KILLER DATE (SCANDALS) (16 page)

“
It’s been many years…,” I heard Ricardo’s voice say, “but I do not think so.  It was used to transport product for years, but long abandoned.  My sons used to play there, and they always found their way out.  Besides, it’s better than if you run across the desert and try to outrun them in your little Jeep.”

“And the diversion
Ricardo?  Can you help us there?” Nick persisted.

Ricardo
held his hand out, palm up. The assistant on his left pulled a cell phone out of his pocket and handed it to the older man who hit a speed dial number, then held it to his ear.  After a couple of minutes of hushed conversation in Spanish, he handed the phone back to the guard.

“We can help…
but there are conditions.”

“I expected that,” Nick’s tone was resigned.

“We will not have our men within one hundred meters of the compound.  However, we have recently had a shipment of Stinger missiles come into our possession which will effectively cause a major disturbance that will distract them long enough for you to get away.  I must tell you that it will be our intent to dissolve the compound into dust…like the rest of the quarry.”

Nick waited.  It was obvious he expected more.

Ricardo continued, “But you have to do something for me in return.”

“Name it
amigo
…name it.”

“I intend to leave no one alive.  I need you to commit to me
that your government will not do anything to stop us, arrest us or bring any retribution on us.”

Jenny’s fingernails dug into my leg.  Apparently, the thought of an apocalypse, even if it involved a vicious drug cartel made her uncomfortable.  And her hand on my leg, however innocent, was making me pretty uncomfortable, too.

“He knows more about our government than I do,” I whispered to her with a wry twinkle, hoping to lighten her mood.

Ricardo must have ears like a bat because he overhead me.  But his smile told me he wasn’t upset. 
“I have a lot of time on my hands here, so I watch Hollywood movies, FOX News and CSPAN.  Your government is not very trustworthy, so I need your personal promise on this, Nicholas.  Do we have a deal?”

“We do.  The U
.S. Government has nothing to do with this.  They’ll probably figure out it was a hit, but they don’t have the manpower or coin to investigate it.  If all goes well, you’ll be doing us a favor and we’ll have one less drug cartel on the streets.  Win-win.”

Ricardo nodded thoughtfully. 
“One more thing.”

“
Miguel?” Nick guessed.

“Are you going to protect him when he gets out of the hospital?”

“He didn’t do anything illegal as far as we know.  He’ll be fine…legally.  But if these guys are not completely eradicated, he’s still going to be a target.”

“
Obviously, I can’t keep him safe unless he’s here.  And you and I both know he won’t stay with his
old man,
as you kids say.”  He looked at Jenny.  “I suspect he’ll want a woman who is like my Alta…headstrong, passionate and spoiled.  They’re sweet and loving, but they have to get their way most of the time.”

“When are
we going to do this, Nick?” I asked.

“How fast can Dallas have that drone in the air?”
Nick questioned Christopher.

“
He’s picking it up today.  We should be ready to go tomorrow.”

“Will that work for you?”  Nick asked
Ricardo.

“We will be ready for
sunrise day after tomorrow.  That should give you plenty of time to get in there and out safely…and before there are too many people awake.”

Nick pulled a
small spiral notebook out of his pocket and leaned across the table.  He and Ricardo spent several minutes in deep discussion.  Nick scribbled notes while Ricardo marked spots on the map. I assumed they would be the targets for the Stingers.  One of Ricardo’s assistants was also taking notes as the old man dictated them.

Finally, they were all satisfied with the details of their plan, and they leaned back
with relieved smiles.  Ricardo stood and reached across the table.  He extended his hand.

Nick
also stood and shook Ricardo’s hand.  “Let’s do this.”

“
Si, si…adios amigos
.  Nice to have met you,” he said, including all of us in one nod.  “
Vaya con Dios
.  Maybe I will see you at the wedding.”  Ricardo chuckled as he turned and walked toward the house.

Pedro escorted us off the property, and all the way back we went over the plans, refining them and making sure we understood each step.  I participated in the conversation, but Jenny seemed emotionally drained.  She listened but didn’t
speak.  When I noticed her head bobbing, I eased her over until her head rested on my leg.  Her eyes fluttered open, and she looked up at me, her green eyes dark with emotion.  Slowly, her long dark lashes drifted closed, and she fell into an exhausted sleep.

As her face relaxed, she looked younger and softer.  How had I ever thought that face wasn’t beautiful?  Her skin was clear and translucent, pale, in sharp contrast with the blackness of her hair and lashes.  Her lips were full and natu
rally a delicious rosy red.  I remembered their intoxicating sweetness with a pang of longing.  What had I done to convince her I wasn’t worthy of her affection?  Technically, she wasn’t the first woman who had rejected me.  I guess my mother would have that honor by choosing slutting around over being a parent.  What kind of mother didn’t even make it to her only son’s graduation?

Not that I had a mother-complex on Jenny. 
Far from it.  I wanted to hold her in my arms and keep her safe.  I wanted to make wild crazy love to her…but shockingly, I also wanted to wake up with her in the morning.  She was strong and loyal and smart…all qualities I could get in a German shepherd.  So, it had to be something more that attracted me to her.

I thought back to our
dinner last night at the restaurant…had it actually been only last night?  So much had happened that it seemed like we had been caught in this whirlwind together for weeks.  We had had such a pleasant evening, talking about our pasts, our dreams and our favorite things.  The conversation never lagged or felt stilted.  We had both had a good time…followed by an almost great time in the bedroom.  If we had gone through with it, would she still have dumped me?  Would she have felt remorse?  Guilt?  Contempt?

All of those feelings would have been worse than what she felt about me right now.  Maybe the time just hadn’t been right.  Perhaps she just took a little more TLC than the other women I had loved and left.  Finesse was one of my strong suits on the stage.  It apparently was time to use it in my love
life if I wanted to have any sort of relationship with Jenny.

And yes, I had to admit, that I did want
something with her.  Not a quickie one-night stand, but a real hold-her-hand, take-her-on-a-date kind of thing.  I wasn’t exactly sure what yet.  I didn’t know if I would ever be able to commit to a woman forever.  That seemed like an unrealistic concept to me.  I had certainly never witnessed a successful long-term relationship.  But I had seen an elephant disappear and a tiger pop into a glass box that was suspended in the air.  Surely, falling in love couldn’t be as difficult as that.

 
She must have needed the sleep because she didn’t move until we pulled into a restaurant parking lot in Fredericksburg.   Nick had eaten there before and since we were all starving, we decided not to wait the extra hour until we got home.

Now that we had a plan, even though there was a lot of risk involved and the timing had to be perfect, we were all more relaxed as we enjoyed the generous amounts of home-style food, finished off with large pieces of warm appl
e pie and Blue Bell ice cream.  Full and tired, we made the rest of the trip in near silence, all of us deep in thought about what was going to be happening tomorrow…and how important it was that we succeed.

A
fter dropping Nick off at the Scandals office, we were at the lake house by 8 p.m.  The evening was still warm as the sun set over Lake Travis and we congregated for tribal ritual number two, the pool-side cocktail hour.  Liberty and Killeen stuck with straight fruit juice as the rest of us drank the pre-requisite debriefing elixir that helped us sort through the events of the day and discuss a schedule of activities for tomorrow.

“Wonder why they call this cocktail hour,” Dallas
mused as he downed the last of his Coors Light.

“Goes back to after World War II
.  That was the time of day when everyone in the hospital had to take their meds.  Guess they were trying to make is sound like more fun than it was…and it hung over,” I added drolly.

“Hung over?”
  Tulsa moaned.

“How do you know that stuff?” Liberty was always impressed by obscure knowledge.  She soaked it all up like a sponge.  I suspected that someday, she’d be a contestant on
Jeopardy
or some other trivia show.

“Backstage conversation is rarely deep, but it covers a lot of territory.  The old performers know a lot of shit,” I explained.

“How did the meeting with Nick and Ricardo go?” Killeen asked as she nibbled on a lemon that had been in her lemonade. She peeled the chunk of lemon off the ripened rind and chewed it.

“
Oh, didn’t you hear?  Nick wasn’t there,” I answered with a twinkle.  “Actually, I liked Ricardo.  A real gentlemen, but quite a control freak.”

“But I
thought Nick went with you,” Killeen persisted.

Jenny put her finger against her pursed lips and shook her head in Killeen’s direction.

“I’ll tell you later, Babe,” Christopher finally said to shut down the conversation about Nick’s participation.  “I think everyone is getting paranoid…but for good reason.  Dallas where are we on the drone?”

“
The new model is easier to fly than the one I flew last summer.  I had a blast today, and Tulsa and I set up the camera.  The check ride was successful, and we’re ready to go!”  Dallas stood at attention and gave Christopher a mock salute.

“I’d like to learn how
it operates,” Christopher said with a touch of envy.  He had the attitude of a kid who wanted to play with someone else’s Christmas toy, but wasn’t allowed.  Since we were in such a time crunch, he knew he’d have to wait.             

“One neat feature is with the press of
a key on the laptop you can have the drone freeze on its current GPS coordinates, and it will hang in one position.  Even if the wind tries to blow it away, it will readjust.”

“I used to have a
n RC plane when I was a kid.  Never crashed it, but one day I lost it when it went out of range and wouldn’t come back.”  Christopher smiled at the memory.  “Well, I guess it did probably crash eventually…but not while I was in control.”

“The r
adius is good for a mile and we should be able to get much closer than that…probably less than a half mile away,” Dallas said.  “I checked the maps and there’s a good spot northeast with some pretty tall hills.  The motor is pretty quiet and if we stay above 500 feet or so they’ll never hear it, especially if there’s any ambient noise in the compound.”

“We’ve got a plan
, and Ricardo has agreed to help...”  Christopher’s cell phone rang and when he saw the caller’s ID, he motioned for everyone to keep quiet. “Evening Nigel.  What can I help you with?”

We all
leaned in as if we could hear Nigel from twenty feet away.  Christopher’s expression grew tense.  He slowly swirled the ice and whatever was left of his drink around and around in his red Solo cup.

“Okay…well I was going to go to Del Rio tomorrow
on a missing person’s case.  Critical? I think it is…yeah…you’re right….you’re right.  What would Roger do?”  He managed to shake his head and continued to swirl his ice and drink without missing a beat.  Christopher looked like he’d rather be anywhere but on the phone with Nigel.  “We’ve got enough people on the case to handle it…I guess.  Okay.  I will…no that’s alright…yeah…Piper’s important to you and, therefore, to me too.  I’d be glad to meet with her and you tomorrow.  Sure.  I’ll see you here at noon.  Goodnight.”  Christopher exhaled heavily.  He turned and looked at Dallas, me and Jenny.