The untraceable cell phone by Santos' nightstand blared out a strident sound, Diego Vargas' tone signal. Santos glanced at the clock before reaching for the phone. Two a.m. Ay, did El Vaquero never sleep?
"¿Sí?"
"The shipment has arrived."
A shipment of China White through the Port of Wintuan. Why had Vargas called to relay information which would have come to Santos within the hour?
"¡Venido aquí rápidamente!"
Santos was instantly alert. "¿Por qué? Why? What has happened?"
"There are problems." Vargas coughed out the words.
"What kind of problems?"
"Do not speak over the phone," Vargas growled.
He spat out the next words almost as if he'd forgotten the disrespect Santos had shown. "And do not ask why when I tell you to come. Get your fucking ass over here! Now!" He cut the connection.
Santos' security men swept Diego's phones and home every week. There was no possibility that he was being bugged, but El Jefe had become rabidly paranoid. A man like that made serious mistakes.
Santos arrived less than twenty minutes later. This current shipment was scheduled for distribution north to Reno and south to Bakersfield. If something was wrong, they would have difficulty getting the price they'd asked. Their contacts did not like to wait for their product.
As he approached Vargas' guarded fortress, Santos noted the added security men at the gate and outside the front door. They recognized him, however, and passed him through at once.
At the door, he knocked lightly, not wishing to awaken Corazon, and seconds later, Diego swung open the heavy oak door and waved him in. For the first time since Santos had come to work for Vargas at the age of nineteen, Vargas looked haggard – old. He'd been a robust forty-year-old man then and now was nearly sixty, but tonight he bore the lined face and stooped shoulders of a man nearly a decade older.
Perhaps now was the time for Diego Vargas to retire.
"What is the problem with the shipment?" Santos asked, looking around the huge industrial kitchen where Vargas had led him. This room was Magdalena's sanctuary. She loved to cook and the low ceiling dangled with an array of cooking utensils.
Vargas poured himself a Jack Daniels neat, and Santos could tell by the slack mouth that this was not the boss's first drink of the as-yet very early day.
"Pedro thinks the shipment is light. We must weigh it again." Vargas threw back his drink in one swift gulp. "Mi Dios, I do not have time for problems!"
"How light?"
"He did not say."
"Pedro always worries unnecessarily," Santos said, leaning against the island counter. "Tomaré el cuidado de problema."
"You will straighten it out tonight?"
"Sí, right away." Santos turned to leave as the wall phone in the kitchen rang.
A flash of panic ran over Vargas' slack features. "¿Qué ahora?" What now?
He grabbed the phone off the hook and muttered into the receiver. "Who?" Pause. "Yes," he said shortly. Another pause. "Are you certain that it is him?" Pause. "Allow him to pass."
He hung up and turned to Santos. "Another problem. Alejandro is here."
That meant something had gone wrong with the hit.
Alejandro was brought by two armed guards into Santos' office. El Jefe sat behind his gaudy, over-sized desk of expensive teak that he'd had specially made several years ago.
Vargas took in Alejandro's appearance. "What happened?" An ugly line of stitches crossed Alejandro's forehead and ran along his right arm. His face was bruised and battered. "You reported that everything went well." Vargas twirled the liquid in his third drink since Santos had arrived.
"Creímos que todo estaba muy bien," Alejandro babbled, "pero entonces – "
"English! Speak English!" Santos roared.
"¿Que?" Vargas asked, his tone like death. "What went wrong?"
The man was too frightened of Santos looming over him to remember his English. "Uno de la muchacha escapada."
¡Mierde! One of the girls escaped.
"¡Qué!" Vargas screamed again. "How could that happen?"
"No sé, El Vaquero," the man whispered. "No sé."
"Calm down," Santos said. "Here." He thrust a drink into the man's shaking hands. It was hard to believe Alejandro was a hired killer, but his fear of Vargas and Santos ran deep. "Give us the details."
"There was a great deal of confusion. We thought the job was complete, but later, when we counted the bodies, we were short one."
"Which girl?" Santos asked because that was the most important question.
"Tell me she is not one of the older girls," Vargas said, rising abruptly. "Or one who speaks English."
An older girl might be more outraged about what had happened to the younger girls. One who spoke English could relate a compelling story. Often Mexican girls who spoke English were educated, intelligent, and outspoken. Vargas did not like either older girls or ones who complained.
"I believe it was Esperanza," Alejandro said. "Most of the bodies were small."
Ay, Esperanza, she could cause serious trouble. "Where is she?" Santos asked.
"Our contact in Nevada told us she's under guard at a hospital near the Tahoe turnoff. I don't know which one. She is under heavy guard."
At the sound of the girl's name, Vargas turned ashen and then angry. He raised his hand to strike the man, but Santos stepped between them.
"Do not blame the messenger, Diego," he cautioned and motioned Alejandro to step outside.
After the man had left, Santos said, "I will find out where the girl is."
"She can destroy me," Vargas said. "She knows too much and she is the only girl who speaks fluent English."
"I will take care of the girl and the shipment," Santos promised. "Do not worry."
At that moment, a noise from down the hallway to the left drew Santos' attention. When he turned in that direction, he saw a naked blonde stumbling through the archway into the living room.
"Wass goin' on, honey?" she mumbled. "Come to bed, baby." She held her bare arms out toward Vargas. Her brassy hair glimmered in the pale light and her tanned, toned body looked lean and muscled.
A showgirl, Santos thought sourly, barely of legal age.
"¡Salga de aquí!" Vargas yelled harshly. "Go back to the bedroom, bitch!"
Even around his young daughter, Diego behaved like a pig. At least when Magdalena was here, he did not conduct himself so carelessly.
His boss was deteriorating rapidly.
"I need a shower," Bella said, climbing off the bed.
"Great!" Rafe smiled, slipping his hands beneath the sheet and running them over her hips. "I enjoy team sports."
She adjusted the shower spray and water temperature, dropped her robe, and jumped in. Suddenly shy, she was grateful the steam blurred the image of her naked body behind the textured glass of the shower. Through the foggy glass she watched Rafe pull off his shorts and open the door. She thought again how magnificent his dark, coppery skin looked, how the muscles rippled beneath the surface of his flesh, and how fine thick hairs covered his chest and legs.
He wrapped his arms around her from behind and cupped her breasts. "You have the most gorgeous breasts."
He kneaded them gently and teased the nipples. "They feel like satin, smooth as silk." He nuzzled her neck, moving his mouth over her ear and gently nipping the lobe.
"Your nipples are so small and pink I want to do this." He turned her around and bent his head to take her nipple and breast into his mouth, the rasping of his tongue an erotic and scintillating texture against her sensitive peaks. He reached for the soap and lathered his hands, running his slick palms over the breasts he'd just teased with his mouth. His caresses lit tiny fires in her blood as he smoothed her arms, belly, between her legs.
When he finished, she performed the same for him, reveling in the smooth, soapy feel of him beneath her hands. She took his penis and rolled it between her fingers, loved hearing him groan. This time he entered her from behind, languidly and slowly, pressing her against the glass shower as he moved within her and touched her in an exquisite rhythm. At last he pounded into her with an almost desperate urgency and she came at the same time as he spilled himself within her.
When her heart had stopped racing and she no longer felt the thunder of his chest against her back, he turned her around and kissed her sweetly on the mouth and cheeks and neck. "That was nice," he whispered, rubbing her wet arms and back. "You are nice."
Nice? she thought, what a… mild word.
Later they toweled off and wrapped their nearly naked bodies in warm quilts. They sat on the sofa in the living room, drinking hot chocolate. Bella stretched her legs across his lap and he rubbed her feet with his free hand. "This is nice," Rafe said, running his hand up her bare thigh.
"What's with the N word?" Bella teased, half disgruntled.
"What?"
"Nice, you keep using that word."
"You don't like it?" He laughed. "I'll find another one."
"It's just so… pedestrian."
"Pedestrian? Like a jaywalker?"
She punched him lightly on the arm. "Not like a jaywalker, silly, just… ordinary, average."
"Oh, baby, you're anything but ordinary." He leaned over to kiss her knee, opened the front of the quilt, and gazed at her chest. "And those are… God, nothing less than spectacular."
She flushed and pulled the blanket around her. "You're embarrassing me," she protested.
He ruffled her still-damp hair and laughed. "But you're so gorgeous when you blush." He winked. "Gorgeous," he repeated, "not at all pedestrian."
She stood, let the quilt fall away from her body, and reached for his mug, wiggling her hips in her skimpy panties as she strutted into the kitchen.
Rafe followed her, reaching for her waist and missing. "Oh, no, baby, not ordinary at all." He caught up to her at the sink and swung her around, bringing his lips down to hers. "I think I'm addicted."
She felt his erection pressing through his shorts into her stomach and laughed. "At least some part of you is."
He lifted her long hair off her neck and pressed a gentle kiss behind her ear. "Wanna try again?"
She reached inside his shorts. "I'm game."
Then Rafe's cell phone vibrated annoyingly on the counter. "Hell," he mumbled.
"Leave it," she said, working her hand up and down his hard length.
"Ah," he groaned before pulling away with a painful grimace. "I can't." He took a deep breath and flipped open the phone. "Slater," he said, nodding at Bella.
Suddenly embarrassed for no reason she could have explained, other than Slater was on the other end of Rafe's cell phone, she went into the bedroom and slipped on jeans and a heavy shirt. Rafe remained standing at the counter, naked but no longer at full alert, she noticed. His brow was furrowed in thunderous disapproval. He reached down and pulled up his shorts, then brushed by her on his way to the bedroom.
She stood in the doorway, watching him put his clothes back on. "What's wrong? What did Slater want at this hour?"
"The girl's ready to talk," he said. "Slater's driving her down here himself. Has a safe house all picked out."
"Good, that means she's well enough to travel."
"Evidently." Anger etched every line of his face and his movements were stiff and hurried. "He wants us to meet him there, but won't identify the place until I'm on what he calls a secure line."
"Why? Doesn't he trust you?"
"He says there's a leak." He paused before scooping his wallet, badge, and change off the dresser. "And he's sure it's not in his department."
"He thinks it's on your end," she confirmed.