A SEAL Never Quits

by Holly Castillo

  He hit a number on his phone and kept walking as the line rang. Finally, Hector’s voice came across the line. “Bueno?”

  “Take them out. I won’t be back for a while. I have business to attend to in Texas.”

  Chapter 22

  As soon as Stryker saw Hector take a phone call, he knew they were blown. There was no way to explain how he knew, but his gut clenched in preparation for battle. A war was about to go down. And he was without a weapon.

  As if in slow motion, he watched Hector’s eyes scan the room, registering where Phantom stood, and then finally where Stryker stood. Stryker was able to look away quickly enough that Hector wouldn’t know he’d figured out what was going down. They had a little bit of time. They would want to kill them slowly and painfully and leave their bodies as examples for anyone else who wanted to try and bust apart their cartel.

  He just needed to know where Buzz was before he could act, or Buzz could easily be collateral damage. He turned slowly and made eye contact with Phantom. The only sign that Phantom gave was a slight downturn of his mouth. Other than that small motion, his face remained impassive, listening to one of the lieutenants talk about a recent kidnap-for-ransom mission.

  Stryker had successfully conveyed to Phantom that he needed to be ready for the shit to hit the fan. But he needed to find Buzz, and quickly. Otherwise, being separated, they were at even greater risk.

  Suddenly, there was commotion at the far end of the room, and one of the sicarios walked out with Buzz in front of him, a gun pressed to the back of his head. Buzz walked into the room but didn’t make eye contact with anyone. Buzz was a much larger man than the sicario who had a gun to his head, and could take him down in seconds. Stryker had watched Buzz do it. But he had to continue playing into their game…at least for a little longer.

  “On your knees, puto!”

  The entire room drew quiet, and all eyes shifted to the center of the room where Buzz obliged and got down on his knees. “What’s going on here?” Benicio asked, stepping forward from his protective circle of sicarios and lieutenants.

  Buzz lifted his eyes, and they connected with Stryker’s. Stryker gave a slight inclination of his head. Buzz knew the situation they were in, and knew the odds weren’t in their favor. They were going to have to take drastic steps, and soon.

  “He was in the communications room. He was doing something on the computers.”

  “Shit. We need to get David here, pronto,” Hector growled.

  Fuck. Their technology guy isn’t here. We need to take him along with Benicio. Stryker doubted they would have the time to get David there before the cartel decided to kill all of them. His fists clenched and unclenched, and he felt Hector’s gaze on him. Slowly he looked up.

  “What was your man doing in there?” Hector demanded, his gaze fixed on Stryker.

  “I have no idea. He’s not my man. We just run together.”

  Hector tilted his head to the side. “Now that’s funny. Because the entire night I’ve been thinking you were the leader of your little three amigos group you have going on here.”

  Chuckles broke out around the room, and Stryker’s muscles began to tighten in anticipation of the battle they were about to fight. They were outnumbered five to one. They’d had worse odds before. But then, during those times, they’d been armed. He needed to buy enough time for Phantom to get into a good position. He was trying to think through the various ways he could do that when Hector spoke up again.

  “Tell you what,” Hector said, stepping toward Stryker. “Why don’t you show us your new loyalty to the Scorpions by killing the man who has betrayed both of us?”

  He pulled one of the guns out of his holster strapped across his chest and handed the weapon to Stryker. “Now, shoot him in the head.”

  Stryker walked over to Buzz, took the place of the sicario, and placed the gun to the back of Buzz’s head. He could tell by the weight of the gun that it lacked bullets. Nothing could have told him more strongly that they were on to his team. They weren’t willing to give him a loaded weapon. At least, Hector wasn’t. But no one else knew what had transpired in the phone call from a few minutes earlier.

  “No offense, Hector, but this isn’t my preferred gun.” He motioned to the sicario to trade guns with him before Hector could react. “I’ve always liked one with a little more heft to it.”

  Hector made a motion like he was going to step toward them, but he stopped when Stryker aimed the weapon at Buzz’s head once again. “Do it, then. Prove yourself to us.”

  Stryker smiled at Hector. “You already know the answer to that, Hector. I don’t have a damn thing to prove.” He lifted the gun and fired, and Hector stumbled backwards as Stryker threw himself to the floor, taking out two more men as they all began to draw their weapons.

  Bullets struck the concrete near him, and he and Buzz lunged forward from their position on the floor. Buzz grabbed one of the sicarios who had his back to him and kneed him in the kidney, making him lose focus and giving Buzz the opportunity to take his gun away from him. Then, he joined Stryker, shooting the man nearest to them and then using his body as protection from the bullets flying at them. Buzz and Stryker didn’t stop shooting.

  “Heads down!” Phantom yelled as warning to Stryker and Buzz, and Stryker knew that Phantom had been able to get hold of one of the automatic weapons from a sicario. Both Stryker and Buzz quickly dropped before the other men knew how to respond, and Phantom was peppering them with bullets from the M14 he’d just taken. Silence followed the ear-blasting volley. No one who was still alive wanted to give away his location.

  Stryker slowly eased out from beneath the body of the lieutenant named Antonio. There was movement in the far corner, and he spun rapidly, then pivoted to continue scanning the room. It had only been Buzz easing out from underneath a sicario’s body.

  Another movement caught his eye, and he fired off a round into the body of Lieutenant Raul before he could reach his gun again. Phantom moved slowly, holding the M14 at the ready. But the one who was moving the most drew Stryker’s attention, and he stepped over dead bodies to reach him.

  “Do you want to know why I didn’t kill you, Hector? Do you want to know why? Because you and Benicio have some information I need.”

  Hector was bleeding profusely from his wound and stared up at Stryker with hatred. Next to him, however, Benicio was still scrambling for a gun, having lost his when Hector had jumped in front of him to protect him from the gunfire.

  “Focus now, Hector,” Stryker said, aiming his gun at Hector’s head. “Who is David? Where do I find him?”

  “Rot in hell, motherfucker.” Hector attempted to spit on Stryker but missed.

  “You’ll be there soon enough. Just answer my questions. I may have mercy and try to save your sorry ass.”

  Hector gave a weak laugh. “We both know I’m past the point of saving, pendejo. I’ll take my secrets to the grave with me.”

  Stryker hadn’t expected much from the man. He reached into his pocket, then, the one he had seen him put his cell phone in. He pulled it out and grabbed Hector’s hand, pressing his thumb to the key pad to unlock it. Within moments he was in Hector’s contacts. “Well, would you lookie there—David Castro. Only David in your phone.” He made a tsking sound. “You really should make more friends.”

  “You…son of a…bitch,” Hector wheezed out, before his head fell back to the floor.

  “Now, we just have you to contend with,” Stryker said, turning his attention on Benicio, who was sweating profusely. “You’re coming with us.”

  “No, no. You have the wrong man. Por favor…listen to me…”

  “Sure thing, Benicio. We’ll listen to everything you have to say once we get out of this hellhole,” Phantom said dryly.

  Together, Phantom and Stryker hefted Benicio to his feet, despite his struggles against them. Stryker turned to
look at Buzz. “Where do we stand on the communications room?”

  Suddenly there was a gargled sound. “We’ve been…betrayed. All of us.”

  “Fuck!” Stryker spun around and saw Hector talking into a separate cell phone, probably Benicio’s. Who he was talking to was the critical question. He snatched the phone out of the man’s hand and heard Hector expel his last breath of air. At least that problem was solved.

  He looked down at the caller ID and his stomach clenched. “Jefe” was the name on the caller ID. Who had been on the other line? Didn’t they have the boss already with them? His eyes reconnected with Buzz. “The communications room?” he asked curtly.

  “Heavily encrypted, as we expected. Whoever is doing this work has a lot of experience in the dark web. But I wasn’t able to get everything. I need more time.”

  “Our time is up,” Phantom said, looking at his watch. “It won’t be long before the policia arrive and we have a real problem on our hands.”

  “I was able to get about seventy-five percent on this flash drive. If you can just buy me five minutes, I can yank one of the hard drives.”

  “Move fast, sailor. We’re living on borrowed time now.”

  They began to propel toward the door with Benicio attempting to twist and turn in their arms. He dug in his heels, and for a relatively trim man, he was also strong, and temporarily halted Stryker and Phantom. And then he began to laugh, the twisted, demented laugh of a man who knew he was going to die.

  “Are you truly the best that America has to offer? This is it? You men are clueless. You have no idea what is even going on around you.”

  “Yeah, sure. Tell us all about it on the drive home.”

  “Too late. Jefe knows everything now. And he’s only the tip of the iceberg. You have no idea how deep and far this goes. It isn’t just Benicio. He reports to someone else, who reports to someone else, and so on and so on. You’ll never be free of us.”

  “He’s stalling,” Stryker spat. “Let’s get him out of here.” They began to drag him forcefully, but suddenly he lunged forward. They were able to keep a tight grip on him, but he hit his head into one of the ornate carvings that seemed so out of place in an industrial building.

  The floor of the building shook violently, and the men staggered their stances, trying to gain better footing. Benicio turned on them and gave a hysterical laugh as blood trickled down his forehead. “It’s over now. There’s no escape.”

  “The whole place is collapsing!” Phantom yelled over the cracking sound of concrete and the crashing of giant blocks of the wall and ceiling down onto the floors.

  “The computers!” Buzz began to charge off, but Stryker tackled him from the side.

  “We have to get out of here,” Stryker yelled at him. “Forget the computers.”

  Benicio turned back to the carving that he had smashed, and, too late, Stryker saw the red flashing light. “They’ve killed everyone and have a flash drive. There are three of them—”

  Stryker lunged at him and slammed him back against a wall that was beginning to crack. “Who are you talking to, you sick fuck? Who are you partnered with?”

  Benicio laughed in Stryker’s face. “You’ll never know. You won’t figure it out until it is too late for you to do anything about it. There are great plans in place. But you’ll be too late.”

  Stryker drew back his fist and smashed it into Benicio’s jaw, sending him sliding back toward the blood-drenched room they had just left. Benicio sat up and spat blood on the ground. “You dumb, stupid—” A massive piece of cement fell from the ceiling, crushing Benicio, and then there was complete stillness.

  “We have to go now!” Phantom yelled, grabbing Stryker by the arm.

  Dodging falling debris as they ran, they threw themselves over cement blocks and raced for the exit. A piece of concrete fell so close to Stryker that he felt the air move the hair on his neck as it went down. “Hustle, boys!” he yelled. “This whole fucking place is coming down around our ears!”

  “No shit!” Phantom yelled back in frustration.

  They jumped through the door and were thrown forward as the interior of the building collapsed in on itself, and they fell down the steps they’d climbed up what seemed like hours ago, hooded and unaware of the way the night was going to play out. Dust plumed around them, making it hard to see. Stryker scanned through the dust and floating debris to make sure his men had made it out alive but it was too hard to see.

  “At your six,” came a cough directly behind him, and he whirled to see Phantom walking forward, Buzz’s arm slung around his shoulder. Buzz limped beside him, grimacing.

  “Damage?” Stryker demanded, his heart rate pounding, but he forced it to slow through paced breathing. This was what he and his men trained and lived through constantly. But he wasn’t about to lose a man on a mission that shouldn’t have been nearly this complicated.

  “Busted my leg when we were thrown down the steps, but I’m going to be just fine. Ready to go home, though.”

  “You and me both, sailor. Let’s grab our shit and get out of here.”

  * * *

  Getting across the border was as easy as usual. Benicio knew which border patrol officers he could count on to look the other way as he slid by. He’d stopped at his home as he had prepared to leave and had found the security video his cousin had recorded as the building had collapsed around him. He had broken the security monitor as well as a fifteen-thousand-dollar vase in his rage.

  How could these three men have come in and done so much damage to his team? He had trained his Scorpions himself! He had even recruited men from the Mexican marines into the sicarios to train his men. They were considered elite, even by other cartels. What had happened?

  He’d changed clothes while at his home and packed a small bag. He had gathered some items he knew were going to be critical to his business in the U.S. Elsa had been the last thing on his mind as he had gone out to his Land Rover and loaded in his bags. When the headlights had drifted through his gate, he had yanked his gun and held it by his side as he stood behind the Land Rover, waiting with his breath held.

  Elsa’s car had slid up into the driveway, and she’d stepped out, looking determined. He knew why she was there. She had told him she would stop by and find out what he had discovered in Matamoros. He had walked around the Rover, startling her.

  “I knew you were looking forward to me coming, Benicio, but I wasn’t expecting you to be waiting for me.” She’d smiled brightly at him.

  “Not tonight, Elsa. There have been…complications.”

  Elsa’s eyes had widened in surprise, then they’d narrowed quickly with concern. “Tío Hector? Please tell me he’s okay. He’s the only family I have left.”

  “I’ll avenge him, Elsa. I’ll avenge him. But until I know how far this goes, stay here. I want you safe.”

  “It comes back to you! That’s how far it goes. They’re after you! ¡Dios mío! I can’t stay here. They’ll come right here.” She’d turned and raced away from him back to her car.

  Benicio realized she was probably right. When word got around that his cartel was crumbling, they would be coming for him, if they didn’t think he was already dead. He hoped the death of his cousin bought him some time until they realized it wasn’t him.

  Now, as he drove east from Laredo, his mind raced with all that lay ahead of him. He not only had business to conduct, he had revenge to exact. And he needed answers more than anything. He needed to know what had gone so horribly wrong.

  * * *

  They had barely crossed the border when Stryker pulled out the burner phone to call Anya. He hated disturbing her in the middle of the night, but he needed to hear her voice and have the reassurance that she was truly okay. He knew the team had been watching over her and making sure she stayed safe, but hearing it from her would make it real to him.

 
“Dr. Gutierrez,” her groggy voice came across the line and he suddenly felt everything was right with the world.

  “Anya, it’s Stryker. I’m sorry I woke you, I just—”

  “Stryker!” Her voice filled with energy. “I’m-I’m glad you called. I didn’t realize your trip would last so long. I’ve missed you.”

  His heart beat faster and he forgot about Phantom and Buzz riding in the SUV with him. “I’ve missed you, too. I’m on my way home now. Is it okay for me to come see you in the morning?”

  “Yes. We need to talk.” Apprehension tinged her voice, and he knew she had a lot of questions.

  “Yes, we do. I’ll see you soon.” He disconnected the call and quickly dialed the admiral. It was past time to talk to him about Anya.

  Chapter 23

  “The air never smelled better, and all I can smell is cow shit and hay.”

  “See, we’re going to make a country boy out of you after all, Buzz.” Stryker chuckled, patting the man on the back. Buzz gave him a weak smile. They were all exhausted and in desperate need of showers and fresh clothes.

  They’d taken the SUV that had driven them out to the communications hub back to where they’d originally met Franco and traded back to their own vehicle. They left the SUV burning behind them, erasing any indication that they’d ever been in the vehicle. They’d waited nearly half an hour before finally entering their “safe” house, unsure whether it had been breached.

  Fortunately, Benicio’s foot soldiers hadn’t hit the place yet, and they were able to grab their go-bags and leave the place quickly. They had zigzagged out of the city, avoiding major territories they knew would be crawling with Scorpion runners. It’d taken them longer to reach the checkpoint and leave the city, but they’d finally made it out. Stryker’s mind ran over the conversation with Anya and, subsequently, Haslett, and he couldn’t wait to go see her.