“Out front.”
“How far to the staging area.”
“Half hour.”
“We need to be there in fifteen minutes.”
“I’ll start the motor.”
Majors exited the house while Stone stepped over the bodies in the hallway to the bedroom where he collected the Tote Bag of Whoop Ass and slung it over his shoulder. He grabbed the small suitcase with his clothes and some additional gear and joined Majors out in the Land Rover.
Majors left the curb in front of the safe house.
There was no sign of cops.
“Strange, huh?” Majors said.
“Not really, considering a cop tipped off the cartel.”
“You think?”
“I doubt it was our D.E.A. contact. We need to go pay Officer Morales a visit.”
“No time right now.”
“That’s okay,” Stone said. “I’ll deal with him later.”
As Majors made a turn heading for the freeway, Stone stole a glance down the block from the safe house. He didn’t see any kids playing in the street any longer. He hoped they made it indoors before the bullets started flying. It must have been awful growing up in this environment, he thought.
Just another reason to destroy the cartels and everything they stood for.
He sat forward. There would be time to consider the collateral damage later. Right now, he needed to get to Amaya Olmos before it was too late.
If it wasn’t already too late.
Her arms felt numb. They were stretched out on either side, immobile. As Amaya Olmos regained consciousness, she looked left and right and saw her wrists were tied, the ropes going from her wrists to the legs of the table on which she lay flat on her back.
Her ankles were similarly tied.
She still had her clothes on. No wounds that she could see.
She lay back and tried to breathe normally.
Only a bulb dangling from the ceiling above her lit the room. Bare concrete walls and a bare concrete floor. The surrounding shadows may have covered exits, but she couldn’t tell. She tried to move her arms and legs again, but there was no use in wasting the energy. She was firmly bound to the table. Nothing to do but wait.
She’d been talking to Jackeline before being chloroformed from behind, explaining to her about Devlin Stone and his soon-to-be-revealed plans. When she exited Jackeline’s room and called Stone to tell him about the conversation, a very strong arm wrapped around her neck followed by a wet rag with a foul scent and then darkness. She’d dropped her phone after screaming; hopefully Stone knew she was in danger and was on his way to grab Jackeline. Amaya didn’t care what happened to her as long as Jackeline and the kids were safe.
Why was she still alive? The answer dawned on her as a door squeaked open.
Valdes needed her alive to find out who the mole was.
Assuming, of course, that she knew.
Why take over an organization if you have a spy already in the ranks? It kind of defeated the whole purpose.
So she might be able to buy herself some time. The longer he took with her, the greater opportunity Devlin Stone had to get to Jackeline and the kids.
Especially the kids. She couldn’t help but look on them as if they were her own.
They weren’t, but she was an auntie to them. She hoped she’d be an auntie to them for a long time to come.
Slow footsteps. Getting closer. Amaya’s pulse quickened.
Manny Valdes stepped into the light.
“We meet again,” he said.
She said nothing. She started repeating a mantra in her head. Stay calm.
“It’s just us down here,” he said. “My men are upstairs with orders not to come down here no matter how much screaming they hear.”
Stay calm. Stay calm. Stay calm.
Her pulse thundered in her skull.
“You’re not dead because I need information,” Valdes said. “I suppose you already figured that out, just like you already figured out that I’m taking over the cartel and merging with Beltrain-Leyva and Plancarte. Brilliant idea, isn’t it? We’ll be unstoppable. At least, once you can your bitch whore are out of the way.”
Amaya pressed her lips together.
“No witty comeback?” Valdes laughed. “What is it with you two, anyway? Are you lovers?”
Amaya said nothing. She didn’t blink as he fiery gaze bored into Valdes’s face.
“It’s not a problem if you are,” he said. “I’ll still respect you even if I’m jealous I never got to see you two go down on each other.” He laughed.
He moved his left hand to his hip. Amaya looked. He wore a pistol on the right side and a knife on the left.
The stainless-steel blade shined in the light. He held it casually, as if about the slice a steak. Amaya’s stoic expression changed a little. Fright entered her eyes.
“We’re just going to have a little talk,” he said. He carefully lay the side of the blade against her cheek. It was cold. She shivered. He slowly moved it from her cheek to her chin, letting the razor edge rub against her skin. She didn’t feel it cut, but her body started to shake in response anyway.
He rubbed the blade along her other cheek.
“You’re a real cutie,” he said. “Kinda nerdy-hot without the glasses.”
The razor edge crossed her chin again. He moved to the other cheek once again and Amaya stiffened as she realized he was mentally masturbating to her and the blade was his penis.
What would the climax be? Plunging the knife into her?
Worse?
Stay calm. Stay calm. Stay calm.
But the mantra wasn’t working.
“I bet you look very nice under your clothes.”
The blade drifted to her button-down flannel shirt. She looked like a farm girl with the shirt and her tight Levis. He didn’t bother with the buttons. He grabbed the fabric and used the blade to slice down the front, the tearing sound almost like a shriek from a crow as the first whimper finally escaped Amaya’s lips.
Valdes stopped, smiled. “You can make noises!”
Amaya pressed her lips together.
The slicing continued. Already her green bra was exposed, her breasts heaving up and down as she breathed, the cups restraining the soft womanly fresh but that same flesh acting as if it wanted to escape confinement. The padding hid her nipples, which she felt hardening in the room’s chill despite the fright running through her bloodstream.
He reached her belt and tugged the rest of the shirt free, slashed with the knife, and flung the fabric open on either side, as if he’d sliced open a fish. She lay there bound and trembling, her stomach quivering, breasts heaving, a sheen of sweat forming on her olive skin.
She shut her eyes tight.
She knew she would die in this room. If she could only hold out long enough for Stone to do his work. . .
Manny Valdes shifted uncomfortably as his bulging hard-on stretched against the front of his pants.
He’d never looked at Amaya Olmos with sex in mind, but “gutting” her like a fish was turning him on like nothing else.
“Tell me who the mole is,” Valdes said, leaning close to her face. “I cannot have a spy in the ranks.”
Amaya’s mouth briefly twisted and she spat in his face. He recoiled, his left hand swinging, striking her. Amaya’s head jerked to one side, the sound of his hand striking her flesh like a gunshot in a quiet room. She made no sound. He wiped his face, examining the sheen of sweat on her body, the round and inviting breasts contained within her bra. He took the knife out and sliced the bra open, flinging both cups to the side. Amaya’s hard nipples poked out at him as each breast drooped to one side. She let out another whimper, biting her bottom lip to keep more sounds from coming out.
“I’m going to break you,” Valdes said. “You are going to tell me what I want to know.”
She finally raised her voice. “I don’t know who it is!”
“Jackeline has to know something. She has to have
told you.”
He reached for her left breasts, fingering the protruding nipple in the center of the pink areola, and twisted as hard as he could.
Amaya screamed. The scream reached a volume that made Valdes wince as the sound bounced off the concrete walls.
Valdes let go.
Amaya stopped screaming, now breathing fast, trying to shift her body despite the restraints and finding no freedom of movement.
Valdes leaned close to her ear.
“This is going to get worse,” he said.
Chapter Nine
“Tell me what you know.”
“I know nothing!”
Valdes glided the edge of the knife across one nipple, then the other, then moved the blade across the smooth valley between her womanly mounds to her stomach. Her tummy quivered some more. She gasped.
Valdes put the knife away and reached for the button and zipper of her jeans. The button popped open easy. He worked the zipper down and tugged the jeans down a little, jerking hard to get the denim to move out from under her plump bottom. Her Victoria’s Secret panties matched what remained of her bra. Valdes reached out and ran two fingers over the front of the panties, feeling the bumps of her labia. He jerked the panties aside. Her vagina was perfectly shaved, as smooth as what he’d find on a ten-year-old girl.
He grinned. “I never knew you shaved,” he said. “I figured you’d be a bear down there.”
She cursed him.
“Manners,” he said. The way her legs were spread and bound to the table, he couldn’t get the jeans off any further. To untie her ankles risked her kicking him, and he didn’t want to spend too much time trying to slice through the denim. He used the knife to slice away her panties instead, the cotton tearing easy, and he tossed the pieces onto the floor and left her exposed.
His erection was growing harder. Lust burned inside him. He wanted to badly penetrate her but her body, basically in the middle of the table, was too far away from the edge of the table for him to reach.
Of course, he could use her mouth.
Until she clamped her teeth on his cock so hard, she might bite it in half.
He sighed. There might be no way to have fun with her before the ending.
So back to business.
“Tell me who the traitor is.”
“I don’t know!”
Valdes’s arm flashed and he slammed the tip of the knife into the table, Amaya’s eyes popping open, another squeak of fear escaping her lips.
“Who has been telling the D.E.A. and our government about our shipments?”
“I don’t know!”
“You’re lying!”
“I don’t know, I swear!”
“I could rape you to death.” He unzipped his fly and took out his cock. It looked like a baseball bat, hanging out in the open. “I’ve never wanted you before but all I want is to have you now. Do you want that?”
“I don’t know who the traitor is!”
“Why hasn’t Jackeline tried to find out?”
“You’d have to ask her!”
“I’m going to kill her.”
“Then you better look elsewhere for your answers--”
Valdes couldn’t stand it any longer.
Amaya’s words choked off as he twisted her head to the side and forced his erection into her warm, wet mouth, shoving deep until he felt the back of her throat tickle the tip of his throbbing cock. She started to gag, her eyes watering, a muffled scream making her mouth vibrate and that felt amazing. Valdes let the pleasure wash over him and pulled out, leaving a trail of saliva between his shaft and her lips. Amaya hacked, choked, trying to spit. She finally started to cry.
Valdes slapped his cock onto her cheek and started rubbing it against his face, leaving smears of saliva and pre-cum. He held her head in place with his free hand and started stroking himself with his left hand, breathing hard, the pressure building in the tip of his penis, and before he knew it, he splashed semen onto her face. The milky fluid trickled down her cheek, under her nose. She clamped her mouth shut as the semen reached her lips, but he forced her mouth open so it dripped inside. She reacted, spitting some more, her body rocking with a coughing fit.
He stepped back, put his dick away and zipped his pants.
Amaya’s coughs turned to sobs once again. Her body tightened and strained against the ropes. It was no use. She was firmly in his power.
But even that power was limited.
Valdes regarded her curiously. If she didn’t know who the traitor was, perhaps Jackeline was keeping the information private. Somebody had to know, and the cartel queen certainly was one who would.
Valdes blinked. A chill raced up his neck.
“She is the traitor,” he said.
Amaya froze. Her eyes locked with his. She uttered not a sound.
“She is,” Valdes said. “It makes sense now.”
Valdes reached for his pistol.
“I have no more need of you, my dear.”
He drew the gun halfway out and then stopped, jerking his gaze to the ceiling, as gunfire erupted on the floor above.
Valdes bolted out of the room.
Amaya let out a rush of air and her body jerked with massive sobs.
The trooper slung a rifle over shoulder, unzipped his fly, and began urinating into the bushes beside the Valdes house.
The nine-millimeter’s night sights settled squarely on the back of the man’s head. Devlin Stone fired one shot. The suppressed pistol whispered and the man dropped like a puppet with its strings cut.
Manny Valdes’s house was a single story off the 15D in a flat section of a valley. Hills rose to Stone’s left and right; behind the house and in front of the house; and he’d parked Majors’ Land Rover near the freeway and approached the house on foot.
He rose slowly, holstering the SIG, shifting to bring up the muzzle of the Colt M933. He tucked the stock into his shoulder and looked down the sight line. He approached the front door. A trooper coming out to pee meant the john inside must be occupied; he kept that in mind as he turned the knob and pushed the door inward. He had a moment’s surprise. The troopers inside were expecting somebody to return.
The door bumped against the inside wall of a dark alcove with a padded bench to the immediate right, where a line of shoes had been placed on the tiled floor. Valdes didn’t want to floors scuffed? Stone pressed on through an entry way. Ahead, a combination dining area with a sitting area opposite, the couches and chairs facing a big screen TV on the wall.
Around the dining table were three more troopers, armed, wearing their socks. They didn’t look at Stone. They were focused on a poker game. When one of them finally did look up at the gringo in black, he shouted an alarm and reached for his hip. That’s when Stone let the M933 do the talking. The compact carbine bucked against his shoulder, flame flashing from the muzzle, and he stitched the trio with .223 tumblers that brought them all down in a heap. A flow of red mixed with chunks of what used to be Mexican killers spread across the floor.
Stone dropped the magazine and shoved in a new one as another gunner emerged from the john. Stone fired. The man’s belly split open, spilling out whatever was left inside as he fell back into the bathroom.
Stone pivoted left, right, scanning the area. No other threats.
Where was Valdes?
Heavy footsteps. Getting louder.
Stone bolted into the next room, the kitchen, empty of threats until a door near the attached laundry room slammed open.
There was Valdes, wearing shoes because the house rules didn’t apply to him, clutching an automatic. Stone and Valdes fired at the same time, neither connecting, Valdes’s shots going wide as Stone dropped and slid across the smooth tile. Valdes didn’t enter the kitchen; he crossed the laundry room doorway, pulling open another door. Stone shifted his aim and stitched a burst through the kitchen cabinets and wall on his side, trying to catch Valdes on the exit, but no screams responded to the shots.
Stone jumped up and
entered the laundry room, the open door leading outside. He stayed low as he stepped through the doorway with the M933 leading the way. Keeping his back to the outside wall, he scanned for Valdes, but the man had taken off like a jackrabbit.
Was Amaya in the basement?
And then he heard her crying.
She screamed when Stone touched her. Tears streaked Amaya’s face and it was seeing that she’d been assaulted was as obvious as a black eye.
She calmed down once she realized who he was. He cut the ropes holding her, helped her off the table, and got her pants back up. She tossed her bra and wrapped the sliced flannel top around her torso.
“Did you get him?” she said. She wiped her face over and over again.
Stone led her to the steps. “No. Let’s get you cleaned up.”
“Valdes keeps women’s clothes here for when his whores are visiting,” she said. “I’ll find something that fits.”
“We have to hurry. Since he’s loose, he’s going after Jackeline.”
“He figured out she’s the one who’s been informing.”
“Marvelous,” Stone said.
They went up the stairs and Stone dragged the dead gunner out of the bathroom so Amaya could clean up after finding a new top and underwear in Valdes’s “whore closet”.
Stone radioed Majors and told him to get the team ready. They were going in hot within the hour.
Chapter Ten
Amaya scrubbed her face three times and when she finally felt like the sting of the semen was gone, she realized she couldn’t get rid of the feel of that animal’s fingers from inside her, or the taste of him from her mouth.
That would have to wait.
The top and panties she found in the “whore closet” were a little big, but she wasn’t in the mood to argue. She tied the top above her midriff. Stone helped her collect a submachine gun and spare ammunition from one of the dead troopers, and they raced out to the Land Rover.
The engine fired to life and Stone shifted gears. The sun was beginning to set, the sky turning a lovely pink, and he again reflected that it was a shame he was there to fight rather than enjoy the beauty. Maybe someday, he thought, the cartels would be gone, and the citizens of Nogales could watch the sunsets in peace. A peace Stone helped deliver.
Cartel Queen Page 7
