Prologue
Scooter
This mission is personal.
I hate when shit gets personal.
I love my job, and I love working for Cerberus, but things get squirrelly when emotions are involved.
Emotions complicate everything. They leave room for mistakes, and since my ass is on the line this morning, it’s making me itchy. Today has to go well, not just for me and the other men putting their lives in danger to shut down Luis Jiménez but also for the women he’s entrapped in his Miami compound.
So, I do my best to get my head in the game. This can’t be personal for me. This is just another mission to help rid the world of some piece of shit scum who thinks he rules the world with no oversight.
He took the wrong girl this time, and for Max Vazquez, it’s personal. His sister is thought to be inside, and as Max looks on from the command center a few miles away, we breach the compound.
This is a mission like every one before it, I remind myself as I follow behind Jinx.
This isn’t personal for me. I’ve let that thought run through my head over and over. Dead girls in places like this aren’t uncommon, and even though everyone is holding out hope that today’s invasion is different, we all know in the back of our minds that there’s a good chance Mia Vazquez will be added to the body count.
She’s been gone for seven weeks, and it doesn’t take long for men like Jiménez and his crew to ruin the women they abduct. These girls are used up and replaced like a carton of milk in a preschool.
“Forty-five seconds,” Shadow says. “Godspeed, guys.”
The familiar voice in my ear steadies me, and my mind goes blank, only leaving room for the main objective.
My trigger finger twitches, anxious to engage, but doing so prematurely would only lead to havoc.
We’re on the first four guards at the entrance before their brains can register we’re there, and they go down with barely a whoosh of air as their villainous lives are snuffed out.
Like alley cats searching for prey, we make our way closer to the compound. I fan out with Jinx, Rocker, and Hound as the other guys split off to the other side of the compound. We studied the schematics of this place with laser focus, and we all have our separate goals.
Taking down the semi-automatic-toting guards is child’s play as we split again. Jinx and Hound head into the rooms they’re responsible for, and I clear mine.
More shots ring out around me, but by this point in my career, they don’t even phase me. Unless I get hit, those noises aren’t my concern.
“What the fuck?” Jinx hisses.
Another shot echoes through the compound, this one closer, heard with my own ears rather than through the mic.
“He was fucking a gash in her side,” Jinx says.
“That was Miguel ‘Toro’ Montoya,” Shadow says into his mic from the command room. “Keep moving, Jinx.”
“Sick fuck,” I mutter as I delve deeper through the compound.
A guy, too drunk to be carrying a weapon, stumbles out into the hallway, but I drop him before he can raise his rifle.
“Piece of shit,” I mutter as I put another bullet between his eyes and step over his body.
Like most jobs we’re tasked with, there’s a kill order on every man in this place. If they even look at us wrong, we’re ordered to drop them. So, unless they’re literally on their knees waving a little white flag, they’re as good as dead, and even with surrender, my finger might slip on the trigger. None of these guys deserve to live.
I move silently, coming close to Rocker as he trains his gun down the hall in front of me. I release a low whistle, so he knows who’s behind him, but before he can acknowledge me, he goes down.
“Rocker’s hit,” I report into my mic without so much as a hint of emotion.
“Report,” Shadow demands.
“H-hit my vest,” Rocker wheezes.
“Lie low, Rocker. Let them finish this, and then we can get you out of there,” Shadow instructs.
A whistle sounds out from behind me just as three guys round the corner. Without aim or care where they’re shooting, the hallway is sprayed with bullets, but Jinx and I are low, prepared for the idiots, and they fall just as hard as the scumbags before them.
“Clear,” Hound reports, and Jinx and I do the same.
“Guess you’re buying the drinks tonight,” I tell Rocker as I lean down to inspect the lead in his vest.
He chuckles on another wheeze and smiles.
“Asshole,” he grunts. “Get my ass out of here.”
“Come on, man,” Jinx says as he joins us, holding out his hand for Rocker to clasp.
Jinx and Rocker head back toward the front as I nudge open the last door in the hall. I have two Cerberus guys at my back as we enter, probably Hound and Grinch going by our entry points.
The air in the room is stagnant and filled with the tangy scent of fear.
No less than a dozen women are huddled together against the far wall. Like usual, they don’t squeal or scream, and it only lends to the fact that they have been tortured and beaten down for so long that even though they’re scared, the end doesn’t seem as daunting as it may have been the first time men rushed into this room.
I search the room, letting my eyes roam over each and every one of them. My vision isn’t hampered in the dark room due to my night vision, but it’s times like this that I wish I couldn’t see at all. Shaking with fear, yet not making a noise, the women are covered in cuts, bruises, and clear evidence of their abuse.
“Mia?” I say softly, looking toward a woman who has silent tears running down her face.
She’s filthy and trembling, holding a bandaged arm against her chest as she cowers further, no doubt praying that the floor will open up and transport her someplace else.
“Scooter, do you have her?” Shadow asks.
“Mia Vazquez?” I ask as I bend down closer to her.
Although her features are the same, she looks like a ghost of the woman in the picture we were given before we got started tonight. She’s thinner, easily twenty pounds lighter, and the long, dark hair I stared at a little too long is tangled, and patches are missing. Dead eyes look back at me, and the poor girl is so filthy, she looks like she was forced to run through a muddy field.
“I’m going to pick you up, Mia,” I tell her as I sling my rifle around to my back and reach out for her.
She doesn’t freeze up or recoil when I lift her in my arms, but she doesn’t cling to me either. She’s dead weight in my arms as I carry her from Hell, weighing less than a sack of feathers.
“I’m Ryan Gabhart,” I begin, hoping that my voice is calming. “I work for the Cerberus MC out of New Mexico. I’m thirty-four. I spent ten years in the Marine Corps before coming to work for these guys.”
I walk slowly, tucking her head against my chest as we pass the dead men in the hallway.
“I’m an only child. I hate pineapple on pizza, and I think men who hurt women should all die slow, painful deaths.”
She wraps her arm around my neck and buries herself deeper into my chest. And for some reason, I do something I’ve never done while carrying a broken woman to safety—I hold her tighter, and I’m reluctant to let her go when we reach the medics outside.