by Scott Bell
Gomez bobbed his head. “Sí. It shall be done.” He strode off, barking orders.
The two teams designated by the leader broke cover and scurried toward their new positions.
DaSilva took a deep breath and forced it out slowly. Now it is time to find out who is fucking with us.
Yeager skirted the benches in the rear of the barn and rigged the door leading to the airstrip in back. Next, he hustled over to repeat the procedure on the north side entrance, the one from the dormitories. If the dorms were occupied, he hoped the residents were smart enough to stay hunkered down and not come through that door to see what all the excitement was about.
He moved down the north wall, back toward the front. On the truck’s passenger side, the barn door had folded back and nearly ripped loose from its hinges, leaving a triangular gap at the bottom. On the driver’s side, the door had been shoved back, but it hugged the side of the trailer, leaving almost no gap. He couldn’t see out, but more importantly, they couldn’t see in. Yeager worked quickly to finish his final task then inspected the front of his rig. He still had a faint hope of driving the vehicle out and getting away.
The truck’s nose was embedded in the middle of the line of pallets holding sacks of… What? Cocaine? If that was the case, he was looking at a hell of a lot of drugs. The plastic sacks reminded him of sand bags, stacked in neat squares, two dozen to a pallet.
The grille of the Peterbilt had knocked a half dozen bags loose and split one open. White powder had sprayed in an arc across the floor.
“Hey, Por Que!” he called out.
“What?”
“Enough dope here to light up LA.”
“Just say no, dude. You wanna give me a hand here or what?”
Yeager used the stack of drugs as a barricade as he crouched and shuffled to the passenger side of the rig. He risked a quick look over the top, and his heart sank into his stomach.
The left side of the Peterbilt was pounded like bad steak. Because of the shredded front tire, the whole cab leaned sideways, resting on the steel rim. The cowling over the engine compartment had been blown open, revealing a severely wounded machine leaking fluids from several cracked or broken hoses, pipes, and joints.
The truck wasn’t going anywhere for a long time, which meant he wouldn’t be driving it back over the border and trading it to Harlan and his merry band.
Charlie…
Abandoned Convenience Store
East of Austin
Charlie sat in the cooler for a long time, her mind in neutral. Nude. Butt getting numb from the cold, concrete floor. Staring at the dead man. One minute, she wanted to cry and never stop, then the next, she wanted to kick the corpse and spit on it. The rest of the time, all she could do was think of the horrible bubbling hiss when she’d cut open his windpipe and how the cartilage had felt under her hand when it parted.
When she finally moved, she didn’t know how much time had passed. Water. She had to wash her hands before she did anything else. Using the remaining water in her open bottle and some from one of the new ones, she rinsed off her hands and doused her arms and legs. Red rivulets ran down to pool at her feet, spreading to join the thick blackened puddle leaking from Skeeter’s gaping neck.
She didn’t know which memory would haunt her more: having to take his reeking penis in her hand or trying to cut it off.
Or slicing the bastard’s throat with a rusty box cutter. She shuddered. At least I’ll get to have a memory. And David will have a mother.
She shook her hands and tried to squeegee the water from her arms and legs. Finally, she just pulled on her clothes, ignoring the dampness and the shivers of adrenaline reaction that racked her.
“Hold it together. Think of David.” Simply hearing her own voice made her feel better. She was alive, and the sorry piece of shit who’d tried to rape her was dead.
“Fuck you, Skeeter,” she told the corpse.
Remembering too many horror movies where the bad guy wasn’t really dead, she skirted around him to the cooler door and stepped into the main store. The door clunked behind her, making her jump. She figured out how they’d locked her in, using a wire peg hook threaded through a ring meant for a padlock. Still feeling superstitious, as if Skeeter would come stumbling out of the cooler at any moment like an animated redneck zombie, Charlie secured the door with the peg hook.
“You’re not coming after me, asshole,” she muttered.
One down. One to go.
Hacienda Del Norte
Northern Mexico
The rattle of incoming fire increased from a few random pings to a full storm of copper-jacketed hail. The metal wall of the barn began to resemble a colander as the guard force by the stables started shooting in earnest. Bullets skipped and rang across the pavement and popped into the back of the trailer. Victor cursed when some hit the rear tires.
“Get back here!” Yeager yelled. Rounds impacted the sacks of cocaine that he sheltered behind. If the incoming bullets caused little puffs of cocaine to drift in the air, he’d be inhaling the stuff like some Cuban dope runner or a redneck Scarface. He snagged a paper dust mask off a nearby table and slipped it over his nose and mouth. He concentrated on providing covering fire while Victor scrambled back. The M4 kicked Yeager’s shoulder in solid thumps as he targeted muzzle flashes, ducked, and moved to another position. Fire, duck, repeat.
Victor scooted around the line of pallets to his left, rolled, and came to rest with his back against the stack, breathing hard. “So now what, Jim Bowie?” He panted as if he’d run a marathon. “The Mexicans got us surrounded.”
“I thought you were a Mexican,” Yeager yelled. His voice sounded tinny over the ringing in his ears.
“Not today. Today I’m like, you know, one of the valiant defenders.”
Yeager started to yell something back when God slapped his hand on the ground and a white-hot flash lit the inside of the warehouse.
DaSilva crouched beside a bench, remaining out of the warehouse sniper’s view. Santos getting shot right next to him—one second talking, the next flying backward—had stunned him. He had no wish to be killed from afar, without even a chance to shoot back. Killing like that… well, it was not something people did to DaSilva.
He grabbed a radio from one of the four men left with him and ordered Marco to increase the suppressing fire on the front of the barn. He hoped the attacking force would be pinned down while Gomez and the flankers took them by surprise.
The radio crackled in his hand. “Don DaSilva?” Gomez said.
“Yes?”
“We are in position.”
“All units!” DaSilva barked. “Fire on the intruders. Gomez, go, go, go!”
A moment later, a mammoth thump blew out the barracks windows. Blooms of fire spewed glass and debris as far as the garden fence, bits spattering across the men huddled there.
DaSilva flinched and ducked, even though nothing came close to him behind the protection of the porch’s adobe arches. “Madre de Dios!”
A trap. Gomez and his men had walked into a booby trap. Given the size of the explosion inside the barracks, there was no doubt that all of them were dead.
Damn. “You,” he said, pointing at one of the men crouched nearby. DaSilva’s ears were still ringing, and his voice sounded as if it came from a well. The man he picked was huge, built like a refrigerator. “What is your name?”
“Lopez.”
“Lopez, take two others and follow Gomez. Their trap is sprung. They won’t be expecting another attack from that direction.”
Lopez and the other three exchanged doubtful looks. Nobody moved.
“Go!” DaSilva fired a bullet into the ground near the guard’s foot.
Lopez stood slowly, moving like a much older man. He jerked his head at two of his compadres, and they all moved off, heads down, clearly unhappy.
Time for the frontal assault.
CHAPTER 34
Skeeter’s handgun lay next to a stack of metal shelving. Th
e long-barreled Ruger Blackhawk was chambered for .44 magnums, a souped-up cowboy six-gun. Charlie checked the load by flipping open the gate on the side, setting the hammer to half-cock, and spinning the cylinder. There were six fat cartridges, one in every chamber.
Her dad owned one exactly like it. He used it because the Ruger had a transfer bar that prevented misfire by making sure the hammer couldn’t strike the firing pin unless the trigger was pulled. Charlie was finally glad she’d sat through all the hours of gun tutoring. “Thanks, Dad,” she whispered.
Everything felt surreal. Cotton wool packed her brain. Her thoughts came at random and slipped away without leaving any lasting impression. Except for two: David and Abel. She needed to reach Abel before he got himself killed going after that money.
Charlie went through the open door leading from the convenience store to the wood-frame house where Harlan had said he was going to set up camp. Twenty feet across a covered, screened walkway, she moved through another open door and into the house. The room she entered had once been a kitchen, but all that was left was a shell of drywall and cabinets with no doors. A dim glow came from yet another doorway that had nothing left but the frame.
She tiptoed over to that one and peeped into a living area. Hissing, yellow light emanated from a Coleman lantern turned to its lowest setting. Two sleeping bags lay on either side of the lantern. Harlan slept in the closest one.
She kicked his foot.
He jerked awake. After a couple of blinks, his eyes focused then widened in surprise. “Hey,” he said. “Hey.”
“Put your hands—”
Harlan came up, hard and fast, a glint of blue steel in his right hand.
She shot him once in the chest.
She cocked the single-action revolver and shot him again.
He thumped to the floor, his Hawaiian shirt blossoming with reddening flowers.
Charlie looked for a cell phone.
Hacienda Del Norte
Northern Mexico
Yeager stared at the ceiling of the barn, stunned. He blinked and worked his jaw, his ears whining a high-pitched tone that drowned out all other sound. Then he remembered he was in a firefight and struggled to a sitting position behind the wall of cocaine-filled sandbags.
Victor was on all fours, shaking his head like a dog. Smoke and dust fogged the air on the south side of the barn, where the barracks door used to be. There was nothing left but a massive hole torn in the wall. Yeager hoped the dust in the air wasn’t filled with cocaine.
“Por Que!” Yeager yelled. “Por Que! Victor!”
Victor looked up and nodded. “I’m good,” he mouthed.
“Left flank,” Yeager said, pointing to the smoking new hole.
Victor nodded again. “Hey, stupido. Next time, don’ use so much C4.”
Yeager smiled and gave him a thumbs-up.
“What’s the plan?” Victor asked, scooting over to sit with his back against the pallet of dope.
“The plan? Kill all these sonsabitches so we can get out of here with the money.”
“Kill ’em all? Tha’s your plan?”
“How else are we gettin’ outta here with the cash?”
Victor shook his head. Yeager peered over the top of his improvised barricade, trying to see through the gap in the barn door. Bullets pinged sporadically through the metal sides of the building or thumped into the dope bags, more annoying than threatening. His pants pocket buzzed, and he jerked in surprise before he realized it was his cell phone ringing. He dug it out and looked at the Caller ID. Blocked.
Victor’s eyebrows arched. “You’re answering the phone in the middle of a firefight?”
“It might be the kidnappers.” He thumbed the button. “Yeager here.”
“Abel?”
The voice was faint and hard to hear through the crackle of static and the ringing in his ears, but he recognized it instantly. “Charlie? Is that you? Are you okay?”
“Marco?” DaSilva keyed the mike as if he wanted to crush it. “Marco, do you hear me?”
“Marco here.”
“We are done fucking around with these guys. You and your men will hit the barn on my command. Get them ready.”
There was a long pause, long enough that DaSilva almost keyed the mike to repeat his orders. He stared at the stables, willing the nightshift commander to answer him.
“Don DaSilva…” Marco said, then the radio crackled to silence.
“Listen to me,” DaSilva said, enunciating each word with care. “We will kill the lights in the courtyard. Your north group will swing wide north, and your south group will swing wide south, like a claw. That way, you will approach the barn out of sight of those inside, further hidden by darkness. At the door, toss in grenades then rush in.” He couldn’t help but add, “Wait for the grenades to explode before you go in.”
“Sí, Don DaSilva.”
“Move when the lights go out.”
“Sí.”
DaSilva pointed at the single guard still with him. “Get the lights.”
The man nodded and rushed off, crouched low to minimize his profile. He disappeared into the hacienda.
DaSilva scratched his cheek with the front sight of his pistol and stared at the triangular gap where the trailer of the diesel rig protruded from their drug processing building. Not long. Not long at all.
“You mean we don’ have to stay?” Victor asked.
Yeager shook his head, staring at his silent phone, still unable to believe it. “She got away. Somehow, she got away. The bad guys are dead.”
A bullet hit the bag next to Yeager’s head in the same instant that Victor yelled, “Tangos!” and started firing.
Yeager ducked and rolled, coming up in a different position and using one of the workbenches as a shield. Three men fanned out from the hole in the barracks doorway, two going right, one left.
Yeager snapped a three-round burst at the two on the right and missed. One ducked behind another bench, while the other crouched and tried to bring his weapon to bear. Yeager’s next burst took the second guy center mass, sending the guard crashing back into the wall.
Victor traded shots with the guy behind the bench, and Yeager looked for the guard on the left. Not seeing him, Yeager crabbed sideways, deeper into the warehouse, keeping low.
“Por Que?” he called.
“Yeah?”
“You work on getting Extraction Plan B into action. I’ll take care of these guys.”
“You got it. Plan B comin’ up.”
Then the lights went out.
Charlie sat on the front porch of the abandoned house and waited for the police to arrive. She didn’t know where she was, so she’d described the place to the dispatcher as best she could. She told them about Nita being taken to see John Stone, and the dispatcher said she would send somebody to investigate.
“Sit tight,” the woman said. “Help is on the way.”
Help. She’d killed two men. She was going to need lots of help. They’d kidnapped her, planned to kill her, and sexually assaulted her. But after killing Skeeter, she could have walked away. She could have taken the road out front either left or right and headed for the nearest house.
Shooting Harlan had been an act of pure selfish rage and a desire for vengeance. The law didn’t take kindly to that type of thing. She would likely be arrested and might have to defend herself in a murder trial. Maybe she would hire that guy who’d represented Abel. He seemed very good.
Whatever. She couldn’t work up a pinch of regret for exterminating those two assholes.
She picked up the late Harlan’s cell phone and dialed Tomas’s number. It was pretty late, and she would be waking them up, but that was unavoidable.
She was going to talk to her son, no matter what.
Yeager pulled the NVGs back down over his eyes, and the inside of the barn turned from pitch black to monochrome green. The guard on the right was holding his weapon over the top of the bench and spraying bullets in Victor’s general d
irection, showing only his hands and keeping his head down.
“Frag out!” Yeager pulled the pin on a fragmentation grenade, counted off two Mississippis in his head, then lobbed it over the guard’s head.
The indiscriminate fire paused. The guy was probably staring into the darkness and wondering what had landed behind him. Yeager ducked, covered his ears, and clenched his eyes shut.
Crack!
Even with his eyes closed, Yeager saw the flash, and he felt the thump in his chest. He peeked over his makeshift barricade and assessed his target. Heavy damage had been done to the wall, and an arm was lying across the bench.
One down. He low-crawled down the aisle, eyes and ears straining for evidence of the other guy’s whereabouts. He paused three-fourths of the way to the end. The back wall of the warehouse was about twenty feet away. The man who had peeled right had ducked behind the first row of benches and dropped out of sight. Two aisles separated Yeager from the first row.
So he’s either one or two aisles over. Or somewhere along the back, between the benches and the wall. Yeager crawled forward on elbows and knees, making as little noise as possible. Not that it mattered much. Victor was calling on the radio in between bursts of suppressing fire as he tried to keep the guards out front from getting too rambunctious. Incoming rounds still pinged and popped, hitting walls, floors, ceiling, and light fixtures. And if the other guy’s hearing is as fucked up as mine—
The guard flew around the corner of the workbench, tripped over Yeager’s prone body, and went sprawling. The M4 cradled in Yeager’s arm cracked him in the cheek when the guard kicked it. The guy ended up sprawled on top of Yeager, his own weapon clattering down the aisle.
Stunned by the blow to his face, Yeager twisted under the guard. He groped for his weapon’s grip, dragging it from under his body.