by Zoe Dawson
That asshat was behind her, their pace quick, and if he shoved that gun in her back again, she was going to have to hurt him. Which was her bravado speaking. He had bullets and knew how to use them. She hoped Pitbull was armed.
They’d taken her badge and her gun. They knew she was law enforcement but asked no questions. Apparently, Asshat wasn’t the boss.
They walked for several miles until they came to a plantation. It was clear to her as they walked through that the crop here was weed. Vincent was looking worse for wear, his steps dragging, and when they reached the edge of the field with the white plantation house in the distance, he collapsed.
“Don’t stand there,” Asshat shouted. “Pick him up.”
Two of the men complied and they moved to the plantation house. Victor and Vincent were taken away toward a cluster of buildings, but she was marched into the big house.
It was cool inside, a generator providing air conditioning and relief from the heat.
Mak was brought to a polished wooden door and ushered inside. A man sat at the desk, his back to her, looking out the window as Victor and Vincent disappeared into a small structure.
He swiveled around in his chair, his grin wide and oily as he looked her up and down. Great, a letch in the jungle. He wasn’t a nice-looking man, his dark hair slicked back and greasy, his eyes a soulless black.
Asshat grabbed her arm and she shrugged out of his grip, which did nothing for her. He just grabbed her again and planted her unceremoniously into the chair in front of the desk. Her badge tossed from his hand made a thunk against the wood.
Then he stood creepily behind her, making her skin crawl.
His head tipped. “You are quite the mystery,” he said. “A lone woman with two bound men in the jungle.”
“You shot down a military helicopter.” Even though he spoke Portuguese, she spoke in English.
His brows rose as he switched to English. “An American helicopter?” There was a flash of fear in his eyes for an instant. Little did he know what kind of shit had hit the fan.
He picked up her badge and studied it. “Who do you work for?”
There was no way he was going to believe she was just a tourist.
“I’m a federal agent of the United States Navy Criminal Investigative Service. The two men you have in your makeshift jail are Victor and Vincent Cortez. I’m here to exchange them for two of our agents who have been kidnapped.”
The man sat up straighter, the oh shit look on his face turning into panic. This was nothing short of a double threat.
“Vero’s brothers?” he hissed.
“Yes.”
He took a breath and let it out. “The best thing for me to do would be to kill all three of you and bury the bodies. But the U.S. government would then be sniffing around our plantation, and worse, Vero Cortez would have my head. Lock her up until I figure out what to do.”
“The safest thing for you to do would be to let us go,” she said. “I don’t give a damn about your illegal activities.”
He looked up at her with those soulless eyes and a shiver went down her spine. “Take her out of here and keep an eye on her. Give her food and water and make sure the Cortez brothers are well taken care of.”
“Can I have my badge back?” she asked. When he didn’t protest, she picked it up and slipped it into her back pocket.
She was dragged to the same place that Victor and Vincent were, and when they unlocked the door, she found them in one of the cells. They put her in the one adjoining it.
Shortly afterward, a man came in and took Vincent out, then brought them food and water.
All she could do at this point was to keep her strength up and wait for Pitbull to come for them. She was sure he would.
They sweltered in the cells for the rest of the day. Mak was so thirsty, her mouth was dry.
Right around dusk, the door opened, and Asshat came in with a smile on his face. He unlocked the cell and pulled her out.
“Where are you taking me?”
He didn’t say anything, pulling her out of the jail and into a gray dusk. He marched her toward the jungle.
“What is going on?” she demanded. The night was so alive with sounds, amplifying life as she walked toward her death.
“That Cortez brother died. He had severe head trauma and the doc said he bled out. My boss thinks it’s best to get rid of you. The other brother may be useful.” She could hear the grin in his voice. “We’ll just tell Vero it was your fault one of his baby brothers is dead.”
Her blood ran cold, her breath rushing out in alarm. Vincent was dead! Oh, God, that made it the worst-case scenario possible. Without the both of them, Vero could call off the deal and kill her friends. But at this point, she was fucked anyway. It was best to bury her and negotiate with Vero for the release of his surviving brother.
When she stopped in front of a shallow grave, the barrel of Asshat’s gun pressed into the base of her skull, stopping her. She closed her eyes.
“What should we do?” Dodger asked.
Hemingway watched as the men, seemingly unarmed, walked toward the two bay doors. They stood there for several seconds, then looked to the front door. “They’re here to load. Find the switch for the bay doors and open them.”
“Copy that,” Dodger said going over to the control panel that worked every aspect of the warehouse. “Got it.” He punched the button on the console and at the sound of the doors opening, the men’s attention went to the loading dock.
The sound of trucks rumbled in the distance until two large ones pulled up and backed into the bay slots. The men began to load.
Suddenly the computer beeped, and Hemingway looked at the screen. Finally, he’d cracked the password. He sure hoped it was the same one for the phone.
He opened the files and started to go through them. There was a wealth of information in them, including financial, and when he opened that file, he whistled. “Jackpot.”
“What?”
“Picador wasn’t just the Cortez brothers’ handler, he was their accountant, too.”
“No shit! Brilliant.”
Hemingway clicked on a folder that was labeled properties. When it popped up, he found it was a list of real estate the brothers owned through a shell company to shield their identity. There was a plantation listed in Paraguay, and Hemingway opened the file to find pictures of what he could only call a fortress. Besides a black chopper and a plane complete with a runway, there were numerous vehicles—SUVs, trucks, and a couple of Mercedes. A heavy iron gate led to heavy oak doors from a half-mile-long driveway that wound up a slight incline. The property was surrounded by eight-foot stone walls, and around the sprawling house, the lawn spread out like a skirt. It was a Spanish hacienda on steroids, the ostentatious air of the house saying they did have the money to indulge their every whim and comfort. There would be armed guards all over the place to keep out the riffraff and rival drug dealers and smugglers, he was sure. The Cortez brothers would want that kind of firepower. Hemingway intended to take them out of their comfort zone, permanently. They shouldn’t have taken his sister, and if he was their grim reaper, then so be it.
Getting a visual of the house for planning purposes was stellar. But what was even better? There was an address and—he chuckled to himself—gate and door codes.
He picked up his cell and dialed Fast Lane. But the call went to voicemail. “Call me as soon as you get this message!” he said. Then, he recited the address to the house and the codes. Before he signed off on the laptop, he sent command an email.
“What now?” Dodger asked.
“As soon as those guys finish with the loading, close the doors. Find the keys to the Sprinter van. We’re going on a road trip.”
“Hoo-yah.”
“Let’s see what kind of guns and ammo this guy has on hand. We’re going to need some firepower.”
An hour later, after scrounging up a couple of shotguns, two automatic rifles, several handguns, and a ton of ammo, He
mingway looked for Dodger. He walked in with a nice camera.
“What’s that for?”
“Our cover.” His face went young and earnest, his blue eyes twinkling with enthusiasm. “Honest, sir. We’re just two National Geographic journalists doing a story on global warming and the part deforestation is playing in the emission of greenhouse gases.”
Hemingway stood there impressed with Dodger’s transformation and his devil-may-care attitude. It was a great cover story. “That’s good thinking.”
“I’m not just a pretty face, mate.” He proceeded to set the camera into a case he had in his other hand, filled with fancy lenses.
Hemingway frowned. “Where did you find a—”
“It’s better not to ask,” Dodger said with a grin.
He had to wonder how appropriate his namesake was. Clearly his mom had a soft spot for Oliver Twist, the artful dodger indeed.
Hemingway and Dodger got into the van. Hemingway set the GPS for the Cortez compound and settled back in the seat. It was a few hours ride, and he needed sleep. He closed his eyes, one step closer to his sister.
“Hey, mate, wake up,” Dodger said, jostling his arm. Hemingway sat up straight and saw immediately what the problem was. A big-assed gun mounted on a pickup truck was never a good thing to wake up to. It was a DShK, a fifty-caliber machine gun with an armor-plated shield. It fired six hundred rounds per minute. The guy manning the gun looked like he meant business.
“Who are these guys?”
“Islamic extremist group, FARC sympathizers, drug dealers, smugglers. Take your pick.”
They sat staring at each other for a few minutes until someone got out of the truck and started toward them. Hemingway removed the gun from the holster at the small of his back and palmed it low enough the guy couldn’t see it. His finger slid over the trigger. Dodger did the same, sliding his automatic weapon to the side between the door and his seat.
The man stopped at the driver’s side door, eyeing the both of them with suspicion. He was definitely not the cops. “What is your business here?” he asked in Portuguese.
Dodger responded in Portuguese with their cover story. The guy didn’t seem pleased. Dodger pulled out a couple hundred in cash and offered it to the guy. “We’re just on assignment, mate. Nature and all that.”
The guy took the money and walked back to the truck.
“I don’t think he bought it.”
“Why?”
“Because he’s a seasoned combatant. It’s in the eyes.” Dodger turned to Hemingway. “No matter how hard we try to hide it, like knows like. Our experience gives us away.”
They sat for a few tense moments, and just when Hemingway thought they were going to move on, another vehicle pulled up behind the Sprinter van.
“Bollocks,” Dodger said as the truck with the DShK opened fire on the vehicle behind them, bullets breaking the side window to the van, leaving holes in the windshield, and hitting the van’s grille as the vehicle sputtered then stopped running. “Let’s get the fuck out of here,” he said. “Grab the stuff in the back.”
They each shouldered a bag of weapons and supplies and headed for the dense undergrowth of the jungle. Adrenaline washed into his system, his heart rate increasing, but his breathing strong and steady.
Shouts behind them alerted them to the fact that they were being chased, and Hemingway wondered if he’d kill his first man tonight. He knew he was putting himself in the situation where he would have to take lives.
There was silver in the distance, and Hemingway realized they were running parallel to a river.
He would do what needed to be done. He wasn’t exactly in a war with these men, but they threatened his mission. Get in, get Paige and Chris out. There was nothing, not these guys or this jungle, that was going to keep him from it.
He’d made his choice in high school about what it would mean to be a Navy SEAL. He wouldn’t lose sleep over what he had to do now or in the future. He knew what this job was about, and he was ready to do what it took to get into the elite of the elite.
If they were smart, they would deal with the DShK and those guys on the road and leave him and Dodger alone. Dodger might have a warped sense of humor, but there was nothing stupid or soft about the former Royal Marine, an elite member of the Special Boat Service, the British equivalent of the SEALs.
He knew the score. He knew the situation they were in. Kill or be killed. He knew what would happen if the two of them were anything less than what they were—exceptional.
Better than anyone they came into contact with who threatened whatever it was they were doing. No, he hadn’t gone through BUD/S yet, but in his heart, in every cell of his body, he was a SEAL. In warfare, it was win or die. It was stark and dangerous and had no room for errors.
He would see his sister and Chris safe or he would die trying.
He had no more thought for anything except survival and escape. Like a barrage from a contingent of Marines, bullets chipped a line through the trees. At the first shot, Dodger and Hemingway ducked behind the largest damn tree he’d ever seen.
“They must have radioed ahead. They have men on the water too.”
“Fuckers,” Dodger groused. “They have no idea who they’re dealing with.”
“After searching the van, they think you’re a pissed off videographer.”
Dodger laughed suddenly as if he was having the time of his life. “Point and shoot takes on a whole new meaning. Seriously, shooting like that could kill howler monkeys or some endangered species.”
“What? I’m not worried about some monkey’s ass right now, Dodger, and neither are they.”
“Hey, monkeys have a right to a safe environment,” he said with a gleam in his eyes.
As if on cue, a howling call split the night, loud and shrieking of danger. Dodger and Hemingway jumped. They looked at each other and laughed.
The rustle in the treetops told them the monkeys were hightailing it out of the area. They were much smarter than their human counterparts.
“Let’s get moving,” Dodger said, handing him a helmet and night vision goggles. Dodger angled toward the river, Hemingway behind him. Moving in different patterns would give them a fighting chance, and he froze when more gunfire swept back and forth behind them, then suddenly stopped. He could only hear the rush of water, the roar of the motor, and they hurried toward the river, then went to ground. Through binoculars, Dodger followed the rigid inflatable boat as it motored toward the banks. Then he went into his pack and came out with a grenade.
“Now you’re thinking,” Hemingway said, patting him.
Dodger grinned again with that clever grin Hemingway was beginning to love.
“Move back and stay low.”
He did as Dodger asked, hunkered down and watched as Dodger crawled on all fours closer to the water and out from under the shield of trees. He kept himself behind cover and followed his progress through the night vision goggles. He had to wonder where Dodger had come up with an extra pair. Then Hemingway heard the distinct metallic click of a grenade being released. Dodger rose, lobbed the charge, and scrambled back to him. They ran several yards before the live grenade dropped into the motorboat, flashlights jerking in search of it, but it was too late.
The explosion ripped like an orange starburst, fire boiling in tight clouds, the smoke pale in the dark. The force blew a man out of the boat, the others jumping after him as the machine gun collapsed, sinking through the bottom.
“Now we and the monkeys are safe,” he said with a smug grin, hurrying over brush and thick vines.
While marveling at the skill it took to throw a grenade to pinpoint accuracy in the dead of night to hit a target on the water a few feet from shore, Hemingway followed close behind.
The river twisted to the left, widening, and Dodger crouched, pulling up his assault rifle, scanning the night.
The boat sank swiftly. He searched the water for a body and spotted a figure frantically swimming. Dodger drew back, his
hand on Hemingway’s chest, shoving him deeper into cover at the sight of a muzzle flash of gunfire from across the river.
“Who’s that?”
“The enemy of our enemy. Let’s beat feet,” Dodger said.
After they had gotten enough distance from the river, Dodger slowed and crouched, checking his compass, looked at the sky and pointed. “That way.”
When Hemingway rose to head in that direction, Dodger put a hand on his shoulder. “You are doing extremely well for never being in a firefight. Calm in battle, smart as bloody hell, definitely bossy, but Yank, you can have my back any day.”
“Same here. This is all completely new to me.”
“But you’re loving every minute of it, admit it.”
He smiled slightly. “Yeah, I am.”
“That’s good, but could we keep this on the down-low?”
“What?”
“The running through the jungle, fighting drug dealing/smuggling/terrorists’ arseholes.”
“Why?”
Dodger winced. “Well, I got caught up in all that fun, but I just remembered. Fast Lane gave me strict orders to follow your arse and keep you out of trouble. He’s not the forgiving sort, if you catch my drift, and his ass-chewing lectures are not at all fun, mate. Trust me.”
After being on the receiving end of one of those ass-chewing lectures, Hemingway was getting his drift all right. “Got it. You did keep me out of trouble. You did all the shooting and blowing up anyway. It wouldn’t be lying.”
Dodger’s face brightened. “Right, mate. Brilliant.”
A few seconds later, he was scowling, and Hemingway knew why. The sound of a helicopter sounded in the distance.
