“I guess that seals it,” Gregg stated, his voice booming compared to the others’ whispered replies. “Do we give them first blood?”
Bridger nodded to himself. “They have to make the first move.”
“They’re stopping,” DJ reported. He slowly lowered his eye to the reticle of the scope and centered it behind the driver’s position.
“Hold,” Bridger murmured. “Hold…”
Juan Carlos Hernandez drove the four wheel drive rental slowly through the state park. His night vision goggles caused the light from the dash to nearly blind him as he tried to see through the windshield. He had turned the dash lights as low as they would go, but what would normally appear as a barely perceptible soft glow was now glaring.
“Are you certain of the cabin?”
Pablo Ortega checked his weapon again for the fifth time. “Si! I am certain!”
“What if the woman warned them?” Juan slowed for a sharp curve and tightened his grip on the steering wheel.
“Then we paid her entirely too much,” Jose Rodriguez muttered as he stared through the inky black windshield. “How close are we?”
Pedro Garcia pointed over his shoulder. “It should be just around that bend.”
Juan slowed the big SUV and coasted to a stop just yards from the gravel drive in front of the cabin. “There are no vehicles.” He nudged Pablo. “Are you certain this is the one?”
Pablo’s face registered his frustration as he glared at Juan. “That is what the woman said. She rents these places, and this is the one she marked on the map.”
Pedro leaned forward and pointed past the cabin. “Behind it. There is a black truck.”
“Fine.” Juan put the big SUV in park. “Let’s do this and get home.” He opened the door as the other men donned their own night vision goggles.
The quartet made their way slowly and silently toward the cabin that Mauk had rented. Each man took up a position at a corner, allowing him to see his compatriots. They had each raised their automatic weapons, preparing to fire blindly into the cabin when suppressed shots broke the silence of the night, cutting the escuadrones matar to ribbons.
A bush rose from across the road and approached the downed men, a rifle slipping out from its grassy exterior. It approached the closest hit man and pushed him over onto his back.
The man exhaled hard, a fine mist of blood spraying from his mouth as he choked. The bush bent low and a hand extended, pushing back the hood and exposing a human face. “Who sent you?”
The killer’s eyes widened just a moment before the spark of life slipped away. The bush sighed heavily then stood and kicked the man’s weapon away. “This one is gone.”
“So are the others.”
Mauk sighed and rested his weapon against the side of the cabin. “Maybe next time we keep one alive for questioning?”
DJ appeared beside him. “I don’t know if that would do much good. Something tells me that these boys wouldn’t talk regardless.”
Lisa bent low and grabbed the ankles of the man closest to her. “I bet I could make one talk.” She began to drag the body toward the front of the cabin.
Bridger approached the rear of the blacked out SUV and opened the hatch. He stood to the side as DJ and Mauk stacked the bodies in the rear. Mauk raised a brow at him. “Do we want to dump ‘em or leave where they can be found?”
DJ slapped his frozen hands together, wiping the frozen forest floor from his mittens. “Does it matter? When these guys don’t check in, they’ll know.”
Bridger sighed then began to pat down the bodies. He came up empty. “Not even a wallet.” He glanced to Mauk. “Who goes into a foreign country without even a cell phone?”
“A kill squad.”
Lisa reached past him and slammed the rear hatch. “They probably have a hotel room in town. Did you find a key card?”
Bridger shook his head. “Nothing.”
She marched to the front of the truck and began to rifle through the cubbies. She popped open the glove compartment and pulled out a small envelope with a key card inside. “Too bad the hotel didn’t think to print their name on this.” She gave him a sardonic smile.
Gregg reached over her shoulder and plucked the plastic card from her grip. “Give me a few minutes. I bet I can narrow it down.”
Bridger nodded toward the bodies. “So, we find out what hotel they’re staying at and we leave the truck in the parking lot. Once the ice thaws they’ll start to stinking soon enough.”
“Good enough for me,” Lisa muttered as she marched toward the cabin.
Bridger opened the driver’s door and pulled the big SUV into the drive of the closest cabin. “Once Gregg narrows down our search, we can toss their room. If we’re lucky we’ll find a cell phone with some numbers we can trace.”
“What good will phone numbers do us?” Mauk asked.
Bridger gave him a cold smile. “We figure out where they’re based and we take the fight to them.”
Mauk broke into a toothy grin. “I love the way your mind works sometimes.”
Near Chapala Mexico
The tall, thin and slightly balding man knocked lightly on the doorjamb before sticking his head into the open office. “Jefe?” He lowered his eyes and refused to look up. “The primary team has missed their check in.”
El Fantasma looked up from the ledger he wrote in and gently set his pen aside. “How late are they?”
“Over an hour, Jefe. The secondary team awaits your command.” He still refused to look up.
“Raul, do not fear me.” El Fantasma stood slowly and approached the smaller man. He placed a gentle hand on the man’s shoulder. “I do not believe in punishing the messenger. Only a weak man would do such a thing.” He gave the smaller man a smile that seemed to set his mind at ease.
