“Or killed,” Lissa said.
“So what are we going to do?” Alex asked.
“Only one thing we can do. Get Tim out before the task force goes in.”
LISSA WALKED IN front of Colt and Alex out of the cantina, and Alex drove them back to the casita. He was staying in the city with a woman, which probably explained some of his eagerness to accompany them to Monterrey.
He would be picking them up in the morning, driving them to San Pedro Garza Garcia, an urban center about eight miles southwest of the city. According to Señor Cortez, El Puñal’s compound, which overlooked the basin, sat near the end of a road winding into the Loma Larga mountains.
As soon as they were back in the casita, Lissa used the information Cortez had provided to find the area on Google Maps.
“The place looks like a fortress,” she said, studying Google Earth photos on her cell phone, satellite images of the house and grounds. “How are we going to get in?” She glanced over her shoulder at Colt, who stared at the screen from behind her.
“More importantly, how are we going to get out?” He rubbed the back of his neck. “Alex will be here in the morning to drive us up there. Once we get a look at the place, maybe we can find a chink in Spearman’s armor.”
Lissa hoped so. But the task of getting in and out without being seen seemed impossible.
“In the meantime,” Colt said, “it’s late. We need to get some sleep.”
Lissa cast him a glance. “What about sleep being overrated?”
Colt’s mouth edged up in amusement. “True, but we really need to be at the top of our game if we’re going against a guy they call The Dagger.”
She sighed. “You’re right. We’ve got to stay focused on Timmy.” She didn’t want to imagine the boy’s fear, being with a man he didn’t know, worried about his mom and sister, afraid he might never get back home.
Colt must have sensed the depth of her concern. “On the other hand, it’s important to get the best night’s sleep possible, and I know exactly the way to make that happen.”
The glimmer of heat in that cool blue eye drained some of the tension from her shoulders. Lissa managed to smile. Reaching out to take the hand he offered, she let him lead her down the hall to the bedroom.
THE MOUNTAINS ABOVE the metropolis of San Pedro Garza Garcia were rugged: jagged granite outcroppings shoving up from the earth, dense scrub vegetation that included the occasional cactus or palm, and thick deciduous forests.
Luxury homes dotted the lower slopes, the streets lined with leafy trees and colorful blooming flowers, but farther up the hill, the terrain turned forbidding, a hostile no-man’s-land.
Using GPS coordinates, they located Spearman’s house at the end of the road at the far edge of the city: a huge two-story U-shaped white structure with a red-tiled roof. It was completely surrounded by a ten-foot wall.
The good news was the terrain would provide the cover they needed to get close to the residence without being seen. The bad news was it was going to take a miracle to find a way in.
Alex parked his girlfriend’s SUV out of sight in the heavy foliage a quarter mile down the hill and they all got out of the vehicle. Wearing the camouflage cargo pants and T-shirt he’d had in his gear bag, Colt joined Alex and Lissa, who both wore lightweight camo.
Before they could come up with a plan, they needed intel, needed to know what they would be facing. They split up and took off in different directions, each taking a position to watch one side of the house. Careful to stay out of sight, they moved silently through the trees, keeping a lookout for any of Spearman’s men patrolling the area.
Colt hunkered down to track the east section of the house and grounds, while Lissa moved around to the west, and Alex took a position at the rear. An hour later, they rendezvoused in a hidden spot in front, where they could observe people and cars going in and out through the main gate.
“Sitrep?” Colt asked Lissa, once they were back in a secure location.
“I spotted two of Spearman’s men on foot patrol. They weren’t paying a lot of attention. Clearly they weren’t expecting trouble.”
“They’ll be far more alert the day the cartel higher-ups are due to arrive,” Colt said.
She sighed. “I wish we knew when that was going to happen.”
“I think Colt nailed it.” Alex rolled his beefy shoulders, probably stiff from sitting in one place for so long. “If I read my cousin Diego right, I’d say sometime this week, probably no more than a couple of days.”
“Which means we haven’t got much time,” Colt said. “You pick up anything useful out there?”
“I might have. You saw the rear entrance into the compound on Google Maps, right? A gate that opens onto a dirt lane curving around the hacienda to the main road?”
“We saw it,” Colt said. “Couldn’t tell much about it from the images we were able to access.”
“Could be exactly what we’re looking for,” Alex said. “Freight and staff go in and out that way, and from what I could tell, it was fairly busy.”
“You get pictures?”
Alex held up his smart phone. “Sure did. Sent them to your cell.”
Colt nodded. “Let’s go back to the casita and make some plans.”
Benito had insisted on meeting them when they returned that afternoon. He joined them just minutes after their arrival and he didn’t come alone.
“I brought someone who may be able to help us,” Benito said as he walked into the tile-floored entry of the guest house. He motioned for the man behind him to come forward. “This is Zachariah Bridges. I think you will find him a man of many talents.”
“Zach,” the man corrected, reaching out to
