Jackal: Barrett Mason Book 3

by Stewart Matthews

“Sorry about that, friend,” someone called from their deck. He swung his leg over the railing of their boat, then dropped himself onto the foredeck of La Playa.

  He was taller than the rest. With long legs, a thin frame, and a hooked eagle’s beak of a nose. He smiled and appeared as relaxed as a man who just offered you a beer. But there was something about him that screamed danger—and it wasn’t the chrome .45 hanging on his hip, or the AK-47 slung over his back.

  “We’re just making sure we’re cautious,” he said. “Don’t want to get surprised by someone with a gun hiding under that beautiful awning of yours.” He clicked his teeth. “I feel ashamed we had to tear it up—you’ve got a beautiful boat here, Captain...”

  “...Rivas.” He smiled wide, flashing his gold teeth.

  The other man touched his chest and returned Rivas’ smile. “Roberto Marquez. And I really am sorry about your awning. How much to replace it?”

  Rivas looked up at it. He pinched his lips together, then shrugged. “Three thousand?”

  “American?”

  “Yes,” Rivas said.

  Marquez reached for his back pocket. My toes curled up in my shoes. No way was this guy giving Rivas anything other than a slug to the chest.

  But Marquez’s hand came back with a wad of neatly folded bills. I was never happier to have my instincts turn out wrong. God, I prayed this would go smoother than I feared.

  I watched him peel off a stack of hundred dollar bills, then count them out loud, one-by-one.

  “You have my sincerest apologies for the trouble,” he said as he stooped down and handed them over the helm’s windshield to Rivas.

  “Thank you,” Rivas said. He barked out a nervous chuckle.

  “Is something the matter?” Marquez lowered himself off the foredeck.

  “I just... I’ve never dealt with anyone like this.” Rivas put the money in his pocket. “I didn’t know what to expect. I mean no insult.”

  Marquez laughed and slapped him on the back of the neck. “Don’t worry about it, friend. We put on a big show,” he nodded toward the men behind Rivas, “but the truth is, violence is bad for all of us. Just like any other business, we want to make the quickest, cleanest transaction possible. Our time is valuable too.”

  “Yes, of course it is.” Rivas grinned. “So maybe you’re ready to get what you came for.”

  Marquez looked over the top of Rivas’ head. Straight at me.

  “I think that would be a good idea—what do you think, Mr. Mason?”

  Shit. He knew my name too?

  “Do whatever you’re going to do,” I answered him in Spanish. I wanted them to know I would understand everything they said. “I’m not here to glad hand.”

  Marquez clicked his teeth, and two of his men moved to me. I stood up. I towered over them, the tops of their heads stopping at my shoulders. They guided me toward La Playa’s foredeck.

  So, I climbed on the foredeck, and saw another member of their crew looking down at me from their boat. He tossed some rope netting overboard. It thunked across the deck at my feet.

  One of my escorts climbed up first. After he got his leg over the railing of their boat, the other nudged me forward. I climbed up like a good captive. No lip, no whining, no hesitation at all.

  Soon as I got on their boat, they zip-tied my wrists together, nice and snug. Instantly, my veins pounded in the tips of my fingers. They guided me toward the stern of the ship, around the main cabin. We stopped a few feet short of a steel hatch.

  “I’m guessing this is my accommodations for the cruise,” I said.

  Nobody laughed.

  They opened the hatch. One of them went ahead of me, climbing down a ladder. I knew the routine, so I went next. I barely fit through the opening. And it was tough to hold onto each rung with both my hands balled together and my fingers falling asleep, but I slowly lowered myself in without busting my ass open.

  Took a second for my eyes to adjust to the darkness I found myself in. But when they did, I saw I was in a small compartment. About half as wide as the ship, and not tall enough for me to stand up straight. So, my choice was to either break my neck or sit on the steel floor.

  I sat.

  Other than the shaft of light coming from the open hatch, the only lighting was a small window on the ship’s port side, and a battery-powered lantern that looked like it had seen plenty of better days.

  “Stay here,” the guy who came in ahead of me said. He motioned with his AK toward the corner of the compartment—to my left. “There’s a bucket for the bathroom. Don’t let it spill. We’ll bring you food when it’s time to eat.”

  “Nothing I haven’t gotten used to already,” I said. “Could do with having my zip-ties off, though.” I held my hands forward.

  He eyed me, warily, then snorted and spat.

  “Tomas!” he yelled. “Cover me!”

  The mouth of an AK peeked from the open hatch we’d just come through.

  “You see that?” he asked. “If he doesn’t like whatever you’re doing, you’re dead.”

  “Sounds fair.” I wasn’t going to pull anything, anyway. If I did, of course, I was dead. But what bothered me more was Rivas and his son would probably get shot for good measure. No witnesses.

  The guy knelt down in front of me, fished a knife from his belt and cut the zip-tie.

  Blood rushed back into my fingers, feeling hot and cold at the same time.

  “Thanks, friend,” I said.

  He only stared at me while he returned his knife to the sheath hanging off his belt.

  “You stay quiet.” He went back to the ladder, then climbed up. A few seconds later, my ears rang when the hatch slammed shut.

  I turned to the window. Lucky for me, it was on the port side of boat—the same side as La Playa. I crawled over, straightened up on my knees and looked out.

  All of Marquez was visible to me, and about half of Captain Rivas. They were talking, the two of them smiling and joking. Thank God. Rivas may have bumbled into something way over his head, but at least he wouldn’t die from it.

  Then, Marquez ripped his handgun from the holster on his hip and fired.

  My skin went cold. Locked away, I still felt the pop of gunfire through the hull—the sudden change in air pressure as the bullet ripped through the space between Marquez and Rivas. Then the clang of the close-range .45 slug striking the hull.

  It was a quick shot. The end of Marquez’s pistol barely an inch from his body.

  Maybe he missed. I could still see Rivas, standing there, still as he’d been when I first peeked through the window.

  Marquez fired again. Off his hip. And a third time—which I heard smack into the hull once more.

  Rivas swayed. Gently at first. Losing the rhythm he kept with the waves. A split-second off the beat. Then he became more and more off-time with every moment. Until he fell face-first into Marquez, who shoved him off, letting him fall onto the deck of La Playa. Marquez pointed his pistol downward and fired twice more.

  I screamed at the window. Bashed at it with my forehead, and slammed my fist against it. The window didn’t break. Didn’t even crack. All my blustering didn’t do a damn thing except make the whole world shake around me. Or maybe that was my brains rattling in my skull.

  Somebody banged on the hatch. “Quiet!” a muffled voice screamed.

  Then, I heard another shout. I ran to the window to look out. It was Tonio, being dragged up to La Playa’s foredeck by two of Marquez’s men. They stopped him right at the boat’s edge—the very tip of the bow where his toes touched a silver rail running around the front of the ship.

  “No!” I shouted. “Let him go!”

  Nobody heard me except the man watching my hatch, who banged on it again and grumbled even louder for me to shut my mouth.

  Marquez’s men stepped back from Tonio. He didn’t cry. He didn’t beg them to leave him alone or promise them that he’d never tell a soul how they murdered his father if they just let him go.

 
; Tonio held his chin up high. I admired the kid.

  Three paces behind him, one of Marquez’s men raised his rifle.

  I jumped as a single shot cut Tonio down. I had to turn away.

  In my dark little cell, I slumped down against the wall and buried my face in my hands. Couldn’t say how long I’d sat like that. Maybe an hour, maybe two. I felt outside of myself.

  But I returned to my mind when the boat’s motors kicked on, shaking the steel walls around me. I didn’t look out the window for another few minutes. And when I did, La Playa was a smoking, burning, white dot forever abandoned in a blue sea.

  Chapter 11

  SOMEONE KNOCKED ON the hatch. Why in the hell they bothered, I didn’t know. Wasn’t like it mattered if I answered. Which I didn’t. They’d march down and bark orders and probably put a bullet in my head and dump me overboard for taking up too much space.

  I didn’t care. I tried to remind myself that Kejal and Libby were out there, waiting for me. But after being crammed into something more miserable than solitary at the DB, and what I had seen them do to Rivas and his son, I wasn’t feeling sunny about my future.

  The hatch whined open.

  “Mason?” a voice I didn’t recognize said.

  “What the hell do you want?” I grumbled back.

  “To bring you some dinner,” he said. “I’m coming down. And I have my pistol.”

  I watched his boots clomp down the ladder’s rungs. His long, thin legs. The old lantern’s weak light bounced off the chrome-plated .45 on his hip. A sudden flash went through my head. That pistol spitting smoke and killing Rivas.

  He touched down on the floor and craned his neck. Just like me, Marquez was too tall to stand upright down here in my new room.

  “You’re not going to kill me when you grab your food?” His eyes swiped upward. “Okay?”

  “I don’t shoot people who aren’t trying to kill me.”

  He grinned. Almost laughed, the mean bastard.

  “Good news for me then, eh?” Marquez put his head back through the open hatch, then reached up. He brought down a disposable bowl—like something from a barbecue. But there wasn’t brisket or cornbread in it.

  “You like rice and beans?” he said, walking toward me. He stopped a step away from my feet, the sat down. He put the bowl between us and slid it toward me like a missionary making first contact with an Amazonian tribesman.

  I never dreamed about sitting down to a big, steaming, hot bowl of rice and beans. And I surely didn’t want anything Marquez had to offer. But as soon as I laid eyes on the food inside that paper bowl, I realized I hadn’t eaten since hopping on an airplane with Greer yesterday.

  “It’s not poisoned.” Marquez dug in with a plastic spoon and took a bite. “See?” he said as he chewed. Then his face scrunched up and he grabbed his neck. He mimed choking. Spat rice on me. Then he laughed at his own damn joke.

  I didn’t react.

  “Oh, come on man! That’s funny!” He slapped my knee. “What? Are you mad at me? What’d I do to you?”

  “Threw me in here,” I said.

  He brushed that off with a flick of his wrist. “You should see where the guys in my crew sleep. One of them thought about killing you just so he could get in here and have a little privacy.”

  “That doesn’t make me feel better.”

  “Fine with me,” Marquez shrugged. “I don’t care if you feel good or bad or whatever. All I care about is getting your white ass to Caracas alive and in one piece.” He took another spoonful of rice and beans.

  “Why the hell you wanna come to Venezuela anyway?”

  “I don’t,” I said.

  That gave him a moment’s pause. “But you know that’s where you’re going.”

  “Not by choice.”

  “Well, you must’ve made somebody mad at you,” he said. “I’m from Caracas, and I wouldn’t go there unless I was getting paid—which I am.”

  “I figured,” I said.

  Marquez took more from the rice and beans. He seemed much more comfortable with me than I liked.

  “There’s all kinds of riots there right now. Somebody killed President Toro. People say there’s another military coup coming. Or some capitalists or something.” He took another bite of my food and seemed to have something running through his head while he chewed. “But I guess I’m a capitalist too. It’s not so bad.”

  “Is that why you killed Rivas and his son?” I asked.

  “That what you’re mad about?” Marquez seemed genuinely surprised. “The old man had a gun. I saw it under his shirt when he turned around to show me something on his boat.”

  My teeth clenched together. I told Rivas to get rid of that thing.

  “He wasn’t going to use it,” I said. “He was just scared.”

  “I didn’t know that,” Marquez picked up my bowl and started eating like it was his. “You start doing stuff like this, and you make some friends doing the same thing, and everybody gives the same advice: don’t let nobody get the drop on you. Shoot first. It’s a risky business.”

  I wanted to punch the unconcerned look off his face. Show him what a risky business can really be like.

  “Killing a man and his son was business to you?” I was an inch away from diving at him.

  He must’ve sensed it. Marquez put the bowl down, slowly. He eyed me like I was about to cross a line I shouldn’t cross.

  “That’s right.” He patted his .45. “And don’t think that I won’t break a contract if it’s in my interests. Understand? I like money, but I like breathing, too.”

  He stood up, slowly. Backed away from me, even slower, keeping his eyes on me. “Since you’re not going to eat, you should get some sleep. Maybe change around your attitude before it gets you in trouble.”

  I didn’t say anything to him. I didn’t have time for a piece of garbage like Marquez. Had to remind myself that he had a quick draw, so standing up and rushing at him probably would get me killed, the same as Rivas.

  “Sleep well, Mason.” He went back up the ladder. The hatch clanged shut behind him, but I’d be lucky if I got a wink of sleep tonight.

  I was too focused on my anger. At Marquez, at Greer, at the whole world for being stuffed full of evil, self-interested men who could gun down a father and his son and laugh about it later.

  Chapter 12

  LOS CHACALES SUMMONED General Barrios to an unexpected meeting. They must have heard about the murder of Constituent Assembly Diputado Marco Erazo early this morning by a mob of rioters. The General was sure of it. Seemed obvious to Colonel Milares.

  In the fourteen hours since Erazo’s death, the news had picked up the story and blasted it in every smoky corner, through every broken window and down every deserted street in Caracas. Though, the General’s name was never mentioned in connection with anything.

  Likely the work of Los Chacales.

  Probably the only people who hadn’t heard it were the rioters who had been out since this morning. They’d been too busy feasting on the smoldering bones of the city, getting weighed down by looted electronics and drunk off stolen alcohol.

  The riots died down as the day went on, but now, just after sunset, there was an uneasy tension in the air. The streets were empty, save for trash caught in the wind. Everyone knew the riots would kick up again soon.

  “They shouldn’t have us driving across town,” Milares said. He was behind the wheel, the General barely paying attention to Milares or the burning car next to them as Milares slowed at a stop light.

  The General had a bad habit of reading the news on his phone, which had only intensified over the past few days.

  “They’re going to get our heads cut off,” Milares grumbled. “We’ll be ripped apart by the mobs.”

  “They won’t know us without our uniforms on,” the General said. “Just keep your eyes on the road.”

  “Eyes on the road. I can barely see with all the smoke.” Milares looked to his right, at the burning car. Flames gnawed
on something vaguely human-shaped. Or maybe it was the driver’s seat.

  “At least the fires light up the road.”

  Milares tried not to laugh. But the General always knew how to get him.

  “They could burn down some of these old apartment buildings while they’re at it,” he said.

  The General’s eyes stayed on his phone, but he cracked a smile.

  “Green light.”

  “What?” Milares looked away from the burning car, and from the corners of his eye, he must’ve seen the green light bleeding across the dash. It tripped an automatic response. His foot lifted off the brake pedal, and pressed the gas.

  Then, Milares saw something else—a person standing in the road. He stomped the brakes and swerved the car.

  “Son of a bitch!”

  The General’s phone tumbled from his hand. Milares gripped the wheel. His nerves thrummed in his fingers.

  Ahead of them, stood a man as fat as an engorged tick. Bottle in one hand, brick in another. He looked at Milares sideways—a glance across the bridge of his nose. Then he went back to stumbling across Las Acacias Avenue.

  “You drunk idiot!” Milares laid on the horn. But the guy in the street didn’t seem bothered. He shambled on, taking a swig from his bottle.

  “How in the hell can someone that drunk live through a riot?” Milares smacked the wheel with his palm.

  “I’m sure he’ll be burned alive, shot, or trampled before the night is over.” The General picked up his phone and unlocked it. “For now, let’s go meet our friends.”

  They continued on, through the heart of Caracas in their little Toyota, without getting a second look from anyone along the way—not that there were many people outside now.

  Every now and again, the General would bring his eyes up from his phone and give a direction. Turn right at the next intersection. Continue past the grocery store, then turn left. Two lights from now, we’ll make a slight right.

  Until...

  “Here—” the General rocked Milares’ shoulder, “—here, Nestor! Stop the car!”

  Milares jerked the wheel over and pressed the brake. The General had him stop curbside at an abandoned building. Milares couldn’t quite see it through the General’s side of the car. Paper covered the building’s front windows. A velvet rope held by two brass poles was half rotted—partially revealing the chain rusting beneath the fabric.