The Cartel (A Sarah Roberts Thriller Book 15)

by Jonas Saul

  An RV slowed, drove around them, then accelerated away. She watched it retreat. Someone at the rear of the RV pulled a curtain back and looked at her. A man. Then the RV turned a corner and disappeared.

  The dump truck’s doors closed. Whoever hit them had gotten out with no regard for the noise they made.

  Darwin moaned beside her.

  She needed that gun.

  Be kidnapped. Be killed in the street. Be tortured. Or … reach down and get that gun.

  But the pain in her ribs grew with each passing moment.

  Fuck it!

  Sarah let out a primal scream as she lunged forward, wrapped her hand around the barrel of the shotgun and sat back up, pumping a round into ready.

  The pain sliced its way through her like the edge of a dull saw blade caressing her ribs. Her vision clouded with the pressure. It felt like the pain was all she could focus on for the moment.

  But the gun was in her hands and the lethal end was aimed out the broken window beside her. The rearview mirror was pulverized. The dump truck’s grill filled most of her vision but because the Hummer rode so high, she saw into the cab of the empty dump truck. No one was in sight. It had been a full minute. Where were the sirens? Darwin stirred beside her again.

  “Hey!” she said. “Wake up.”

  Darwin moaned. He touched the side of his neck.

  “Darwin. We have company somewhere. You need to be present. Wake up.”

  His eyes opened.

  “Get a gun in your hand,” she whispered with urgency, the pain keeping her mouth tight.

  Darwin was a fighter, but the accident seemed to have knocked something loose. He was slow reaching for his weapon.

  Her damaged door was no longer an exit. She would have to crawl across the large center console and leave through Darwin’s door, which was not an inviting thought.

  I’ll need morphine to make it out of this vehicle.

  An acrid smell rose from under the Hummer. Something leaked from the accident. Maybe something was burning.

  Darwin seemed to be awake now, but his eyes were glazed. He looked like he’d been woken up from a dead sleep and wasn’t sure where he was yet.

  “Darwin,” Sarah said in an even voice, her breaths coming in short, sharp waves. “Please wake the fuck up and look around. We have two possible enemies outside the Hummer. I can’t see shit with this dump truck up my ass.” Darwin looked at her, his deadpan expression offering nothing coherent. “You think you could get on board with this idea and kill those bastards that did this?”

  The acrid smell intensified. Something definitely was burning.

  “Darwin, smell that?”

  He sniffed the air. “Shit Sarah, what happened?”

  “You’re going to die, Darwin,” she snapped through gritted teeth.

  “I am?” It was as if he was ten years old again and his mother just said he was about to be punished.

  “If you don’t pull it together and deal with this, I’m going to kill you.”

  He stared at her for a prolonged period. The burning smell filled the cab now.

  Sarah raised the butt of the shot gun, scrunched her face up at the pain, and jabbed Darwin’s shoulder.

  “Hey!” she shouted.

  After being shoved into the corner and bouncing back, he blinked several times and then his face creased into a frown.

  “Why’d you do that?” he asked.

  “There you are.” She inhaled slowly. “You’re back.”

  The dead stare had disappeared. Just in time because now she heard the familiar lick of a flame.

  “The Hummer is on fire,” Sarah said. “We need to leave. Now.”

  “Where’s the asshole who drove into us?” Darwin asked. He had a gun in each hand now.

  “There were two men in the dump truck.”

  Darwin looked outside his window.

  The high-pitched ping of a ricochet bounced off the hood of the Hummer as Darwin jerked his head back.

  “They’ve got us pinned down,” he said.

  A flame lifted from under the hood on the passenger side.

  “We’re going to cook in here. How long before you think this thing will blow?”

  “No idea. Any second.”

  “Gee. You’re helpful.” She took a breath in. “That doesn’t. Inspire hope.”

  “Not here to inspire hope. I’m here to live.”

  “Then shoot. Those bastards.” Another measured breath. “And let’s get.” A breath. “Out of here.”

  Darwin searched her face. “Why are you talking like that?”

  “Ribs.” She breathed through her clenched teeth and pursed lips. “Cracked bad or broken.”

  “And you picked up that shotgun?”

  “Better the pain,” she stopped to breathe, “than death.”

  “Okay. You got me there. One nothing for you.”

  “This isn’t hockey.”

  “Everything is about scoring.”

  “Okay.” She faced him. “Then beat them. Kill them. Whatever.” She breathed. “But get me to a hospital. And let’s stop talking,” she clenched her jaw and breathed, “in a Hummer that’s about to explode.”

  “Right. Got it.”

  Darwin extended his hands out the window and began firing toward the shooter. The flames rose higher.

  There was a surprisingly strong response to Darwin’s barrage. He had to lean close to Sarah to avoid getting hit by a ricochet.

  While bent inward, he turned the key in the ignition. For some blessed reason, the stalled Hummer started up.

  “Shit, that’s crazy,” Darwin said. Two more bullets dinged off the hood. Darwin and Sarah jolted in harmony. “Didn’t think it would start.”

  He dropped it in four wheel drive, waited for the light to indicate it was locked in, then hit the gas. The Hummer’s engine ground like it was running coffee beans through it. The fire intensified, shooting flames out sideways. But it edged forward even though it was attached to the dump truck.

  “This baby can hold a ton in the cargo and pull several tons on a trailer,” Darwin shouted over the grinding engine.

  “I’m glad you’re,” Sarah breathed in, “so happy about it.”

  The Hummer wasn’t going straight. With the dump truck hooked to the side, the Hummer was forced to the right on a wide arc.

  That gave Darwin shelter to be able to get out of the Hummer.

  As she thought of it, he must’ve too because he hit the trailer button on the dash telling the Hummer it was pulling something heavy and dropped the accelerator. The Hummer performed a wide arc to the right until something metallic banged in the engine and it stopped with a backfired protest. Flames rose from under the hood like someone was stoking a bonfire.

  “We have to get out of this—” Sarah shouted but stopped as Darwin opened his door and dropped to the pavement.

  Gunfire rattled outside, then Darwin returned fire.

  He was on his own. She wanted to help, but crawling over the center console was going to be hell.

  Yet she couldn’t leave him out there on his own. The heat from the Hummer’s fire reached through her broken window, burning her skin. In a few moments, her eyebrows would singe.

  With the shotgun as a crutch, she pushed off the floor and tried to twist in her seat. The pain forced a white hot sheet of cool sweat onto her skin. She felt the color drain from her face. A weapon fired twice outside.

  Where are the police? What about neighbors? Isn’t anyone going to call this in?

  “This sucks,” she said out loud. “What about Aaron, eh Vivian? Now what? I’m not of much use to anyone now.”

  More gunfire outside. The flames were inside the broken window now. If she were to sit up straight, her hair would catch fire.

  Anger fueled her. Being trapped in a burning vehicle while Darwin was under fire created a fury inside her that diminished the pain. It was the kind of anger that absolved her knuckles of torment during a fight. A paper cut stung when r
elaxed at home. But cut and bleeding knuckles during a rage-fueled fight didn’t hurt at all. At least not until hours later when the rage was gone.

  That rage built now. Being hindered by the pain in her ribs added to her helplessness and if there was anything Sarah hated, it was helplessness.

  She pushed off the seat with the shotgun, crawled over the center console, groaned deep as she raised her legs over the gear shift, and dropped into the driver’s seat, panting with pain.

  “Okay, that hurt more than I thought it would. Please don’t pass out, please don’t pass out.”

  Not one to pause too long, she hauled the shotgun up, checked it was ready to fire, and stuck her head around the corner.

  Darwin was nowhere to be seen.

  The top rim of a shooter’s head protruded from behind an old Datsun. He brought his gun up and just as she heard the weapon discharge, she pulled her head back.

  The fire on the passenger side had grown, melting the plastic rim of the door and some of the inside roof. She had to get out but the shooter had her pinned down.

  “Okay, I give up,” she shouted. “Come and get me.”

  “No way,” a man shouted back. “I wait until you burn.”

  Shit, that didn’t work.

  “I’m going to jump out before I burn.” The shouting was almost as painful as moving.

  “I kill you if you come out.”

  She looked around the front of the Hummer, opened the center console and rummaged inside. She pulled Darwin’s Sat phone out and clipped it to her pocket. Rosina would need an update when they got out of this.

  Something red caught her eye. She leaned back farther, wincing with the effort and looked at a small fire extinguisher. It was too small to put the fire out under the hood, but it could have better uses.

  She unclipped it and turned back to the open door. The man was still there, huddled behind the Datsun.

  “See if this burns as hot when it explodes,” she yelled, then tossed the red extinguisher at the Datsun with great effort, a yelp escaping her lips at the sharp pain in her ribs.

  It landed far too early, but rolled closer. It stopped ten feet from the Datsun. The man peered through the Datsun’s windows at it, no doubt waiting for it to explode.

  Sarah swung the shotgun around, aimed at the red canister and fired.

  She missed.

  She pumped the weapon and fired again.

  Missed again.

  The man moved to the back of the Datsun. She pulled back inside the burning Hummer, the heat on her back severe. It could blow any time. She needed to leave.

  Then the man stepped out from behind the Datsun and fired twice at the driver’s side of the Hummer. When he stopped, Sarah leaned down sideways—ignoring the pain—to watch him stop at the fire extinguisher and pick it up. When he turn to run the ten feet to get behind the Datsun, Sarah rolled out of the Hummer, landed on her feet on the road—her right knee almost giving out with the pain—pumped the shotgun, aimed carefully with one second to go, and fired.

  The front tire of the Datsun blew out. Chunks of metal bent inward on the front quarter panel. The rest of the damage was in the man’s hamstring and upper calf. Before he dropped to his knees, his back still exposed to her, she had already pumped the weapon and was squeezing the trigger.

  This time she hit him square in the back. The shooter dropped to his knees. He released the extinguisher. It fell beside him and rolled under the Datsun.

  Sarah leaned against the Hummer and scanned around her, letting the tip of the shotgun lead the way, waiting for another shooter to appear, but none did.

  The man she shot fell face forward and didn’t move again. After a moment, Sarah tossed the shotgun back inside the Hummer, pulled the gun from her waistband and started forward.

  “Darwin?” she shouted and winced. “Darwin?”

  The heat from the fire consuming the Hummer and the relentless sun made her seek shade. She moved down the street, passed two parked vehicles, and took cover behind an old GMC SUV.

  Sirens roared in the distance.

  Finally …

  A fast scan of the house to her right caught a curtain falling back into place. People were watching but staying out of the streets. Someone had called emergency services and only now they were coming. An easy ten-minute delay.

  A loud boom from the Hummer startled her. The hood blew open and the fire raged from the center of it.

  “Over here,” a man shouted.

  Sarah ducked low and moved around the SUV toward the sound.

  Beside a white gate near a driveway to a residence, Darwin lay sprawled on the pavement.

  “Here,” he called to her.

  “Any more shooters?” she asked before leaving cover.

  “Only one.”

  “I got him.”

  “Then no.”

  She started toward Darwin cautiously. As she neared his position, she spotted another shooter lying face down beside Darwin.

  “I got this guy just as he shot me in the arm. I couldn’t use this hand so well to get the other guy by the Datsun. I have no aim with my left hand.” He winced. “Sorry about that.”

  Sarah knelt down slowly—scrunching up her face at the pain in her ribs—to look at Darwin’s wound. “How bad is it?” she asked.

  “Mostly a skin graze, but it numbed my arm something fierce.”

  “Must’ve hit a nerve.” Sarah looked over her shoulder as emergency vehicles turned onto their street. “We have to toss the guns.”

  “Here, take them to the Hummer. Let them burn. I have more. Then I have to leave. They can’t find me here.” He got up on one elbow. “This is such a good thing. I can’t believe how well this turned out.”

  “What?” Sarah collected the guns and got to her feet as a fire truck came to a stop on the other side of the Hummer. She looked down at Darwin and raised her eyebrows. “You’re kidding, right?”

  “As I lie here thinking about it, this is great news.”

  “How’s that?”

  An ambulance pulled up behind the fire truck. Two police cars arrived behind it.

  “You’ll be taken to the hospital now. It’s public. You’ll be registered under your own name.”

  “And?”

  “I’ll go get patched on my own and head to the cabin where I’ll get my GPS tracker and weapons and come back to arm you at the hospital. As we discussed earlier, I think the cartel will come to the hospital within twelve hours of you being admitted to try to kill or kidnap you.” He smiled wider. “They may come earlier than twelve hours. Then we’ll have them.”

  “I’m glad to see you’re so happy about that,” Sarah said as she kicked his foot. “Can you smell my sarcasm?”

  “They’ll play right into our hands,” he said, ignoring her question. “And take you to where they’re holding Aaron. I’ll monitor it on GPS and come get you. This could be all over this time tomorrow.”

  A paramedic headed their way.

  “Gotta run, Sarah. See you at the hospital.” He winked as he got up on his knees and ran bent over for the cover of a fence on the next property line.

  She didn’t wink back. Nor did she share in his enthusiasm. She headed for the Hummer, away from the paramedic. As the fire hose hit the windshield of the burning Hummer, Sarah tossed the weapons inside the open driver’s side door and kept walking until she got to the ambulance.

  “These guys attacked me and tried to steal my Hummer,” she said. “Naturally, I defended myself.”

  A police officer walked up and pushed the paramedic aside.

  “You have a lot of explaining to do, lady.”

  Sarah smiled, even though her ribs hurt like a bitch.

  Chapter 18

  Parkman moved to the front of the RV.

  “Daniel, pull off the highway. We’ve been out here too long.”

  Daniel checked his mirrors and started to the right.

  “What are you thinking, Parkman?” he asked.

  �
��We need to change vehicles. They’re going to miss the customs officer we have in the back and learn soon enough that this was the last vehicle he was sent to search. Then every cop within a fifty-mile radius will be looking for this vehicle.”