Club Nuevo

Los Angeles, California

 

Andres held onto the wheel of his car with both hands, fearful fingers dancing up and down the length of his spine. His side was throbbing, reminding him he wasn’t at his physical best. He could see Isaac standing in the mouth of the alley where his limo normally dropped him off on Friday nights, the site of the abduction that had taken place almost exactly twenty-four hours ago.

This was it.

He touched Stevie’s knee to get her to look at him. “Stay in the car.”

She nodded.

He got out, taking a deep breath as he began to walk toward Isaac.

“Stay where you are,” one of Isaac’s men called.

He stopped, halfway between the gang members and his car. They came toward him, two men. They searched him quickly, pulling his gun out from its holster under his arm.

“Where are they?” he called to Isaac.

“You give me my family, and I’ll give you yours.”

Andres watched his searchers, waiting for them to back away. Then he crossed his arms over his chest and studied Isaac. “I’m not handing him over until I see that my daughter and woman are safe.”

“They’re still alive, if that’s what you’re wondering. They’re sitting with Lobo, and you know how trustworthy Lobo is.”

He knew Lobo. That’s why his shorts tightened, and he felt like he was going to projectile vomit.

“That wasn’t the deal!”

“Yeah, well, you stealing Tommy wasn’t the deal, either, Andres.” Isaac stepped forward, away from the protection of his entourage. “I trusted you. I ignored Lobo when he said there was something not quite right about you, and I trusted you. You betrayed me.”

“It was easy infiltrating your organization, Isaac. Took me less than a few days to get Lobo to give me work. Took even less than that to find out where your corners were, who your dealers were. You’re sloppy, hermano. You’re vulnerable.”

“Bullshit!” Isaac moved closer, anger clear in the color on his face. “I run a tight organization!”

“Then how did a disgraced narcotics officer manage to work his way up to working in your club in less than a month?”

“You had help.”

“Did I?”

Isaac seemed uncertain. “You got arrested, and no one outed you!”

Andres nodded slowly. “If it was that easy for me to do it, don’t you wonder if you might have other moles in your organization? Other cops who found it as easy as I did to infiltrate your gang?”

“Not possible!”

“Isn’t it? Maybe you even have trusted associates, relatives, who’ve turned their backs on you. Gone to the cops and become informants.”

“My people are loyal!”

“Are they? Or do they just tell you what they have to, to keep themselves safe?” Andres tilted his head in a nonchalant way, proving he had no cares in this negotiation. “You’re going down, Isaac. You don’t know it yet, but the process has already started, and keeping a drug-addicted state senator’s son at your side isn’t going to keep you out of jail.”

Isaac charged toward Andres, his gun raised. Andres could see his finger on the trigger, could see he was seconds from taking a bullet in the chest. But what Isaac didn’t see, because he was so enraged, was that he was coming too fast. He was too close, close enough for Andres to grab the barrel of the gun just as he was ready to pull that trigger.

The bullet went wild, flying somewhere into the darkness. Andres twisted Isaac’s arm, forcing him to turn and become a shield pressed to the front of Andres’ body.

“Back off!” he yelled to the entourage that had reacted too slowly, rushing forward too late to save their boss. But their guns were raised, each one making a target out of Andres’ tall form. “Back off, or I will break his neck!”

“He’s lying!” Isaac screamed. “Kill him!”

“I wouldn’t do that,” a woman’s voice behind Andres said, a slight monotone to it. Stevie had gotten out of the car and was backing him up as she slid up beside him, her 9mm aimed at the men closest to them.

Andres wasn’t sure who fired first, but he felt the bullet hit Isaac in the center of the chest.

They’d killed their own boss.

He tossed Isaac aside, firing in quick succession with Isaac’s 35 Magnum. The two that had come over to search him were closest. They went down first with massive wounds in the centers of their chests. Stevie hit a couple of the skinny boys in the back. The others, the hard gang members, ran around the side of the building for cover.

Andres grabbed Stevie’s arm and pulled her back around his car. All he could think right in this moment was that he hoped to all hell that Gray and Alyssa had been in that back office like he suspected. If not, he might have just gotten them killed.

“Keep your head down,” he said to Stevie, but her back was to him, and she didn’t hear. She crawled toward the front of the car and took a couple of covering shots at the corner of the building before running a couple yards to another car parked closer to the alley opening. Someone fired at her, but it didn’t look like they hit her. Andres followed her lead, aware that they needed to stop those guys from going back into the building. Once they went inside, it would be a duck hunt trying to find them all.

Not to mention that Gray and Alyssa could still be in there, and they might use them as human shields. Everyone saw how well that had gone for Isaac.

Andres gestured for Stevie to go around the front of the car and head into the alley while he drew fire on the backside. She nodded, immediately moving forward. He had to give her one thing: she was fearless.

He fired almost aimlessly at the side of the building, but he ran out of ammunition after just a few shots. He reached into his boot and pulled out a snub-nosed revolver he’d hidden there that his searchers had missed. Another few rounds, and Stevie was making her way along the property wall where shadows kept her hidden.

Andres saw two of Isaac’s men fall, pretty sure it wasn’t from his gun. Not from Stevie’s, either. Another set of rounds, and he understood that the other operatives stationed around the building had been given the go-ahead to engage. He’d never been more relieved to have backup in all his career.

It was over in seconds. The other operatives hit the ground and gathered up the rest of Isaac’s men. Within minutes, the empty parking lot was filled with men in flexicuffs. Police lights swarmed the area seconds later, the real cops taking over. Andres walked over to Stevie, helping her up from her crouched position by the wall.

“You okay?”

She nodded, but then gestured to the front of his shirt. Andres looked down and discovered that he must have pulled a few stitches. There was blood soaking through his shirt in multiple places, the worst of it over the stab wound. It took him a second to realize that some of the blood was probably Isaac’s.

“I’m fine,” he assured her.

Then he turned and began wading through the crowd of men and cops and operatives, searching for a familiar face. Wren was talking to a guy in plainclothes, clearly a cop, and probably the cop in charge. He turned the other direction, not wanting to get bogged down in official bullshit.

It wasn’t until then that he headed down the alley, headed for the back door he’d told Robert about, the door through which a man could come and go without being seen. A door that was perfectly positioned to slip a kidnapping victim through.

Where were they?

Cops came pouring out of the door just as he reached it, talking quietly to themselves. He didn’t catch what they were saying, and wasn’t sure he wanted to. He was about to step through, steeling himself for the sight he’d been expecting since the moment he learned Gray and Alyssa had been snatched.

“Andres?”

He turned, his knees going weak as his eyes fell over her face. He stumbled forward, tears spilling from his eyes for the first time since he was a small child. If she hadn’t been there to catch him, he might not have made it. But she caught him, sliding into his arms like she’d always been meant to be there.

“You’re okay?” she asked, running her hands over his face, his throat. He grabbed her wrists, the pounding of her pulse underneath the most incredible thing he’d ever felt. He stared into her eyes, studied her face, his mind telling him that this had to be a mirage. He knew that she was lying dead in that back office, her life ended too early because of him. But here she was, and she felt so real!

A slight frown touched her lips. She pulled her hands from his grip and touched his face again, her thumb brushing over his bottom lip.

“It’s me, Andres. I’m here. I’m okay.”

He shook his head. “It’s not possible.”

“But it is. You saved me!” She moved closer to him, pressing her body hard against his. “You told Robert where I’d be, and he pulled me out before they could do whatever they had planned. Because of you.”

He started to shake his head, but she grabbed his jaw and refused to allow him to deny the truth as she saw it.

“You promised to protect me, and you did. You saved me.” She reached up and kissed him, her lips so soft against his. “You will always save me.”

He melted then, unable to deny the truth. He lifted her up and turned away from the darkness that had always seemed to follow him. He held her as tightly as he could, kissing her with every ounce of strength he had left, kissing her like it was the last time he’d ever kiss her.

“I love you,” he whispered against her lips. “I’ve always loved you, and I will always love you. Please don’t go!”

She laughed. “I was never going anywhere, you fool. Haven’t you realized by now that once I set my mind on something, it would take a natural disaster to shift me from my course?”

He couldn’t help but laugh, too. “Yeah, I think I knew that.”

But it never hurt to be reminded.