Chapter 9
I sit outside the bar for two hours, watching people come and go. Diego is difficult to miss when he finally makes his appearance. He’s several heads taller than most men, maybe a head taller than me. He’s built like a slab of brick, a rectangular body with relatively small arms. He doesn’t lift. He is just huge as some men are.
After waiting for another couple minutes to be sure the street is quiet, I leave my car and go to the trunk, grabbing the tracking device. Luckily, it’s always in here. I hurry across the street and place it behind the tire of the beat-up car he arrived in.
Then I return to my car and drive around the corner, parking in an alleyway. After that, it’s more waiting, just like so much of this work is. I watch the tracking app on my phone, trying not to think about returning to Lena, crushing her against me in a fierce embrace.
“You’re not leaving me. Ever. You’re going to stay exactly where I want you.”
Then I’d kiss her, but I know that would be the end. If I ever let myself kiss her, I won’t be able to stop. I’ll tear her clothes off after tasting her, needing to taste every part. I’ll have to feast on her young soaked honey pot, tongue her eager hole, lick her excitable clit, fuckingownher in every way.
My phone starts beeping. The tracker is moving. Good. Something to focus on. I can’t keep obsessing, but I can’t stop, either.
Even as I follow the tracker, always keeping one or two streets between us, Amelia is in the back of my mind. When I save Susan, she might never want to see me again. I wouldn’t blame her. Susan wanted a better life for Amelia. That was the whole reason I agreed to it in the first place. I saw a desperate mother.
Maybe this is all my fault, but I can make it right. I keep driving.
I pull up outside the house. It sits on the end of a row, all one-story shack-type things. The beat-up car Diego arrived in is parked on the lawn. He sits on the porch, smoking a cigarette, another man sitting beside him. I reach into my glove compartment, scan my thumb, and take out my pistol. Then I walk to the trunk and quickly take off my T, put my vest on, and pull my T over it. It’s not ideal, but it’s better than nothing.
I watch the windows for threats as I walk past the beat-up car. Diego stands slowly and flicks his cigarette away. Up close, he seems his age. It’s his confused smile. Despite his face tattoos, he looks young. He’s only twenty-two. Hell, that’s still older than Amelia.
“You want trouble, gringo?”
The other man stands, shorter, wider, with a tattooed belly poking out of a white tank. He glares at me. Antonio laughs a moment later. “You are dressed for war, my friend.”
His tone has completely changed. His pupils are far wider than in his mugshot photo. He’s clearly on something that could work to my advantage. His hand is twitching, so I slowly put mine behind my back, glancing at the windows, hoping like hell there isn’t a gunman posted across the road.
This is sloppy, but I have to work fast for my woman.
“I am ready for war, my friend,” I reply. “I need some information.”
Diego sits just as slowly as he rose, but the other man keeps glaring at me. “I see no gun, gringo. I see no reason to be scared of you.”
“So, am I scared?” Diego says, looking up at the man. But he’s so tall that he doesn’t have to look upthatmuch. “I’m sitting. I’m ready to talk. This is interesting to me. But if I take your word as gospel, I’mscared, is that it?”
“No, I—”
I leap back when Diego springs into action. He moves far quicker than I would’ve guessed. He explodes into a right-hand punch, hitting his so-called friend across the face. It’s a routine I’ve seen before. The drugged-up boss beats up his own men. I step back as he hits him twice more, then spits on him.
He turns to me, smiling shakily. “Where were we?”
The man on the ground groans. I don’t have the time to give a shit. Anyway, he probably deserves it, as pessimistic as that might be.
“Susan Benson,” I tell him. The other man has rolled onto his back. He’s carefully probing his nose, and there’s something about the movement. It looks like he’s done it before. “How much do you want?”
He places a hand on his chest, looking genuinely offended. “It’s not a question of money, sir.”
My hand twitches, urging me to go for the pistol and shove it in his face, but there’s no telling where Susan is. If I had backup, a team, but this has all happened in, what, anhour, maybe a little more?
“Enlighten me, then,sir,” I say coldly.
“Do you speak Spanish?” he asks.
I nod, answering in Spanish. “Tell me where she is.”
“Relax. Listen, Luis Mendez is a very big figure in the town where I am from. We all heard stories of the great Luis Mendez, who came from the mud like us, who bled for us and brought schools and hospitals.”
Cartel-owned conveniences. It’s a common tactic of theirs.
“Get to the point,” I snap.
He sighs. “I have now had the honor of meeting Luis Mendez. He is in his later years. I’m unsure if he knew I was there, but he came alive again when I mentioned this wonderful thing—this data disk that held millions. He cried on my shoulder. He’d never met me before. I was a friend of his son’s, but he cried. I would die for that man. I made him a promise.”
Some people say the narcos look at their bosses like royalty or gods. I’ve seen glimpses of this kind of behavior before, but never like this. Whether it’s the drugs, his messed-up upbringing, or maybe he was just born like this, he’s a zealot. He’s ready to die for the narco cause.
“It was a custom build,” he goes on. “This data disk.”
“Portable hard drive,” I say in English, and he repeats it.
“And this could hold all that money?” he says, not even looking at his buddy dragging himself into a chair.
Yes, it could. Ithad, and that was my mistake. Or maybe it was selfishness, but a man needs money to operate. I could’ve handled it alone. I saw a lonely, lost mother; perhaps she reminded me of my own. Maybe she reminded me of what she did, so I helped her. Now look at me.
“Why do you think Susan knows where it is?” I ask.
“Shetoldme. She said it right to my face. I was at a bar, minding my own business, and this drunk American lady stumbled over with all her friends. They wanted to take photos of me for my face. Drunk American women, eh?” He gestures at his facial tattoos that cover most of his features. “They go crazy for any little thing.”
I swallow. It’s something I warned Susan about in the past—her behavior in public. I’d told her she should always be aware of her surroundings, and she’d replied with something about being able to handle herself. So naïve, but she wasn’t my responsibility.
“So she took the photo, then…”
“Then drinks and stories. She thought it was so funny. A friend of her husband’s stole it. Then, her husband stole it fromhim, but he was too scared to do anything. He hid it. He died. She kept it. Then, somehow, she found a way to make the money real.”
“That’s quite the tale,” I say. “Let’s call it a million.”
“We’re not discussingprice, sir,” he says with an intoxicated conviction. He stares at me without any hint of doubt. “It’s the data disk, thehard driveI need. It had a unique whalebone cover and his daughter’s name inscribed. He was going to give it to her. She died.”
I almost groan, massaging my head. A good operator incinerates anything he never wants to be discovered, but I remember the inscription. I remember how it generally looked. It will take time, though, dammit.
“I may be able to help you,” I say, switching back to English.
“Is that so, gringo?” He seems amused.
“I know where the wallet is,” I reply. “I was the one who helped Simone to launder the cryptocurrency.”
He nods, smiling. “Yes, okay, this is good.”
“For obvious reasons, I’ve hidden it. I’ll need time to get it.” To create it, the closest replica I can get. I need to make some calls. “In the meantime, I need to know that Susan is okay. Her daughter is worried about her.”
“Her daughter will be more worried if I don’t keep my promise to Señor Mendez.”
I almost go for the gun right then, like a flash of violence surging through my body. It almost takes complete hold of me. The second he threatens my woman, I almost blow the operation.
“Have you hurt her?” I ask. “How bad are her injuries?”
“Easy, easy,” Diego says, laughing. “I haven’t touched her yet. I made friends with her. She came to the location willingly. She doesn’t smell too good. Not the best toilet facilities, but I haven’t touched her.”
He doesn’t sayyet. Other men would. They’d need to assert some kind of warped dominance, but Antonio isn’t like that. I know a truly dangerous man when I see one.
“I need a video of her talking to her daughter.”
“You’re the boss now, then?”
“I’ve got what you need—”
“No, you said Simone spent it. You laundered it for her. I’m not slow.” He gets an edge to his voice. “Do I seem slow to you?”
“You said this wasn’t about money. Do I seem slow to you?”
He grins. “Not just about money, my friend.”
I’d love to punch this asshole across the face, but I have to play his game. “I only laundered a small portion of it. I’ll make up the difference and return to you with the hard drive.”
His eyesgleamat this. As far as jobs go, this is on the surreal end of the spectrum. It’s the religious zeal. “I could work with a deal like that.” His hand twitches for a glass object on the porch sill. Ah, his pipe, already dirty with its previous uses. “I will call my friend. Wait here. You can speak to her. Maybe record a little video, eh? But not a porno, eh?”
He chuckles, lighting the pipe, inhaling and blowing out nasty-smelling smoke.