Dirty Money

by Ashley Bartlett

  “No shit.” Rico fired off another round. “Gabriel is down, and I’ve been trying to get to him.”

  I glanced up to see one of our pickers on the ground ten feet in front of us in a pool of blood. The guys firing on us were twenty feet past him. Not great.

  “Fuck this. Who else is here?”

  “Aldo is in the trees to the north. He didn’t wanna go in yet ’cause these fuckers might run.”

  “All right. Me and Frank will cut down. Big,” I addressed the decidedly small man past Rico, “Join Aldo. Give us three minutes then take those douche bags down.”

  “Got it.” He turned to crawl away.

  “Oh, and, Big.” He glanced back. “Don’t shoot us.” A hint of a grin crossed his face.

  “Rico, get Gabriel the fuck outta here.”

  “Got it.” Rico raised his head an inch and cut down a couple more plants. It was a shame. He was just burning money every time a plant went down.

  Frank and I crawled a couple feet away then ran to the cover of the jungle below the field. We dodged between trees until we caught glimpses of two men firing into our field. I motioned for Frank to stay back then crept forward. When one of the men stepped back, I centered my gun and fired.

  It clipped his arm. Not where I was aiming. Fuck. I ducked back behind a tree.

  “That hand is useless.” Frank was right behind me.

  “No fucking shit.” They opened fire on us. I holstered my H&K. “Give me one of those.” I pointed to the AKs. He handed one over.

  Bullets sprayed the tree we were behind. I blindly let off a round toward them. The assault rifle jumped and jerked and nearly forced itself out of my grasp. AKs are not made for one-handed firing.

  They kept shooting.

  “Fuck it.” I pulled at the Velcro straps of the immobilizer on my hand with my teeth then flung it to the ground. “Cover me.”

  With the AK braced against my left shoulder and the H&K in my right hand, I turned, knelt, and opened fire. Frank did the same in the opposite direction.

  One of the guys went down immediately. Big and Aldo appeared from the north. And from the east, a third guy who wasn’t one of ours appeared. He hit Frank in the leg and turned toward me. Frank kept shooting and took the guy out, red blossoming across his chest as he twitched then died. The remaining guy got off two more shots before Big and Aldo cut him down.

  He made the two shots count. One hit Frank. Again. The other grazed my ribs. I felt it. Fucking hot, stinging pain spread over my side eclipsing the throbbing in my too well used broken hand. I fell back and stared at the glimpse of sky through the trees.

  “Shit. Fuck.” I could hear Frank. “Boss, you hit?”

  I turned my head. He was sitting back against the tree and trying to come toward me.

  “I’m fine.” I tried to smile. “Don’t move.”

  Aldo ran up, first to me, then Frank.

  “Goddamn it.”

  “Help me up.” I clapped my good hand over my side.

  “No. Just stay still.” Gently, he pushed me back down and placed his hand over mine, adding to the pressure.

  “It’s not bad,” I said. “Really. Just help me sit up.”

  “Aldo,” Big yelled. “One’s alive.” I angled my head up. Big was crouched in the trees training his AK on a stationary figure sprawled on the ground.

  “That’s it. Help me the fuck up.”

  “Leave her,” Frank gasped. “She’s hurt.”

  “So are you, douche bag. But I got a job to do.”

  Aldo looked back and forth between us then slid his arm under me. He lifted until I was in a sitting position against the tree.

  “Good. Now check Frank.”

  “I’m fine. You need to get help first,” Frank said.

  “Bullshit. You’re bleeding everywhere.” He was. “Check him, Aldo.”

  Aldo crouched next to Frank and did a superficial check of his wounds.

  “What’s he got?”

  “The leg isn’t bad, but his arm is fucked.”

  “Do what you can.”

  Gallantly, Aldo stripped off his shirt, revealing a very sweat-stained wifebeater. He tore the shirt in half and looped it around Frank’s thigh.

  “No homo.” He grinned at Frank. They laughed, then stopped awkwardly and looked at me.

  “I don’t fucking care.”

  “Sorry, boss,” Aldo said.

  “Yeah, sorry,” Frank echoed.

  They didn’t say anything else. Aldo took out a knife and cut open Frank’s sleeve. That shit was mangled. I didn’t know what I was looking at, but it was bloody. Aldo tied another piece of his shirt over the open wound.

  “Go tighter,” Frank told him. When Aldo did as he said, Frank immediately leaned to the side and puked.

  “That’s all I can do for now.”

  “Help me up then.” I held out my uninjured left arm. “I got shit to do.”

  “Damn it, leave her,” Frank barked.

  Again, Aldo vacillated. Then he grasped my arm and helped me stand. I leaned against a tree and concentrated on breathing and looking like I could handle more physical pain than I’d ever felt. Hey, it wasn’t as bad as Reese. Suddenly, I wanted to puke too. So I did.

  “Shit.” Aldo was back at my side. “Maybe you should lay back down.”

  “I’m good.”

  “Help me up too,” Frank told him.

  “Shut the fuck up, Frank. You’re worse off than me,” I said.

  “Yeah, well I got a job too.” He rolled to the side and started to push himself up.

  “Shit.” Aldo grabbed him and helped him stand. Frank threw his good arm over Aldo’s shoulders.

  “Let’s go.”

  I debated ordering him to stay still, but then Cesar and another picker showed up and helped Aldo balance Frank. They broke into a rapid Spanish exchange with Aldo.

  “What are they saying?” I asked.

  “Jackson sent them down. He’s with Rico trying to keep Gabriel alive. Thought we might need help.”

  Guess we were making this a party. Slowly, we made our way to Big.

  “Hey, boss,” he greeted me like we hadn’t seen each other in days. “Want me to kill this guy?” Very conversational.

  “Not yet. Check his pulse.”

  “Sure. Hold this.” He handed his AK to Cesar. “Pulse is strong. He might even wake up soon.”

  “Good. I wanna know who the fuck they are and why the fuck they’re here.”

  “Don’t need him for that,” Big said.

  “Why not?”

  He moved to the other body on the ground and lifted the sleeve of the guy’s T-shirt. He had a tattoo with a name.

  “Who’s Ramirez?” I asked.

  Simultaneously, all five men spit on the ground and said, “Ramirez” and “fucking Ramirez.”

  “Could I get some kind of list of our enemies?” I asked the group. “Or maybe a pie chart to graph how much we hate them in ranking order?”

  Frank laughed. Everyone else stared.

  “The Ramirez family runs most of the growing around here,” Aldo finally answered. “They’ve been moving in on our territory for a while. These guys must be scouts.”

  “Awesome.” I stepped over the guy who was alive, grabbed Big’s shoulder, and carefully got on my knees. “Aldo, give me your knife.”

  He looked at me like I was crazy, but did it anyway.

  Who knows what the fuck I was thinking? I sure as hell didn’t. I traced a circle around the tattoo and teased the skin up until I could peel it off. Frank looked like he was gonna heave again, but he held it in check. Cesar did puke. Who knew skinning someone made a noise like that?

  “Does anyone have a handkerchief?” Again, the look, but Big handed me a dirty bandana. I wrapped the skin in it and handed it back to Big. “Keep the other one alive. See if the last guy has a tat. I’m gonna want that one too.”

  Big nodded and just kept nodding as I slowly got to my feet.

  “
You two stay with Frank.” I pointed to Aldo and Cesar. “You come with me,” I told the other picker. “We’ll send down a stretcher or something. Don’t let Frank walk.”

  Frank looked like he was gonna argue, but I walked away. He didn’t need to know that I pretty much collapsed on the guy walking with me as soon as we were out of sight.

  *

  When I woke up, the warm air smelled like fresh cut grass, but muskier, and a little sweet. Under that was the skunk-like tinge of weed. Too bad I couldn’t get high off that shit.

  Frank was passed out on the cot next to me. Gabriel wasn’t there though. He’d been in real bad shape.

  I didn’t remember coming here.

  Slowly, I sat up. The skin at my side pulled a little. I pulled up my shirt and inspected the neat line of stitches. My whole side was bruised and everything was swollen. As I stood, the shirt fell back down. I made my way in the dim light to the door.

  Out in the warehouse, the smell of curing pot increased tenfold. The place was nearly empty save for a few guys. I climbed a staircase opposite me to what looked like an office.

  “You’re awake.” Marco turned from the table of guys to look me up and down. “You look like shit, homie.”

  “Thanks.”

  He turned back and introduced me in Spanish to the group of men. I sketched a wave.

  “You the crazy one?” a meaty dude to Marco’s right asked.

  “I guess so.”

  “We sent your message back to Ramirez.” The men began to nod and laugh.

  “Everyone appreciated your sentiment.” Marco grinned with them, but it didn’t reach his eyes.

  I imagined what Marco would have said when Big handed him a scout and the tattoos off two dead guys. He wouldn’t have been happy.

  “The fuckers shot at my guys.” I shrugged my left shoulder. They could sort out my motivation from there if they wanted. “How’s Gabriel? And Frank?”

  They all stopped smiling.

  “Gabriel’s dead,” Marco informed me. “Frank’ll live.”

  I didn’t have anything to say.

  One of the men on the far side of the table got up and came around the table. After handing me a glass of tequila, he poured more into everyone else’s cup. Silently, we raised them and drank.

  “So what now?” I asked.

  The guys all glanced at Marco. He twitched his head toward the door and they all filed out. I waited.

  “I’m sending more men back out. Doubling enforcement,” Marco said. “You’re going back to the States. Vito’s in Los Angeles. He wants to see you.”

  “Why?” I thought Vito wanted me to stay in Mexico.

  “He was very impressed with your…work. He said he’s got something new for you.”

  “What about you?”

  “I’d like you to stay here with me for a couple weeks.” For the first time since I’d come in, he met my eyes fully. “You need to heal.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “No, you’re not.”

  “Leave it alone, Marco.”

  “You don’t have to do this.”

  “Yes, I do.” He had no idea how much I had to do this.

  “You finished your job. You got paid.” His dark eyes bored into me. “Leave. Go south. You’ll like Argentina.”

  “Fuck off.”

  “No. You don’t owe them anything. You don’t owe him anything.”

  “Actually, I do.”

  “You’re not like them.”

  “Don’t tell me who I am.” Now I was getting pissed.

  “You’re me.” Marco stood and came closer. “We don’t belong in this world.” He was right. I belonged to the world I’d left behind. With people who loved me, who knew me. But that place was gone now.

  “Then why the fuck are you still here?”

  “Because there’s nowhere else for me.”

  “You don’t know where I came from and you don’t know why I’m here.” I felt my voice go cold as I said it, but I didn’t care. He would never know what I’d lost.

  “We’re alone. We’re born that way,” he insisted. Except he was wrong. I wasn’t alone. I’d never been. Until now. “This isn’t family. Go find yours, ’cause it ain’t here.”

  That he was right about. He just didn’t know I had to be here to find mine. Vito was a slim shot at getting the twins back, but it was the only one I had.

  “I’ll be in Los Angeles,” I told him, then turned and left.

  Chapter Nine

  I’d been in my room a grand total of two minutes before there was a knock at the door. I opened the door the width of the security latch. Securing it was a joke. Most of Vito’s guys probably could have broken it by sneezing.

  “Cooper?” It was a beefy dude in a suit. Not at all ambiguous.

  “Yeah?”

  “Vito sent this for you.” He held up a shopping bag.

  “What is it?” I wanted a shower. I wanted to brush my teeth for a solid twenty minutes. I wanted to sleep in a bed. With sheets. I didn’t want a present from Vito.

  No-neck looked in the bag. “Clothes.” Maybe I was wrong.

  I shut the door, fumbled the latch off, and opened it back up. He handed the bag over then turned and walked away.

  “Thanks,” I called to his retreating back.

  These guys seriously lacked personality.

  I upended the bag on the bed. Anything bad I’d ever thought about Vito I took back. Levi’s, 511s, 32s. I was slightly disturbed that Vito knew my style and size of jeans, but I was too happy to care. A package of white T-shirts. Couldn’t go wrong there. And, oh, I loved the man, boxer briefs. That was it. No menacing notes. No weapons or cell phones. Maybe Vito wasn’t such a bad guy.

  I kicked off my boots. Peeled off the sad excuse for socks I’d been wearing for a month. They were crunchy. Same with my shirt and undershirt. The jeans were stiff with dirt and grime and, not surprisingly, blood. Underwear topped it all off. I threw everything except the boots in the trash.

  I dumped out the contents of my duffle bag. The stiff liner fell out on top of my clothes. Instinctively, I checked the slit cut into the seam, felt the smooth surface until I found the slight rise where my Canadian passport was. Vito didn’t know about it. I wanted to keep it that way. I shoved the liner back into the bag. Tossed all clothes in the trash.

  Carefully, I removed my St. Christopher and set it on the empty dresser.

  Damn, it felt good to be naked and not in fear.

  Except I freaked out when I turned from flicking on the shower. I didn’t know the haunted figure in the mirror staring back at me. It wasn’t me. It couldn’t be.

  Deep shadows hung below my eyes, they were still vibrant green, but now framed by the kind of darkness I’d only seen in vampire movies. My face was streaked with dirt. No surprise. Neither was the dark tan on my face and pale skin where my clothes had been. But it looked like someone had pared away my flesh and left only bone and muscle behind. The muscle was new. I didn’t know where had it come from. The bone was scary. I started counting my ribs, but stopped when I realized way more were visible than should have been. My hipbones jutted out at seemingly unnatural angles. Same with my collarbones. I looked like some sad refugee. Maybe I was.

  I doubted my mother would even recognize me.

  Disgusted, I got in the shower, twisted it high enough to burn away the last few months, stood there, and waited to feel whole again. As I ran the soap over my body and watched the black water run down the drain, I took stock of the new scars, counted them. My knuckles were white with little nicks from split skin. Scabs on my elbows were fading to shiny pink. The bruised bullet wound in my side would join their ranks soon enough.

  This was not my body. This wasn’t me.

  I swallowed hard and tried to fight it, but I couldn’t. Tears mingled with the water coursing down my face as I sank to the ground and began to sob. I choked and gasped, spit the taste of fear from my mouth, but it remained.

  If I ever foun
d Reese, would she even want me?

  *

  I slept for fifteen hours. I was planning on a solid twenty-four, but Vito called. Really, I was surprised at his restraint. He was waiting for me in a suite a couple floors up. Wanted me to meet someone. Super.

  When he opened the door, he gave me a once-over and seemed a little disgusted at the package. Maybe he didn’t consider unlaced boots with jeans half tucked in professional. Maybe it was the pants hanging off my ass. I’d lost weight so they were too big. Maybe it was the long hair hanging down over my ears and onto my collar. Well, maybe he should have given me warning. I would have gotten a haircut and a belt. He could just deal.

  “There’s coffee.” He pointed at a room service cart.

  I grunted and poured myself some. I didn’t offer him any.

  “What do you want?”

  “This is Esau.” Vito indicated a hairy-looking dude sitting in an armchair behind him.

  “Oh.” I didn’t realize we weren’t alone. “Cooper.” I stuck out my hand to Esau.

  “It’s a pleasure.” He smiled. His canines were sharper than normal, predatory.

  “You will be working together,” Vito informed us.

  I opened my mouth to protest, but Vito cut me off before I could speak.

  “I remembered your rules.” He grinned like it was funny. “You won’t kill people, you won’t run girls, and you won’t do anything involving drugs other than marijuana.”

  “You have rules?” Esau asked. His voice was soft, dark, but melodic.

  I nodded and drank my coffee. “Got a problem with that?”

  “No.” He flashed the canines again. “You have a code. It means you know yourself and your limitations. I like that.”

  Did he think he was Yoda or something?

  “They aren’t limitations. I’m perfectly capable.” I didn’t want this dude to think I had a weak stomach.

  “Poor word choice. I only meant…” He glanced at Vito. “Most of Vito’s guys will do anything for a scrap. They want respect; they want money. They don’t ask questions, and they don’t care who dies as long as it isn’t them. They lack creativity.”

  Vito started to laugh.

  “Creativity?” As soon as I asked, I knew I shouldn’t have.