Motherfucker’s playing with a big dog now.
“You just passing through town?”
“Yup,” I say carefully. “Just passing through. Needed a little vacation and I thought I’d get in some fresh mountain air.”
The leader looks around at his men as though weighing my words against their reactions. It’s a lot of play-acting, in my opinion. They’re trying to seem more impressive than they actually are.
“Sounds like a load of mierda to me,” the leader says. Bullshit.
I shrug. “Then I don’t know what to tell you.”
The smile drops from his face and he narrows his eyes at me. “How about you tell me what you’re really doing here?”
“I just did.”
“Is that right?”
I suppress a sigh, getting impatient as fuck with this roundabout line of questioning. “I just told you it is.”
“Then answer me this,” the leader continues. “Why would some passing tourist go up to Guillermo’s farm and purchase firearms if he was just here to—what was it you said?—take in some mountain air?”
Fucking Guillermo. I knew that fat bastard was shady as hell. He sold me out to local muscle for a cheap little payday.
“Need a gun to kill deer,” I say. But it’s a lame excuse and we both know it.
The tension in the air ratchets up another notch.
He spits on the ground between us. “There’s something fishy about you.”
“Me?” I say innocently. “I’m just your average guy who likes to hunt. That’s all.”
“Not many ‘average guys’ come up against four armed men and appear so cool about it,” he points out.
Before I can stop the words from escaping, I snap, “I wouldn’t be so cool if there was anything to be scared of here.”
That’s probably stupid of me, but this motherfucker is pissing me off.
The moment the words leave my mouth, I feel the atmosphere around me change for the worse.
All four men kind of straighten up, as though I made some kind of threat against them. Which I suppose is not wrong.
Maybe they’re not all as stupid as they look.
“Oh, yeah?” the leader says, raising his gun for the first time and waggling it towards me. “This doesn’t scare you?”
“In case you haven’t noticed, I’ve got one of those too,” I say. “Not that size matters, but mine’s bigger.”
“You’re outnumbered, pendejo,” he hisses.
He’s standing there, practically begging me to be scared of him. The fact that I’m not playing into his hands is pissing him off.
I enjoy it more than I should.
I growl, “Not the way I see it.”
The leader’s eyes widen a little. I can see his confidence start to waver.
It’s always a confronting moment when you’re faced with someone who refuses to be rattled.
I’ve been there before, a long time ago, when I was an inexperienced pup trying to learn the ropes. Half of it is power and skill. The other half is all mind games.
Right now, I have the upper hand in both.
“You think you can take us all on?” he asks.
My fists twitch, an old habit that resurfaces the moment my old world catches up to me.
Break first. Ask questions later.
Then my thoughts turn to Esme.
I need to think of her. Everything I do from now will have a direct effect on her.
This is the first time in my life I’ve weighed my actions against future consequences.
“I don’t want to,” I reply, sidestepping his question. “I just want to be able to finish my hike, hunt some deer, and go home.”
“Go home,” the leader snarls. “You don’t have a home here. This is our fucking territory.”
“Then allow me to get off it,” I say carefully. “And no one has to get hurt.”
“The only one in danger of getting hurt right now is you.”
“You willing to bet on it?” I ask.
Another flash of uncertainty flits across his eyes. It disappears almost instantly, but I’ve already caught it.
Do the smart thing, asshole. Walk away intact.
Then I see his jaw set in a determined square that I don’t like one bit.
And I know he’s chosen violence instead.
“I don’t know who you are,” the leader begins, taking me by surprise. I was sure he had cornered me here because he knew who I was. “But I have eyes in this town. And they whisper important bits of information to me about everything that happens here.”
Why have I caught their attention?
“The word around town is there’s a beautiful young woman with big hazel eyes,” he says. “According to my sources, she looks a lot like Esme Moreno.”
That makes my blood run cold.
Esme. They’ve caught her scent.
Fuck.
I have to play it cool. Esme’s safety and my sanity depends on it.
For a moment, tangible fear grips my heart. I wonder if another group of men have been dispatched to the cabin.
If that’s the case, I need to get to her as fast as possible.
But as desperate as I am to get to her, if I show my hand now, then I’ll just be proving that they were right about who she is.
“Asma Mirena?” I ask, purposefully butchering her name. “Who the fuck is that?”
“You’re telling me you don’t know.”
“I wouldn’t be asking if I did,” I growl with irritation. “Who is she? What’s she have to do with me?”
The leader exchanges a glance with his men. “She’s a bargaining chip,” he replies. I almost lunge at him right then and there. “And a very important one at that.”
“Is that right?” I say, trying to sound unconcerned. “Well, good luck finding her then.”
“Her father was a notorious crime lord. Controlled quite a few cartels down this route,” the leader continues. “Except that he was killed, along with his entire household. According to my sources, the only body not recovered from the massacre was Esme Moreno’s.”
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
It’s becoming increasingly clear that my only way out of this is to kill them all. They know too much.
And the fact that Esme is on their radar at all does not sit well with me.
“And you think I know where this woman is?” I ask, playing my part up until it’s clear I can’t
