“Jose?”
“Yes sir?”
“Send only the best men.”
“Yes sir, I’ll send Rico and his crew.”
“He’s available? I thought he was still handling that problem in Vera Cruz?”
“He just called and said that he was on his way back. The men who were causing you grief were put in their place.”
Alvarado smiled.
“That means they’re in the ground.”
“Anything else, sir?”
“Yes, I’ll pay fifty-thousand American to the man who kills Tanner.”
“Fifty-thousand dollars?”
“Absolutely, that is how badly I want this man dead.”
“I’ll spread the word.”
“Do that.”
Alvarado ended the call, but he kept staring at Tanner’s photo, as an old memory tickled the back of his mind.
CHAPTER 4 – A safe place
On Randall Street in Manhattan, Joe nodded to the men guarding the door as he entered his suite.
He and Laurel were staying at the Rutherford Hotel along with over fifty of his men. The hotel was the property of the late Bruno Heinz and Joe and his people had taken it over.
It had been Tanner’s idea, and Joe had agreed that it might be the last place Krupin would look for them. But just in case, Joe had men stationed on the roof, on each floor, and even in the basement and nearby alleyways.
Laurel looked up at him from where she sat on the side of the bed, and Joe could tell that she had been crying.
Laurel stood and went to Joe, and he opened his arms for her to fall into.
“You’ve been thinking about Sophia again, haven’t you?”
“Yes, she was so happy, Joe. She had just fallen in love with Sammy and it was like her life was beginning again, and now... now she’s dead.”
“That’s why I want you to leave the city. It’s too dangerous for you to be around me.”
“I don’t want to leave you.”
“Baby, I don’t want you to leave either, but it would give me peace of mind to know that you’re safe.”
Laurel wiped away tears as she separated from Joe.
“I guess I could visit Merle and Earl.”
Joe shook his head.
“That’s no good, it’s too obvious.”
“Then where do you want me to go?”
“I’m not sure, but I’ll decide after I talk to Tanner.”
“Why Tanner?”
“Unlike everyone else I know, he can’t be bought.”
“You don’t trust your men?”
“I do, but the cartel could offer them millions or threaten their families to get them to betray me. Tanner has no family and he can’t be bribed. There’s one more thing too.”
“What?”
“He loves you, Laurel. He’s already risked his life once to save yours; if he knows a place to put you, I know it will be safe.”
“I’ll be safe, but what about you?”
Joe stared into her eyes.
“Nothing will keep me from marrying you. Do you believe that?”
Laurel hugged him.
“I believe you, and there’s something I have to tell you.”
“What’s that?”
“I know I said that I wanted a small wedding, but, oh I feel stupid bringing this up now.”
Joe caressed her cheek.
“You would really like a large wedding, right?”
“It’s foolish, I know.”
Joe kissed her.
“It’s not foolish, and I’ll make it happen.”
There was a knock on the door.
“What is it?” Joe said.
“It’s me, Boss, Bosco. Tanner just came in.”
“Right, I’ll be out in a minute,” Joe called through the door, and then he spoke to Laurel. “Pack up a few things. You’ll be leaving soon.”
“All right, but where will I be going?”
“I don’t know, but I promise you you’ll be safe.”
***
Joe joined Tanner at a corner booth in the hotel’s bar. There were picture windows along the wall that faced the street, but they had all been painted black so no one could see inside.
“How’s Sammy doing, Joe?”
“The doctors think he’ll awaken soon.”
“That’s the only good news I’ve heard.”
Joe leaned towards Tanner.
“I have a favor to ask. I need you to find somewhere to stash Laurel. She’s not safe here.”
“There’s nowhere you can put her?” Tanner asked.
“I trust my men, but we both know that most people can be bought, and money is something that the cartel has a lot of.”
Tanner thought of Romeo and Nadya, but then nixed the idea because of the travel distance involved. He then thought of someone else.
“I’ll need to make a call to someone. If they agree, we’ll send Laurel there.”
“You trust this person?”
“There’s more than one, and yes, I trust them. Laurel will be safe with them.”
“Can you make it happen today?”
“If they agree, yes,”
Joe let out a sigh of relief.
“Thanks Tanner; I won’t be able to think straight until I know Laurel is safe.”
“I hear you,” Tanner said, as he took out a phone.
Joe rose from the table to give him privacy.
“I have to check on my men. Let me know what your friends say.”
Tanner paused for a moment to recall a number, and then dialed.
A friendly female voice answered.
“Hello?”
“It’s Tanner.”
“It’s about time you called me, Tanner. I’m always the one who calls you.”
“How are you?”
“I’m good, what’s up?”
“I need a favor.”
CHAPTER 5 – Gathering and scattering
Tanner left the hotel soon after making the call. He had to meet someone at a bar in Lower Manhattan.
The bar was on a side street and struggling for business, which was fine with Tanner, less business meant fewer people. The street was also narrow and offered scant places of concealment for a sniper.
After scouting out the area for the meet, he watched as the man he was meeting arrived alone in an old car.
Tanner entered the bar a few minutes later and sat across from the man at a back table. The man was about fifty, and his nose had been broken many times. The last time it was broken by Tanner.
“Did you get it, Duke?”
“I did, and the price was high, but I still managed to walk away with over a thousand dollars.”
“Keep it as a bonus.”
Duke smiled.
“I knew I’d like working for you, and I won’t ask what you need that item for.”
“It will be used as intended.”
Duke let out a huff.
“I’m so glad we’re on the same side now, speaking of which, have you heard from our mutual acquaintance?”
“Sara Blake? No I haven’t, and I don’t expect to.”
“I always liked her, and she tipped as well as you do.”
“Where’s the item?”
Duke pointed across the street.
“It’s in the trunk of the car I arrived in. If you need instruction in its use, there’s a video with it.”
“I’ve used one before.”
“Why does that not surprise me?”
Tanner walked over to the car with Duke and had him start it up before opening the trunk.
“What? You think I rigged it to blow up?”
“Trust will come with time, Duke.”
“I hear you, but I’m too smart to double-cross a man like you, Tanner, also, I have no reason to.”
“What about the car, is it hot?”
“It’s clean and reliable. Just park it when you’re done and send me a text where I can pick it up.”
T
anner inspected the item in the trunk without removing it, and found that it was of good quality.
“This will do.”
“Watch your back, Tanner; I hear the Alvarado Cartel is gunning for you.”
“You got it all wrong, I’m gunning for them.”
“I’m serious, Tanner.”
Tanner studied Duke for a moment before slamming the trunk shut.
“Sit in the car with me for a few minutes. I need to place another order.”
***
After leaving Duke, Tanner drove to a home improvement store. He had left his own car in the store’s back lot, and he transferred the item he received from Duke into it. Afterwards, he checked his watch and saw that it was time to take Laurel to the airport.
***
Tanner drove in aimless circles around the airport parking lot until he was certain that they hadn’t been followed.
Joe had stayed behind at the hotel with his people, and only he, Tanner, and Laurel, knew where she was headed.
Once inside the terminal, Tanner waited with Laurel until her plane was boarding.
“These people I’m staying with, they’re friends of yours?”
“I guess you can say that.”
“I wish I could stay here; I’m so worried about Joe.”
“He’s worried about you, and I hear that if it weren’t for the man he had guarding you, that you might be dead.”
“Yes, Big Ralphy saved me, and I haven’t even been able to visit him in the hospital.”
“You can see him when you come back.”
“Tanner?”
“Yeah?”
“I’m so sorry about Sophia. I know you two broke up, but I also know that you had feelings for her.”
“Despite everything, we were friends, and the people who killed her will pay.”
Laurel stared into his eyes.
“I love you, Tanner, please be careful, and please watch out for Joe. It would kill me if I lost either one of you.”
“The best thing I can do for Joe is to kill his enemies, that is, after making certain that you’re safe.”
Laurel sighed.
“I feel like I’m running away just when Joe needs me.”
“It’s best, Laurel.” Tanner took out a phone and handed it to her along with a strip of paper. “Joe will call you on that every day from one of the numbers on that paper. If the phone rings and displays a number that doesn’t match, don’t answer it, remove the battery, and wait until midnight to activate it again. If you get a text, it won’t be Joe, no matter what it says.”
“It’s so cloak and dagger.”
“It’s just to be cautious.”
Laurel’s flight was ready and Tanner watched her walk off with emotion stirring in his chest.
He loved her, would always love her, and he was as worried for her as Joe was.
“She’ll be safe,” he whispered to himself.
When he was certain her flight was in the air, he returned to his vehicle and headed north of the city. He had another flight to meet, and more men to kill.
CHAPTER 6 – The man, the myth
MEXICO CITY
Alexa Lucia watched as nearly three dozen of Alvarado’s men boarded a pair of private jets.
She had been tracking three of the men to kill them, but held off on her attack after they climbed into a limo.
Alexa had followed the three men to the airport, where she recognized more of Alvarado’s men. Something was happening somewhere that was causing Alvarado to send a small army to handle it, and Alexa was going to find out what that something was.
Alexa was a beautiful Mexican woman of high intelligence and unique skills. She had light-brown skin with the Anglo features of her grandmother, who, as a teenager from Detroit, had gone to Mexico in 1946, fallen in love with Alexa’s musician grandfather, and settled there to raise six children.
Her grandmother was gone now. Her entire family was gone, and they had been murdered by Alonso Alvarado.
Alexa followed the limo her three targets had taken as it exited the airport. Although he would be on a low level, the driver would be a member of the cartel, as were the rest of the men. It was likely that the driver had overheard some of the men’s conversation, and would at least know their destination.
Alexa wanted that info; she wanted anything that she thought might help her kill Alonso Alvarado.
When the limo parked in front of a Mexico City bar on a quiet street, Alexa watched the driver emerge and enter the dimly lit tavern.
She was in her van, a Ford Transit. The vehicle was white, had tinted windows and a raised roof. These days, it was often Alexa’s home as well as her transportation, and where the rear seats would normally be, she kept an air mattress.
The driver of the limo appeared to be about forty. The man looked as if he might have been handsome when younger, but too much alcohol and food had softened his features and rounded his body.
However, certain of his appetites would likely be going unfulfilled, and Alexa intended to play to those appetites, in particular, lust.
Alexa moved into the rear of the van to change into something more appropriate, and when she emerged, she headed into the bar.
***
The limo driver, Felipe, had just ordered his second beer when he saw the woman in the tight dress enter.
As she headed towards him, he realized that his mouth had dropped open. He closed it and cleared his throat.
Good God, but the woman is hot.
Felipe watched her take a seat two stools to the right of his own. When she smiled at him, he actually felt his heartrate speed up.
“Hi, is that your limo outside?”
“Yes, well, I drive it.”
“I love limos; some of the hottest sex I’ve ever had has been in the back of a limo.”
Felipe simply blinked and nodded, as her mention of sex had made him lose his voice.
The bartender came over. He was an old man, but not so old that he didn’t appreciate the loveliness of his newest customer. Felipe heard him ask the woman what she wanted and noticed that the old guy never took his eyes off her breasts.
She ordered white wine, and when it came, Felipe insisted on paying for it. That made the woman smile again, and she moved over to take the stool next to Felipe. After offering her hand, she told him that her name was Anna.
Felipe found her not only beautiful, but charming, and she seemed interested in everything he had to say. He was about to order her another glass of wine when she asked him if she could see the inside of his limousine.
***
Alexa climbed into the rear of the limo while making sure that Felipe got a good look at her ass.
The man was practically drooling when she turned to him, and she smiled and patted the seat beside her.
“Come here.”
Felipe moved towards her so fast that he bumped his head on the doorframe, and Alexa had to fight the urge to laugh.
Once he was seated beside her with the door closed, Felipe’s eyes wandered over her body, and Alexa knew that the fool was expecting sex.
She hadn’t lured him alone into the back of the limo for pleasure, but for pain.
When she brought the knives out, she held one over his crotch and the other one against his throat, Felipe froze, but after swallowing and releasing a short breath, he spoke.
“I don’t have any money.”
“Maybe I want the limo.”
Felipe composed himself a bit and a small smile appeared.
“This limousine belongs to The Alvarado Cartel; if you take it they’ll kill you.”
“The narcos you dropped at the airport, where are they going?”
“What?”
“You heard me, Felipe.”
“I can’t tell you that.”
Alexa sank the tip of a knife into the flesh beneath Felipe’s chin.
He hissed from the pain, and Alexa watched a line of blood race down his throat and onto his white shirt.
“You will tell me what I want to know or I will kill you right now. It’s your choice.”
Felipe’s breathing had quickened, but he stared at Alexa with a look of defiance.
“You’re lying. You won’t kill me, not a woman like you.”
Alexa smiled. If he only knew how many of his kind she had killed,
She pushed down on the blade positioned above Felipe’s crotch and it sliced through his pants and into the flesh beneath his pubic hair.
Felipe cried out in shock, attempted to move, and cut his chin on the other blade.
“Strike out at me and I’ll slit your throat,” Alexa told him. “Stay absolutely still and answer my questions.”
“All right; just don’t cut me again, oh God; my pants are filling with blood.”
“Where were those men headed?”
“To New York City, there’s a man there killing our people.”
“A man? One man?”
“His name is Tanner.”
“What’s his first name?”
“There is none. He is just called Tanner,” Felipe said, and saw in Alexa’s eyes that she knew the name.
“You know Tanner?” he asked.
“Not the man, no, but I’ve heard the myth.”
“What myth?”
“If this Tanner is a Tanner, the men who left here are all dead.”
Felipe made a derisive sound.
“Alvarado sent over thirty men to New York City. You think one man can kill thirty?”
“I don’t know, but I do know one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“Your usefulness has come to an end.”
Alexa’s hands moved in a blur and she embedded the knives in Felipe’s torso. She watched him die, and as always, it brought to mind the death of her blessed abuela, her grandmother.
She was about to leave the limo when, what she called her, “little voice”, spoke to her. It was telling her that there was something of interest for her in the limo.
Alexa looked about and found it stuffed into a compartment on the door. It was a flyer with a mugshot displayed, and it had the name Tanner written beneath the photo.
Alexa studied the wrinkled photo with great interest, while paying particular attention to the eyes, which she found to be sexy.
“A Tanner,” she whispered, and then she left the limo with the photo clutched in her hand.
The TANNER Series - Books 7-9 (Tanner Box Set Book 3) Page 27