Los Zetas Cartel Collection (3 book series)

by AJ Adams

  “He’s in solitary, so it’s not like we can ask him,” Millie pointed out, “but he’ll be even madder if we lose the business!”

  “Is it that bad?” Cousin Pat asked. “Surely it’s not that urgent?”

  “Yes, let’s just wait,” Cousin John said. “It’s only a year or two, maybe less.”

  “No, we can’t wait!” Millie shrieked.

  At that point the family looked at the accounts, and that’s when they shifted their position.

  “Jesus! What the hell were you two thinking?” Cousin Pat asked. “This is a mess!”

  “It needs fixing,” Cousin John said. “Me and Donald are too busy. Frosty has restaurant experience. I don’t see an alternative.”

  “Frank, Roger, you suck at the job,” Cousin Rose agreed. “Let Nats do it. She’s got her head screwed on right.”

  “Yeah, Frosty is hard core. She’ll get the job done,” Aunt Sadie agreed.

  “If you don’t, Millie will lose her home,” Suzie, Roger’s wife pointed out, “and there’s Delicia to think of, too. Let Frosty do it.”

  “Frosty’ll do it proper,” Cousin Pat chimed in.

  Seeing it was unanimous, I agreed—on terms.

  “I’ll do it, but I’m not having any of you second-guess me. I make the decisions, do the books, take a salary, and then I hand over any profits to Millie. If she doesn’t like how it’s going, I quit, and then it’s up to her to deal with it.”

  “I can’t work in the pub!” Millie shrieked. “Everyone will want credit, and I don’t know how to refuse them!”

  We all knew that was true. Millie was a pushover. That’s was why Bobby always walked all over her.

  “Just see the rent is paid and that I can go see Bobby every week. As for the rest, I can live off water and a crust of bread.” Millie began to sob. “Life without my Bobby is like a jail sentence, anyway!”

  She’s got a touch of drama queen, but I knew she’d let me do it my way. Now there was just one more obstacle.

  “Also, when Bobby gets out of solitary, he has to approve. If he doesn’t, I walk.”

  I knew he would have to agree. My ex father-in-law is an arsehole in many ways, but he is supremely practical, so he would see his sons had to be replaced.

  “Wait, you’d take a salary?” Roger was finally reading my proposal. “We’re family!”

  “I have to earn a living!” I snapped back. “If you can find someone who’ll do it for free, be my guest!”

  “But this much?” Frank asked. “Not minimum wage?”

  “Why should I live off minimum wage? I’m taking no more and no less than you paid yourself.”

  I’d seen the books, you see, and I knew both Frank and Roger had given themselves a decent salary. Also, it meant they couldn’t complain. Well, they could, but it would come off as whining, and the family would ignore it.

  “Fair enough,” Millie said quickly. “Thanks, Frosty.”

  “And stop calling me that!” I told her. “I have a name, use it!”

  “Sorry, Fros—erm, Nats.”

  And that was the end of that. Apart from everything else, Frank and Roger had been operating illegally, so the first thing I did was close up and look for someone to hold the premises licence, the permit that would allow us to sell booze. That was a problem because the Trueloves had all been in some kind of trouble, from smoking a joint to burglary. A couple of distant cousins had clean sheets, but they were too antsy to take it on.

  Old Joe stepped up, bless him, and I paid him a hundred quid a week plus a free dinner every day with pleasure and gratitude. Until last month, as I said before.

  Going through an agent meant some complicated paperwork, and I managed to make it legal, but it probably wouldn’t stand up in court if there was any trouble. I was warned it might involve fines and maybe prison for the licence holder, so it wasn’t something a normal person would do.

  To outside eyes it might sound crazy to invite a criminal like Sooty into the business. It did to me too at first, but after thinking it over, I realised it made sense, because the only people who’d do the job were villains. They’ve all got form, just like the Trueloves, but they have expensive lawyers and political connections who can fix things.

  The crooks in our area are mostly Peckham Knaves, so it was no surprise that Bobby had picked Sooty. I knew his form, so I was well prepared for trouble. The greedy prick had started demanding free drinks and dinners before the ink was dry, so I had him sign chits, and now he was cornered.

  “I’ll ruin you,” Sooty hissed at me. “I’ll cancel that licence.”

  I can play hardball, too, so I wasn’t fussed. “And kiss goodbye to a thousand quid a month for doing bugger all? I don’t think so.”

  Sooty stomped off, swearing about bitches needing tuning up, but I wasn’t worried. He liked money too much to screw up our deal.

  “Do you know what? Frank ran around on you because you’re such a bitch!” Roger was there, putting his oar in. It was pure jealousy and frustration. Roger thought that my rescuing his dad’s pub meant I was showing him up. “You should be nicer to people.”

  “If you don’t like the way I work, go drink elsewhere.”

  Roger fucked off and ten minutes later his son, fourteen year-old, Johnathan, walked in. He looked miserable. Definitely trouble.

  “Erm, Nats, do you have a minute?”

  “Yes, at two o’clock.” The boy looked like hell—thin, drained and lost. “Go sit down, love, and I’ll bring you some lunch. We’ll fix whatever it is after, okay?”

  His face lit up. “Thanks, Nats.”

  At one thirty I had to toss Danny Havers out, and at two the rest of the lunchtime crowd had thinned. Dwayne M’boko, my bartender, came in for his shift. He was a miracle, that boy, hardworking and honest. I handed over to him and went to sit with Johnathan.

  “What’s up, love?”

  “Erm, can I borrow fifty quid? No, I mean, fifty-five quid?”

  “Ten per cent? You’re in to a loan shark?”

  “No, not exactly. There was this horse, you see. A sure thing.”

  Right. Johnathan was a child, but he’d been watching his dad bet on the gee-gees since he was a tot. Unfortunately, it looked like the lad had the eternal optimism of the classic punter who gets a sure tip from a man in the pub. “It fell at the first fence?”

  He was amazed. “How did you know?”

  “A lucky guess. Who’s the bookie?”

  No proper bookie will take money from a kid, so I knew it would be a villain, but even so the answer horrified me.

  “Sal Binks.”

  “Stinky? You went to Stinky Sal’s flat? Jesus, Johnathan! You know he’s a creep!”

  “I’m sorry! But he was the only one who’d take the bet!”

  And God knows what that slimy shit would demand as payment. I had no proof, but Stinky came across as a major perv, and there was no way I was letting him get his filthy paws on Johnathan.

  “Don’t tell dad!” Johnathan was pleading. “He’ll take his belt to me!”

  Roger was famous for whacking his son. I thought it was a mistake, but not having kids myself, it was hardly my place to say so. But Christ! Hanging with Stinky was not to be encouraged.

  “He should give you a belting. You deserve it.”

  Johnathan smiled, recognising I was chuntering out of concern. “Thanks, Nats.”

  I had a couple of hours before my next shift. “I’ll fix it, but on one condition.”

  “Never do it again?”

  “That, and you do a week of kitchen work next school holiday. As penance.”

  “Yeah. No problem.” Johnathan calculated. “Hey, a week of work for fifty five quid? That’s less than minimum wage!”

  “I did say penance.”

  “Right.” But he was grinning, the cheeky imp. “Nats, I get to eat lasagne, right? And zabaglione?”

  “If you’re good.”

  I got a smacking kiss. “You’re the best, N
ats! I don’t care what the others say.”

  Terrific. But that’s kids for you. Johnathan raced off, back to school and no doubt with a classic scheme to avoid being isolated for skipping class. He was after all a typical Truelove: dodgy as hell and charming with it.

  “Nats, you look lovely as ever.” Scott Winters was grinning at me. I braced myself. Yes, he said it, “You are lovelier every day.”

  God knew he meant well. He always did. In a word, Scott was nice. He had a decent job in the local bank, dressed neatly, never swore, held open doors, was good to his mum, and he bored the fuck out of me.

  “There’s a wonderful film on tonight, Jules et Jim. Could I persuade you to join me?”

  Scott didn't go to school with us; he was from Sussex originally, but as he'd started as a teller in our local bank straight after leaving school, Millie had taken pity on him.

  Saying "poor lad, being away from all he knows" she had invited him to family gatherings and mothered him. The rest of us didn't like him much because he'd started off as somewhat prissy and had turned pompous over the years, but we'd become used to him, and he was part of the landscape.

  Scott was definitely part of my world because he had the flat two floors above mine, and he was one of the pub's regulars. Also, he'd asked me out every week since the day my divorce came through, but marriage with Frank had been such a disaster that I hadn’t wanted to even date.

  Last week I’d caved. It was classic: a drink, Life Is Wonderful in Italian, and supper. I like the flicks, and I speak okay French and Italian, but to be honest, I’d rather see Jason Statham than Jeanne Moreau and Oskar Werner.

  My instinct was to refuse to go again, but my sense told me that although Scott might be dull, he wasn’t the type to get into a fight. You see, I’m a bitch. A mouthy one. Men just can’t take me, so I decided that if I were to find a man, it would have to be one who knew better than to get into spats with me. Scott was too damn refined to raise his voice. Also, he wouldn’t cheat on me, or get me jailed or raped.

  Foul breath in my face. Pain sharp as knives between my legs.

  Fuck, I really didn’t want to go there.

  I pushed my thoughts deliberately back to the present. I needed to date again, and here was Scott. I was feeling snappy, but I tried to act nice. “How about I take us to the Gold Screen? They’re showing all the Terminator films. We could just pitch up and catch whichever one is on.”

  Scott smiled. “Oh how droll! You are witty, Natalia. As if a lady of taste like yourself would like that trash.”

  Oh Jesus, I couldn’t do this. “Actually, Scott, now that I think of it, I can’t. I have an errand to run this afternoon.”

  “Young Johnathan’s in trouble?”

  If Scott had one vice, it was an addiction to gossip, and the nastier the better.

  “Nope. I just need to sort out some red tape.”

  “Oh, are you buying the kebab shop?”

  Trust Scott to know that. “Snooping, Scott?”

  “Oh no, but I saw you talking to the loan manager, and he knows we’re close, so he confided that you have your eye on the property next door. Natalia, it’s so exciting! Much nicer for a lady to run a little shop of her own than work in a seedy pub.”

  Great. Seedy. Fucker. Still, the customer is always right, and Scott spent a fortune on takeaways every week. “Well, keep it under your hat.”

  “Oh, it’s our little secret!”

  So it would be round the city before sunset. Lovely.

  I got up and gave him my best smile. “Sorry Scott. Enjoy Jules et Jim.”

  Ten minutes later I was at Stinky’s, sixty quid in my hand. I was in a bad mood, so I banged my fist on the door— and went flying straight through. I had a brief impression of Stinky sitting tied to a chair and a dark furious face glaring at me. Next thing I knew I was on the floor, seeing stars and with the most amazing pain in my jaw.

  Like I said: I bloody hate Mondays.

  Chapter Three: Quique

  She was sprawled on the floor, unmoving. My first thought was that I’d killed her, so when I felt a strong pulse beating in her wrist, I was relieved. Her jaw wasn’t busted either. “No damage beyond a headache, thank God.”

  James was all business. “We can tape her up and dump her in the bath.”

  If the maricon hadn’t croaked, it would’ve been different, but as it was, there was no point in messing with the body. “The girl may have a friend waiting downstairs. We don’t want someone else busting in. Let’s go find and take care of Sooty.”

  James made a quick call and then frowned. “That may have to wait. He’s got a wife, a mistress and a couple of business interests, so he’s tough to pin down.”

  “Right. In that case, let’s go to headquarters. We’ll set up, and when word comes back, we do the fucker.”

  We were out of there and half way back to the office when I realised my watch was missing.

  “I don’t fucking believe it!” When I replayed the scene in my mind, I felt the snap of the band as I punched the girl out. “She must have fallen on top of it.”

  “Is it a problem?” James asked. “Can they trace it to you?”

  “It was my father’s. It’s a Dunhill and it’s inscribed. We’ve the same name.”

  “Joder!”

  Yeah, a bad day was rapidly turning into a clusterfuck. Thankfully, it wasn’t a total disaster. “Who’s our local connection?”

  “That’ll be Cox and Foster. Cox is a detective inspector, and Foster manages the evidence hold.”

  “Have them come round in two hours.”

  “Sure thing.”

  The crew were waiting for us. Matu, Paco and Lencho were all old friends. They were lieutenants, running the day-to-day business for Jorge. Back home we have geographical as well as specialist areas, like being a security man for Matamoros or a distribution expert in Mexico City, but as our London set-up was still fairly new, it was pretty fluid.

  “I’ve been taking care of logistics,” Matu said. “Lencho’s been focusing on distribution and Paco on communication. We’re sharing responsibility on everything else until we see how everything shakes out. The boss gives the green light on general policy three times a week, and we run anything worth more than fifty thou by him.”

  “I’ve been dividing my time between security and backing up the boss on asset buying,” James admitted ruefully. “Looks like I fucked up.”

  “Hey, two players hire an outsider! There’s no way you could anticipate that kind of deal.”

  It was automatic, that reassurance, and totally fake. In the Zetas, being in security means getting in front of whack shit. If you can’t do it, you become a cop, private eye or some other kind of loser who sorts out a disaster after it happens.

  “I should’ve known what was coming,” James chastised himself. “I felt something in the air. I knew trouble was coming our way.”

  “Yeah, and that’s why you were riding shotgun on Jorge,” Paco reminded him.

  “We’ve been doubling up on monitoring communications, too, and there wasn’t the sniff of a plot,” Lencho volunteered.

  “And we had all those sudden schedule changes, too,” Matu pointed out. “That must have fucked things up for them.”

  “Yeah, but still, he got shot on my fucking watch!” James was beating himself up.

  “Shit, man! We were all here when you tried to get Jorge to wear that bullet-proof vest!” Lencho said.

  It sounded like James had done the right thing all the way down the line. That was a relief. Like all businesses, we have our own internal problems, but it really sounded like this wasn’t anyone’s fault.

  “Sometimes shit just happens,” I said. In a high stress environment we have to keep tight, so I encouraged them. “We’ll get to the bottom of this soon.”

  “Right.”

  “Sure.”

  “Fuck ‘em all, we’ll get them!”

  Seeing we were all ready for revenge, I got James to get me up
to speed. “Where are we in terms of business?”

  He was keen to show he was on top of it. “The way I see it is this: we’re all dying for payback but we’re also making some important deals. Let’s not let this situation distract us because otherwise it’ll fuck us over later.”

  It sounded like trouble, so I followed his lead, starting with the shooting. “We know who planned the hit. One’s taken care of, and the other will be pushing daisies by tomorrow.” There was a murmur of approval. “But we need to make certain whether Stinky and Sooty, who sound like a fucking comedy duo, were working with senior approval or not.”

  Seeing me look at him, James jumped in. “Lencho, you get on that. Matu and Paco, provide support. I want to get Quique up to speed on the other business.”

  I wondered for a second whether James was being cute. If he was trying to bump off Jorge, it would make sense to distract me. However, fifteen minutes later, his move made sense. The London outfit were on a mission, and it sounded like it had real disaster potential.

  I listened carefully and then tried to get the facts straight. “So what you’re saying is that you’re juggling eight deals, running from half a mil to three mil each. If you do it right, we own a sweet bit of real estate on the river. It means we import our coke direct, bypassing ports. Also, we’ll own enough property to set up a mall and an office tower.”

  “Yeah, that’s about the size of it,” James nodded.

  “But it’s stacked like a deck of cards, so the slightest fuck-up means we’re screwed, with sellers wanting shares or jacking up prices by a thousand per cent, so we’d end up holding bits and pieces of fuck all, and losing millions, too.”

  “Exactly.”

  For a moment I was wondering what the hell the boss had been thinking when he sent me to London. This job needed a realtor or someone with commerce training.

  Don’t get me wrong. I’m great at what I do, but I’m a security specialist. I’m from Guatemala, you see. We had a civil war that lasted forty years, so battle is part of our lifestyle.

  I was in my first gunfight when I was seven years old. At sixteen I decided to go pro and joined the army. I ended up as one of the Kaibiles, that’s the commando unit or what you might call Special Forces, so with one thing and another, killing is what I’m great at.