“How much doesn’t he know at this point?” I can’t suppress a bitter laugh. I’ve endured torture before, but César Zavala broke me using the only ammunition he had, which just happened to be the one thing that would work.
I spilled my goddamn heart, gave him everything. He now knows that the DEA sent me undercover to gain intel on Zavala’s favorite rival, the Amador Cartel, and that said cartel discovered my presence and attacked, hoping to finish the job they’d failed to do three years ago. That attack was what blew my cover, destroying more than two years of work I’d done in an effort to gain access to Zavala’s files on his enemy.
I told him about the deal Arturo Flores struck with the US government to help take down the Amador Cartel. Naturally, Zavala saw that as an opportunity to get a piece of the pie. He has the intel the US government wants, and he won’t let it go without ample compensation. In his case, this means securing a deal similar to Arturo’s, as well as getting his older brother released from federal prison in Texas. I suppose I should be grateful that it gave him a reason to let me go, but it’s only a temporary reprieve. I need to deliver on our deal, or else.
Booth sighs. “Maybe this can work to our advantage. Did you at least manage to get the intel before he sent you packing?”
“Yeah,” I say. “But only the pieces he gave me himself. Not all of it. He knows why I was there, under whose orders, and who I’m working with. He knows about my connection to Flores and the DEA. He knows everything. I had no choice.”
“I get it, man,” Booth says in an understanding voice. God, I love this guy. He’s had my back for more than two years while I worked my way into César Zavala’s good graces—not an easy feat, considering he’s the leader of the second-most profitable—not to mention deadly—cartel in Mexico. Booth knows my darkest secrets, so if anyone can guide me out of this shit, he can.
“Zavala wants a piece of the deal,” I continue. “He wants some of what the US government has offered Flores for his help taking down Amador. Amador’s is the only cartel keeping him from being king of his little world, so he’ll play ball. He sent me off with what he calls a sample. Not enough to actually help, but enough to prove there’s more. All he wants is this deal and to get his brother released from custody and delivered to him. If we do that, he’ll give us everything. He said he’d even pull the goddamn trigger, if we let him.”
Booth is silent. I can picture his light blue eyes staring out the window of the ratty apartment in Mexico City he’s been living out of for the past two years. He processes intel like a machine, piecing together a strategy. We’ve made a good team. The only other man I’ve considered as close a friend on this assignment was Rafael, but I never shared the truth with him. Rafael would have killed me if he knew I was a spy.
“But if we don’t bring him in on the deal? What’s his counter?”
“Fucking hell, Booth, does it even matter?”
“We’re going to get Zoe back one way or the other, but we still need to know what the damage is going to be if we screw him.”
I’m hesitant to share, but perhaps the downside is too damaging for the powers that be to say no to this deal once I bring it to them. “He has dirt on Arturo Flores that he’ll share with Amador if things don’t go his way. Enough to destroy Flores. And if Zavala allies with Amador . . .”
Booth is quick to put the pieces together. “Together, they’d be unstoppable. Okay, here’s what you need to do . . .”
Relief washes over me. I’m always more effective when I have a plan, though I’m pretty agile when I need to adjust to circumstances on the fly. But that’s what backup plans are for. I firmly believe that you should always have a way out, a back door so you don’t get cornered. I wasn’t prepared for this assignment to go so far off the rails. I am worse than cornered now, but at least Booth has a cooler head than I do and can steer me in the right direction.
The intel I was supposed to steal from the Zavala Cartel would have been funneled through Booth to the local authorities and the special DEA unit they’re collaborating with to combat drug cartel activity in the US and Mexico. From there, they’d analyze the intel and use what they learned to flesh out the off-books operation to gut the Amador Cartel once and for all.
Arturo Flores, the Los Angeles kingpin whose cooperation helped get Operation Broken Heart rolling to begin with, just happens to be a close friend of my family. My own dealings with both Amador and Zavala, back when I made my money pursuing extra-legal activities as a gun runner, made me a perfect candidate to insert myself into Zavala’s organization.
Zavala knows me as Mason Black. Three years ago, I was the handy go-between with a friend who had the real contacts for guns at the Naval Weapons Station. What he didn’t know was that “friend” was J.J. Santos, and that we were one and the same. J.J.’s original deal was with Amador, but that deal went bad. As a result, J.J. was killed when Amador’s lieutenant, a psychopath by the name of Gustavo Delgado, shot him point blank in the chest.
Except I survived. But it gave Arturo a way in. And with his help and the help of the Feds, I faked my death and
