by Steve Curry
I tensed my stomach muscles because that was going to stop a stream of nine-millimeter bullets right? Except there were no bullets. The submachine gun went click. Somewhere in the process, I must have closed my eyes because I had to unscrew one to see what happened next.
Heather, still with one of his hands in hers, reached across and struck him in the throat, this time with her hand held like a knife’s edge. I heard the delicate bones at the front of his larynx break. Breathing was going to be something of a problem after that. He seemed to realize it too. The malfunctioning gun hit the seat between us. I didn’t bother going for it though. It might have made a decent club but that wasn’t a fair fight against the guy leaning between the seats to level his own weapon at us.
I grabbed the barrel of the shotgun and wrenched it forward only to drive it back into his shoulder. The tactical stock hit with a heavy enough impact to twist him in his seat. That gave me the leverage to force the gun barrel down. He released that gun and went for the handgun in his belt. There was little chance to beat him. The shotgun was unwieldy and trapped between the seat and the gurgling fellow in the back with us.
I was still reversing the longer weapon when his barrel lined up with my left eye. In that limited space there wasn’t a chance in Hel of dodging that shot. I was about to have my disorganized memories scrambled more thoroughly and spread all over the back of the hummer. Then the Uzi burped a handful of rounds that took out his gun hand, then smacked into his chest, and finally, a round went in over his left eye to spread ugly scarlet and off-white on the windshield.
One of the bullets must have gone astray because there was the nasty whine of a ricochet followed by a breathless grunt from the driver.
“I told you to brace yourself.” Heather’s voice was light, almost cheerful as I looked over to see her wrapping her free hand around the safety bar above her window. I barely got hold of my own safety bar when the Hummer abruptly spun to the right and hit a curb. I felt the vehicle start to tilt under me and had to hope we didn’t roll too many times. We were in the outskirts of Mexico City by then so we weren’t traveling at a crawl but we weren’t speeding along either.
The speed was enough for a roll though. Between the sudden turn, no brakes, and the lift of the curb we went over in a fairly slow tumble. I managed to brace myself with a foot on the transmission hump and my shoulders pressed against the corner of the rear seat. I’m not sure exactly how Heather managed to control her own tumbling so that she barely had a hair out of place when we came to a grinding sliding stop.
She was on the underside laying back against her door. Since there was no exit that way she made one for us. I heard the silenced gun burp again and felt rounds whip past my face to remove the window above me. Falling glass dropped on my neck and down my shirt but managed to fall all around her without actually touching the girl. She gestured me through the window with the little automatic and I took her suggestion to heart.
Somewhere below me was a shotgun and at least one other handgun. I regretted not stopping for one of them when I got through the window to sit on the door. Armed people were spilling out of the car ahead of us. The car behind us had spun out of control as well when it tried to avoid our surprise acrobatics. That one was all tangled up with some entrepreneur’s carriage and donkey. At least the donkey and his driver looked alright. The SUV and the carriage were an intermingled wreck. Thankfully there didn’t seem to be any carriage passengers.
A slap on my leg got my attention. I looked down to see Heather’s well-manicured hand waving imperiously to demand my assistance. “No good ma’am. There are a lot of busy bees piling up out here with guns. They look pretty pissed off.”
She slapped my leg again and I looked back down to see her smile. “It’s all okay Moose. I’ve left the guns in the car see? They don't know what happened just yet. I’m just an innocent unarmed girl to them. So give me a hand.”
With no better response, I helped her out while I tried not to think about all of the weapons that would be pointed our way fairly soon. I don’t know why it was right then that I noticed her song had gone from hymnal sounding organs to an energetic electric guitar. I lowered her to the ground and start to extricate myself the rest of the way as I heard the first words of the song start low voiced but growing louder. “Bawitdaba da bang da dang diggy diggy”
The sound was muted when she replaced the dangling earbud. “Stay here Moose. I’m gonna go get Luis.”
I barely had time to get down from the car before she was moving at a slow but steady pace into the oncoming gunmen. I started to scramble back up the car and get some firepower of my own. It would be too late for her but I could at least pile some of the bastards up for her before I went back to Valhalla.
I needn’t have worried. The first two guys to reach her were shouting and gesturing with their AKs. She just ignored them and moved in close enough to start dancing. I mean she was literally within hand-holding, arms around each other, dancing distance without being shot. That was a bad mistake. The first one was taken by surprise when she spun into him and used her leverage to point the rifle at his buddy. That seemed like a bad time to pull the trigger to me, but he reacted to the surprise more than his aim I guess. Holes stitched their way up his buddies legs with loud bangs from the weapon.
One of the guys behind them tried to shoot but had no clear angle with Heather cuddled up against the rifleman. She spun to keep her living shield between them while she snagged a knife from his belt and dug it a good two inches into his side. Maybe he didn’t have good trigger discipline, but his posture got a ton better while he tried to keep straight up on his toes to avoid the pain pressing in near his innards.
The approaching gunmen were still circling when I popped back out of the car with the handgun. I couldn’t find the uzi and there was no time to free the shotgun from where it was wedged under seats and a body or two. I was just about to even the odds for her when I felt a hard metal object slam against the side of my head.
Somebody must have gotten out of the carriage and SUV pileup. I was down but not out. Which turned out to be fortuitous. Since I was on the ground I barely felt the rush of air as something blew on the other side of the Hummer. It didn’t make a lot of sense. I mean maybe the friction of the car had thrown some sparks, and maybe there was something combustible there. There might have even been some impact to cause a fuel leak. But the chances of enough leakage to cause the gas tanks to go up were astronomical. The odds must have been with us. I felt a rush of hot air above me and actually heard the passage of some metal banging off the road around me. None of it came close to hitting me though. Maybe that was because most of the flames and metal seemed to have found their way to the guy standing over me.
I rolled to my feet with the handgun leveled. The guy with bits of glass and flaming metal in him fell to take my place. One of the two guys facing Heather had turned to face the explosion. That meant he wasn’t an immediate threat while he blinked away the spots. I shot the other one four times with two steady evenly timed shots to center mass and two to the head as I advanced.
His buddy was just beginning to switch his aim from Heather to me when a different gun spoke out from the other side of the burning car. I went ahead and shot him twice myself before I saw the mess that the other shot had made of one side of his head. I swung around to point my gun that direction as Franco came around with his pointed towards me. We both lifted identical eyebrows and then swung to face the other vehicle.
We were just in time to see “Jeffe” step into view. He had made it out of the same accident that Franco and the shish kabob at my feet had.
“Senorita, you will release my man, or I will have your man castrated! Domingo bring him out!” We’d managed to get past that icy reserve. Jeffe sounded very angry and very confident of his control of the situation.
“The same goes for these men. If they do not lower their weapons they will be shot, if they survive that, I will make sure they see you raped repe
atedly and thoroughly puta.” The anger was gaining an upper hand, he practically spit the last word at her. I wasn’t sure if that was good or bad. But I was sure that I didn’t intend to just drop my gun because we’d hurt his feelings.
The arrival of a guy I assumed was Domingo changed the dynamics. He had Luis by a cord around his neck. The bodyguard was also bound with zip ties but at least his hands were in front of him. The problem was the machete held up between his legs from behind. It must have been really sharp. There was already a cut in the pants and a sheet of blood oozing down the material and exposed thigh. If that blade moved much at all it would make a mess of not only Luis’ junk, but probably his femoral artery leading to a very real chance of bleeding to death in mere moments.
I wasn’t sure how Heather would react to such a threat. Not many people would take that kind of chance with a friend and there had been some indications that the two of them might be much more than buddies. I was expecting her to release her gunman which would put Franco and me in an ugly three-way crossfire. I misjudged her.
She rolled her eyes and blew a gum bubble while she took her next step. Without any real effort, she pushed the blade to the hilt in her hostage’s ribs and watched him slide off the knife to the ground. That left us at a stalemate of sorts. We didn’t have a clean shot at Domingo with his machete. But if either of the baddies did anything, then Jeffe was going to spring a whole bunch of painful leaks.
“So now what Mr. Jeffe?” The girl’s voice was almost syrupy sweet as she stood with her fashionable shoes in the scarlet puddle she’d made with her knife. “If you like do anything, I like smile and ask my posse over there to like shoot you like a whole lot and it’s totally gonna hurt almost as bad as your haircut, and like if your little friend slices so much as an inch more of my friend, I will ask these gentlemen to totally shoot lots of holes in you and your cheap wardrobe.”
I saw the head kidnapper stifle his rage with a supreme effort. He took a minute to control his breathing and tamp down the fires of his anger then barked an order over his shoulder. “Bring him.”
This time the hostage was Pedro Perro himself with his traitorous ex-associate. The smuggler was walking carefully as the rat behind him scurried to stay in the cover of his charge while pointing his own handgun at the back of Pedro’s skull.
“There is no play. Only a deal.” Jeffe had regained his composure and went so far as to lower his own weapon. “We take the car, and we take your friend over there and the short Americano. The rest of you leave. Run and get out of Mexico before I can get back with enough men to paint this whole street in your blood.”
It was Heather’s turn to get red from her neck up. Her grip tightened on the knife and I was pretty sure that “Jeffe” would have his guts for foot warmers if he’d been within reach. She had to settle for stamping a foot and splashing gore all over her legs. “I’m not leaving Luis. Take the sleazy smuggler and his buddies or whatever but you don’t get mine.”
That got the first smile Jeffe had displayed since the wreck. “Now that would be stupid of me. Why take a hostage that your foes find without value? Let us be clear. The only way you leave here with your “friend”, is carrying his lifeless body as the blood leaks out. I have seen such a death. If the cut is high like Domingo is holding it, then the blood vessels they snap back up into his crotch. Blood pours out by the bucket. Only a very good surgeon can fix it. If, however, you take your friends and leave, then I will let your precious Luis go unharmed when we are through with our business tonight.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the girl fight the urge to stomp her elegant shoe into the blood puddle again. Her fists clenched and unclenched for a long three count before she spoke through locked teeth. It wasn’t the right time for it, but I couldn’t help being amused that even with her jaw locked tight she still had that valley girl accent from the eighties or nineties. “O, M, G, You already have one hostage. So like why would we give you another one?”
Somehow the cartel guy could make a shrug almost as irritatingly smug as his smile.“I need two hostages for two different purposes senorita. Your companion is coming to make you and your associates behave. The short and wide Yankee is coming because there are Americano spies asking questions about him. We do not need the Americanos interrupting our operations tonight. By tomorrow none of that will matter and we will be gone. The gunrunner knows where to find us. He provided many of the weapons for my men. Have him show you tomorrow so you can pick up your friend.”
Heather had shown impressive patience during his long-winded speeches. I was starting to think maybe there was a sharp brain working behind the bubblegum and blonde bimbo vibes. That all came crashing down with her next move. She dropped the knife and walked over to Jeffe who kept his gun trained on her while his own eyes tightened. “Please do not be stupid little girl. It would be terrible to put a bullet hole in such a lovely creature.”
“Like, I totes hope my dudes are simpatico” She let out a sigh as she turned her back and slowly walked the last few steps with her hands in the air until her back was almost against him.
“Ugh, I guess You’re gonna have to like take me too. I’ll go and like keep an eye on you and your bargain haircut and cheap clothes. I don’t trust you to play nice behind my back.”
Which probably explains why she had deliberately put her back to him with her hands up. My impression of her mental capability took a sharp turn from upwards to precipitously falling.
The boss kidnapper was nothing if not swift thinking and adaptable. He took one long step and hooked a hand into her hair as the other brought his gun up along her jaw.
“Very admirable little girl. And you Perro? Do you see how things have changed?” His one visible eye glittered with an eager hate behind the girl’s head. “You will come with us now too. Everyone but the businessman with the guns is invited to the party now.”
Franco looked around the tableau making up his mind. Other than my weapon, his was the only one not pointed at one of our supposed allies. With a shrug, he changed even that. His aim switched from Jeffe to my head in one swift smooth motion.
“Magnus was it? Please drop your weapon. I assume the Latin gentleman would be just as pleased with your death as your captivity. This way I get to go back to Corsica and eat mamma’s manicotti one more time.” He had dropped that joyful banter finally. I had little doubt that he would shoot me if it came to that. We had been brothers in arms once, but that was a long time ago. Who knew what he’d seen since then? Or how it had changed him?
I didn’t do anything stupid and dramatic like let the weapon loose to swing from the trigger guard. I simply pulled my trigger finger out and very gently put it on the ground. Nothing else seemed prudent. Then again surrendering to these assholes didn’t seem particularly prudent either but sometimes you take the lemon with the least bitter suck to it.
“Very good senor Franco. You may keep your weapon, but please, back away to that cafe behind you. Once you are inside we will acquire another vehicle and be on our way. Please stay inside. Have a cup of coffee. Maybe eat something. Do not come back out for half an hour and we will be long gone. After that, I think perhaps you should sell your weapons elsewhere.” I idly wondered if Franco wanted to put a bullet in this windbag’s teeth as much as I did.
If so, he didn’t show it. After a curt nod, he backed away with his weapon trained on Jeffe despite the likelihood of hitting the girl. If I was guessing he would shoot her and keep firing even as she fell. Eventually, some bullets would get past to the target behind her. Franco didn’t seem jovial and harmless at that precise moment.
Once he was out of sight, orders came spitting out from behind Heather’s head as Jeffe ordered his men. Two of them with AK’s showed up from behind the wrecked donkey cart. If the situation had devolved we would have all gone down in a shitstorm of bullets. Maybe the girl wasn’t as stupid as I thought. Or maybe she was just lucky.
It took the heavily armed criminals less th
an five minutes to get us back on the road in their one working vehicle and a great big pickup they “borrowed”. A glimpse at the guys they took the truck from told me this was probably not the first time this truck had been borrowed. It might even have been the second time in twenty-four hours.
It probably would have been smart to separate us again inside the two vehicles. I think el Jeffe was more pissed than smart though. He had us all zip-tied at the wrist and ankle then all three of us were tied to the cargo rings inside the pickup bed. He gestured at one of the guards to join us and traded that guy a shotgun for his own little uzi. The shotgun made sense. If we got rambunctious he could probably get us all with minimal effort and only incidental damage to the vehicle.
We were on our way along fiercely uneven cobblestones before Pedro finally spoke up. “Well, that was a real cluster fuck. What the hell happened to your car?”
I don’t know why he glared at me. When it came down to blowing things up and wrecking everything from prisons to hopes and dreams he was way ahead of me. I hadn’t blown up anything.
“One of those..” Heather paused to find the right word, “Assholes! Put his hand up my skirt.”
Apparently, that was all she deemed important about the previous scene. I decided to clarify for those who hadn’t been part of it. “She smacked him and his gun went off. One of those little full autos. Ricocheted around and got the driver. Flop goes the weasel. As for the explosion, it beats the hell out of me. Maybe a fuel line or something.”
Our guard grunted a command in Spanish and gestured with his gun. We all four shrugged at him in unison despite at least two of us understanding whatever he’d said. The gunny glared at us and then lifted a thick and filthy looking finger to his lips.
“Damn man, I don’t know that I’d put that ugly nubbin anywhere close to my mouth. I mean maybe you know where it’s been and all but that digit is nasty.” Pedro didn’t sound too upset by our turn of fate. Instead, he seemed delighted to antagonize the guy with the face-chewing buckshot in his gun. Which earned him another glare and grunt that had to mean “shut the hell up” in Spanish.