Outside Altadena, California
San Gabriel Mountains
Dusk
Valentine winced as he hung by his wrists. With his weight working against him, his body ached at the agonizing pull to his joints that made it hard to breathe. With the shackles cutting into his flesh, warm blood trailed down his arms. His numb body swayed in the cool mountain breeze as he waited to lay eyes on Mateo.
He stared into a dense stand of evergreen trees, mesmerized by the dying light of day flickering through the branches. It reminded him that even after he took his last breath, the world would move on and Raine would be waiting for him. In the distance he heard the steady rumble of a waterfall, the one he’d listened to inside the tunnel, and stilled his mind to its hypnotic and comforting drone.
The worn path of a hiking trail cut through a dry creek bed of boulders and snaked through a small canyon before it changed course up a steep grade to the mine entrance where he hung. He imagined Raine trekking through the remnants of old, rusted mining equipment strewn along the footpath, glancing back at him with her sweet smile and sunlight shimmering in her hair.
With every breath labored, he closed his eyes and pictured her climbing the trail beside him. When he died, he wanted Raine with him.
At the sound of men approaching down in the canyon, Valentine opened his eyes. Mateo had come.
***
Mia’s stomach lurched when the helicopter banked into a turn. Dressed in black BDUs like the rest of her team, she gripped the arm rests and grimaced at Faith who sat beside her with Mike D’Antoni in the cockpit. Mike had picked up a special ops team at the airport, men dressed in full SWAT gear.
Mia took deep breaths to stop the nausea. As she stared out a passenger window down to the ribbon of asphalt near the base of the San Gabriel Mountains, she held a topographic map in her hand that Mike had given her. The bumpy flight had made staring at the small print hard on her stomach.
“Our target has picked up two more vehicles. They’re heading out of the city…east.” Mark’s voice came over the headset Mia wore to block out the rotor noise and to communicate with Mike and her team.
“Looks like they’re taking the next exit,” Dan said from his vehicle. “With less traffic, we’ll have to hang back so they don’t spot us.”
“Copy that.”
Dan Romeo drove ahead of Mark, tailing the cartel entourage. They had a blip on their GPS system and had tracked the signal from a lavish home in the Hollywood Hills and taken the 210 freeway toward Pasadena. When the vehicles took the Lake Avenue exit and headed north into a residential area of Altadena, they had to be more careful to avoid being spotted.
“Do we have any confirmation that De La Cruz is in one of those vehicles?” Mike asked over his headset.
“No, but they’ve got a convoy now,” Mark said. “I’d bet money the bastard is down there.”
“You getting anything to help us, Mia?” Dan’s voice sounded hopeful.
Faith glanced toward Mia and reached for her hand without saying a word. With the extra men onboard who didn’t know about her and Faith’s psychic abilities, Mia felt her face heat with the added attention, but she didn’t have time to worry over it.
“Give me a minute,” she replied.
I can do this.
Mia had sent the telepathic message to Faith and her friend nodded with a smile. Mia closed her eyes and remembered the nightmarish dream she had—and all the visuals Valentine had trusted her to see. Nothing would be too trivial.
The unyielding darkness that made her blind, the cold she couldn’t shake, the frigid water dousing her from the shower, the glint of metallic gold—all of these things had to mean something to Brax. The last person she pictured was the man on the train who stood over Raine, the one Mike said had died months ago.
Mia tried to make sense of the vision flashes, but puzzling through the fragments stressed her out until she embraced her gift and trusted it to give her answers. She placed her fingers on the map as if she held an Ouija board——scrying to locate Brax.
Her fingers gravitated to one spot again and again. Even when she wanted to cover more ground, the location worked as a magnet to draw her back and her fingertips felt as if they had touched a flame. After she held the map closer to see where her gift had taken her, the puzzle pieces fell into place with the visions she sensed had come from Valentine.
“Oh my, God. Yes. This has to be it,” she whispered.
“You have something?” Faith reached a hand to her shoulder with an encouraging smile.
“The Dawn Mine in the San Gabriel Mountains. It’s by Millard Falls. Can we fly over the spot first?”
“Sorry, Mia,” Mike said. “If the cartel is in the area, we would tip our play. We don’t want to force their hand. They could kill him and vanish in this terrain.”
What Mike said made sense, but it didn’t stop Mia from second guessing as Faith keyed something into her satellite smart phone.
“I hit up Andy for terrain details of the trail system. He says there’s a campground near Dawn Mine if we have to land. It’s only a half mile to the waterfall Mia mentioned.”
“I’ve hiked the area. I can help with an assault plan,” a man from the SWAT team said. “The terrain is too rough. We’ll need a fast rope insertion.”
As the team communicated their tactics for a stealth attack, it didn’t take long for doubt to creep into Mia’s belly. Everything would come down to how much she trusted her gift, the way she’d interpreted her visions, and the link she believed she had with Valentine.
If she was wrong, he could die. As the helicopter pitched and rolled left, Mia wanted to puke.
***
Twenty minutes later
The stocky man had his loyal soldiers gathered around him as he came up the path with his steely dark eyes fixed on Valentine. Brax had seen Mateo De La Cruz’s face before—in the crosshairs of his suppressed .300 Winchester Magnum sniper rifle.
That day Brax had pulled the trigger—the culmination of a covert CIA mission into Mexico had ended in a hostage situation without one innocent life lost, but not everyone had walked away.
A man had died.
“I have looked forward to this day,” Mateo said. “You have no idea.”
The man touched a hand to Valentine’s bare belly and when he flinched, Mateo smirked.
“Oh, I think I do.” Brax seethed. “But there’s a big difference between us.”
De La Cruz glared at him with his nostrils flared.
“Your brother Arturo took a priest hostage and put a gun to his head. He threatened to murder him in front of innocent children, rather than take his punishment like a man. I had the shot and I took it, following orders.” Valentine forced each word from his mouth, fighting through the pain. “I had no choice, but you did. Raine was innocent. She didn’t deserve to die. What kind of man does that make you?”
As Valentine stared into the eyes of a man he’d grown to hate, he flashed on what instigated everything.
Advance intel on his mission into Mexico had missed key facts. Valentine had been the sniper on a team sent to arrest Mateo De La Cruz. With his target visually confirmed, Brax did his job and saved lives. He had a successful mission until the truth came out.
Even though he had good reason, Brax had killed the wrong man.
Mateo had a twin.
“He was still my brother!” His body shook as he yelled. Gasping for control, he lowered his voice. “Losing him was like cutting off my legs….cutting out my heart. He was beyond being my blood. I would have died in his place.”
“I would’ve let you.”
“Damelos.” Mateo held out his hand to the man with the battery couplings, demanding he hand them over. “Ahora!”
Without warning, Mateo touched the cables to the battery, sending a jolt of electricity through Valentine’s chest. His eyes rolled back in his head and his body stiffened and jerked with the sudden shock.
He couldn’t breathe and his chest scorched like seared meat.
When Mateo cut off the juice, Valentine saw stars and nearly blacked out. His chin dropped to his chest and he smelled burning flesh. With his skin on fire and his muscles paralyzed, Valentine gasped for air and couldn’t fill his blistered lungs.
“None of this brings my brother back, but you should know. I made sure she saw me when I pulled the trigger. She knew she would die. You didn’t see the fear in her eyes, but I did.”
“You, son of a bitch!”
Jolting him again and again, Mateo brutalized him until Brax thought he’d suffocate. After the man tossed the battery cabling to the ground, the crime boss pulled a black-bladed combat knife from its sheath and stepped toward him.
Too weak to struggle, Valentine hung like a side of beef, waiting to be gutted. Mateo grazed the cold edge of steel across his skin, drawing first blood.
“I know how to make this last.” He glared up at Valentine. “When I slide my hands into your open belly, I’ll pull out your steaming intestines with my fingers. You’ll see everything.”
Brax fought for each breath and mustered his strength.
“You killed an innocent woman…and you wouldn’t face me, man to man. You’re a coward, Mateo, and your men know it.”
With his jaw muscles clenched, Mateo let the blade speak for him. He gripped the knife and made the first cut.