by Peter Nealen
But if they were going to take the house, then they needed to work their way back toward Flanagan and Wade and link up. Without constant communication, there was no way Gomez wanted to wing a two-way breach. It would be far too easy to accidentally shoot a friendly, even without directly engaging.
Of course, the chances were also good that the girl might accidentally get shot in the next few minutes. But there was only so much they could do to mitigate the risks.
He started to angle to his left, toward where he’d seen Wade and Flanagan. They were invisible now, having apparently gone to ground in a different firing position. He sincerely hoped that the two men had identified them; he didn’t want to get shot by a friendly thanks to mistaken identity, and certainly not right behind his own house.
A pair of suppressed shots almost blended together into a single sound, and glass tinkled not far away, just around the corner of the house. Gomez imagined he could almost hear a body hitting the floor, at the same time he faintly heard screams of Spanish profanity. Another one down.
He’d seen a bit of the blast from at least one of the gunshots. Shooting and moving like they were doing precluded a lot in the way of prepared firing positions, so there was going to be some dust kicked up. He looked right at the spot and took a hand off his rifle’s forearm to signal that they were going to move on the house.
He knew that it wasn’t in the original plan, but then, the original plan had been more of a “commander’s intent” than a detailed course of action. Kill the bad guys, save the kidnapped girl. Even if she was a truck stop hooker, it would be worth it. At least he’d clear these savages out of his family’s home.
A ghillied shape rose slightly and replied with more signals. The man—Gomez couldn’t tell if it was Flanagan or Wade—pointed to him, then to the house. Then he pointed to himself, followed by the ground, and lifted his rifle to point it at the house.
The message was clear enough. You move up; we’ll cover you. Lifting his rifle to the ready, Gomez moved toward the house, keeping his muzzle trained on the two windows that were in sight, staying low and out of a direct line with the opening. The glass was broken, the interior dark. He didn’t see any shapes or movement inside.
Reaching the wall, he crouched down just to one side of the window closest to Wade and Flanagan and paused for a moment to let Javakhishvili catch up. The Georgian wild card was breathing a little hard, but he just moved up next to Gomez and gave his shoulder a quick squeeze. With you.
Gomez motioned toward the window. There were several ways to make entry into a house, and he didn’t want to move around the corner and potentially cut off Wade and Flanagan’s fields of fire. Besides, he expected that the bad guys inside probably would be expecting an assault to come in through one of the doors. He didn’t want to do what they expected.
Javakhishvili looked up at the indicated window. Long-haired and sharp-featured, the squint lines around his eyes deepened as he studied the problem. Finally, he looked at Gomez, pointed to him, and raised one finger, then pointed to himself and raised two. Gomez nodded. It was his house. Damn straight he’d be the first one in.
Javakhishvili nodded, gripped his rifle, and stepped back, lifting it to point at the window. At the same moment, Gomez mirrored his movement, though much closer. He punched the OBR’s suppressor at the remaining glass in the window frame, swept the edges of the frame to clear the broken glass, and then, glad that he’d remembered gloves, put his off hand on the frame and heaved himself in the window.
If he’d been hoping for a smooth ninja-slide into the room, he should have known better. He didn’t get quite as high as he’d hoped, and his boot scraped against the outside wall as he had to try to shove himself up and through the opening. Even as he got most of the way through, he saw the gangster crouched by the corner, and the second one coming through the door.
A shot snapped painfully past his head, taking the one in the doorway in the throat, even as Gomez threw himself the rest of the way into the room, landing in a heap on the floor with a painful thud, even as a shotgun blast shredded the air just above him. He rolled, his heart pounding, knowing he was out of position, and took a snap shot, upside down, at the shape of the shotgun-toting gangster in the corner. He missed, but the bullet smacking into the stuccoed wall right next to the young man’s head was enough to throw his second shot off, and that blast blew more chips off the far wall and a few out of the window frame.
Gomez rolled desperately away, pumping 7.62mm bullets at the sicario only a few feet away, just hoping that one of them hit. The kid was screaming in Spanish and trying to rack the shotgun again, up until Javakhishvili took a half-step to one side and put a bullet in his head from twelve feet away.
Gomez finished his roll, coming up to a knee practically right in the doorway, looking down the hallway toward the family room. Fortunately, he already had his weapon up; he and the gangster running down the hall, only about six feet away, fired at the same instant. The gangster’s pistol barked deafeningly in the enclosed space, while Gomez’ rifle shot sounded like a heavy book being slammed shut. The gangster’s bullet plucked at his sleeve, while his own punched through the man’s sternum. A growing red stain formed around the hole in his white wife-beater as he fell on his face.
There was a heavy thud behind him, followed by Javakhishvili’s voice. “Friendly.” None of them wanted to get shot by being sloppy. That entry had already been a near thing.
The thing was, and if he’d been able to detach himself from the action for a moment to reflect on it, Gomez should have been shaken by what had just happened. He had only survived that entry by sheer luck, surprise, and Javakhishvili’s quick marksmanship. He should have been dead.
But aside from his chest heaving with the exertion that always went hand-in-hand with close quarters battle, Gomez didn’t feel a thing.
A flurry of suppressed gunshots hiss-cracked outside. There was some more yelling from inside. Gomez got to his feet as Javakhishvili’s suppressor moved into his peripheral vision, and started into the hallway.
The house had a simple layout; he and Javakhishvili had just stepped out of the master bedroom and into the hallway that split the two-thirds of the house not dominated by the kitchen and living room. There were two doors on either side, leading to the kids’ bedrooms and the laundry room. He hadn’t lived in the house in years, preferring to keep his own place in Silver City, but he stayed every once in a while, when he came down to help out between jobs.
He moved to the first door. That had been Sonya’s room. The door was shut and locked. Ahead, he could see that Emilio’s door was open, and he started to push toward it. The open door was the greater threat, so it got cleared first.
He was three steps from the door when a roaring fusillade of gunfire thundered from the front of the house. He turned toward the front, as a long burst ripped through the front door toward the hallway, chipping more plaster off the walls and punching deep, splintered holes in the woodwork. He flattened himself against the wall, pointing his rifle, but didn’t have a shot.
A moment later, an engine roared outside, and the shooting stopped. Gomez started to surge toward the front. They were getting away. They’d collapsed to the front of the house, laid down covering fire, and gotten in a vehicle to escape.
But Javakhishvili grabbed his arm. “Open door left,” he hissed. Gomez nodded, turned to the door, and rushed in, his rifle in his shoulder, the scope just below his eye.
The room was empty. It had been trashed; there were empty beer bottles, liquor bottles, and various other trash scattered across the floor, and he didn’t want to look too closely at the rumpled, stained bedsheets. He turned back toward the door.
He knew Javakhishvili had been right. If there had been someone still in that room, and he’d charged across the doorway to go after the escaping sicarios, he’d probably be dead. But letting them escape burned in his chest.
“Friendlies coming in!” Wade bellowed from the front doo
r.
“Come ahead!” Javakhishvili yelled, when Gomez didn’t show any sign of opening his mouth. In fact, Gomez was already heading for his own room. The house wasn’t cleared yet.
Chapter 11
“Gomez,” Brannigan called softly.
Gomez looked up from where he was standing in the living room. His face was blank, lifeless. His dark eyes were cold and distant.
Brannigan jerked his head toward the back of the house. “A word,” he said. “Now.”
Gomez just nodded and followed him toward the master bedroom at the end of the hall. He was still ghillied up, his OBR slung in front of him, one hand on the firing control. Brannigan was still in civilian attire, but had his own rifle on him, not to mention the 1911 holstered on his hip.
Brannigan walked into the dimly lit room, looking around. The bodies hadn’t been moved yet. The walls were pocked with shotgun pellet and bullet holes. Broken glass was scattered on the floor under the big picture window that faced the now well-lit hillside behind the house.
Flanagan had called shortly before Brannigan and the rest had reached the abandoned adobe, explaining the situation. They’d immediately redirected to the Gomez place, but it had still taken the better part of an hour to get there.
In the meantime, Flanagan, Gomez, Wade, and Javakhishvili had finished clearing the house. The sicarios who had survived the assault had all left in a hurry. There were what looked like stacks of drugs, mostly heroin and methamphetamine, in what had been Sonya’s room, along with more stacks of cash and expensive electronics in the laundry room.
Gomez’ old room looked like it had been used as a holding cell. There were handcuffs affixed to the bed frame, and needles lying on the floor, along with even less wholesome trash.
There had been no sign of the girl that the men had watched the bad guys drag into the house. They must have taken her with them.
He turned and faced Gomez. The younger man met his gaze impassively. That blankness bothered him. He had a good idea what was going on in Gomez’ head, and seeing that girl had probably just pushed him another few steps down the road to Hell. She probably wasn’t his sister, but the correlation had to be there.
He put his fists on his hips. “Look,” he said quietly, “I’m not going to stand here and pretend that this wasn’t at all justified. Joe told me about the girl. But we’re in a bad spot now because of it. Before, we were just slightly nosy, suspicious outsiders. Now, you’ve opened up the ball, and things are going to start moving fast. You want to know why Sheriff Thomas has been cooperating with these assholes? Because they’ve got somebody they’re keeping as a hostage for his ‘good behavior.’ Now, there was no way for you to know that before you started dropping bodies, but the fact remains that they’re going to call him in after this, and he’s going to have to move fast so they don’t kill whoever they’ve got that he cares about. Furthermore, if they put two and two together—and you know damned well that they will—and figure out that you had something to do with this bloodbath, what do you think that’s going to mean for Sonya?”
Gomez didn’t reply. He barely even blinked. His face was so immobile that Brannigan wasn’t even sure that the wheels were turning. “Are you even hearing me, Gomez?” he asked, letting his voice go a little bit harder, slipping a little bit more into the authoritative bark that he’d been justly famous for in the Marine Corps. He hadn’t had to use that voice in a long time.
Gomez heard the change in tone, and the threat that went along with it. “Yes, sir,” he said, stiffening slightly.
“I sure as hell hope so,” Brannigan bit out. “Because this was sloppy. I know we’re not in the mil anymore, and we’re not exactly on the clock here. So, I can’t threaten you with any formal disciplinary action, or even dock your pay. But get this straight.” He stepped closer and loomed over Gomez. Brannigan was a big man, his body hardened by a long career as a fighting Marine and by hard living in the mountains since then. “You want the team’s help? You stay a team player. You risk your brothers out of your own personal feelings again, and I’ll put you in the dirt. You reading me, son?”
Gomez looked him in the eye then, and he felt that the other man was really seeing him for the first time since they’d stepped into that ruined bedroom, that was starting to smell of death. “Yes, sir, I am,” he said.
Brannigan searched his face, which was as stony and blank as ever. But he thought that he saw, deep in those dark, passionless black eyes, a glimmer of hope that he’d gotten through. “What do you know about the name Espino-Gallo?” he asked.
Gomez grimaced at the words, showing more expression than he had since Brannigan and the rest had arrived at the ranch. “So, it is them?”
“Looks that way,” Brannigan replied. “And apparently you know the name. Talk.”
“They’ve been around for a while,” Gomez said. “They’re a big family; I don’t know exactly how big, but big enough that there are Espino-Gallos all over, from here to El Paso to Nogales. Most of them are arrogant pricks, and they’ve had their run-ins with the law, once they get far enough north. There have been rumors for a long time that they were running drugs and extortion rackets for the Sinaloa Cartel in Cuidad Juarez.”
“But nothing you’ve ever heard corroborated?” Brannigan asked.
Gomez shook his head. “I never went digging too deeply. You do that with narcos around here, and you’re setting yourself up. Worse, you’re setting your family up. The CJNG went after somebody in Albuquerque last year. Killed his family with chainsaws in front of him, then cut him into slices, starting with his feet.”
“Well, apparently keeping your nose out of their business isn’t enough anymore,” Brannigan said grimly, looking around the bullet-riddled, blood-spattered room. “Some of this local trouble seems to have started with somebody talking about the Espino-Gallos in connection with missing people.”
Gomez’ eyes were far away by then, as he nodded slowly. “That could make sense,” he said. “The guys I roughed up before Transnistria weren’t Espino-Gallos, I’m pretty sure, but they were definitely hanging out with one of them.”
“Think they’ve got local gangs bird-dogging for them?” Brannigan asked quietly.
“Probably,” Gomez replied. “Though how much they need to if they’ve got Thomas in their pocket…” he trailed off, his voice hard and bitter.
“Thomas may be making a bad call to go along, but he’s in a crack, same as you,” Brannigan said. “If we can find out who they’ve got and spring ‘em, we might free his hands. He might even be grateful enough to look the other way while we disappear.”
Gomez didn’t say anything, but he followed Brannigan’s gaze around the room, and nodded.
Brannigan watched him for a second. He really wasn’t entirely sure what was going on in Gomez’ head. He knew that if he were in the younger man’s shoes, he probably wouldn’t be thinking all that straight. He’d lost Rebecca to cancer, and that had been the greatest catastrophe of his life. He hadn’t had a target to go after in that case; a man can’t shoot cancer, blow it up, or punch it in the face. Gomez had a target. Is he going to be able to keep it together and do the work, or is he going to fly off the handle and go berserk?
But Gomez nodded again. “So, it’s a rescue mission, then,” he said. He met Brannigan’s gaze directly. “You don’t have to worry about me, sir,” he said. “They’ve got my sister.”
The important part didn’t need to be said. If he went off the reservation, he risked losing Sonya. He wasn’t going to do that.
Brannigan nodded. “Let’s get the bodies out of here,” he said, “and exploit the site as best we can. I know this was your home, but there might be something useful that these animals left behind.”
Gomez just nodded again, slinging his rifle around to his back and turning toward the nearest corpse.
***
Childress was sitting up when Hart walked into the hospital room. Well, he was sort of sitting up. He was propped u
p by the bed, since his midsection was still healing, and he had no muscle control past his waist.
“Looking better, buddy,” Hart said, setting the food he’d brought on the side table and sliding into his accustomed chair.
Childress just snorted bitterly. “Don’t try to bullshit me with that motivational crap, Don,” he said, staring at the ceiling. “I just got cut open for the fifth time, and I still have to call the nurse to wipe my ass for me.”
Hart didn’t have much of anything to say to that. He sat in the chair and looked at the floor, wishing that he had a fifth with him. He’d cut way back on his drinking since taking his place as Childress’ bodyguard and caregiver, but that didn’t stop the craving. Especially when Childress got like this.
Because as much as he’d hoped that his own experience would give him some insight to share with his friend, at times like this, he just couldn’t find the words. Sure, he’d lost his leg. It had been bad, and he still struggled with it. But he could walk. Childress never could under his own power again.
“It’s rough now, but you’ll cope, man,” he finally ventured, after a long and awkward silence. “You’ll get through this.”
Childress turned to look at him. His eyes were sunken in an already slightly too-pointed face. “The Blackhearts were my livelihood, Don,” he said. “Working for Brannigan was my only source of income. What am I gonna do now, now that I’m completely useless?”
Hart pressed his lips together behind his beard. It kept him from flapping his mouth like a fish. He really didn’t have an answer. And he hated himself for it.
“That’s what I thought,” Childress said, turning his eyes back to the gridded, noise-dampening tiles of the ceiling as the silence dragged on.
Hart stared at the floor. The silence between them stretched on until Hart’s phone started blaring Creedence Clearwater Revival. Despite the beeps of the medical machinery and the murmur of activity outside the door, the phone’s ringer seemed deafeningly loud.