Page 15

“B atman, you there?”

Unable to verbally acknowledge Costello’s question, Darius coughed once.

Her voice had come through the comms unit in his ear canal.

The thing was so small no one would be able to see it—that also meant it would have to be carefully removed when the mission was over.

The microphone that went with it was on Darius’s watch, but Carlos was standing next to him on the patio, so he had to use prearranged signals.

“Have you seen Diaz lately?”

Frowning, Darius glanced toward the mansion behind him.

He didn’t know where ` was going with this and let out two more coughs.

It didn’t mean much that he hadn’t seen the head of the cartel all day–there had been several days he hadn’t seen the man or only spotted him once or twice.

With about twenty-four hours left before the auction, it was doubtful Diaz had left the compound.

“You okay, amigo?” Carlos asked. “Getting sick or something?”

Staying in character, he snorted. “Yeah, probably. Wish I was back in Miami or anywhere else that’s warm this time of year.

” While it was winter in the southern hemisphere, the local temperatures had been hovering in the high fifties and low sixties during the day for the past six days, and about ten to fifteen degrees lower at night.

According to tonight’s forecast, the temperatures wouldn’t come close to the freezing mark, and they were due for heavy thunderstorms and hail.

“Yeah, the cold weather sucks. I heard Diaz and Secada talking about heading to the Panama house after the auction. Margaritas and senoritas in bikinis? I’m up for that.”

“Me too,” Darius agreed, wishing the man would shut the fuck up so Costello could tell him what was going on. He gestured to his right with the AK-47 he was carrying for guard duty. “I’m going to take a walk around the house–check things out.”

“Knock yourself out. I’m going inside to get warm. Nobody’s around. Come in for some tequila when you’re done.”

“Sounds good.”

Darius strolled around the perimeter of the building as Carlos ducked inside the entrance to a mud room. Once he was sure he wouldn’t be overheard, Darius spoke softly into his multi-purpose watch. “I’m clear, Costello. Sit-rep.”

“For the past hour, the camera feeds have been in and out, just like the last time a storm rolled in—they’ll probably get worse.

But besides that, Diaz hasn’t been spotted on the security cameras all day.

” Over the past six weeks, Costello and Romeo had been scanning through the recorded security tapes from the compound, looking for anything that could provide them with more intel.

But since the teams had arrived yesterday, they’d been monitoring the live feeds.

The only rooms that didn’t have surveillance cameras installed were the master bedroom suite, Secada’s suite, and Diaz’s office.

“He went into his bedroom this afternoon around 1300 and hasn’t come out since.

Secada went in there about a half hour later and stayed for about twenty minutes before coming back out.

Nobody’s gone in or out of the master suite since. ”

With his head on swivel, checking his surroundings, Darius responded, “I heard Secada tell the house staff this afternoon that Diaz had a stomach bug or something and didn’t want to be disturbed. He gave them the rest of the day off. That was the last I heard from either Secada or Diaz.”

“Secada was in Diaz’s office for almost three hours after he left the master bedroom.

He then went to the security office for a little bit before going to his own suite.

That was about two hours ago. I don’t know if he’s still in there or if he’s back in the office or with Diaz.

The live feeds have been out more than they’ve been on. ”

“Damn storm,” Darius muttered, a second before a lightning strike brightened the dark sky. It wasn’t long before the crack of thunder followed. The storm was rapidly getting closer. “All right. I’ll see what I can do about checking on them. I’ve got a bad feeling about this.”

“So does Boss-man. He’s already on his way to the compound with the second team. I’m turning over the surveillance feeds to Cookie and Egghead in Tampa, then headed your way too. If shit goes down, you’ll have plenty of backup—just give them a few more minutes to get there.”

“Got it.”

Something was wrong. Emmanuel Diaz had taken over the family-run cartel after his brother had been killed, but he wasn’t the intelligent and crafty businessman Ernesto had been.

However, the family name, and the money behind it, had been enough to win over many of the men who currently worked for him.

Truth be told, his right-hand man had become the brains of the operation.

In fact, Darius was curious why Secada hadn’t done a hostile takeover—maybe he was waiting until the timing was right.

Rounding the back of the house again, Darius looked up at the northwest corner where the master bedroom suite was located. The lights were out, and it was only 2000 hours. Emmanuel never went to bed before 10 p.m. Had Secada decided to stage a mutiny? There was only one way to find out.

Darius was just about to head inside when Ian’s voice came through his earpiece. “Batman?”

“Go.”

“We’ve got the compound surrounded, but it looks like things are going to go FUBAR. We’re not the only ones out here. Looks like there might be a rival cartel trying to move in.”

Another flash of lightening lit up the sky, and its accompanying crack of thunder indicated the storm wasn’t far off. “Any chatter?”

“Egghead’s looking into it but might not have the intel in time—not that it really matters at this point. You locate Diaz yet?”

“Negative. Going to scout out his bedroom. Just need a few minutes to get up there.”

“Your safeword is ‘snake’.”

“Copy that, snake.” Darius almost laughed—Boss-man was getting his two businesses’ terminologies mixed up.

But either way, Darius sure as hell hoped he wouldn’t need to use the word “snake” to indicate everything had gone to shit and his cover was compromised.

But it was nice to know there were now over a dozen team members ready to come to his and the female prisoners’ rescue.

Instead of going in through the mud room and possibly running into Carlos, Darius hustled to the other side of the house to an entrance the house staff used. Once inside, there was a maid’s staircase that lead to the second floor. He snuck up the steps on silent feet.

Upon reaching the top of the stairs, he stilled at the doorway leading to the hallway and listened for a moment. All seemed quiet. Even though the security cameras were flipping out, he hit the button on his watch to be sure they didn’t come back on at the wrong time.

Peering around the door jamb, he checked to see if the long hallway was empty before he stepped out.

To his left was the door to Secada’s suite.

Pretending as if he was just making the usual rounds, Darius turned right and strode past several guest rooms, the main staircase, a sitting area, and the Diaz children’s rooms. He stopped outside the master bedroom suite, swung his AK-47 around to his back, and, again, listened for a moment.

Outside, the storm had arrived. A clap of thunder sounded like it was right on top of the house, while rain began to pound on the roof and windows.

Fuck, what more could go wrong? The weather was going to make it more difficult for him to hear his team out there and for them to see what the hell was going on with the unexpected company.

As far as Darius could tell, there were no sounds coming from the other side of the door. The hallway and foyer chandelier flickered off then back on again. Great, add in a power outage and this mission going FUBAR would be an understatement.

Trying the doorknob, he found it locked.

He didn’t have his pick set with him—hadn’t thought he’d need one tonight—so he reached into his pocket to get the next best thing.

While the locks on the house’s exterior entry doors were all reinforced, the interior ones were easy to bypass.

Pulling one of his alias’s credit cards from his wallet, he slid it between the door and its jamb.

Within seconds, he had his rifle back in his hand and was edging the door open.

There were no lights on in the room, but a combination of foul and metallic odors hit his nose.

Aw, shit .

Darius pushed the door open enough to enter, then shut it again behind him, leaving the room’s lights off.

A thunderbolt gave him enough just enough illumination to see Diaz lying sideways on the bed, with his feet hanging off the side.

Digging a small flashlight out of his pocket, Darius turned it on, stepped forward, and stared down at the dead man.

Diaz and the black comforter were covered in blood, and he’d apparently lost control of his bowels and bladder as his life had drained from him.

A narrow slit in his shirt to the left of his sternum told Darius a knife had probably been plunged directly into his heart.

Had Secada killed him? Most likely. But that conjured up a bunch of other questions, like who was getting ready to attack the compound and were they friend or foe of Diaz’s second-in-command?

Had murdering the bastard tonight been part of a larger plot to seize control of the cartel or had it just been bad timing as someone else staged a hostile takeover?

Either way, it was fucking up the entire mission.

They were going to have to get the women out of there tonight.

The mission had been to get the names of as many human-trafficking scumbags as possible, but not at the risk of the prisoners’ lives.

At least Diaz wasn’t part of the equation anymore, and Secada would be removed as well before the night was over, if Darius had anything to say about it.

Darius stealthily moved back to the door, opened it a crack to make sure the coast was still clear, then closed it again. He lifted his wrist to his mouth and spoke softly. “Boss-man?”

“Go.”

“Diaz has been taken out—probably by Secada. No one else knows yet, as far as I can tell.”

“Fuck. Things are about to go to shit here too. We grabbed one of the tangos in the woods and not-so-politely asked a few questions before silencing him. There’s an attack coming your way, and the hostages are in the fucking middle of it.

You’ve got to get them out of there, but with the fur about to fly, I can only spare two from the teams to help you.

We’re going to be taking fire from both directions, and this downpour isn’t helping matters, but we’ll clear the way for you to lead the hostages into the woods. ”

Well, hell. “Is Tampa on the line?”

Brody’s voice sounded in Darius’s ear. “Affirm, Batman, but not sure how much we’ll be able to help. Video feeds are still down.”

This night can’t get any freaking worse, can it? “Who’s backing me?”

“Costello, Romeo, you’re on hostage detail,” Ian ordered. “Babs, can you still fly in this mess?”

“That’s a rhetorical question, right?”

A few chuckles came over the line at the female helicopter pilot’s snark, but Ian ignored them. “Fine but change the exfil point to Bravo. You’ll be caught in a crossfire here.”

“Exfil Bravo, copy that.”

The original plan had been for Babs to land the contracted UH-60 military helicopter to extract the hostages and most of the team in the large lawn area behind the main house.

Now they were going to have to figure out how to schlep the women a half mile through the jungle, in the cold rain and darkness, to reach a second area large enough for the big bird.

To top it off, the women were poorly dressed for the foul weather and terrain.

“Romeo, Costello, you’re going to have to come in through the mud room—he hadn’t known what else to call it so that’s what they’d been calling it throughout the mission.

The entrance to the stairs for the dungeon is off that to the right.

” While they’d been studying the floor plans of the estate and satellite photos of the grounds for weeks now, he wanted to make sure they were all on the same page.

“Most of the guards are in the bunkhouse for the night. I’ll take care of Carlos.

There should be two others on the perimeter, but they tend to be slackers.

The weather probably drove them to take cover. ”

The only other guard they’d have to worry about until the alarm was raised was the one in the shack at the front gate. With any luck, he’d be snoring away or distracted by boredom, but he wasn’t Darius’s problem. His team would take the guard out, quickly and quietly.

“Boss-man, how much time do you think we have before the tangos attack?”

“According to the guy we interrogated, you’ve got twenty minutes max.”

Fuck!