by Various
“You kill my father, so you die, gringo. You have no right to be in my country.”
“Your drug and gun money was making inroads in my town, bastardo. My town.”
The kid was dark with a permanent Mezcayan tan. With one brown hand he’d lifted a cigarette to his pretty mouth; with the other he’d carefully centered the cold barrel on Phillip’s forehead.
“Your town?”
Xavier’s eyes were scarily irrational in his pretty-boy face. His finger had pulled back the trigger ever so slightly. “Bang. Bang, gringo. Your town is going to be my town.”
Before Phillip could argue, the thick, acrid cigarette smoke from the kid’s cigarette had made him wretch. Hell, maybe puking up his guts had saved him. Instead of firing his gun, Xavier had burst out into hysterical laughter and shrieked, “Cobarde. Coward.”
Then the bastardo had danced a little jig.
“Tengo sed. I’m thirsty,” Phillip had said.
Xavier had smiled that pretty smile. “So—drink this!” He’d pitched the cigarette into the vomit in front of Phillip’s face.
Bastardos. His death was a game to them. Phillip Westin, ex-Marine, had been handpicked for the Alpha Force. His usual style was spit-and-polish perfect.
He wouldn’t be a pretty corpse. He wouldn’t even rate a body bag in this hellhole compound that was hidden deep in Mezcayan mountains and rain forest.
There’d be no military honors at his funeral. No funeral, period. No beautiful woman to weep over his grave back home in south Texas.
Suddenly a blond goddess, no a witch, seemed to float above him in the misty black.
Oh, God…. Just when he was weak, wet, shaking and puking with fear, he had to think of her—the icy, trampy witch, who’d walked out on him. Usually, the witch was satisfied to haunt his dreams. When he was awake, he was disciplined enough to keep his demons and witches at bay.
But he was weak and cold…so cold and feverish a spasm shook him…and so scared about dying he could think only of her.
Anger slammed him when her sulky, smoky voice began to sing the love song she’d written about their doomed relationship.
He jerked at his ropes, and to his surprise they loosened just a bit. “Go away! Leave me alone!” he yelled into the steamy darkness.
The perverse phantom draped her curvy body against the black wall and sang louder.
Nobody but you/Only you.
“Shut up,” he growled even as every cell in his body began to quiver as he fisted and unfisted his fingers in an attempt to free his hands.
I had to say goodbye…but everywhere I go…there’s nobody in my heart…only you….
Her husky voice had his head pounding. He dug his fingernails into his palms. Suddenly to his surprise, he jerked his right hand free of the ropes. “Damn you, shut the hell up!”
And yet I had to say goodbye, the witch crooned.
“Tramp! You’re just a one-hit wonder. You know that, don’t you?”
That shut her up, but she didn’t go away. Instead, that sad, vulnerable expression that could tie him in knots came into her eyes, which shone brilliantly in the dark. Her golden hair fell in silken coils around her slim shoulders.
Hell. She looked like a little lost sex kitten in need of a home and a warm bed. His home. His bed.
Oh, God, all she ever had to do was look at him like that and all he wanted to do was to hold her and to protect her and to make love to her. What would he give to have her one more time before he died?
Everything—
His gut cramped as he clawed his cot with his free hands. He remembered exactly how her hair smelled, how her skin smelled, how her blue eyes flashed with tears if he got too domineering. She’d had a fearsome talent for gentling him.
Escape. He had to escape.
His hands shook. He closed his eyes and tried not to remember how small she was or how perfectly she’d fit him.
Think of something else! Like getting out of here!
But when he swallowed, he tasted her. One taste, and he was as hard as a brick.
Somehow he got the ropes around his ankles loose, but when he tried to stand, the black walls spun and he fell back onto the cot. Weak as he was, his groin pulsed with desire. Hell. The proximity of death was the best aphrodisiac.
Damn Celeste Cavanaugh. He’d asked her to be his wife, to marry him. What a damn fool he’d been to do that. Hell, he’d picked her up in a bar. No. Damn it. He’d rescued her from a bar brawl. She’d been a nobody from the gutter, the prettiest, sexiest little nobody in the whole world with a voice like an angel.
He’d lifted her out of that life, given her everything, and treated her like a lady. She’d moved in with him and they’d played at love and marriage. Why the hell hadn’t she bothered to tell him about her ridiculous ambition to be a country-western star? Why hadn’t she at least given him a chance to understand it?
As soon as she’d gotten on her feet, she’d run to Vegas with another man. Phillip had come home from a dangerous mission in the Middle East where he’d gone to rescue his buddies.
His homecoming had been delayed because he’d been captured and had had a narrow escape.
But once home again, he’d thrown his seabag down at the door, stalked through the ranch house, calling her name. God, all those days and nights when he’d been a hostage trapped in that cell in the Middle East, he’d been burning up for her. Just like now.
She’d left him a letter on his pillow.
“I met a man, who’s going to get me an audition with a world-famous producer, Larry Martin. I’ll call you from Vegas.” She’d said her stage name was Stella Lamour.
There had been more letters in the mailbox from Stella. After he’d read and reread those letters, every word carving his heart out, something had died inside him. Maybe his feelings.
Forget her.
But he couldn’t. Seven years later, she still starred in all his dreams.
When he died down here, she wouldn’t even know. The bastardos would sling his bloody corpse into the jungle, and he’d rot. In this rain and heat and mud, he’d be fertilizer in less than a month.
You’re an ex-Marine. Forget her.
When he tried to stand again, he passed out and dreamed he was back home in Texas dancing with her at the Lone Star Country Club while his Marine buddies cheered and clapped.
He regained consciousness to heat that was as thick and dark as a sauna, to no-see-ums eating him alive. To explosions and heavy boots stomping down some corridor.
Dawn. Time to die.
Was there a weepy, pink light sifting through the single crack in the ceiling or was he hallucinating again?
Shouts in Spanish were followed by more heavy footsteps. Then the lock on the heavy door clicked. The door banged. Flashlights danced in the dark, blinding him.
“Xavier?” Westin squinted. Terror gripped him like a fist. He felt so weak and vulnerable he muttered a quick prayer.
Cobarde. Xavier’s contempt still stung.
In those last fleeting seconds before certain death, Phillip’s life flashed in front of him in neon color—his lonely childhood in his mother’s Houston mansion with all those rooms that echoed as a solitary little boy walked through them in search of love.
Nobody had ever wanted him…until Patricia, his college sweetheart. For a time she’d seemed so perfect, but in the end, she hadn’t wanted him enough to understand his determination to see the world and become a Marine.
Neither had Celeste. Both his loves had left him.
The flashlight zeroed in on his face, blinding him again. What was the use? He held up his hands in surrender. All he said was, “If you’re going to kill me, just be done with it.”
Cobarde.
“Not tonight, sir,” said a familiar respectful voice that slammed Westin back to his days in the Marines, back to the Gulf War. Phillip’s eyelids stung when he tried to stand. Once again his legs crumpled beneath his weight. The lights spun and he nearly fainted.
“Friends,” came that familiar, husky voice that made Phillip’s eyes go even hotter.
“Tyler….”
Westin blinked. Ty Murdoch, his handsome face painted black and green, his night-vision glasses dangling against his broad chest, towered above him like a warrior god.
“Tyler—”
Phillip was trying to stand but was falling again when Tyler’s strong arms grabbed him and slung him over his broad back in a fireman’s lift.
“You’re going home,” a woman said.
“Celeste?”
Before the beautiful woman could answer, Phillip fainted.
He was going home. Home to Celeste.
When he opened his eyes, they were beyond the compound, hunkering low in the tangle of bushes on the edge of the lavish lawns. Dimly he was aware of the pretty woman cradling his head in her lap.
“Celeste?”
He was sweating and freezing at the same time.
An eternity later he looked up and saw a chopper coming in hot, kicking up dust and gravel before settling on the ground.
A rock that felt like a piece of hot metal gouged Phillip’s cheek.
“Damn.”
Then Ty was back lifting him, up…up…into the chopper. They took off in a hurry. They were going home.
Home to Celeste.
He shut his eyes and saw Celeste…blond and pretty, her eyes as blue as a Texas sky. She was crying, her cheeks glistening. The image, even if it was false, was better than a funeral.
Phillip’s hand shook as he lifted the razor. He paused, staring at the gaunt face with the slash across the cheek. It had been seven days since the rescue, and he was still as weak as a baby.
When the infirmary door slammed open, he jumped like a scared girl, panicking at the sound of boots because they reminded him of Xavier. The razor fell into the sink with a clatter.
In the mirror, the dark-haired stranger with the hollowed-out silver eyes was pathetic. By comparison the darkly handsome man who strode up behind him was disgustingly robust.
“Mercado?”
Ricky flashed his daredevil grin. “Good to see you up and about.”
“Yeah.” Westin had to grip the sink with tight fingers so he wouldn’t fall. No way was he walking back to the hospital bed. No way would he let Mercado gloat at how wobbly he was.
“After this, you’d better lay low, amigo. You stirred up a hornet’s nest.”
“You think I don’t know that.”
“El Jefe’s big. And not just down here. They’re well connected in Texas.”
“Why the hell do you think I came down—”
“These guys won’t give up. They’ll be gunning for you and yours.”
“There is no yours. She left me, remember.” Phillip shut up. He didn’t want to talk about her.
Still, Mercado was one of the few who knew about Celeste. Most of his buddies believed he’d never gotten over his first love, Patricia, the classy girl he’d loved in college—the proper girl. It was better that way, better not to cry on their shoulders about a trashy singer he’d picked up in a bar and been stupid enough to fall for.
“Yeah, and Celeste’s the reason you’ve had a death wish for seven damn years.”
“Shut up.”
“You’re forty-one, amigo. ”
“You make that sound old.”
“Too old for this line of work.”
“This was personal. You know that. The bastards were moving into Mission Creek. They were using kids to run guns. Kids—”
“Why don’t you go back to your ranch? Find a nice, churchgoing girl, get married and hatch some rug rats.”
“Sounds like fun. What about you? You straight? Or are you gonna run arms for the family?
What the hell were you doing down there?”
Mercado scowled. “Saving your ass.”
“You had some help.”
“What does it take? A declaration written in blood. Like I told you—I’m straight.”
“You’d better be.”
His face and eyes dark with pain, Mercado shut up and stared at the floor. Phillip felt instant remorse. “Ty told me you were useful in the Mezcaya rescue,” Phillip admitted.
“I’m surprised he said—”
“He did. Thanks. I owe you…for what you did for Ty. And for me.”
Suddenly Westin was no longer in the mood to question the character of a man who’d helped save him. The heated exchange had left him so weak, Mercado’s dark face began to swirl.
His fingers couldn’t seem to hold on to the sink. No way could he shave.
“Oh, God,” he muttered as the gray tiles rushed up to meet him.
Mercado lunged, barely catching him before he fell.
“Find that nice girl,” Mercado muttered. “Lean on my arm, old buddy, and we’ll get you back to bed.”
“Hell. I don’t go for nice girls. I like ’em hot…and shameless.”
“Maybe it’s time for a change of pace…in your old age.”
“Old age?” Stung, Phillip almost howled. The truth was, a ninety-year-old was stronger than he was. Oh, God, why was it such a damn struggle to put one foot in front of the other? When he finally made it to the bed, he was gasping for every breath. He let go of Mercado and fell backward.
His head slammed into the pillow. Even so, they both managed a weak laugh.
“Get the hell out of here, Mercado.”
“Forget shameless. Find that churchgoing girl, old man.”
Mercado waved jauntily and saluted. Then the door banged behind him and he was gone.
Chapter 1
Stella Lamour grabbed her guitar and glided out of the storeroom Harry let her use as a dressing room. After all, a star had to have a dressing room. She tried to ignore the fact that the closet was stacked with cases of beer, cocktail napkins and glasses…and that the boxy, airless room gave her claustrophobia when she shut the door.
Some dressing room…. Some star….
As Stella approached the corner to make her entrance, she cocked her glossy head at an angle so that her long yellow hair rippled flirtily down her slim, bare back. At thirty-two, she was still beautiful, and she knew it. Just as she knew how to use it.
“Fake it till you make it, baby,” Johnny, her ex-manager, always said.
Fake it? For how much longer? In this business and this city, beauty was everything, at least for a woman. Every day younger, fresher girls poured into Vegas, girls with big dreams just like hers. Johnny signed them all on, too.
Hips swaying, Stella moved like a feral cat, her lush, curvy, petite body inviting men to watch, not that there were many to do so tonight. There was a broad-shouldered hunk at the bar. He gave her the once-over. Her slanting, thickly- lashed, blue eyes said, “You can look, but keep your distance, big boy—this is my territory.”
Johnny Silvers, her no-good ex-manager, who liked fast cars and faster women, had taught Stella how to move, how to walk, how to hold her head, how to look like a star—how to fake it.
Some star. The closest she’d come was to warm the crowd up before the real star came on stage.
Now she’d sunk to Harry’s.
Harry’s was a dead-end bar in downtown Vegas, a hangout for middle-aged retreads, divorcées, widowers, alcoholics, burned-out gamblers—a dimly lit refuge for the flotsam and jetsam who couldn’t quite cut it in real life and were too broke to make their play in the hectic, brightly lit casinos on the strip. They were searching for new lives and new loves. Not that they could do more in Harry’s than drown their sorrows and take a brief time-out before they resumed their panicky quests.
In a few more years, I’ll be one of them, Stella thought as she grimly shoved a chair aside on her way to the bar.
Her slinky black dress was so tight across the hips, she had to stand at her end of the bar when she finally reached it. She’d put on a pound, maybe two. Not good, not when the new girls kept getting younger and slimmer.
Mo, the bart
ender, nodded hello and handed her her Saturday night special—water with a juicy lime hanging on the edge of her glass. She squeezed the lime, swirled the water in the glass. Wetting her lips first, she took a long, cool sip.
Aside from Mo and a single, shadowy male figure at the other end of the bar, Harry’s was empty tonight. There wasn’t a single retread. So, the only paying customer was the wide-shouldered hunk she’d seen come in earlier. She knew men. He was no retread.
There was a big arms-dealer conference in Vegas. For some reason, she imagined he might be connected to the conference. He was hard-edged. Lean and tall and trim. He had thick brown hair. She judged he was around thirty. Something about him made her think of the way Phillip looked in his uniform. Maybe it was the man’s air of authority.
Just thinking about Phillip made her remember another bar seven years ago when she’d been a raw kid, singing her heart out, not really caring where she was as long as she could sing.
She’d gotten herself in a real jam that night. Lucky for her, or maybe not so lucky as it turned out, Phillip Westin had walked in.
Just the memory of Phillip in that brawl—he’d been wonderful—made her pulse quicken again. It had been four drunks against one Marine, but a Marine whose hands were certified weapons. In the end Phillip had carried her out to his motorcycle, and they’d roared off in the dark. He’d been so tender and understanding that first night, so concerned about her. What had impressed her the most about him was that he hadn’t tried to seduce her. They’d talked all night in a motel and had only ended up in bed a couple of days later.
The sex had been so hot, they’d stayed in that motel bed for a week, making wild, passionate love every day and every night, even eating meals in bed, until finally they were so exhausted, they could only lie side by side laughing because they felt like a pair of limp noodles. When they’d come up for air, she’d said she’d never be able to walk again. And he’d said he’d never get it up again. She’d taken that as a challenge and proved him wrong. Oh, so deliciously wrong. Afterward, he’d asked her to marry him.
She’d said, “I don’t even know you.”
And he said, “Just say maybe.”
“Maybe,” she’d purred.
