“You look surprised,” Hunter murmured from behind my shoulder. “You chose to accompany us on a midnight expedition to stake out a cartel operation. You’re in goddamn law enforcement, Detective… what exactly were you expecting?”
I shook my head in anger.
“Not this.”
Hunter stepped aside, crossing his arms as he leaned back onto a support beam on the back deck. His stern face turned to watch me carefully.
“What in the hell are we going to do?” I asked fruitlessly, throwing my hands up in exasperation. “You’re just expecting me to stand idly by and let you torch bodies… let you torch evidence?”
Hunter nodded without an ounce of regret or consideration on his face.
“That’s not how we do things!” I groaned with mounting anger. “How can you just act so blasé about this shit? Who the fuck thinks that torching bodies is normal?”
Hunter’s eyes darkened, even in the low visibility under the moonlight. “Someone who has lived on this side of the law for as long as I have, Detective… someone who has done this for a very long time.”
I stuck a finger into his chest.
“I thought you told me that this life wasn’t going to change you, Hunter. But it was nothing for you to give the order… and when the police catch wind of this… I’m going to be implicated–”
“Calm the fuck down,” he commanded.
Oddly, I felt myself obeying the order.
“Listen, Sarah, this is exactly what’s going to happen,” he growled. “The police aren’t going to care about some little skirmish near a break in the border fence. They’re going to put this down to cartel infighting, and leave it at that. Do you know how many headless assholes they find down here every single week? We’re just going to finish up here, head back, and wait to see what our new friend has to tell us. We might have lost the battle… but the war is just starting. Now it’s just a matter of time…”
“A matter of time until what?” I asked.
“Until we have a better grasp of what we’re up against… and figure out how to approach the problem properly.”
“But what about the goddamn girls?” I demanded. “What’s going to happen to them now that we’ve interfered?”
“Trust me, Sarah, I know these people,” Hunter reassured me calmly. “Víboras Verde isn’t going to take those girls far… we’ve disrupted their operations, and they’re going to sit on this a day or two… hole them up somewhere safe.”
“And you’re just going to, what? Ride into goddamned Mexico to get them back?”
Hunter turned to face me, his eyes filled with burning, solidified faith. I felt a slight shiver down my spine when he met my weakening gaze.
“That’s exactly what I’m going to do.”
“You… you don’t understand,” I pleaded. “I can’t be a part of this. What you’re proposing is… it’s insane.”
I waved towards the burning pile of bodies nearby, coughing at the smell. “This little fight tonight is one thing… but going into Mexico to fight this cartel? Just loading up men and guns, and bringing the fight to their turf? That might have worked nearly a decade ago, but you can’t get away with that now!”
Hunter pushed off of the support beam and walked over to my side. He brushed a few strands of hair from in front of my eyes, and smiled softly in the moonlight.
“Sarah… I don’t expect you to understand. All I ask for is your trust… Have faith in me. I know what I’m doing, and my men believe in me. Can you do the same?” He whispered, pressing his lips lightly to my forehead.
I shook my head. “This is crazy.”
“It’s not as crazy as you think…”
I pulled away from him. “Whatever you’re planning, you’re going to get a lot of men killed. Heads are going to roll for this.”
Hunter crossed his arms, looking as confident as ever. “I’m counting on it… but none of them are going to be from the men on my side. My Devil’s Dragons will shed blood over this, and I fully expect all of them to come back with me.”
I sighed in exasperation. “Do you even have a plan, Hunter? Do you really know what you’re doing here?”
“I’m working on it,” he chuckled. “And in the morning, I suspect that I’ll have enough to push forward. Just give me a little time.”
I thought of my Lieutenant, back in Phoenix. “Time is not a luxury I really have, Hunter…”
He leaned forward, lips planted against mine. “One day. Give me one more day to figure things out, and then make your decision. But if you want to find those girls, there’s your chance.”
I pulled away from him and shook my head. “That’s what you said about tonight… how many chances do I have to give you?”
Hunter turned away, his face unreadable.
When I started walking away from the burning pile of cartel corpses, he called after me. “Where are you going?”
“I’m getting out of here, and I’m praying that I can still salvage part of my career when I get back to Arizona…”
“So, that’s it?” He asked calmly. “You’re just going to give up and go without seeing this through? You go out of your way to convince me that you’ll stick it out this time, and now you’re just going to freeze up again and take the easy way out?”
I paused in my tracks.
What if that was exactly what I was doing?
When it became clear that I didn’t have an answer for that, I slumped against the side of the farmhouse. My inner strength gave out, and the tears started to stream down my face…
Chapter 43
The ride back to the dilapidated bar felt like it lasted hours, although it was only maybe twenty minutes before we pulled up into the gravel.
The bikers strolled into their headquarters, and began tending to their wounded. Three of them had taken bullets – one in the shoulder, and two in the leg.
These club members weren’t going to see action for a little while, but Hunter ensured that they were well taken care of. He said they had a sympathetic doctor hanging round a nearby after-hours clinic, and I watched the three of them get hauled off to get patched up.
I took a seat at the bar countertop, sipping a glass of water. Hunter was busy checking on his men, but kept glancing over my way. When his phone buzzed, he stepped aside to take a quick phone call.
Grizz was left in charge, and he took the moment to step behind the bar. He looked me over briefly before pouring a tumbler of whiskey.
“You look like you could use something stiffer than tap water,” he muttered as he placed the short glass in front of me.
“How could you tell?” I asked, grate
fully smiling as I kicked back the drink.
“Just a hunch,” he answered.
We stayed in silence for a moment – me, glancing over the bikers as they shed their equipment and cleaned their weapons, and him, eyeing me cautiously.
“Why are you here?”
“Excuse me?” I asked, turning back to face Hunter’s second-in-command. The question was so direct that I wasn’t sure what to do with it.
“I asked, ‘Why are you here?’” He repeatedly softly, his piercing eyes trained onto mine. I almost felt like he was looking right through me, into my very soul.
“I… because I’m looking for missing girls,” I answered quickly. “Cheerleaders.”
“Right,” Grizz nodded contemplatively, before suddenly shaking his head. “No, that’s not right. What are you really here for?”
“I don’t know what answer you’re trying to angle for there, buddy, but you’re doing a pretty bad job of it.” I laughed, taking another swig of whiskey.
“You know what I mean.”
The awful part was, I did know.
“It’s not like that,” I insisted.
“Like what?” He tilted his head thoughtfully.
“You think I’m just here for Hunter, and that I don’t really care about my case at all.”
“I never said that.”
“Oh, come on,” I insisted, setting the whiskey glass down. “You think that I’m here to fuck your boss and play at being a detective? I’m following a lead on a case – my first case. I’m here because you guys were doing a private investigation into the missing girls, and I want to know what you came up with. And Hunter…”
“Hunter is being who he is,” Grizz shrugged.
“Something like that.” I thought on this for a moment. “What do you know about the missing girls? You’re his right-hand man. Do you know anything else about them?”
Grizz thought for a moment.
“I know that we found them once.”
If I’d been holding the tumbler in my hand in that moment, it would inevitably have shattered against the floor.