It was a senseless fight that he was losing. So many innocents killed, and nothing changed, regardless of which politicians were in office or what brave initiatives were floated. He was a cog in an ugly, futile machine that was more for appearances than anything.
He checked the Glock’s magazine and pocketed a spare, then replaced it in the quick-release hip holster.
Whatever obligation he owed the assassin, he would repay.
Whatever the cost.
He would get Dinah back, alive.
That was all that mattered.
Chapter 36
Gravel crunched under the oversized tires as Briones guided the Dodge down the dirt road, the cinderblock buildings on either side covered with graffiti and filth and the tarpaper shacks fashioned from discarded lumber and filched materials lending an aura of disrepair to the area. These were the hovels of the working poor, with no social net to catch them when they stumbled – their everyday existence as harsh as any third world population’s, with non-existent sanitation and pest infestation battling disease and crime as the primary scourges of the grim shanty town. Running water had only made it to the unfortunate residents within the last decade, with most electricity bootlegged from the few overhead power lines running to the industrial buildings. Sewage was a continual problem, as the rough septic tanks the more industrious neighbors had installed cracked from the region’s constant earthquakes and the wastewater seeped into the ground. Still, it was an improvement over the open trench latrines that soured the air; and little by little, progress was being made.
Cruz pointed to the dark market and Briones pulled the car to the side of the road, near two rusting mid-eighties Chrysler sedans that had seen their best years fade behind them in clouds of oily, partially combusted smoke. Both men got out once the engine died, and Briones’ nose wrinkled involuntarily at the fetid stink of raw human waste.
When El Rey materialized soundlessly behind them, both men jumped, their nerves already on edge.
“What the...don’t do that,” Cruz blurted, hand on his Glock.
“Sorry. Occupational hazard. Where are the weapons?” El Rey asked, not bothering to acknowledge Briones, who silently walked to the trunk and popped the lid. Inside, an arsenal sat ready. El Rey appraised the trove and then reached in and grabbed a silenced Beretta, then one of the rifles and a knife. Last, he fished out a set of night vision goggles, then pulled them over his head and switched them on.
“Hey. That only leaves us with one set of NV gear,” Briones complained, but El Rey cut him off.
“You have a weapon with a night-vision scope. Use that.”
“But–”
Cruz intervened, uninterested in yet another unwinnable squabble between the two. “I think Carlos here would be better served with them than without,” he said, then turned to the assassin. “So what’s the plan?”
El Rey knelt by the car and hastily drew a rectangle in the dirt, then drew another inside. “It’s a walled lot, with a single building, probably no more than three hundred square meters. There are four guards outside and, from what I can tell, two inside. The four outside are carrying shotguns or AKs, and the interior guards are probably similarly equipped. There’s no security gear, so that will make this easier. The grab was apparently a last-minute decision, so they’re keeping her in one of their low-traffic places. El Jaguar was clear on the number of men and the lack of security equipment, though.”
“Wait. You found El Jaguar?” Briones blurted.
El Rey grunted assent.
“Well, where is he?”
“Enjoying his eternal reward,” El Rey said dryly.
Cruz and Briones exchanged a look.
“Here’s what we’re going to do. I’ll go in here, on the back side. Capitan Cruz, you take the high ground there, in that abandoned two-story building across the way from the warehouse. Use the night vision-scoped rifle to pick off anyone I don’t get, but only fire if I’m hit. I’d rather not wake the whole neighborhood if we don’t need to. And you, Lieutenant, when the captain gives you the signal, come through the front gate; but again, don’t shoot unless you see me in trouble. We should be able to do this silently, with any luck at all.”
“What, you mean you plan to try to take out all six yourself, without alerting anyone?” Briones scoffed.
“It’s not like I haven’t done it before. This is your best play. Just be a nice boy and do as you’re told. Don’t shoot, and stay out of my way. Unless you want the captain’s wife to pay for your blunders with her life,” El Rey finished.
“Lieutenant, I think we have to do this his way,” Cruz warned, seeing Briones bristle. He eyed the assassin. “I hope you know what you’re doing.”
“Give me five minutes to get into position, and then I’m going in. Remember. Do. Not. Shoot. If either of you gets trigger-happy, this blows up and your wife dies.” El Rey paused and glared at Briones. “I presume you both have cell phones. Capitan, call the lieutenant when I go in so he knows it’s begun. You, turn your phone to vibrate so you don’t alert the guards.”
He spun, and was just about to trot into the darkness when Cruz grabbed his arm.
“Good luck.”
“Don’t worry. I won’t need it.”
And then he was gone.
Briones turned to Cruz, shaking his head. “I don’t like this. He’s up to something. He’s excluded both of us...it feels wrong,” he protested.
“He did, but I think it’s because if he told us to wait in the car, we wouldn’t have. So he gave us tasks to keep us occupied.”
“I really think we need to reconsider–”
“Lieutenant. So far, he’s located the key Los Zetas player in Mexico City and extracted the whereabouts of my wife in about as much time as it would have taken us to submit a report requesting permission to begin surveillance on him. I think we play this his way.”
“That’s another thing. Aren’t you concerned about how he handled El Jaguar? I mean, he obviously killed him, and probably tortured him.”
“I think that if you’re going to kidnap family members, it changes the rules. Besides, is the world such a bad place without El Jaguar polluting it? How many lives will be saved because he’s dead? No, I have mixed feelings about this. I wish I could say I was shocked, but I’m actually just glad he’s on our side.”
“When did we become vigilantes?” Briones asked.
Cruz understood his moral outrage, but knew him well enough to understand that it was more for show than anything. Years of working on the anti-cartel task force hardened you, he knew from personal experience.
“We’re not vigilantes. We’re mounting a mission using assets from another government agency. One that operates with considerably different latitude than we do. Fortunately, for Dinah’s sake. Let’s not get all self-righteous on this. Remember our objective. And remember what happened to my wife and daughter. If I’d had someone like him back then, maybe they’d still be alive.”
Briones had no response.
“I’ll take full responsibility for this operation, Lieutenant. All I ask is that you put your feelings aside and pull on the same oar with me.”
Briones appeared to think about it for a few moments, and then nodded. “Okay, sir. I’m in. Let’s get into position. By my watch, we’ve got about three and a half minutes before all hell breaks loose.”
Cruz watched as Briones flipped on his night vision goggles and then jogged down the dirt road towards the compound. He was still uneasy about his lieutenant, and uttered a silent prayer that he wouldn’t let his obvious dislike for the assassin spill over and make him do something stupid. Cruz hefted the rifle and then sprinted for the abandoned structure, a flutter of anxiety building in his stomach as his boots clomped against the loose dirt of the sad road to nowhere.
Chapter 37
The warehouse yard was dark and the area still except for the sound of murmured conversation from the rear, where two guards were lounging by the back wall, lying t
o each other about their most recent sexual exploits. The younger of the two, a little tank of a man with long, greasy hair and a goatee, was laughing quietly at the rollicking story his companion was telling.
“Anyway, I’m standing there with my pants off, and she sees my gun. So then the freaky bitch–”
He was interrupted by a scrape from the wall thirty meters away – metal on concrete.
Both men stiffened at the sound, and then the storyteller hoisted his shotgun and pumped the slide, chambering a round before making a hand gesture for the other to stay put. The younger man needed no encouragement, and remained standing by the rear wall, his back against it, his Kalashnikov assault rifle dangling loosely by his side.
“It’s probably a dog or something,” he whispered to his older companion, who made another hand gesture to be quiet, and then crept forward into the gloom.
A few seconds went by, and then a loop of rusting wire slid from the top of the wall and around the younger man’s throat, surprising him. As the impromptu garrote tightened around his neck, his eyes bugged out and he reflexively dropped his weapon, both hands clutching at the snare strangling him while he danced an involuntary jig. Pressure from above almost lifted him off his feet as the wire sliced into his skin, and then blood seeped from around the wound before spraying onto the wall when the carotid severed.
The entire macabre scene played out in fifteen seconds in complete silence, other than the thud of the AK47 hitting the weeds and the muted stamping of the gunman’s feet as he performed his death dance.
When the older man returned from his fruitless exploration, he hissed a whisper at his younger partner, whose shadowed figure was leaning against the wall in the dark.
“I didn’t see anything. You’re right, it’s some animal or–”
A form covered in head-to-toe black dropped to his right; he barely registered the glint of steel before a stinging slice lacerated his trachea. His free hand groped for the gash as blood first bubbled and then gushed from the wound, and then the world spun as tiny pinpoints of light shimmered through the enveloping darkness and he slumped forward with a choking moan. El Rey stepped aside, catching his shotgun before it hit the ground while avoiding the bloody torrent that spurted from the guard’s neck.
Two of the six guards down in only a few seconds, and El Rey hadn’t broken a sweat. He returned the blade to his belt sheath and peered at the front of the compound, where he knew the other pair of guards was patrolling, oblivious that their number had just been reduced by half.
The assassin crept forward, the night vision goggles illuminating the dark in fluorescent green, and then spotted the first of his targets, the guard’s assault rifle hanging from a shoulder strap as he relieved himself against the crumbling perimeter wall.
Gerardo traced his name on the deteriorating mortar with his splattering stream, the liter of water he’d drunk having finally worked its way through his kidneys and demanding release. The night duty wasn’t so bad, he thought, except when it rained, and their hard-ass shift leader made them stand in the drizzle, as though anyone would be moving against an empty warehouse in a downpour. After a few more seconds his flow slowed to a trickle and he sighed in satisfaction, then zipped up after a few vigorous shakes.
The spike of searing pain in his upper spine was as sudden as lightning, and the force of the blow knocked the wind out of him. He fought for a gasping last breath, but his nervous system had abruptly stopped obeying his brain’s commands and his lungs remained empty, and then he was falling, his bulk leaden, his legs no longer supporting his weight; knees not so much buckling as his whole body collapsing at the speed of gravity, like a controlled building demolition.
El Rey knelt and wiped the KA-BAR’s bloody blade on the man’s shirt, pausing to watch his eyes glaze, and then swept the other side of the yard with the night vision goggles, searching for the remaining guard. He was just about to stand and inch along the wall when a gruff voice called to him out of the darkness on his left.
“Hey, Gerardo, you got a smoke–”
The first subsonic 9mm Parabellum copper-jacketed round from the Beretta M9’s silenced barrel caught the speaker in the jaw, tearing half his face off as the soft lead hollow point mushroomed into an ugly blossom of destruction. A split second later its twin dotted a neat hole directly between the guard’s eyes, and the deformed slug careened through his cerebrum like a willful pachinko ball, instantly terminating his life.
El Rey rose from his kneeling crouch and moved swiftly to the dead newcomer. What was left of his head was twisted at an unnatural angle on the hard-packed dirt, and after a quick once-over, the assassin decided that even with the blood splatter he would serve the immediate purpose.
A few seconds later, he had the night-vision goggles off and the man’s loose jacket on, the Beretta just fitting in one of the pockets. He laid the goggles to one side and then returned to the other corpse and relieved it of its black baseball cap, which thankfully didn’t have much blood on it, though it stank of sour sweat and grimy hair. He pulled on the hat and then fished in the dead man’s overcoat, stopping when he found a pack of Marlboros and a plastic butane lighter. He glanced over his shoulder at the two warehouse windows in the near distance, seeping dim amber light, and then straightened and walked to the building entrance.
The two seated interior guards registered the front door swinging open, and then a growling voice followed a cloud of cigarette smoke through it. They relaxed as they saw the familiar jacket of one of their crew, and never had time to register their oversight.
“Shit, it’s colder than hell out there–”
The Beretta popped through the jacket’s fabric, and the first guard took two rounds to the chest. His partner was swinging an assault rifle up as the next series of four shots stitched a frying-pan-sized pattern of bloody wounds in his upper abdomen. The rifle crashed to the concrete floor as the man tumbled back in the chair and dropped in a heap on the ground. El Rey approached the two prone forms, and seeing that the first gunman was still breathing, toed his weapon out of reach before confirming that the other one was dead.
“Where’s the girl?” he asked, and the man’s eyes flicked to the left. El Rey’s gaze followed his to the interior office door.
“Anyone in there?”
The man shook his head, then coughed blood, the chest wounds burbling as he struggled for breath.
The assassin covered the ground quickly and threw the door open before ducking around the jamb and sweeping the darkened room with his pistol. Light streamed through the doorway into the room, and he could just make out a figure seated in a chair in the far corner. There, biting against a rag that was stuffed in her mouth and held in place with silver tape, was Dinah.
He felt around for a light switch and was rewarded by an overhead bulb sputtering to life. Dinah looked dazed, and then her eyes widened in panic when she recognized him, his gun clenched in his hand, blood smeared across his coat.
“Relax. I’m here to get you out of here,” he soothed as he approached her and felt for the edge of the tape. “This is going to hurt, but don’t make a sound. Are you okay?”
She was nodding a yes when he ripped the tape off and she whined in pain, the adhesive leaving a red welt, tears welling in her eyes from the sting. He pulled the filthy rag out of her mouth and she coughed, then spit to the side. He slid the blade of the KA-BAR from the sheath and for a second the terror returned, and then he was talking again, softly, rhythmically, coaxing her to calm.
“This will only take a second. I need to cut the bindings. Can you walk?” he asked, then placed a hand on one arm as he bent down with the knife. “Hold still. I don’t want to cut you.”
“I...I can walk,” she whispered as he sawed through the rope, and then her hands were free and she was clenching and unclenching her fingers, trying to get circulation to return. He knelt and repeated the process with her ankles, the line falling away as he sliced, and then he stood and studied her. One
side of her face was discolored by an angry bruise, and the eye on that side was swollen half shut.
“I’m getting you out of here, do you understand? Your captors are dead. Your husband is waiting outside. It’s over. You’re free,” he assured her, and for a moment the look in her eyes was of incomprehension, and then, slowly, disbelief.
“What? You...my husband...how...?”
“Long story. Come on. Stand up. I’ll help you.” She was suffering from shock, and probably dehydration, judging from her stupor. “Did they drug you?”
“N...no. No drugs.”
“Okay, then. Come on. Up.” He slipped his arm under hers and lifted her to her feet, and then inched towards the doorway. She took one hesitant step, and then another, and then they were walking, slowly, out of the makeshift cell and towards the front door. Dinah’s eyes took in the two bodies and then she shut them, tears rolling down her face, and began sobbing as they moved, all the fear and anxiety and hurt from her ordeal purged in a swell of relief.
When they stepped through the entryway, he guided her through the night and towards the front gate, the darkness enfolding them both in its anonymous arms. A clatter sounded from in front of them, and they looked up as the gate swung open with a creak, Briones pushing it forward on rusting hinges.
They were halfway to him when El Rey slowed. Briones continued approaching, and the assassin’s mind whirled as he watched the lieutenant raise his submachine gun and point it at them. Time compressed into slow motion as he aimed the weapon at El Rey, and then it was too late – he’d pulled the trigger.
They heard a thump behind them and El Rey swung around, jerking his Beretta free as he glimpsed the body of the surviving bodyguard sprawled near the door, a pistol gripped in his lifeless hand, his brains spattered on the warehouse wall behind him. Dinah stood alone for a second, taking in Briones, gun still raised, and the assassin, who was slowly spinning back to face him, and then she stumbled and El Rey reached out and caught her.
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