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“Yeah. Did I hear Joaquin’s name?”
“Yes. We gotta get out of here.” She relayed the senora’s news.
He was a shadowy figure sliding off his sleeping bag, and she rose onto her knees to turn on the lamp. Blinking against the sudden light, she saw him crouched in front of his bedroll, readying its two pieces with swift efficiency for a return to their respective places on his pack.
He glanced at her over his shoulder. “Tell Mrs. G. that when Joaquin shows up here she needs to tell him the truth—that she rented us a room. And for her own safety, she should try to act surprised when he finds us gone.”
Mags interpreted for Senora Guerrero as she scrambled into her clothing, then translated Mrs. G.’s reciprocal warning to be as quiet as possible because Hector down the hall was both a light sleeper and an incorrigible gossip. Looking at her watch, Mags saw she’d slept longer than it had felt like. It was almost 1:00 a.m.
Finn finished dressing before her, and the instant he had his shoes tied, he carried his gear over to the backpack. After storing it, he glanced over at Mags’s suitcase, then turned those dark eyes on her. For a single brief, hot moment his gaze slipped over her still bare legs before rising to meet her eyes.
“We might not be able to get to the car and if that turns out to be the case it’s gonna be difficult to move fast hauling a suitcase. I have a little room in my pack for some of your stuff. You think maybe you can fit part of it into your purse?”
She nodded and grabbed a change of clothing, a sweater in case the evenings grew cooler than tonight, clean undies, socks, a pair of shoes to supplement her sandals and, after a brief internal debate, her performance gear. She handed a share of it to Finn and stuffed the rest into her tote. She pinned up her braid, tied another scarf around her head to disguise her hair color and used a pencil to quickly darken her eyebrows and draw a beauty mark next to her upper lip.
Finn swung the rucksack onto his back and came over to the senora. “Muchas gracias,” he said with palpable heartfelt appreciation and bent to press a fleeting kiss upon the older woman’s forehead. Then he turned to Mags.
“Let’s move,” he said briskly, and headed with long-legged strides for the door.
She followed in his wake.
The senora was right behind her. “Leave through the kitchen,” she said in a low voice.
Finn had already entered the room before Mags could finish speculating how much she dared raise her voice to translate Senora Guerrero’s instruction. He made a beeline for the back door, but Mrs. G. raced to place herself between him and the exit. She put a hand on his chest and pointed first to herself, then out the door.
Stepping back, he nodded, and the senora grabbed a lidded earthenware pot from the counter, turned off the kitchen light and opened the back door. She carried the pot over to a compost heap and emptied the kitchen waste onto it, glancing casually around the small yard as she did so. Straightening, she made a small, close-to-her-body hand gesture to indicate they should come out.
She and Finn had no sooner stepped into the yard when a pounding commenced on the front door and for a second Mags thought her heart had stopped. Then it thundered in her chest with such force she was surprised the entire neighborhood didn’t start yelling for her to keep it down out there. Mrs. G. scuttled past them into the kitchen and quietly closed the door behind her. Mags jumped when Finn’s work-roughened fingers suddenly wrapped around her wrist.
He placed the knife he’d liberated from Joaquin in her hand, and she saw that he’d retrieved the gun as well.
“Come on,” he breathed and edged around the corner of the house.
For a second she stared down at the knife in horror. Then she gave herself a mental shake and took a giant step to catch up.
He put a hand back to halt her when they reached the front corner of the house and cautiously he craned his head to look around its edge. Almost immediately, he pulled back and lowered his mouth to her ear. “There’s a guy keeping an eye on our car,” he said. “And there’s an SUV in front of it that’s too shiny and new to belong to anyone but city guys.” He hesitated, then asked, “What are your thoughts on distracting him while I disable it?”
Her stomach went queasy and she wanted to say, “Are you out of your freaking mind?” Instead, she whispered, “No problem,” and handed him back the knife. She yanked her tank top down to showcase some cleavage and tucked it into her shorts to keep it low and tight. “I’d better cut through the neighbors’ yards, though. Coming out of this one won’t help our cause.”
“Wait.” He gripped her arm. “I don’t know what I was thinking.” His voice was surprisingly fierce for a tone so low-pitched. “Because on second thought, putting you in danger doesn’t seem like such a hot idea.”
No shit, Sherlock, her mind agreed, so relieved she wanted to break into a dance. Because it really was a lousy idea. But her big mouth said, “And yet, it’s the only idea we have. And I really like the thought of you disabling their car. Otherwise, they’ll be right on our tushies, and if that’s the case I don’t think we’ll have a prayer of shaking them.”
He was quiet for a moment. “Here, then.” He thrust the gun at her. “Take this.”
Her hands flew back, palms out, in repudiation. “I’m not going to shoot the guy!”
“Then use it like a hammer if you need to,” he said in a hard whisper. “Because, baby, if it comes down to you or him, better that you’re the one who walks away.”
True. But still—
“I’ve never handled a gun in my life, Finn. He’s more likely to take it away and use it against me.”
“Then, here.” He held out the knife. “Take this back.”
“No. It’s too big and the same thing applies. Plus, you might need it to disable the car.”
He studied her for a nanosecond, then nodded. “Okay. You have anything small and sharp in that behemoth purse?”
“Yes!” She dug out a pair of pointy little manicure scissors and immediately felt better to have some kind of weapon she could easily hide.
Finn looked less than impressed with her choice, but he didn’t say anything. Instead, he bent down and pressed the same kind of kiss to her forehead that he’d given Senora Guerrero. She felt surprisingly strengthened by it.
Then he stepped back. “Good luck, Magdalene.”
“Mags,” she insisted.
“Mags,” he agreed and repeated, “Good luck. And be careful.”
“You, too.” She turned and went to the back of the yard before crossing to the one next door, then slipped through that and a couple more fenceless adjoining yards. As she crept along the side of a little house several down from Senora Guerrero’s, she pulled out a richly pigmented lipstick and dabbed some on her mouth, rubbed her lips to give her what she hoped was a just-been-thoroughly-kissed look, then massaged the color that had transferred to her fingertips into the apples of her cheeks.
She waited until the man standing guard over their rental car turned his back, then stepped out onto the narrow concrete sidewalk bordering the packed-dirt road that ran through the village. She was only two buildings away from the cantina and as she began walking back toward the boardinghouse, she drew in a calming breath, then slowly eased it out.
She could do this. She’d spent practically every Saturday since she was nineteen years old performing on the streets. Of course it was more posing than true acting.
She swallowed a snort. Because she’d been acting, one way or another, since five months, two weeks and three days after her thirteenth birthday. This was simply more of the same, only with more physical risk at stake. So she shook out her hands.
And called out in friendly, faintly slurred Spanish, “See you tomorrow, Rosita!”
CHAPTER FIVE (#ulink_331fccb6-2daf-5d3a-8a9f-ae8d019341fa)
AT THE SOUND of Mags’s voice, the man guarding their rental car whirled to face her. He had the excessively developed muscularity of a weight lifter lacking an enough-is-enough gene. He also looked like a guy who could turn mean as a snake with very little provocation, and that had her second-and third-guessing herself in the suspended seconds he stared at her through narrowed eyes.
Then it apparently sank in that she was a lone woman with weapon-free hands and the tension in his burly shoulders eased. He slipped the gun held close to his side into the back of his waistband.
Flashing him a loose, friendly smile, Mags pretended not to notice. But she thought, Gotcha, when she saw his chest puff out.
“Hola.” Adding a swing to her hips and the occasional faint stagger to her stride, she made her way toward him with the exaggerated care of a drunk. “I know every one in town,” she said as she reached the trunk of the rental and eased her tote down her arm and onto the packed dirt road, “And have since birth, so I know you’re not from around here. I’m Benita.” She pulled back her shoulders a bit. “Who are you?”
“Frederico.” He seemed to be speaking directly to her breasts, and even though her aim had been precisely that—to utilize whatever assets she had to distract him—she couldn’t help but wish she hadn’t showcased her boobs quite so effectively.
Not that she could do anything about it now. She tilted her head toward the boardinghouse. “Are you staying at Senora Guerrero’s?”
“No. We’re just here to see if someone we know stopped for the night.”
She made a derisive sound deep in her throat and doodled a design in the dirt that covered the rental’s trunk. Its hood was only feet behind the cargo hatch of Frederico’s sleek black SUV and he stood next to the rental’s passenger-side door. He stared at her, not even pretending he wasn’t checking her out. It was creepy, but luring him down here so Finn could work whatever magic he planned on the SUV shouldn’t be too difficult.
Despite the thug’s definite awareness, however, her near snort had his brows drawing together. “Are you mocking me?”
“What? No.” She managed not to sigh, but she’d forgotten about the Latino machismo. “It’s just that, other than you, no one of interest has stopped in this town for a very long time.” She waved a hand, staggered as if the action had thrown her off balance, then slapped her hand down on the trunk to catch herself. “Well, I did hear in the cantina that a couple of americanos are spending the night here, but I didn’t actually meet them.” She shrugged. “Not that I would’ve been able to talk to them anyway—americanos never bother to learn our language, you know?”
His expression said he agreed wholeheartedly, but he merely nodded.
She licked her lips. “You’re very handsome. Where are you from?”
He left his post next to the passenger door and swaggered down to her end. “Santa Rosa.”
“Ay! You are so lucky! I would love to see Santa Rosa someday!”
“You have never been?”
“No. It is far away and I have no car.” Out of the corner of her eye she saw Finn slide out of the shadows. “But hopefully someday.” She turned to lean her rear against the back of the vehicle and patted the fender next to her hip.
“Still,” she said, tilting her head to look up as if she didn’t care one way or the other if he joined her, “I bet you don’t have a view in the city that can rival our sky.”
It was certainly like nothing she had seen for far too many years. Yet as if her first thirteen years in El Tigre had imprinted it in her DNA, it was a sight she’d carried with her wherever she went. Even in the dead of night—or in this case, earliest morning—the sky was a deep midnight blue strewn with a million stars. Many shimmered dimly and looked every bit the hundreds of light-years away that they were. Others burned brightly and seemed close enough to reach up and gather by the fistful.
Frederico merely shrugged, however, unimpressed. “Give me the bright lights of the city any day,” he said, leaning against the trunk next to her. He turned to give her a smoldering once-over. “I like looking at you, though.”
She brought a hand up to brush back her hair and maybe buy herself a few moments’ reprieve from the intent she saw building in his expression. Just in time she remembered the elaborate head wrap she’d created to disguise the fact she was a blonde. But the action brought her hand into her line of sight and even in the dim light she was sidetracked by how dirty her index finger had gotten from writing on the trunk. Without thought, she popped it in her mouth and sucked.
An unfortunate impulse, as it turned out, and one she regretted immediately. But before she could even grimace at the taste, Frederico whipped an arm around her and yanked her first to her feet, then into his arms. Her mouth went slack in surprise and the finger she’d been about to spit out slid free. Then faster than she could catch her breath he slammed his mouth over hers.
Her hands automatically flew up to shove him away and as they met the cloth over his chest it was all she could do to suppress the instinctive urge to push, and push hard. She curled her fingers into the fabric to keep herself from doing so and managed to stand docilely. But this venture had failure written all over it because docile was all she could pull off. She simply wasn’t a good enough actress to pretend she enjoyed this slob’s attentions.
Her brain was still rapidly looking for a way out that didn’t include her and Finn being gunned down or captured, when Frederico wrapped his hands around her hips and lifted her onto the trunk of the car. Then he slid his meaty paws up her waist, her diaphragm, clearly aiming for her breasts.
Oh, no. That is so not gonna happen!
Luckily, before she could blow everything, Finn materialized behind the cartel thug. She watched as he raised the gun he held by its barrel and brought the pistol grip down hard against Frederico’s head. The crack as it made contact sounded like thunder to her overstimulated senses.
Then Frederico’s dead weight came down on her like a felled tree. It was far too late to dodge out of his way and feeling his slack heaviness picking up velocity as it tipped her upper body backward, she feared his overmuscled mass would slam her head right through the rear window.
But Finn caught the cartel enforcer by the back of his collar and belt and hauled him upright, holding him in place long enough to move between her and Frederico and shove a shoulder into the thug’s gut to carry him in a firemen’s lift.
“Move,” he said in a low rough voice and stepped out of her way.
She moved, sliding off the trunk with alacrity to follow him.
In a few long-legged strides he was at the back of the SUV, reaching for its cargo release with his free hand. It clicked open and he took a large step back to allow the hatch to rise. He looked over at her.
For a second she could have sworn she saw fury etched on his face. But that didn’t make sense. And since he merely said in a neutral voice, “See if you can find the latch to pop the hood,” she decided she must have misunderstood. He bundled Frederico handily into the cargo space.
She picked up her tote, then hurried to open the driver’s door on the SUV. It took her what felt like forever to locate the hood latch, but finally she released it, then quickly eased the door closed to kill the light. She turned...and literally bounced off Finn’s chest as he strode toward the hood.
He caught her by the upper arms and steadied her, then set her aside. “We have to get the hell out of here,” he said. “Joaquin’s gonna be out any minute.”
“Did you disable the car?”
“I slashed a couple tires, but I’m going to grab the distributor cap and cut the radiator hose as well.”
“I thought having possession of these babies might help slow him down, too.” She dangled the keys she’d found in a section of the console between the front seats.
For just a second he stared at them as if hypnotized. “Damn. If I knew the keys were in the car, we’d have taken this rig instead of the rental.” But he apparently shook off the regret that sounded in his voice with a brisk roll of his shoulders and leaned into the engine compartment.
In practically the same movement he straightened back up, a car part hanging from his fist. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”
They dived into the car and Finn had just fired it up and put it in gear when Senora Guerrero’s front door opened with a crash. Joaquin stormed out, his gun swinging around to take aim at them.
“Duck!” Finn snapped, then leaned over the steering wheel himself to provide a smaller target.
She bent below the window just as he stomped on the gas. She heard the report of a gun, but not the sound of the bullet hitting anything. A nervous laugh escaped her and she slowly sat up as Finn shot out of range between the few buildings that constituted the village center. “He missed. Oh, thank God. He missed, Finn!”
“What the hell did you think you were doing?” Darkness, not lightened appreciably by the thick blanket of stars, enclosed the countryside as they left the meager lights of the township in their rearview mirror.
She blinked...and realized her mouth was opening and closing like a trout’s. She snapped it shut, only to open it again and croak in genuine bewilderment, “What?”
“With Mister Handsy—what the hell did you think you were doing?”
“Excuse me?” She hauled herself upright in her seat and swung to face him, outrage muscling aside the icy terror that the past several minutes had wrapped around the scant dregs of her courage. “You asked me to distract him, to put myself in danger—then believe you have the right to critique the way I handled it?” She glared at him. “What did you think was going to happen? That I’d pull out a deck of cards and challenge him to a game of Go Fish?”
He took his attention off the road to pin her with cold eyes. “I didn’t think you’d invite him to stargaze, then suck off your finger like it was his di—”
Rage such as she hadn’t felt since she was thirteen going on fourteen exploded in her brain, red-hot and out of control. Her usual fail-safes—not engaging, taking deep breaths, hell, taking a moment to prevent herself from acting before thinking—went up in smoke and she launched herself at him, fists swinging.
“What the fu—?” He fought the car as it swerved across the dirt road.
The vehicle’s wild rocking barely even registered as Mags landed blows in any undefended spot she could find. “You dare say that to me, you pimping son of a shit?” she demanded, further enraged when she became conscious of the tears welling in her eyes. With sheer determination she willed them away. Damned if she would let him see he’d made her cry. “That man had his filthy hands, his mouth on me and you dare accuse me of tacitly offering him a blow job?”
She didn’t realize the car had rolled to a stop at the side of the road until Finn’s strong arms wrapped around her, pinning hers to her side.
“Stop that,” he said in a rough, authoritative voice. “We don’t have time for this.” But his arms tightened even more and one big hand roughly stroked her head, dislodging her head wrap. “I apologize, Magdalene. That was a crappy thing to say.”
“It was an asshole thing to say. And my name is Mags.” Her nose was squashed against the hard plane of his chest, her back arched at an awkward angle and, all told...? “This has gotta be the worst stinking birthday of my life.” And just as she’d thought in the Santa Rosa cantina what felt like aeons rather than half a day ago, that was saying something.
He jerked against her, further torturing her nose, and she could feel him tucking in his chin to look down at her.
She wasn’t about to return his regard.
“It’s your birthday?”
Okay, maybe not technically, since it was after midnight. “Well, it was when I fell asleep,” she muttered sulkily. So, close enough.
* * *
“CLOSE ENOUGH,” Finn unknowingly echoed Mags’s thought as guilt piled upon guilt. God, hadn’t he just been a prince among men with her today? His mom would be so proud.
But they needed to focus on the here and now, and he gently moved her back to her side of the front seat.
