KILLER DATE (SCANDALS) (24 page)

A brief inspection of the cave made me relax a little because I saw no sign of creatures, either dead or alive.  But more importantly, I could feel a slight breeze which told me we were close to an exit.  I looked down at the others and shined the light so they could see the wall. 

“I think there’s an opening at the end of this.  Who’s next?”

“Who brought the step ladder?
”  Angie’s voice was doubtful.  “I can’t get up there.”

“I
’ll boost you up,” Orlando offered.

“We’ll help you,” Jenny tried to encourage her sister.

Nick turned his back toward Jenny.  “There’s a rope in my pack.  Can you get it out?  It hurts too much for me to take it off.”

“Sure.”  Jenny unzipped the black backpack while I focused the light inside.  She found the rope and zipped the pack shut again.  “How will this help?”

“Toss one end up to Reno,” he instructed her, then to me, “Tie it around your waist.”

It took a couple throws, but it finally reached me
.  I grabbed it and tied it around my waist as instructed.  “Anyone done any mountain climbing?”

Jenny, Angela and
Orlando answered an unenthusiastic “No” in unison.

“Mountain climbing?
  Fuck,” Nick grunted.  “I’m from Texas…we don’t really have mountains here.  I was hoping someone had a better idea.  Anyone want to turn back?”

“Not me.” 
I held my hand down.  “Come on Angie.  Hold the rope and just walk up the wall.  I’ll help you as soon as I can reach you.”

She sucked in a deep breath and wrapped her fingers around the rope.  Orlando and Jenny got on each side, and as soon as Angie pulled herself up a little, they moved beneath her so her ass rested on their shoulders when she paused to take another breath.  Inch-by-inch, she hauled herself up until I could grasp her wrists.  With help from below, pushing her up and me pulling from above, she made it over the ledge.

Breathing heavily, more from nerves than exertion, she crawled behind me and sat. 

Jenny quickly scaled the wall with very little help from me.  Orlando climbed up next
.  I waited for Nick, but when he didn’t come up, I leaned over the edge.  “Come on, Nick.”

He had his arm wrapped around his ribcage.  “Man, I don’t think I can make it.  Go on without me.”

“Shit,” I muttered and untied the rope from my waist.  “Can you hang on to this?” I asked Orlando.  He nodded, tied the rope around his waist and braced against the rock.  I gave the flashlight to Jenny, then backed over the edge, using the rope to rapel down. 

Nick shook his head.  “I can’t.”

“Don’t make me pick you up.”

He and I both knew there was no chance in hell that was happening, but it was enough motivation for him to
grab the rope and try to pull himself up with one arm while bracing his ribs with the other.  I watched, impressed with his strength as he inched his way up.  I wanted to help him, but I definitely wasn’t putting my hands on his ass.  Instead, I moved closer.  “Step on my shoulders,” I instructed him, and, as evidence of how badly he was hurt, he actually complied.  That gave him the final boost he needed to reach the top so that Jenny and Angie could pull him over.  He stifled a groan as he heaved his weight up on the ledge, then moved off to the side to give me room.  I climbed back up, much more quickly with the rope.

“I’ll lead,”
Jenny volunteered and gave me a little smile.  I suspected it was a bit of the old adage,
If you fall off a horse, get right back on or you’ll let fear get the best of you
.  Crawling on her hands and knees, she headed off down the small tunnel and the others followed.  Orlando untied the rope and stowed it back in Nick’s pack.

The zipper sounded super loud in the quiet.  Somewhere down the tunnel we had just left, Nick and I heard the muffled sound of conversation and the rattle of rocks.

“They’re still coming,” I whispered. 

Nick nodded.  “I was hoping they’d take the other
one.”

“Maybe they didn’t bring a rope
.”

“
Ha!  These guys won’t give up, and they probably know these caves…they have a rope.”

As quietly as possible I crawled down the small tunnel, trying to ignore the pebbles and sharp rocks that cut into my palms and through my pants. 
This really sucked.

I could hear Nick’s labored breathing behind me. 
Our only hope was making it to the ranch.  I had no doubt Dallas would be waiting for us there.  By now he would have notified the authorities, so if the Veracruz guys followed us out the other end, they would be arrested.  Of course, there could always be a shoot-out.  Hopefully, we’d be safely into a nice air-conditioned building by then, enjoying some food and a glass of ice water.

Finally, fate was on our side when, after crawling for about ten minutes, we rounded a corner and rays of sunlight splashed inside, partially blocked by a few tumbled boulders and some bushes.

By the time I caught up to them, Orlando was already trying to push the rocks out of the way.  Jenny and Angie were helping, but they weren’t making much progress.

“Let me through,” I told them, and it took us a minute to shuffle back and forth until I was able to pass them and join Orlando at the cave’s entrance.  Together, he and I pushed away
all but the largest boulder, but we had opened enough space where we could climb out.  “Let us check it out first,” I told the girls and Nick, who didn’t protest as he leaned against the wall, looking as if he was about to pass out.

Orlando went first and I followed. 
I spread my arms wide and sucked in deep breaths of clean fresh air.  The sky overhead was the most brilliant blue that I had ever seen.  A soft breeze in my face acted like a shot of adrenalin.  God, I could never be a mole.

I looked around, expecting to see farm houses, fences, a barn or something that looked like the Diaz ranch.
  Instead, I saw no sign of civilization, not even a horse or a cow.  I was beginning to have a bad feeling about this.  But we were outdoors and free, so how bad could it be?

I stuck my head back into the cave and told the girls and Nick to come on out.
  Orlando and I helped them climb out, and they stretched and relished the freedom just as we had before them.  Only Nick wasn’t celebrating, but I chalked that up to his injuries. Now that we had light, I could see the back of his head matted with dried blood from what appeared to be a very nasty gash, and he had his arm wrapped across his ribs as if every breath was torture. 

But there was something more.  As he did a complete circle, his gaze searching the countryside, I saw that his frown was deepening.

“Shit!” he muttered.  “Shit, shit, shit…”

Our revelry screeched to a halt.  “What’s wrong?” I asked, not really wanting to hear the answer, but knowing I had to ask.

“Do you see that river behind us?” he asked.

I looked back at the tunnel and saw that the rocky area that had formed our cave had actually gone under a river, and we were now standing on the other side.

“Yeah, I can’t believe we went that far.”

“Too far.
  That’s the Rio Grande.”  Nick shook his head and his shoulders slumped.  “Fuck me…we’re in Mexico.”

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

The reality of that hit us like a ton of bricks.

“How did that happen?” Jenny asked.  “Why would there be a tunnel to Mexico?”  Even as she asked it, her expression changed.  “Oh, right.  It was probably a drug tunnel.”

“So, there’s no ranch where we can take a shower and get some food?” Angie’s voice was shrill, and it was clear she was on the verge of becoming hysterical.

“No, there
is
a ranch,” Nick snorted.  “It’s just about five miles on the other side of that river.”  He waved his hand in the general direction that was almost due north of where we were standing.  “And we can’t fucking get there from here.”

I hadn’t known Nick long, but I had discovered that if there was a dark cloud, he was going to find it.  Surely,
the situation wasn’t as bleak as he was acting like it was.  “Ah, come on, Nick.  We can just go down to the river and wave over the Border Patrol and get them to pick us up.”

“Really?
  Don’t you remember that Marine who accidentally crossed the border outside of San Diego and is rotting in jail?”

I didn’t follow the news much, but I had heard about that story.  The worst of it was that our government
did nothing to help get him out while they were bending over backwards to help refugee children who had illegally crossed the Mexican border into the U.S. 

“But if we tell them our story…
,” Jenny suggested.

“Did you bring your passport?” Nick asked.

Jeez, I didn’t even have my driver’s license with me.

“First, we’ve got to get away from the cave
and find a place to hide in the rocks out here,” Nick told us.  “We could have guests join us at any minute, and I’d rather not have a shoot-out here in Mexico.  I’ve spent a couple nights in their jails, and it’s definitely not an experience I want to repeat.”

I didn’t really want to be involved in a shoot-out either…especially since I didn’t even have a weapon.

“Damn, we should have taken the other tunnel,” I muttered.  “This is all my fault.”

“You don’t
know if that other tunnel would have been better,” Jenny said.

“We didn
’t have any choice,” Angie added.  “At least you got us out.”

“Listen…
”  Nick held his hands up and leaned toward the cave.  “Shhh.  It’s them.  We’ve got to get out of here.”

He looked down at a
dirt road that was several yards below us, then started walking in the opposite direction and uphill.  We quietly followed him, climbing over and around rocks until we reached an outcropping that was next to a scrub oak thicket and offered shade and protection from all angles.  He investigated the area, prodding the piles of leaves and checking around the rocks for snakes and scorpions, then told us to crawl in.

“Why didn’t we go down to the road?” Jenny asked.

“Get behind the rocks,” Nick told us, “and then we’ll talk.”

The rock was pretty big and we were all able to crawl under the lower branches of the oak trees and
be completely out of sight.  Best of all, we were out of the burning rays of the midday sun. 

Nick was the last one into our little hideaway.  He
stirred up the leaves and pulled some dead branches across the opening so it didn’t appear anyone had disturbed the underbrush.

By
standing on our knees we could see over the rock, but still remain hidden by the branches of the twisted oaks. We watched as three Mexican men crawled out of the hole we had recently exited. 

“They don’t
know we’re up here so they’ll assume we went down the mountain and toward that dirt road,” Nick whispered to us.

“
Look, there’s someone coming,” Jenny spoke softly.

A
caravan of vehicles sped along the road, sending up a wall of dirt and dust spirally behind them.

“It looks like the border patrol.  We’re good!
”  Angela started to stand up, but Orlando jerked her back down.

“
It’s the
Federales
.  They can’t be trusted,” he whispered urgently.

We watched as t
he caravan of two Jeeps and a personnel carrier, all with machine guns mounted on them, left the road and bounced over the rocky ground until they arrived at the cave entrance and stopped.  The passenger in the first jeep appeared to be an officer because he had a fancier uniform.  The other guys were dressed in military green with bullet-proof vests…not a comforting sight.  The three Veracruz men walked up to them, and they greeted each other with a comfortable familiarity.

“They look friendly
, don’t they?” Jenny observed. “Don’t they know they’re cartel members?”

“Oh, they know,” Nick snorted.

“The cartels pay them off,” Orlando added.  “The police and military make very little, so they supplement it with bribes.”

Angie shifted uncomfortably. 

“Please be still,” Jenny told her.  “It’s a good thing Orlando stopped you.  You could have gotten us all killed.”

“Don’t start with me
, Jen,” Angela said in a raised voice.  “I guess you’re going to blame all of this on me…like it’s my fault.”

Jenny turned to look at her with exasperation.  “Well…duh…it absolutely is.  I could be surrounded b
y three and four-year olds with nothing more threatening than blunt-tipped scissors.”

“I’ll just go turn myself in.  Is that what you want?”  Again, Angie started to stand.

“Stop it,” I ordered and grabbed Angela’s shoulder.

“Taking her side?
”  Angela asked bitterly.  “Of course you are.  I saw the way she looks at you.  You two probably hooked up…”

“No
, we haven’t…and it’s none of your business anyway.  And I’m not taking your side or hers…I’m taking
my
side.  I intend to live through this and however or whatever I need to do to stop you from giving our position away, I’ll do it.  Understood?”  I stared at her with all the fierceness I could muster, all things considered.  I was beginning to wonder why Jenny had been so concerned about her little sister when Angie clearly had a death wish.

Angie dropped down to a sitting position
, scooted as far away as possible and pouted.  I, for one, was glad because it kept her quiet.

Jenny smiled at me and mouthed
, “
thank you
.”

“Get down,” Nick hissed.
  “He’s got binoculars, and he’s scanning the mountain.”

We all ducked behind the rock and let Nick be our eyes.

“They’re leaving,” he said after a couple of long minutes.  We could hear the sound of their engines starting.  “Shit, one of the Jeeps is staying at the cave.  They’ve got us pinned down.”

“
Too bad we don’t have our cell phones,” Jenny said.  “Do you call 911 in Mexico?”

Orlando shook his head.  “No, and I don’t think you would want the local police either.  There is so much corruption, you can’t trust anyone.”

“Great way to live,” I commented.

“That’s one of the reasons so many of us are trying to leave,” Orlando added.

I reached up to my neck where my throat mic should have been.  It wasn’t there.  I had no idea when I had lost it.  I looked over at Jenny and saw that hers, too, was missing.  Only Nick’s was still in place.

“Have you tried contacting Dallas?” I asked him.

He fiddled with his earpiece.  “I don’t think it’s working.  I tried talking to him while we were in the caves, but he didn’t respond.”  Nick pulled the earpiece out and noticed that one of the wires had snapped and was dangling loose.  He tried to twist them together, replaced the earpiece and repeated, “Test, test, test.”  After a couple more attempts with no results, he tossed it aside.  “Well, there’s always the chance he heard us even though we can’t hear him.”

“But he’s going to think we’re heading toward the ranch,” I pointed out.

“Dallas, if you can hear us, we’re in Mexico,” Nick whispered.  “I can’t be more specific because they might be monitoring this frequency.  Just get to the river…fast.”

H
ope and helplessness hung almost visibly between us.  We all knew that even if Dallas had heard us, it was a shot in the dark.  Not only did he have to come to the exact spot along the eight hundred plus miles of Rio Grande, but we would have to make it through a heavily armed group of trigger-happy men to get to the river’s edge.  And who knew what kind of timeframe we were looking at.  The one sure thing was that it wouldn’t be any time soon.   

Nick kept watch while the rest of us settled down. 
I passed around the last bottle of water I had.  Unfortunately, all the granola bars were gone.  “Any food in your backpack?” I asked Nick.

“Special Ops don’t carry food.  We find it and kill it ourselves,” he stated with a note of pride.

“I’d rather have a cheeseburger,” I commented wryly.

“Or a pizza,” Jenny said with an almost sexual moan.

“I’d kill for a bottle of ice cold Gatorade,” I added.

Nick silenced us with a squinty glare.

It was blazing hot, even in our shelter especially now that the slight breeze had disappeared.  The cloudless sky offered no sign of relief, and we were grateful for the shade that cut at least ten degrees off the stifling Mexican heat.

Angie and Orlando huddled together off to the side, leaving Jenny and I almost alone…or as alone as it was possible to be
in such a small space.

Jenny reached over and took my hand.  “I want to apologize.”

“For what?”

“For misjudging you.”
  She gave me a shy smile.  “You were so slick, I felt like you were playing a game.  I didn’t want to be another girl you’d screw, then leave.”  She lowered her voice even more, “You unfastened my bra with one hand without looking.”

I started to deny that, but she had me pegged.  I
had a lot of experience, all without commitment.  I was a love-‘em-and-leave-‘em kind of dude.  Bottom line was, I had never met a woman I wanted to stay with for any length of time…until I met Jenny.  She was fun and silly, but when it was called for, she was serious and logical. I didn’t have any idea how long that attraction would last, but I really wanted to find out.

“I shouldn’t ha
ve dragged you into the middle of my mess.  And I didn’t even pay you,” she sighed.

“
Don’t be silly.  I jumped in willingly.”  I looked into her sparkling emerald eyes that, in spite of the danger we were in, were calm and relaxed.  She had been able to save her sister…at least from the cartel…for now.  Helping her made me feel happy and useful.  I couldn’t remember a time in my whole life where I had felt useful.  I chuckled.  “If I had it to do all over, I’d be here, with you, in a heartbeat.”  To my complete surprise that was a true statement.

She l
eaned her head on my shoulder and snuggled against my arm in a completely un-friend-zone gesture.  Knowing nothing might ever come from this because it was very possible that we were going to die out in a Mexican desert, I felt emboldened.  What the hell did I have to lose?

“If we make it out of this…no,
when
we make it out of this, why don’t we start over?  We’ll go back to Earl’s Steakhouse and have Amber as our waitress.  From there, we’ll play it by ear.”

“But no
bloody guy on the porch.”

“No way.
  I think one kidnapped sister, one near-dead guy, one visit to a drug cartel, a couple of explosions and a crawl through a cave with killers chasing you is enough for any relationship.”

“Don’t forget the rattlesnake,” she reminded.

“Oh, yeah,” I agreed.  “Now that we got all that out of the way, it should be smooth sailing from here.”

She twined her fingers
between mine, and while we kept our hands out of sight of the others, we shared a connection that was more than just physical.  I leaned my head against hers, and we both must have fallen asleep because the sun had dropped a little when I opened my eyes.  It had been over thirty-six hours since any of us had slept, and we were all hungry, thirsty and exhausted.

“What time is it?” I asked Nick.

“Almost two-thirty,” he answered.

“Siesta time.”
  I yawned.  “I’ll keep watch.  Why don’t you take a nap?”

My yawn was contagious, and Nick didn’t try to hide it
as his answer was swallowed by his own yawn.  “Maybe I will…but just for a few minutes…”

But before he could move, a low hum caught our attention.  Jenny and I got back on our knees and joined Nick to peer over the rock. 

“Looks like they’re making radio contact with someone,” I said.

“It’s a
drone,” Nick whispered.

Orlando and Angie joined us as we tried to find it against the blue sky.

“There it is.”  I pointed toward a spot.  “Flying above the dirt road.”