Special Forces: Operation Alpha: Saving Laura (Kindle Worlds Novella) (Guardians of Hope Book 2)

by KD Michaels

  Mendoza turned to his man at the door. “Bring the dark-haired bitch to the room. I think I’m going to start with her. Maybe if this cunt hears her friend screaming then she’ll lose her attitude.”

  Mendoza walked out of the room leaving his man to go and grab Cortez. Laura fought against her binds to get to the man and stop him from dragging Cortez out of the room. The thug kicked Laura hard in the side knocking her over, then kicked her again in the head and laughed as he dragged a struggling Cortez out of the room. Laura heard whimpers coming from the other side of the room and looked. She saw the four girls they had been searching for in the same room.

  “Are you girls ok? Have they hurt you?” Laura asked the girls.

  “We’re ok for now. They haven’t done anything other than keep us doped. Are you a cop? I’m Danika. I’ve been trying to keep these guys calm so those men don’t get angry or anything.”

  “You’re fine, Danika. It’s best to keep calm and not give them what they want no matter what. They haven’t touched you yet, have they?” Laura started to worry they were too late.

  “No ma’am, they haven’t raped us yet. I was scared that one of their men would have the way he was acting, but Mr. Ackerman was adamant to the guard that we were to be untouched. Although I don’t know how long that’s going to last now that we are here.” Danika worried her lower lip.

  Several hours later, the same thug, now jacketless, sweating, and his sleeves rolled up, brought in a motionless Cortez and dropped her onto the floor near Laura with a smirk. “Enjoy your freedom because your time under my fists is coming soon,” he boasted in broken English.

  When he left, Laura and Danika crawled over as best as they could to Cortez and checked on her. She was still breathing which made Laura relax just a little. “Taz, omg what did they do to you?”

  “Ah, nothing really? They tried to get me to cry out or say who we spoke with about the case. They wanted names and I told him to bite my ass. You know the usual smartass shit we say and do. They hit like little bitches to be honest,” croaked Cortez.

  “Doesn’t look like they hit like bitches,” piped up Danika.

  “Hey kid you’re 16, watch the language. Your mother will have your ass and ours if you go home cursing like a sailor,” Laura warned.

  “Yeah like we’re gonna get out of here. You guys are cops. Not like they are going to come to Mexico or wherever we are to save us. We’re not exactly in Kansas anymore, Dorothy. While you two sleeping beauties were knocked out the four of us weren’t,” came Danika’s cheeky reply.

  “Yeah well, they don’t know about our connections and I guarantee when a particular Alpha male who has Pratt in his grasp can’t be found, not even the hounds of hell will stop his ass from finding us. And let’s not forget her brother when she’s late picking up Cody,” Cortez replied sounding hopeful.

  “Don’t hold your breath, Taz. He’s deployed right now. I haven’t spoken to him in a couple of days since he deployed other than when he was in air to let me know he was called out and that it would be a bit. Dom can only do so much but yeah he’s got friends from his military days he’ll probably call on to get the ball rolling,” Laura said on a sigh.

  “So basically we’re goners no matter what since no one would be looking for us,” Danika repeated.

  “No, you haven’t met our Captain. That’s one scary bitch and she has no problems strong-arming the political powers that be to send in someone to get us. Just hang in there, Danika. If they do come in and take you don’t give them the pleasure of knowing they are hurting you, no matter how much it hurts. Don’t cry, don’t scream out, don’t give them any reaction, and they will lose interest. They want to break your will and if you give them any reaction it eggs them on because you’re a fighter,” Cortez stated with strong conviction.

  Laura sighed. “This is all my fault. I shouldn’t have pissed Ackerman off.”

  Cortez opened one good eye. “Don’t you dare start that shit, Laura. These guys got pissed the minute we started looking for these girls. We did our job and we will continue to do our job. We may die in the line of duty but at least we fought for these girls despite the fact there are bad badges out there being paid off to look the other way.”

  A short time later, Mendoza walked into the room with a big grin on his face. “Ah lovely senoritas, which one should I take now? Will it be one of our lovely young guests to start their training for my dick or hand them over to one of my men to have their fun? Maybe I should take the lovely Detective Pratt and have my fun with you?”

  “Fuck you, asshole. Do your worst. But you won’t break me,” Laura spat out.

  Mendoza laughed as he grabbed Laura’s arm and dragged her out of the room. He dragged her into a room four doors down from where he held them. “Let’s see how long it takes you to beg for your life or that of your partner? This should be fun.”

  Laura never saying a word, only glared at him. Mendoza started to shift from foot to foot, getting uncomfortable with her staring at him. Laura knew he didn’t like it when a woman appeared to be on an even field with him. She knew he was uncomfortable and basked in the aura of that fact.

  Laura didn’t know what all they did to Cortez, but she had a strong feeling she was about to find out. Mendoza advanced toward her and smacked her hard across the face with his open palm. “You think you’re so much better than me, don’t you puta?”

  Laura didn’t say anything. She just turned her head back toward Mendoza and glared at him. She wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of a response. She knew what he wanted and she wasn’t going to give in to it. No matter how much it hurt.

  Mendoza came back at her again this time punching her with a closed fist, knocking her over, chair and all. Laura grunted from the force of the blow and the hard fall. She closed her eyes and bit her lip hard to keep from screaming out, which enraged Mendoza even more.

  Huffing and growling, Mendoza came over and kicked her legs which were tied to the chair she had been sitting on over and over again. Mendoza stopped, breathing heavily as he stumbled back becoming angry that Laura didn’t scream out once. Looking over at the thug behind him, he jerked his head toward the table.

  Laura was picked up, ropes cut from the chair, dragged over to the table, and once again strapped down. “Let’s see how well you can handle this, you bitch.” Laura just stared at the thug not saying a work or giving any indication that she was scared.

  Laura was petrified. Despite the fact that she loved water and the beaches, which goes hand in hand with living in San Diego and being involved with a SEAL, her biggest fear had always been drowning. She panicked when Mendoza placed the rag over her mouth and nose as the man poured a bucket of water slowly over her face. When they removed the rag, Laura started coughing and spitting water at the men and gasping for air. Mendoza and his henchman continued waterboarding Laura for over an hour, each time making her gasp for air, coughing and spitting up water.

  Mendoza becoming angrier with the lack of response from Laura, removed her from the table and dragged her over to hang her from the meat hook by her tied hands, dangling from the ceiling in the middle of the room. He tore Laura’s shirt off of her body and smirked. He balled his hands into fists and spoke to thugman in Spanish. Laura watched as thugman walked out of the room. Mendoza walked around the room for a few moments, then turned before he headed straight up to Laura and punched her hard into her stomach causing her to gasp from the surprise punch.

  Mendoza started laughing as he threw some more punches to her stomach and kidneys, walking around her in circles as he did so. Thugman walked back into the room with a whip, a baseball bat, and carrying a car battery with cables. Laura gulped seeing the items in his hand, but the vision was short-lived as Mendoza started hitting her again.

  “I want to know who you talked to about your investigation into the arcade, Detective. You can give it to me now or I can cause you so much pain. Either way, you will tell me what I want to know.”

/>   “Ok ok, I’ll talk. Shit. Ok, I went to my Captain and told him what we knew and then he went to his boss and it was decided to put pressure on Ackerman.”

  “Very good. Now what is your Captain’s name?” smiled Mendoza on the win.

  “Shit, he’ll have my ass in a sling. His name is Captain Kirk of the Starship Enterprise and his boss is Star Lord,” Laura started laughing

  Mendoza roared as he pummeled Laura in the stomach and kidney area harder. He stepped back after several hard punches and ordered his guy to hook up the battery and cables and to get the hose. “You think you’re so funny, puta. But you’ve only made things harder for yourself.”

  For the next two hours Mendoza kept good on his promise to cause her immense pain. She was shocked with the cables connected to the battery, she was beaten from head to toe, whipped, and beaten some more.

  For four days, Cortez and Laura fought with everything they had against Mendoza and his men. They believed that as long as Mendoza was focused on them, they wouldn’t touch the girls, they were protected because Mendoza was occupied with them. But, they didn’t know who much longer they could keep it up.

  7

  “Matthew, I need to get up and get ready for work,” laughed Caroline. “You’re going to be late if you don’t get your shower.” Caroline turned over and kissed Matthew ‘Wolf’ Steel and got out of bed.

  “We can conserve water and shower together.” Wolf got out of bed and chased his wife into the bathroom. Just as he got to the door, his phone went off. Grabbing his phone, he answered.

  “Wolf.”

  “Wolf, gather your team and get into the office. We’ve got a mission,” Commander Patrick Hurt ordered.

  “Yes sir, we’ll be there within the hour.” Wolf hung up and sent a secured text to the rest of the men on his SEAL team to be at Commander Hurt’s office within the hour.

  “Sorry Caroline, seems like we have a mission.” Wolf kissed Caroline deeply and passionately, then got a quick shower to dress for his meeting with Hurt.

  One hour later, Wolf, Cookie, Abe, Dude, Mozart, and Benny were gathered in Commander Hurt’s office. “Gentlemen, sorry to cut your morning short, but we’ve got a hot one. Two female detectives from our of Riverton County Sheriff’s Department Human Trafficking Task Force were kidnapped approximately four days ago. They were investigating the disappearance of four underage girls, Tabitha Jennings, Danika Star, Juanita Sanchez, and Farzooh Nadinaez. It’s believed that the owner of the arcade killed the kid that worked for him to draw the two Detectives, Laura Pratt and Tarilyn Cortez, to him, and also killed two San Diego PD officers in the process.”

  “Why kill the SDPD officers but not the detectives? That doesn’t make sense,” Cookie said.

  “No, it doesn’t. Their Captain believes it has to do with the investigation itself. They apparently caught the eye of the man who wanted the girls so he ordered Ackerman to take the detectives, as well.” Hurt’s phone started ringing. “Hurt. Yes sir, the team is here. They just arrived and I was giving them the basic rundown. Yes sir, give me a minute to put you on speaker. You’re on speaker now, sir. Gentlemen, President Lyman wants to speak with you personally.”

  “Gentlemen, thank you for arriving promptly. I’m sorry to have cut into your morning but I wanted the best on this mission and Senator Lytle tells me you’re the best. Gentlemen, I owe these two women my life so I’m pulling out all the stops to get them rescued. They saved my daughter when she was kidnapped by a rogue Secret Service Agent a couple of years ago. They’ve kept in touch with her through it all and made sure she knew she wasn’t alone. My daughter is distraught when she learned that these two in particular are missing. I want them found and brought home, along with those four young girls. Any questions?”

  “No, sir. We will get them back no problems, sir,” Wolf replied in the affirmative.

  The phone disconnected when Benny pipped up, “So these girls know the President of the United States?”

  “More like the president’s daughter did,” Abe said with respect. “So these two are part of a task force that focuses on Human Trafficking? How come we’ve never heard of them?”

  “Because gentlemen, my team operates quietly,” Captain Irby said stepping to the front of the room. “That’s why they are effective. They started out as a pilot team to see how well it worked with all the issues of victims falling through the cracks of the system. We’ve been very successful after we got our feet planted and worked through the initial trial and error phase. I’m Captain Katherine Irby, the head of the Human Trafficking Task Force. I was asked by your Commander to bring over what you would need to go after my girls. They are strong and they are tough. Bring them home to me gentlemen. Commander, here are the files you requested. I know I could have emailed them, but I needed to look you and your men in the face and know that your team will bring my girls home. They are family. It took us four days to get this far, we won’t stop until they are home, even if that means going against every protocol and going to Mexico to recover them ourselves.”

  “These men are the best. Not sure how you got in here, but thank you. We will bring them home, Captain. I’ll have my assistant escort you out.”

  Turning back to the men, Hurt continued briefing the team. “Ok men, you’re going into Mexico. The man they are the guest of, and I use the term lightly, one Francisco Mendoza. These women pissed off the head of the Mendoza cartel. He risked everything to have these women taken. This is everything the department and our intel has on him. Go kick ass and bring them home.” Hurt dismissed the men after passing out the information prepared for the team.

  Wolf and the team grabbed their gear and headed to the plane to get in the air and go over their mission. “Ok guys, we have two adult females and four minor females. I think we all can agree that the two detectives won’t leave without the kids unless they are in a body bag. So we need to be prepared for any resistance. They can help keep the girls calm if they are able to.”

  “Shit, from what this file says, Detective Pratt has a brother that was former Delta. Cortez is also former Army. These two are military affiliated in some way, shape, or form so they will fight with everything they have. I think our main focus will be on keeping the four younger girls calm,” Abe stated, skimming through his file.

  “If these two are as good as the President and their Captain stated, I wouldn’t be surprised if we wind up finding them fighting their captors when we get there. They sound like the type that would do anything and everything to keep the focus on them so the girls are left alone,” Mozart put in his two cents.

  “Using Mozart’s logic, then we can assume that we may be carrying one if not both out,” Dude commented.

  “Agreed, so be prepared for them to be fighting off anyone and everyone if they are able to, but the strong chance we will have to be carrying one or two out,” Wolf remarked.

  “Do we know which area we are going into? According to intel, Mendoza has two compounds where he regularly stays. He’s very rarely seen out in the public unless he’s going from one to the other. How do we know which one he’s at, not even intel can give us a general idea,” Benny chimed in.

  “According to intel, which compound shows the most activity right now?” Wolf asked Benny.

  “Since Mendoza is the head of the Mendoza cartel, they pretty much run everything from Ensenada to San Elequoi. He has a compound in Ensenada and San Elequoi about forty miles south. From what intel shows, the most activity is around San Elequoi, but it doesn’t jive with the activity that’s going on in Ensenada.”

  “Shit, this guy runs that much? That’s a lot of territory. We don’t have the ability to go through both of those. If we hit the wrong one, our element of surprise is gone. We’ll be sitting ducks and they will up the guards for the other. Wait, you said the activity doesn’t jive with each other, what do you mean Benny?” Mozart questioned.

  “It means that one or the other usually has more activity than the other. San El
equoi has the most activity right now, making it look like they are all there. But there’s small amount of movement coming out of Ensenada which is unusual other than the small number of guards that would still patrol the area to keep the home protected, but this looks like more than that. Mendoza is married with kids, right?”

  “What if the wife and kids are in San Elequoi, which would make sense for him to have the family away while he’s entertaining our targets at the Ensenada compound? That would make sense to me. These two are enough to cause a ruckus and draw attention. They are fighters. My gut says they are the Ensenada compound while he sent the wife and family to the San Elequoi place,” Abe declared.

  “I agree with Abe - Ensenada. What about the rest of you men?” Wolf asked the rest of the team.

  After getting the nods from the rest of the team, they alerted the pilot they were ready while they prepped their gear ready and worked out how they were going to go in and rescue the victims.

  Six hours later, the team arrived at the outskirts of the Ensenada compound and started their observation. After hour two, they finally saw movement in the compound. “Well, there’s Mendoza’s top man. Son of a bitch, what is that he’s dragging?” Mozart whispered into his mic.

  “Fuck, that’s one of the detectives. They worked her over good,” Dude fumed.

  All of the sudden, the man went down with a female on top of him fighting, three more men came out of the building to assist. The men cringed when they saw one of the men backhand her. “Enough, they are going to kill her. Take them out, Benny. Let’s go,” Wolf ordered.

  Wolf and the team took off and took out the four thugs. Laura whirled around after grabbing the thug’s gun she’d been fighting with and turned to where the shots came from, aiming at the figures running her way. “Stay right there, asshole, or I’ll blow your head off your shoulders.”