, “How could you do this to me? I loved you.”

  The agony and tears in her voice ripped at him. Her eyes, though, no longer held anger but pain. A pain that was so intense it sliced him open.

  I loved you too.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Present day

  San Miguel de Allende, Mexico

  Valentina Mieles banged her fist on the table.

  “The ungrateful son of a bitch!” Mieles raged. “After everything I’ve done for him and his entire goddamned family. This? This is how he repays me? By talking to the DEA?”