The Tanner Series - Books 1-11: Tanner - The hit man with a heart

by Remington Kane

  Rockford had been holding his keys when he was hit. Tanner picked them up from the ground and moved Rockford’s vehicle into the parking lot of an adjacent apartment complex, so that Rockford’s girlfriend wouldn’t wonder why his car was still parked outside. With that done, Tanner returned to his vehicle and drove off.

  When he regained consciousness, Rockford would talk, oh yes he would, and with the information he supplied, Tanner would cause Alonso Alvarado, AKA Martillo, more grief.

  It would also let Martillo know of his whereabouts, but that was all right, because before the man could act, Tanner would be with his mentor again, with Tanner Six, and the two of them would come up with a plan to bring the bastard down.

  Tanner grinned. It would be like the old days all over again.

  He drove to the outskirts of the city as he searched for an appropriate place to torture and thought about the coming days.

  402

  Gutless

  Tim Jackson had left a message for Tanner in his email account. It contained a decoded copy of what had been on the website Chemzonic covertly used.

  Nothing much was on the Chemzonic website that was on its surface incriminating, as even the decoded language was riddled with hidden meanings and euphemisms. It was enough to convince Tanner that there was something rotten going on at the plant. Tim had uncovered two other things that were interesting.

  One was the wanted poster of Alexa, who was worth a hundred grand dead or alive.

  The poster listed her “crimes” and Tanner was impressed. He had been told by Rico Nazario that Alvarado’s desert compound was impenetrable, and yet, Alexa had not only made it inside, but had also, as the poster put it, “blasphemed” against Alvarado.

  Tanner didn’t know what was meant by that, but he assumed he would be pleased by it. He also liked the drawing of Alexa. If she were half as beautiful as the sketch, she would be a looker.

  There was yet a third drawing on a wanted poster, one that worried Tanner even more than the one with his own face on it.

  It was of Tanner Six, with the age updated, and it was close to how he looked. Alonso Alvarado must have been searching for Tanner Six ever since their encounter, and he was offering a huge reward for information about his whereabouts. Tanner Six was unaware of that, as had been Tanner, because they had both assumed that Martillo, who was Alvarado, was dead.

  Alonso Alvarado had to die for what he did to Tanner’s family, for Sophia, for placing a price on Tanner’s head, and to keep Tanner Six safe. Tanner would kill the man. That was a fact. Now, all he had to do was figure out a way to do it.

  He sent another email off to Tanner Six, one which warned him about the price on his head.

  When Rockford awakened, Tanner made sure the first thing he saw was the blowtorch. Rockford screamed at the sight of the flame, and not a manly scream either. There was no one to hear him though, as Tanner had broken into an aircraft hangar on a private airfield. The nearest structures looked to be miles away.

  Tanner had secured Rockford to a metal chair after chaining the chair to a support post. The small hangar was spotless, without so much as a grease stain on the floor. Tanner respected the work it must have taken to keep it immaculate.

  With that in mind, he had wrapped the support post with clear plastic and covered the floor beneath Rockford’s chair as well. When the man bled, it wouldn’t leave a trace.

  Tanner stood looking down at the big man and spoke to him. “Rockford, I’m not a cop and I don’t work for the cartel. My name is Tanner. Maybe you recognize me?”

  Jack Rockford tore his eyes away from the flame and stared at Tanner. Seconds later, liquid pattered unto the plastic beneath Rockford as he urinated on himself. When that display of cowardice was done, the man threw up.

  Tanner backed away and gazed down at Rockford in disgust. The man was terrified, and Tanner hadn’t even begun the questioning yet. Tanner turned off the blowtorch and sat in a chair across from Rockford.

  “Tell me what’s going on at Chemzonic.”

  Tears began streaming down Rockford’s face. The big blond Adonis looked like a former NFL quarterback, but he was nothing but a wimp.

  “You’re going to kill me,” Rockford moaned.

  “If you answer every question truthfully and do what I say I won’t harm you.”

  “Then the cartel will kill me instead.”

  Tanner shook his head at Rockford in bewilderment. The man had chosen to go into the wrong business. If you were going to work with a drug cartel to manufacture meth, it would be helpful to have an actual set of balls.

  “Rockford, once you tell me what’s going on, I’ll contact the authorities. They’ll stick you in witness protection.”

  “Alvarado owns people here, important people, maybe even Feds.”

  “I won’t contact the Feds here, just in case. You’ll be safe, and if you don’t cooperate, I’ll kill you now. It’s your choice.”

  Rockford sniffled. “Some choice… what is it you want to know?”

  Rockford told Tanner everything. He even disclosed the illegal activities that were taking place at the Mexico City plant.

  Tanner freed his hands and had him write everything down. It took over an hour. When it was done, Tanner secured Rockford’s hands again and gagged him. He wanted to get away from the man.

  The dried puke smelled heinous and Tanner suspected that Rockford had not only urinated but had soiled himself as well.

  “I’m leaving, but someone will come for you. That someone will be a federal agent. Try to back out, don’t cooperate, and we’ll see each other again. Do you understand what I mean?”

  Rockford nodded.

  “Good, and don’t worry, Rockford, they’ll stick you in witness protection and give you a new life.”

  He began mumbling, and Tanner loosened the gag.

  “What is it?”

  “Does my wife have to come with me when they give me a new life?”

  “Yeah, or else she’d probably get killed just for the hell of it.”

  Rockford sagged. “Damn, now I’ll be stuck with that bitch forever.”

  Tanner put the gag back on. It seemed that not everyone thought Cindy was a sweetie.

  403

  Contact!

  Cousin Eddie, the bartender, had gotten a look at what Tanner was driving, so Georgie knew the plate number of Tanner’s rental.

  Tanner had paid cash at the bar for the two beers he’d consumed while there, and so unfortunately, they couldn’t get a name off a credit card.

  No matter. If Tanner was at a motel, they’d find him by morning. But luck was with Georgie, and a sharp-eyed Owen spotted Tanner as he drove past them while they were stopped for a light.

  “Georgie, that was Tanner that just went by, hang a left.”

  Georgie had to wait until traffic passed by, then he made the turn while the light was still red.

  Tanner drove into the parking lot of his motel and made a quick circuit around the cars. Alexa remained unseen, because the windows of her van were tinted, but Tanner took note of the vehicle as he left his car. When the driver side door of the van opened, his hand was moving toward the gun on his belt.

  It’s him! I’ve found him. Alexa thought, as Tanner drove past her van and parked.

  Tanner was already out of his vehicle and in front of his motel room door when Alexa left her van. She walked toward him at a quick pace. When she saw him reach for his gun, she held her empty hands in front of her.

  “I’m unarmed, and, I think we can help each other. My name is Alexa Lucia.”

  Tanner stared at her with a perplexed expression. It was the woman from the wanted poster, from Mexico, he was sure of it. But if so, what was she doing here?

  “How did you find me?” Tanner asked.

  Just then, Georgie pulled into the lot. His car was followed by Scar and his gang on their rumbling motorcycles. Georgie stopped the car short and stared at Tanner and Alexa. Although they weren’t standing
close together, he could tell they had been involved in a conversation.

  Georgie thought that Alexa looked familiar and that she might mean something to Tanner. When Scar pulled up alongside of Georgie’s car, Georgie pointed at Alexa.

  “Get that girl! We can use her.”

  Tanner opened the door to his motel room as Georgie drove toward him, but before entering, Tanner shouted to Alexa.

  “Run!”

  Alexa didn’t run. She was a fighter. As the Tin Horsemen jumped off their bikes and headed toward her, Alexa positioned her feet in a defensive stance and took out her knives.

  Spenser Hawke arrived home in Wyoming after dropping Amy off at her store in town. Amy had not been happy about the cancelled trip to New Orleans, and she didn’t understand why Spenser wanted to go after Tanner.

  “You’re financially comfortable, aren’t you? Why risk yourself going after a man like this Tanner?” she had asked.

  Spenser couldn’t explain it to her, or rather, he wouldn’t explain, but the million-dollar reward didn’t mean the same thing to Amy that it meant to Spenser.

  He checked his messages, and afterwards, he took a shower and sat on his sofa with a bottle of beer to think.

  Spenser lived in a home he had built himself; actually, he built it with friends, “his boys” as he liked to think of them. The home had two floors with spacious rooms and an awesome view of the Bighorn Mountains. It was a lot of house for only one man. He had begun to hope that Amy might someday come there to live.

  To him, that meant companionship, but to her it meant marriage, and although she spent many nights there, she refused to move in.

  Spenser took a swig from the bottle and talked to himself. “Why don’t you marry that woman? You know you love her.”

  Did he love her, really love her? He trusted her with his secrets… well… most of his secrets, but he didn’t know how she would handle the big one. The one that made him think about going after Tanner.

  He heard the motor while the truck was still a mile away, because sound traveled well over the empty land surrounding his house. He also recognized the engine and knew it was Amy coming to see him.

  He was only wearing a pair of faded jeans and the hair on his chest glistened in the light of the fire he’d built upon entering the house. Spenser padded over to the door in his bare feet and opened it just as Amy stepped out of her pickup truck.

  The truck had an emblem on its doors with the name of Amy’s store on it, The Trading Post, and she often used the truck to make deliveries. Amy owned the store with her brother, who was also a friend of Spenser’s.

  In the sky to the north, Spenser saw a flash of lightning and realized a storm was headed his way. He hoped it wasn’t a portent of things to come.

  As Amy drew closer, he smiled. “Hi honey.”

  Amy walked over and hugged him. “I didn’t like the way we parted, and I didn’t want you to think that I was mad at you because you cancelled the trip to New Orleans. I’m more worried about you going after that man, Tanner. He sounds extremely dangerous.”

  “Oh, he is, that’s for certain. But you know that I can handle myself.”

  Spenser and Amy went inside and settled together on the sofa.

  “There’s another thing too, Spenser. How do you expect to find him?”

  Spenser had been taking a sip of his beer. When Amy asked her question, he grinned around the lip of the bottle.

  “Well honey, a man like Tanner will make himself known eventually.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “It means that any dudes that come at him hoping to claim that bounty will not live long enough to regret it. If I had to guess, Tanner will make certain they die memorably. That way, it discourages the next bunch.”

  “But it won’t discourage you, will it?”

  “No, but it will let me know where he is, and then I’ll travel there and find him.”

  Amy snuggled against Spenser. “A million dollars isn’t worth your life.”

  “I agree, and don’t worry, I’ll be fine.”

  But Amy was worried, and she held Spenser just a little tighter.

  404

  Alone At Last

  Tanner’s motel room, Room 32, was bordered by an alley on its left side. He had scouted the area before checking in and realized that the alley would make a good trap, were he to encounter trouble.

  Nevertheless, he had planned to use that measure only were he to be pursued by one or two men. When Tanner saw that five men were exiting Georgie’s vehicle, he switched to Plan B.

  After entering the motel room, he left the door ajar and rushed to a second door on the right side of the room. The door connected his room, Room 32, to Room 33, which was also his room, as he had taken both vacancies when he checked in.

  Tanner was through the connecting door in a flash and had it locked before Georgie and his boys hit the door to Room 32.

  In Room 33, Tanner cinched a belt around his waist. It was a tactical belt with a pouch on its side. It held several spare magazines, a compass, and a flashlight. But, it was one of the items inside the pouch that Tanner would use.

  He grabbed his pre-packed duffel bag from the foot of the bed, even as he removed one of two fragmentation grenades from the belt pouch. Tanner pulled the pin, and after opening the door that led outside, he released the spoon and the grenade armed itself. The countdown had begun.

  As Georgie and his men rushed into Tanner’s room, Room 32, Alexa found herself surrounded by the Tin Horsemen.

  Scar was coming at her from the front, reaching out for her as if she would just stand there and let him grab her. Alexa lashed out with the knife in her right hand and slashed the fool across both palms, then, while still in motion, she kicked to her left and caught Bruise square in the teeth with the heel of her boot.

  Scar backed away while looking in shock at his bleeding hands, while Bruise toppled backwards onto the parking lot blacktop.

  Being stupid, Wound lowered his head and charged at Alexa like a bull, and like a bull, he wound up gored, as Alexa jammed one of her blades deep into his right shoulder.

  Tanner left Room 33 with the lit grenade in his hand. When he looked to his left, he saw Alexa cut one of the bikers while kicking another. The fluidity of her movements told him the woman was a trained fighter. He had to look away from her, because he had his own fighting to do, or rather, he had a toss to make.

  The last of Georgie’s men had left the door to Room 32 open after entering. Tanner tossed the grenade inside. When it hit the floor, the five men all looked down at it.

  Georgie was farther into the room than the others were, as he had been heading to check out the bathroom. When he heard the clunk of the grenade hitting the floor, he turned to look at it, realized what it was, and dived toward the open bathroom doorway.

  After lobbing the grenade into the room, Tanner slammed the door shut and crouched down beside the brick wall in the alley.

  An instant later, the blast occurred. The windows seemed to billow, and then shattered. To Tanner’s surprise, the motel room door had stayed in its frame, although its middle section was missing, along with its doorknob. The side of Georgie’s car was filled with pockmarks from the shrapnel and debris.

  When Tanner stood, he saw that Alexa had defeated the other two bikers. One had a blade sticking out of his shoulder, while the last one was sitting on the ground and cupping his crotch with both hands.

  He smiled. He always liked a woman that could fight.

  When the door to the motel room flew open, Tanner drew his gun while wondering how anyone could still be on their feet after such a blast.

  It was Georgie. He stumbled from the room like a drunk walking on the deck of a ship in rough seas, then fell face first onto the pavement and breathed his last.

  Georgie’s backside looked as if it had been fed through a meat grinder, and blood seeped from dozens of small wounds.

  Tanner put his gun away, got in his car, and star
ted the engine.

  Alexa called to Tanner. “Wait!”

  But Tanner didn’t wait. He had the car in motion even as the door on every occupied room popped open, as the other guests came outside to see what had made the explosion that had awakened them.

  Alexa rushed to her van to pursue Tanner, but only after she appeased her curiosity and peered inside Room 32. A second later, she so wished she hadn’t looked, as she viewed what a fragmentation grenade could do to several bodies in close quarters.

  She was driving out of the parking lot as the desk clerk left the office, and although Tanner had a head start, his car was still in view.

  As Alexa drove onto the highway in pursuit, she thought about her first sight of Tanner. She had felt something, strong emotions, but she wasn’t quite sure what they were.

  The sketch had not done him justice, for although the eyes looked like the eyes in the drawing with the fierceness burning in them, there was something else in those eyes as well. It was intelligence, a deep intelligence, and she sensed decency in the man. That he was intelligent had not surprised Alexa, but the sense of decency she felt emanating from him was a shock.

  The man was a hired killer, a gun for pay, but then, hadn’t she killed as well? Why did she think of herself as a good person? Was it because she only killed those who were in league with Alonso Alvarado?

  Yes. It justified her killing, but she was still a killer, a murderer, and she sometimes wondered what her grandmother would think of her. Would her abuela be proud, or perhaps horrified?