He put both hands on the vanity and leaned in close. His eyes were bloodshot from the emotional moment in the shower, but Xander did not see weakness. He saw a man staring back at him who had found his purpose. Though anyone else on his team could easily have told him that purpose long ago, knowing who you are is something you can only figure out for yourself. He knew now why that fire had been permanently planted inside his soul. It wasn’t as he had always thought. It wasn’t planted there to ruin his life or to make him miserable. It was planted there for no other reason than fuel. Fuel for the machine that he had become. That fire was something that he had always used to do extraordinary things. And now he was finally at peace knowing that it would always be there, waiting for him to tap into when he needed it. It was the thing that had always made him special, and it would be the thing that would carry him through those moments when all hope seemed lost.
As he looked deep inside himself, he could feel that fire burning at that very moment.
White hot.
There would never be another question about what he was to do with his life. The bourbon company, the horse racing, the jet setting, all those things were great. But Xander, at heart, was a soldier. And the only thing that would ever get his full attention for the rest of the time he remained on this earth would be just that.
Fighting for those who couldn’t fight for themselves.
For the first time it had become crystal clear.
It was what he was born to do.
As he realized this, Xander watched a smile grow across his face. It was as if he had just been made whole.
He also realized that whoever was responsible for hurting these young girls was about to pay the ultimate price.
29
Ghost of Battles Past
As Xander King was experiencing a moment of clarity, David Tarter sat behind the wheel of his black Hummer, having the complete opposite kind of moment. Instead of things becoming clear, they had just become incredibly muddied. He slammed his hands against the steering wheel, hard, several times. He was frothing at the mouth. He was so close to getting the job done of delivering a girl for two million dollars, and an unnecessary complication was the last thing he needed. He had just ended a call with his contact on the job, and it appeared that a ghost from his past was somehow hot on his trail.
David and Xander King went way back. And the memories weren’t what you would call fond ones. In fact, Xander had been the reason David and Jon were court-martialed from the Navy. That fact had been burning a hole in David’s gut ever since. As he sat there wondering how it was possible that Xander was involved, he couldn’t wrap his mind around it. He heard stories of Xander leaving Special Ops to go vigilante, and he heard about what happened in Paris a few months back, but why he would be involved in this baffled David.
This changed everything. Though he wasn’t scared of Xander, he couldn’t help but remember the caliber of soldier he was.
“You finished with your little hissy fit?” David’s partner, Jon, finally said. “Who cares if Xander is involved?”
David turned toward him. The Los Angeles sunshine blasted through the front windshield and aided in hardening David’s scowl.
“We all better care.”
“Come on, David. That little rich boy ain’t gonna do shit,” Jon said.
“Do I have to remind you how exactly it is that we came to be sitting here?”
David rolled down his window, picked up a pack of cigarettes from the console, lit one, and took a moment. He wanted Jon to take a moment as well. As he sucked on the cigarette, he transported himself back to Afghanistan. Back into that small little hut of a house. And back to the sights, smells, and sounds that brought an end to his and Jon’s military careers. Their SEAL team had just cleared a small village, and he and Jon thought they may as well be rewarded for their trouble. Most of the other SEALs knew this sort of thing went on, but they didn’t partake. They also didn’t interfere. The women there weren’t human to David. They were trash. So he had always felt he could do whatever he wanted with them. It didn’t matter if they were good-looking or not. War was lonely, and they were still women, even though it was hard to tell that by the clothes they wore.
All the other team members had moved on that night. David and Jon thought they had the woman to themselves. But one young, cocky, self-righteous son of a bitch had doubled back to make sure the two of them were okay. And when he found them on top of that woman, he couldn’t just close the door and leave well enough alone.
“No, asshole. I don’t need reminded,” Jon said. “I remember exactly how Xander chose that Muslim bitch over his own brothers. At first, when he walked in, I thought he was just jealous ’cause we had found her first.”
David smirked.
“Didn’t you offer for him to join?”
“Yeah, that’s what set him off.”
“That, or it could have been her squealing,” David said. His smirk grew into a proud smile.
Jon returned the smile.
“I’ve never seen a guy fight like that, though. Damn he was strong. My nose is still crooked from that night.”
David tossed his cigarette butt out the window, his face scrunched in disgust.
“Fuck that son of a bitch. Only reason he got the best of us that night was because we were literally caught with our pants down.”
“I agree, that’s why I don’t understand why you care. You ask me, this is a good thing.”
“Good thing,” David furthered his scowl. “How the hell is a complication a good thing?”
“Because now, not only do we get to make two million for a relatively easy job, but we also might get revenge.”
David was quiet for a moment. He felt the scowl on his face slowly move to intrigue. The thought of taking down Xander King was almost as good as the two million dollars.
Jon said, “See. It’s a good thing.”
David picked up his phone and scrolled to his brother’s name in his contacts and tapped to call him.
“This changes everything,” David said to Jon while the phone rang.
“How do you mean?”
“If we do get a shot at King, which hopefully we are long gone before he ever knows what happened, we can’t be having any amateur bullshit mucking this up. Get ahold of the crew and tell them to get to the airport early. We need to have a meeting.”
Jon nodded and went to his phone.
David told his brother over the phone. “Tommy, you and Lisa get here ASAP. We need to talk.”
“But we are in the middle of—”
“I don’t give a damn what you’re doing. Things have changed. Get here, now.”
David ended the call. Francisco’s plane was set to arrive in the next hour. He knew they needed to regroup. He didn’t have any idea how much Xander knew about where they were, or where they would be taking the girl, but they all had to assume he would find out, and they needed to be ready.
Jon said, “The men are on their way over. You’re going to cut your brother and sister out of this, aren’t you?”
“I’ll still pay them for their trouble, but there is no way in hell they are ready for what’s coming tonight. If we should happen to run into King.”
“Agreed,” Jon said. “Are we ready?”
David lit another cigarette, opened the truck’s door, and nodded for Jon to follow him. The lift gate opened, and the two of them walked around to the back of the Hummer. David lifted a black tarp, revealing a large cache of high-powered weaponry. Everything from a Barrett .50-caliber sniper rifle to an AirTronic GS-777 rocket launcher.
David smiled through his cigarette as he puffed a cloud of smoke into the air.
“You’re damn right we’re ready.”
30
Better Than Nothing
“Told you so,” Xander told Sam.
Sam looked up at him from her phone. Her expression was not what you would call amused. “Are you going to follow that up with a nanna-nanna-boo-boo
? How old are you again?”
Xander made an “oooh” face at Kyle.
“Well,” she said, “this certainly isn’t Gabriela.”
The picture on the screen of her phone was sent to her by Marv. It was of the undercover FBI agent, Eliza Sanchez, and she looked nothing like Gabriela. The woman in the photo was more J.No than J.Lo.
“So this is no help to us?” Kyle said.
Sam closed out the picture and turned toward Xander and Kyle. “Not really, no. And they do not know Eliza’s current location, so we can’t be sure if she is working with Francisco, the criminals taking possession of the child, or neither. But we have to assume that she is at least in bed with one of them. There isn’t another explanation for how they found us in Mazatlán.”
“Any other useful information?” Xander asked.
“Nothing useful. Nothing at all really. Only where she went to school, the date they made her an agent, and so on.”
Jack leaned in. “They check ya pretty good when ya go into the FBI. Anything about her family?”
“None to speak of. Her parents died when she was young. She bounced around the system for a while until she landed in a foster home as a teenager. Nothing noteworthy there about the foster parents.”
Xander didn’t like the sound of any of this. Knowledge is power. So far, they had almost zero power. Other than knowing that Francisco Romero is involved, they really knew nothing. They didn’t even know if the FBI agent, Eliza Sanchez, was compromised or not. And if she was, they didn’t know her location. They didn’t know where Francisco was going with the girl he captured. They had no clue who was going to be taking possession of her when he did get where he was going.
They had nothing.
Until Sam’s phone rang.
“It’s Marv,” she told the group. She put the call on speakerphone. “Hello?”
“Sam, I have good news.”
“Let us have it, Marv,” Xander said.
“Hey, Xander. Sorry this has been so confusing. We will be doing a full investigation into how the FBI handles their agents after this.”
“What’s the news?” Xander cut to the chase.
“Right. All three of the planes out of Mazatlán are definitely going up the coast of California. We are certain, due to the timing of it all, that one of them is Francisco.”
“Great, where are they?”
“You aren’t too far behind them actually. About an hour, I’d say. And you are quickly gaining on them. Both your jet and these planes are following the same path. I’d bet my job he’s going to land somewhere in Los Angeles.”
Xander and Sam looked at each other and smiled.
“That is good news, Marv,” Xander said.
“Doing all we can from here. I’ll keep tabs and let you know where they land. But for now, I would just stay the course where you are going. You have to get those girls off the plane and out of harm’s way before you go after him anyway.”
“Sounds good, Marv.”
“I’ll be doing my best to track down this Agent Sanchez. My bet is that if we find her, we’ll find whoever is running the trafficking ring from the US end of the trade.”
“I agree. Talk soon, my man.” Xander nodded that he was finished.
Sam ended the call. “All right, at least we have something.”
“Better than nothing,” Xander agreed. “All I have to do is get my hands on Francisco. He’ll be begging me to find the others involved in this thing after that.”
“So we’ll stay the course then,” Sam said. “Hopefully by the time we hand over the girls to the FBI waiting for us at LAX, we’ll have more to go on. I just hope the hour we’re behind won’t be long enough for Francisco to make the handoff.”
“All the more reason we need more information about Eliza Sanchez. She is the key to this thing. We find her, we find the second party involved in this trafficking ring.”
31
The Ultimate Betrayal
David Tarter was holding court in the corner of the parking lot at the private terminal at the Burbank Airport. This end of the airport was mostly unknown, and due to its proximity to downtown Los Angeles and the movie studios, it was mostly frequented by celebrities who craved a little discretion. For Tarter, as well as Francisco Romero, discretion was the word of the day. Employees at this terminal were trained to keep their mouths shut, making this the perfect place to transfer their package.
David was going over the plan with his team of ten ex-military men. He had worked with all of them previously, and that was the way he liked it. No surprises. The eleventh man on the team was up in the tower. David had done a tour with him back in Afghanistan, and for twenty-five thousand dollars he would be helping to get Francisco’s plane in without anyone noticing. He was explaining all of this to the team behind his black Hummer and their three black vans that were parked side by side. He had Jon add signage to the sides of the van advertising: Whistle Dry Cleaning. “If it’s not clean as a whistle, it’s not Whistle Dry Cleaning.” Jon had taken the liberty of adding the punchy slogan. David wasn’t amused.
As he finished explaining how they would get the girl, and how they would split off, each van ending at a separate destination with only one arriving at the real drop, Tommy and Lisa pulled into the parking spots adjacent to the vans.
Tommy got out of the car with haste, and David could see very clearly that he wasn’t happy.
“You started the meeting without us?” Tommy said.
David turned, stalked over to Tommy, and grabbed him by the shirt, quickly putting an end to the questioning.
Lisa remained in her car. She was going to let Tommy get it out of his system before she approached. She knew David was a ticking time bomb, and she knew that Tommy coming at him in front of his men wasn’t going to end well. She tried to tell him, but Tommy never listens. Besides that, she had no idea what she was going to do. She hadn’t slept at all the night before. The thought of selling a young girl to some rich monster, to rape her and do whatever else he pleased to her, made her sick. This had felt wrong from the first time David mentioned this was the next job. It went against every fiber of her being. But she was lodged directly in between a rock and a hard place.
She owed money to the wrong people. They would kill her if she didn’t pay them back. But how could she ever live with herself if she not only let David do this but was a part of it herself? Her palms were sweating. Her heart was thudding. And her stomach was tied up in knots. She glanced out the window and watched David grab Tommy by the shirt and toss him against the back side of the van. How did she get herself into this mess? People, innocent people were going to die if she didn’t put a stop to it. As she watched David assault Tommy, she flashed back to David beating that cop half to death the night before. He was crazy. He didn’t care who got hurt, and ultimately she knew that included her.
She had to stop him.
Lisa sent up a silent prayer as she pulled out her phone and dialed the number that was sure to be her downfall. She had backed herself into this corner, trying to remain loyal.
She realized in that moment that loyalty to the wrong people was the quickest way to bring yourself down.
David smashed his forearm into Tommy’s throat as he pinned him against the van. How dare he come at him in front of his own men. Brother or not, that disrespect could not be tolerated. Rage flooded his body. He needed to make an example of Tommy.
David drew back his right hand and threw it forward, smashing Tommy in the gut. Tommy let out a grunt, then dropped to his knees.
“You’re out!” David shouted, towering over his much smaller brother.
Tommy looked up, but he couldn’t speak. There was no air left in his lungs. Instead, he held his stomach and coughed for a breath.
“Both of you! I should never have brought either one of you in on this one. It is way above your pay grade. Get off your knees and get the hell out of my sight.”
Tommy gasped a few more times but still
couldn’t find words. David heard Lisa’s car door open, so he turned his rage toward her.
“Come get your good-for-nothing brother, and both of you get the hell back to San Diego!”
Lisa was barely out of her car, and David had already started in on her. Screaming at her to get her brother. He was psycho. This only confirmed that she had just made the right decision. And for whatever reason, he was yelling at her, telling her she was out. Out? Could he really mean it? This was perfect. She could just go and grab Tommy, and get the hell out of there just in time.
“Are you deaf, Lisa? Come get your brother and get the hell out of here.”
She had heard him correctly. It was a miracle. Lisa rounded her car and walked straight toward Tommy, who was on his knees gasping for air.
“Jesus, David. What did you do to him?”
Why was she talking to him? Just pick up Tommy and get the hell out of there. Don’t make things worse, it would all be over soon.
“Just get him the hell out of my sight. Go back to San Diego and boost some cars or something useful. This big boy shit ain’t for the two of you.”
David had given her an out, and she wasn’t going to wait around for him to blow another gasket. She walked over to Tommy and helped him to his feet. He was still gasping for air. While she was on the phone in the car, David must have hit him. Unbelievable. His own flesh and blood. She was so glad she wouldn’t have to deal with David anymore. She was finally going to be able to do some good. Make a difference in the world. She could finally be on the right side of things and make sure people like her foster brother, David, never hurt anyone else again.
King's Reign (The Xander King Series Book 4) Page 14
