by Mel Odom
“What kind of trouble is your sister in?” Pike didn’t want to ask, but he couldn’t help himself. He figured maybe the sister was hanging with the wrong guy, something the kid should tell his parents, not a stranger who worked at the garage.
“There’s this guy—”
Pike held up a hand. “Hector, your sister is going to meet bad guys. She’ll figure it out. And if you’re really worried about her, you should tell your momma and your daddy.”
“I don’t have a father. He ran away after I was born.”
Pike cracked his Coke open and took a sip. The tune was as old and familiar as the Led Zeppelin song playing on the boom box. He let the kid tell it, though, knowing that telling it would at least help a little. There were things in this life that couldn’t be controlled. That was just how the world worked.
“It’s just my mom taking care of us. She has two jobs and is barely home. If I told her what Erendria was doing, it would break my mom’s heart, and there still wouldn’t be anything she could do about Erendria.”
“Look, Hector, I can see you’re worried about your sister. I get that. I respect that. But I ain’t no family counselor. Whatever this guy is to your sister, you should work that out with her and your momma.”
“What he is, is a drug dealer. He’s turning my sister into his mule. And she’s too stupid to see that.”
Pike looked into the kid’s dark eyes and knew he wasn’t going to go away. “You could go to the police.”
Hector expelled a disgusted breath. His voice became high-pitched and strained. “I go to the police, you know what they’re gonna do? They’re gonna bust Juan Mendoza and Erendria too if she’s there. She wants to be a nurse, like our mom. You think she’s gonna get to be a nurse with a drug arrest on her record? After she gets out of jail for who knows how long?”
Pike took a long, slow drink of the Coke. Then he pulled over an empty plastic five-gallon bucket that he and Monty used to soak car parts in to clean them. He turned the bucket upside down. “Why don’t you have a seat and tell me about this Mendoza guy?”
Standing in the dark shadows that lined the street, up against the closed doughnut shop across from the house and dressed in a black hoodie, Pike knew he was invisible in the night. He wore a pair of urban combat pants from his kit, a pair of military boots he’d gotten from the Salvation Army, and black leather gloves that molded to his big hands. He carried no ID. If he got busted, he’d make one phone call and be out in an hour.
Mulvaney wouldn’t be happy about that. Neither would the US Marshals assigned to Pike. He didn’t care. What he was doing here tonight was a risk. He felt good taking a risk. For the first time in a long time, he felt alive. Working at the garage was good and clean, but it wasn’t the kind of thing Pike felt like he’d been born to do.
He kept watch over the house, but he was constantly aware that Petey wasn’t with him and hadn’t been in four years. That was a long time to go without eyes in the back of your head. Sometimes, though, Pike thought he felt Petey there, just over his shoulder, a half step gone so he’d just missed seeing him.
Juan Mendoza was biracial: half-Hispanic and half–African American. He ran a crew of hardcases—four in all—who were from both communities. Mendoza had staked out a section of the neighborhood and settled in. Crack cocaine, meth, and prostitutes flowed through the house.
Most of the residences around Mendoza’s house belonged to honest people struggling to make a go of it despite the economy and the cultural pressure. But none of them were brave enough to stand up to Mendoza.
Hector had explained it all two days ago. And the kid had provided pretty good recon, which Pike had confirmed.
Twenty-five years old, Juan Mendoza had been in and out of lockup since he was twelve. His history read a lot like Pike’s, except for the drug-related arrests. Pike had never had anything to do with drugs, but he’d run with people who had. All he’d ever done while running with the Diablos was provide protection, keep other biker gangs from preying on them, recover lost money or goods, and take care of Petey. Pike didn’t like drugs, but most biker outlaws did because the profits were good.
Mendoza hadn’t taken a fall in six years. The last time had been a three-year shot for dealing. Once he’d gotten out, he’d gone straight back to the business he knew, but he was smarter about it this time. Mendoza’s operation consisted of having kids haul his merchandise. If they got busted, they got juvie—a short haul through the justice system—and released.
And kids could be scared into not talking.
Even when they were trying to save their big sister.
According to Hector, Erendria was in love, and she was trying to help Mendoza make his fortune so they could move away. That was the dream Mendoza had been selling her. Of course, the guy was also selling that dream to two other girls Pike had spotted during his surveillance of the house. Mendoza kept the girls staggered pretty well too. He was cunning—and totally ruthless.
The four guys with him were ruthless; not so much in the cunning department. But they were all strapped.
Pike was surprised the police hadn’t already flagged the operation and taken it down. But Mendoza lived small, like a tick feeding on a dog’s ear, taking just enough to survive without getting too large. He was low-profile all the way, living in the neighborhood and controlling everything he needed to.
The delivery system was good too. The house was a front. Buyers came up to the curb and delivered the money to one of Mendoza’s men. Then the car drove halfway down the block, and one of the kids working for Mendoza delivered the goods. If an undercover cop popped one of the kids, they were experienced enough in the system to close their mouths and ride it out.
Mendoza never kept the drugs in the house, and it wasn’t against the law to have money. He even had a storefront loan office that explained why people were there dropping off the money. Simply paying off their loans, Officer. Just business.
Across the street, a sports car loaded with college students pulled up to the curb and honked the horn. One of Mendoza’s men came out, talked briefly with them, and took the money they passed over. Then he waved them down the street.
A few doors down, a young boy ran out from between the houses and gave the guys in the sports car a small package. The driver stepped on the accelerator hard enough to burn the tires and sped off down the street.
They weren’t regular customers. Just wannabes who decided to go slumming. What they’d been given probably wasn’t even drugs.
Pike returned his attention to the house. He headed to the corner, rounded the block, and approached Mendoza’s house from the rear.
The plan was simple. The best plans always were. Pike knew that from experience. He darted down an alley between houses, then hopped over a bridge railing and dropped into the drainage ditch. Houses fronted streets on either side. Dogs barked and yapped, but most of them just picked up the excitement from the others and carried on the hue and cry. A few men and kids came out of the houses to check on the dogs, but Pike knew how to move through the shadows and remain unseen. A couple of security lights flared to life, but none of them came close to him.
He paused long enough to pull a black ski mask over his face. His mouth and nose were covered, but the eyehole was big enough that his vision wasn’t restricted. He kept moving.
Fifty yards farther on, he came up out of the ditch and crouched beside a tall tree just beyond the fence around Mendoza’s backyard. Peering through the back windows, he couldn’t see much. All the windows were covered by blinds. One of them shifted, and Pike knew someone inside had gotten concerned over the barking dogs.
Paranoia and the drug culture went hand in hand.
After letting five minutes pass, breathing slowly and evenly, Pike vaulted the fence and crossed the backyard, which had become a repository for an ancient and rusting Chevy, two refrigerators, and a stove. Maybe once the backyard filled up, Mendoza would have someone haul the junk off. Or maybe he’d just mo
ve.
The front door was reinforced steel. Pike had taken notice of that on his first tour of recon. But the back door that opened into the garage was a no-frills, hollow-core wooden door. Mendoza must have figured any attack would come from the front, or that cops would only come from that way.
The rap music streaming from inside was almost deafening even on the other side of the back door. Pike timed the percussive beats and pulled the ASP baton from his hoodie pocket. The weapon was short and easily concealed when unexpanded. He flicked the release and had sixteen inches of matte-black steel in his fist. Because of the tight confines presented by the house, he’d gone for the shortest length. Other batons expanded to over two feet.
With the next wave of bass percussion, Pike let out a breath and rammed his shoulder into the door. Wood shattered and screws shrieked, and the door flew open. He stepped into the garage, the ASP held in close and ready.
On the other side of the garage, two men leaned on a lowrider and stared at Pike. They’d evidently been sharing a joint, maybe talking about the car. The thick, musky haze of marijuana filled Pike’s nostrils.
The men reached for the pistols shoved into the fronts of their belts, but Pike was still in motion, never halting once he’d broken through the door. He swung the baton and shattered the hand of the man on the left before he could get his pistol clear. Pike planted his empty hand in the center of the man’s chest and shoved.
By that time the second man was lifting the pistol, his finger already sliding inside the trigger guard. His thumb flicked for the safety, missed, and immediately tried again. Too close now to go for the hand, Pike swung a backhand blow that caught the man on the shoulder. Bone crunched under the assault. Pike felt the shoulder go, but he didn’t hear anything over the music.
The man opened his mouth to scream as his pistol tumbled from his nerveless fingers. Moving quickly, Pike hit the man in the throat with the Y of his open hand, catching his opponent between his thumb and forefinger and hitting him hard enough to shut his wind off but not to kill him. Pike didn’t want to leave any bodies. Cops looked harder and longer when someone got killed, even when the dead were people like Mendoza and his crew. The neighborhood would be scared.
Gagging and choking, the man went down. Pike swung the ASP again, catching him on the temple and knocking him unconscious. The guy sprawled like a dead man.
The other guy flailed at his gun with his shattered hand, but his fingers weren’t working and couldn’t close properly. He took a breath to try and yell. Pike kicked the man in the face, no mercy in him as he thought of Hector and his sister. Pike didn’t think of himself as a good man by any stretch of the imagination, but he wasn’t a Juan Mendoza, either. Pike figured his own road to hell was already paved, but there had to be a special place for guys like Mendoza and his buddies.
The man’s head thumped into the wall behind him, and he went slack-jawed as his eyes rolled back up into his head. Heart beating slightly faster, Pike checked the door that led to the house.
It was still closed, and men’s voices punctuated the rap music that streamed endlessly.
Kneeling, Pike flipped both men onto their stomachs and secured their hands behind their backs with zip ties. He took out a roll of gray duct tape and ran strips over their mouths and around their heads.
He took one of the pistols, checked the load, and slipped it into the back of his waistband. He wasn’t going to kill if he could help it, but he wasn’t there to die, either. If he had to shoot someone, it would be better if he shot them with one of their own guns. Whatever story they told the police—if they talked at all—would be confused.
A quick search of the garage revealed the breaker box on one wall. Pike found the master switch, then closed his eyes and counted off thirty seconds, allowing his eyes to adjust to darkness.
Then he threw the switch.
The music died instantly, and even though his eyes were closed, Pike noticed the absence of light. He blinked his eyes open and could see the dim outlines of the garage because the door to the outside allowed moonlight in. With the ASP in one hand, he headed toward the door to the house.
At least three men were still waiting inside.
Pike opened the door, slid inside, and found himself in a utility room. After a brief glance to orient himself as to where the washer and dryer were, he pulled the door closed behind him and walked through the room and into the kitchen.
Violent cursing filled the silence that had fallen over the house.
“Man, what happened to the lights? Jervay! Hey! Jervay!”
Hearing the footsteps closing on him, Pike paused beside the refrigerator. Using his peripheral vision so he could see better in the darkness, Pike waited, trusting the light coming through the window on the other side of the kitchen to help him.
“Yo! This is stupid, homes! I’m gonna break my neck wanderin’ around in the dark.”
“Use your lighter, ese. Don’t be stupid,” the man said in Spanish.
The shadow paused in front of Pike and reached into its pants pocket. Pike reached out, caught a fistful of the man’s shirt by feel and yanked him forward, then lifted a knee into the man’s crotch. Air whooshed out of the man’s lungs along with a thin, gurgling cry of pain. Then Pike clubbed him behind the ear with the ASP and let the unconscious body drop to the floor.
“Hey. You listenin’ to me? Light up.”
Taking long strides, trusting his night vision and the light leaking through the window blinds in the other room, Pike closed on the remaining two men.
One of them had a penlight attached to his key ring. Drunk or high, he struggled to thumb the penlight on. His hair was done in cornrows that stuck out like tiny pigtails in the darkness. Pike rapped him on the temple with the ASP and he crumpled.
On the other side of the room, Juan Mendoza suddenly struck life to a lighter with one hand while he raised a big-bore pistol in the other. He cursed and fired immediately as the dancing flame atop the cigarette lighter spun shadows around the room.
The muzzle flash ricocheted off the light-colored walls and ignited a small, dark sun inside the room. Pike dodged to one side, and the bullet zipped past him and emptied the guts from a large-screen plasma television. Glass tinkled to the floor.
Mendoza rushed his next shot before he’d recovered from the recoil of the first. His second round bored through the ceiling and drew a tumbling fog of plaster dust that lit up against the lighter flame. He yelped curses and tried to correct his aim.
By that time, Pike was on him. He closed a big fist over Mendoza’s hand and held the pistol to one side as the drug dealer fired another round into the wall. Pike whipped the ASP around in a backhanded blow that caught the man in the ribs. The meaty thunk was punctuated by breaking bones. Pike had heard the sound plenty of times before and recognized it easily.
Mendoza screamed but had little air left in his lungs. He squirmed and tried to pull the pistol back on track, firing yet another round into the ceiling. Pike stabbed a thumb into the nerve cluster on the back of the man’s hand, and the pistol dropped to the carpet with a muffled thud.
Before Mendoza could yell again, Pike whipped the ASP across the man’s face and broke his jaw. The yell turned into a bloody mewling. Mendoza dropped to his knees and fell back against the easy chair behind him.
A frightened scream came from a few feet away.
Glaring through the gloom, Pike barely made out the young woman standing in the hallway door. She was of average height but seriously underweight. Her dark hair was pulled back, and all she had on was a T-shirt.
“Get out of here.” Pike snarled the command and spoke in Spanish. When the girl didn’t move, he stood, picked up the fallen pistol, crossed over to the girl, grabbed her elbow, and hustled her toward the front door. Lights flashed over her from a car just pulling to the curb. An instant later someone honked. A customer was waiting.
The girl got the message and took off running.
Pike closed an
d locked the door, then went back to Mendoza. The drug dealer was reaching for where the pistol had been and using his other hand to hold his broken jaw. The pain alone from the fracture should have knocked him out. Pike suspected that the pharmaceuticals in his system had kept him functioning.
“It ain’t there, Mendoza.” Pike dropped into a squatting position beside the man. “Now you need to listen to me.”
“Gonna get you, man. Gonna kill you.” Mendoza’s words were slurred and almost incomprehensible.
Pike pushed the pistol into Mendoza’s forehead, getting his attention at once.
Mendoza quieted and went still.
“Got your attention now, ese?”
Mendoza mumbled again, and this time Pike recognized the words of the prayer. He’d had religion thrown down his throat in juvie and in some of the foster homes.
“Call on God all you want to, but it’s just me and you in this room, Mendoza. If he does exist—and I ain’t convinced of that—God don’t care about nobody.”
Mendoza kept praying, shaking from the pain or the fear—Pike wasn’t sure which.
“This is the only warning you get.” Pike pressed the pistol muzzle harder against Mendoza’s head to get his point across. “You don’t know me, but I know you. When you get free of the cops—if you get free of them—you get yourself gone. You don’t come around here again. You do and I’ll put you in the ground. Do you understand?”
“Yeah.” Mendoza nodded and his eyelids fluttered.
“Give me your phone.” Pike collapsed the ASP and shoved it back into his hoodie.
Mendoza fumbled in his pants pocket and brought out a cell. Pike took it and headed back through the house. He didn’t know if the neighbors had called for the police.
Outside the house, with no one following him, Pike flipped the phone open and dialed 911. When the dispatch officer answered, he gave her the address and told her to send an ambulance with the cops. He spoke in Spanish. Then he hung up, vaulted the back fence, dropped the phone into the spillway, and disappeared into the darkness.
