by Ann Major
“If the Mexicans find so much as one lousy bullet in your car, they can put you in prison for years and years,” Wolf said, following them. “If they catch you trying to break Mia out of prison, you could get shot or arrested and tortured. Then there’ll be three of you rotting down there instead of just one.”
“Four,” Shanghai slammed to a stop so fast, Wolf nearly ran into him. “We’re not driving into Ciudad Juarez. We’re flying straight in to the prison. Cole says we’re going to need a helicopter, Wolf.”
“That’s the damnedest idea—”
“Remember that story you told me about when you flew into that hellhole in Kuwait and got your buddy out?”
“Hey—have you been listening to me at all?”
“Yeah. To every damn word. But it doesn’t change anything. We’ve gotta get her out.”
“What’s this we shit?”
“If you’re a wuss, Wolf, find me somebody with more try.”
Wolf stared at him. “This isn’t about try. This is suicide.”
“You saw her pictures. That’s my little girl, Wolf. Mia and me, we’re a mess. She lied to me. She did me wrong. But, hey, that little girl’s pure angel. And she doesn’t even know me.” His voice softened. “Someday when she does, I want her to look up to her daddy. I don’t want her to think I left her mommy to die in Mexico. Do you get that?”
“But…”
“Okay, Wolf. So, you can’t do this. So, put me in touch with one of your craziest pilot friends—somebody who’s got what it takes. Somebody with try.”
Federico’s eyes narrowed on Collins’s gaunt face. Then he eyed the door of the posh Ciudad Juarez restaurant and bought more time by toying with his steak milanesa.
“You ask too much,” he murmured when he met Collins’s gaze again.
“Valdez, you and I both know that if a man has the right protection, he can do anything in Mexico. You own everybody who’s anybody in this city. Why can’t you get the federales to drop their charges against Mia Kemble?”
“I’ve tried.”
“Try harder. If you don’t, they want to go the other route. If they’re forced to do that, can you buy them the protection they’ll need?”
“To land a helicopter in El Castillo itself?”
“Yes.”
“Even if this was something I wanted to do, your plan is loco. I won’t help you and Mia’s crazy husband bust her out of El Castillo.”
“I broke your story, and now Morales is in prison. I nearly died doing it. I would have—but for Mia. I’ve got to do what I can for her. You got what you wanted. You owe me.”
“I can’t do it.”
“If you don’t, she’ll die.”
“So…lots of pretty young women die in this city. Write a story about her.”
Federico sliced off a hunk of his steak and chewed silently. The meat was tough, and he had to work on it for a long time before he swallowed. Or maybe he was just stalling. Finally he met Terence’s eyes again. “What you ask is very difficult.”
“We were brothers once,” Terence said.
“That was a long time ago.”
“Those bastards were burning me with a cattle prod!”
“Okay. Okay. But you don’t have much time.” Federico tossed his fork onto his plate and bolted a shot of tequila. “This is complicated. There was going to be a break at El Castillo today. Some people on the outside bought land two hundred meters from the prison. They built a shack and then dug down through the rock until they hit some sewage tunnels. They used rag-covered tools so nobody would hear them. If you don’t get Mia Kemble out before the prison break, it’ll be too late. Another thing, Morales wants her dead. They’re postponing the break, so he can send somebody through the tunnel into El Castillo tonight to kill her. After the break the authorities will seal the prison so tight that not even I will be able to help you. Can your people move that fast?”
“What choice do they have?”
When Cole, Wolf and Shanghai flew along the border, the bridge on the Mexico side and the El Paso side was backed up for three miles in both countries.
“It’s worse than I thought,” Wolf said, tensing as he stared down at the glistening vehicles. “Remember how I told you the U.S. government is fingerprinting anybody who looks the least bit suspicious before they let them enter the States—”
Wolf veered away from the river.
“Good thing we decided not to drive,” Shanghai said.
Closing his eyes, he tried not to think about Mexico or Mia and all that lay ahead. He wasn’t kidding himself. Bribe or no bribe, lots of things could go wrong and probably would. He could die. He could get her killed.
“Aw, hell.” He’d given up the idea of dying old when he’d made bull riding his profession.
And Mia…Rotting in a Mexican prison had to be worse than a quick death.
He’d get her the hell out of Mexico or die trying.
So what if he didn’t end up a skinny, old man in his nineties sitting out on his front porch in a rocking chair?
Ten
Some mistakes are too much fun to only make once. Dressing in drag wasn’t one of them.
As Shanghai headed toward the pair of huge steel doors set centrally in front of a high stone wall, a man driving by in a rusty, red pickup swerved closer to the curb. Pounding the side of his pickup, the man let out a shrill wolf whistle.
Feeling like punching the macho bastard in the jaw, Shanghai cringed in what he hoped would be a feminine, coy come-on. Clutching his hot-pink purse against his fake breasts and tossing his curls, he walked faster, swinging his ass.
“Ey, gringa!”
Either the ass work was passable, or the poor, thickheaded fool was half blind. Shanghai knew he was too tall and too masculine to be very sexy in drag. The pointed tips of the cheap red high heels pinched his toes so badly they’d gone numb on him. He’d chosen the loose-fitting black dress and shawl to conceal rather than reveal. Still, this hombre dug him, which just went to show that a lot of guys went for something strange.
The lipstick, foundation and rouge made Shanghai’s face and lips feel hot and greasy. The tight panty hose were so short they tugged at his balls with each mincing step. When he finally reached the doors, he rang the bell with one fingertip and waited with his other hand on a hip, just as Joanne had told him to do.
When he got through security, he signed in as Joanne. As the final guard looked him over, Shanghai held his breath. Hopefully Collins’s friend had paid off the right people and he wouldn’t be strip-searched.
“You’re going to die tonight!” Raquel was screaming at Mia through the bars, her black eyes burning with hate as Mia finger-combed her wet hair.
Mia shuddered. She was a little chilled from having just bathed herself and washed her hair under a lukewarm faucet in the kitchen.
Suddenly a guard pushed past the crazy woman, unlocked the cell door and bawled out Mia’s name.
“Kemble, you have a visitor.”
Ignoring Raquel, Mia scurried after the wide-shouldered woman. “Who?”
“A woman.”
Her mother, no doubt.
Happiness and an intense nostalgia for the ranch and her child flooded her as Mia rushed after the woman through the dusty courtyard. Five minutes later she was still smiling when she stepped into a tiny, gray-walled visitor’s room with a single video monitor hanging on the wall. Then she raced eagerly toward the figure seated at the table. Only to freeze when the woman looked up and she met his steel-blue gaze. Mia’s breath caught in her throat. Her heart knocked wildly.
Not Shanghai Knight.
Sensing her extreme reluctance toward her visitor, the guard chuckled sadistically and shoved her farther into the room. When the door slammed and Mia was locked inside with him, she backed toward the far wall. Hovering there, she twisted a strand of wet hair around her finger and then nervously tucked it behind her ear.
He stared at her, his mouth curling so insolently, she knew
she must look terrible.
“Come here and sit down,” he commanded coldly. “And smile. Show your dimples. Act like you’re glad to see me. I signed in as your mother.”
“Oh, my God.” Her voice shook.
“Get a grip.” His eyes flicked to the monitors. “They may be watching.”
“I think they’re broken,” she whispered as she slowly made her way to the table.
With stiff fingers, she pulled out a metal chair and then fell heavily into the seat opposite him. For another long moment they stared at each other. His square-jawed face was leaner and harder than she remembered. His eyebrows were still as dark and rich as Texas soil. Despite his feminine attire, he seemed as ruggedly virile as ever. His skin was brown. His blue eyes were the color of cold steel. As always he seemed even bigger than he was.
“As soon as the sun goes down, be in the courtyard,” he whispered.
“But they do a count and lock us…”
“They won’t tonight. Your door will be unlocked.” His mouth curled again, this time with a mixture of cruelty and contempt.
“What are you doing here when you clearly—”
“My personal feelings about you aren’t relevant,” he said.
“You don’t even want to help me.”
“This isn’t about you or me or what you’ve done.” His deep voice held world-weary cynicism.
“I’ve done nothing.”
“Save that line for your mother. She believes your bullshit story.”
“If you hate me so much, why are you here?”
“We have a child, a little girl you never bothered to tell me about. Vanilla.” His voice softened when he said her name.
She swallowed. “I—I tried.”
“Not hard enough.” His voice was savage. Leaning toward her, he grasped her shoulders so hard, his fingers dug through the thin cotton bodice.
“You wouldn’t listen.”
“If you’d tried to tell me about Vanilla half as hard as you tried to get me in bed, I would have heard you. Then no way in hell would I have let you marry my brother!”
“Do you think I wanted to trap you?”
“I think you wanted to trap somebody.”
Suddenly his eyes were on her mouth, and just as suddenly her gaze fell to his. Unwanted heat flared inside her, and she felt the wild tremor in his hands against her damp shoulders. It didn’t matter that he wore lipstick or that hideously ridiculous wig. He was all male, and she was all female. And they both knew it.
She licked her dry lips. Even dressed as he was, his physical nearness had a devastating effect on her.
She wanted to hate him, but despite his self-righteous anger, his nearness stung her into a primitive awareness of him.
Nobody had ever made her feel half so much as he did. She’d grown up knowing he’d saved her life.
Against her will she remembered how many nights she’d dreamed of him.
She was a fool. A stupid, silly little fool.
When he finally let go of her, his mouth was bitter with self-disgust and loathing.
“This is supposed to be an official visit—generously granted to a grieving mother by the corrupt police comandante. I’m supposed to show you pictures of your little girl and my grandchild.” His drawl smoldered.
He looked so ridiculous and ill at ease in his dress and wig, she couldn’t resist a teasing insult.
“Nice outfit. Way better than mine. Can I borrow it—”
His shiny, painted lips tightened. “Don’t—say anything!”
Scowling, he opened his hot-pink purse and began to rummage. Finally he dragged out the same stack of photographs her mother had already shown her.
“I was just kidding. You look bizarre.” She bit her lips to suppress a smile. “Your shoes and purse don’t match. You—”
“Good, then maybe you won’t hit on me.”
“No chance of that,” she whispered.
“Really?” he taunted. “I spent half my life running from you.”
Her stomach lurched.
“You think I’m trash now, don’t you?”
Her directness rendered him speechless.
“I didn’t sleep with Tavio,” she whispered, frantic for him to believe her.
“I don’t care!”
“Okay. I don’t know why I bothered to defend myself—to you, of all people now.”
With shaking fingers, she sifted through the pictures he’d handed her but blushed as she grew too aware of Shanghai watching her.
She hated him for being able to compel her just by sitting across from her.
“I hate you,” she whispered in a low, seething tone. Then she instantly regretted saying anything.
“Good.”
“If it weren’t for that camera, I’d slap the hell out of you!”
“Tavio’s obviously taught you a lot of nasty tricks.” He laughed, and the sound was a rich rumble that infuriated her so much she stomped his toes under the table.
“Ouch, damn it! I’m your beloved mother!”
“Don’t you dare laugh at me!”
He smiled.
“Don’t you dare smile, either!”
“You’d better not step—”
When she kicked his shin harder than she’d stomped his foot, he grabbed her leg under the table. When she squirmed to pull free, his fingers dug painfully into her flesh, and he held on.
“I wish to hell you’d figured out how much you disliked me before you seduced me and got yourself pregnant! Because—now for better or worse—we’re stuck with each other!”
“You can leave for all I care!”
Spreading his fingers wide against her bare skin, he ran his powerful hand up her thigh. “Is that really what you want?”
When his hand lingered caressingly on the inner part of her leg, she grew warm.
His fingers inched up to her panties. “You like me touching you, don’t you?”
Unable to deny it, she went still.
Having proved his point, he grinned and then slowly removed his hand.
“I don’t ever want anything from you again,” she said.
“You want out of here, don’t you?”
He must have taken her silence to mean yes.
“You’re not calling the shots anymore, darlin’. I am. Listen because I’m only going to say this once. You have to do exactly what I say. Exactly. Your life and mine depend on it.”
The chopper hovered above the courtyard and then banked sharply. As guards in the gun towers sounded sirens and mounted rifles onto their shoulders, the chopper dropped like a bomb into the postage stamp-size courtyard, causing a dust storm that made dirt and rocks fly in all directions.
When Mia ran toward the helicopter, Chito suddenly appeared in the opposite corner of the courtyard and took aim at her. Her only chance was to keep running, so she did.
Somebody in the helicopter opened fire, and Chito jumped back behind a doorway. Guns blazed. Bullets ricocheted off the walls, pinging when they hit the chopper’s rotors.
The pilot’s eyes were enormous. She read the exact moment he decided to abort the mission.
“Shanghai! Shanghai!”
Shanghai looked down at her as she raced toward him, her arms outstretched, her eyes pleading.
They were going away! Shanghai was going away!
As the chopper began to climb, she began to scream.
“Don’t leave me, Shanghai!”
The helicopter was eight feet above the ground and spiraling upward rapidly when Shanghai jumped.
Chito fired again.
Landing beside Mia, Shanghai grabbed her by the waist and rolled with her. Chito continued firing at the chopper until it disappeared over the walls. Then he ripped his empty clip out and ran. Without giving Chito time to reload, Shanghai grabbed Mia’s hand and dragged her to her feet. Raising his gun, Shanghai ran right at Chito.
“What are you doing?” Mia yelled. “That’s Chito! Tavio’s right hand man! He’s th
e hitman who’s come to kill me!”
“He’s our only way out then. The bastards have a tunnel somewhere. They’re planning a break. Since your friend got in that way, he’s gotta know where it is. I can’t kill him till he shows us the way out!”
When Chito stopped, Shanghai dropped to his knees and fired twice, aiming high deliberately. “Make tracks, you little shit.”
The tunnel was airless, and Mia had to fight against her fear of suffocation. She could hear Chito’s panicked footsteps stumbling and thrashing up ahead of them as Shanghai pulled her through endless dark passages. The ceiling was so low, she bumped her head several times. The walls were so narrow she scraped herself against them again and again until she felt all wet and sticky. She fell so many times, she was sure she was going to have bruises everywhere.
As she ran, she heard little squeaking sounds at her feet. Rats? She held on to Shanghai’s hand tightly, fearing they’d find worse at the end of the tunnel.
The tunnel grew even narrower. She felt trapped and so totally claustrophobic that she wanted to scream endlessly.
Would more of Tavio’s men be waiting for them? Or would Chito lay in wait to kill them?
Miraculously when they emerged, they found themselves alone in a crumbling cardboard shack in the midst of many others that served as makeshift homes for the homeless. A plastic chair with only three legs lay toppled on its side. A child’s dusty red crocheted cap dangled from a nail. Chito was gone.
She was gulping in fresh air when she looked at her hands and saw that they were covered with blood.
Suppressing a scream, she held up her hands so Shanghai could see.
“Chito’s hit, I think. That’s probably why he cleared out,” Shanghai whispered, his breathing as hoarse as hers.
Dogs barked as Mia and Shanghai crouched in the shack gasping to catch their breath. Chickens cackled outside. People were talking in the dirt street.
Cautioning her to stay down, Shanghai held a finger up to his lips. Before she could protest his leaving her, he was on the other side of the tarp that served as the door. When she heard shouts and he didn’t come back, she began to shake uncontrollably.
Suddenly the shack’s walls seemed to close in as the tunnel’s had. It was all she could do not to run out of the shack calling for him.
