Have Gun, Will Travel (The Bare Bones MC Book 5) (22 page)

The tracker Sax had put on the Corvette and the credit card being used at the last gas station in Geronimo Estates had led them back to the Mogollon Rim. One of Sax’s old mining buddies had told him Tormenta had been rumored to have an underground bunker up there. He couldn’t be precise about the location, just somewhere above the hunting camps of the “estates.” The associate had heard he had a whole hideout underground, with water pumped from a creek, diesel-generated electricity, and an End of Days food cache.

Sax mostly thought about Beatrix as he rode. He’d intended on promising to 86 his subs if she told him the mystery of the abbey. It was a strange feeling, knowing he’d never see Sasha, Miss Manners, or Princess Ivanovna ever again. He’d been banging those women since Anna had gone off the rails eight years ago. Some were newer than others, but once Sax found a woman who was a fit for him, there was no reason to give her up for the sparse comforts of a Days Inn.

So he was in a monogamous, committed relationship now. His first since Anna. He had an old lady.
I have an old lady
. It all felt so new, mysterious, and challenging. She’d mentioned wanting another baby. Was he up to that after what had happened with Anna? His first son had been raised as his brother’s. The second one had spontaneously aborted much too soon. Was it just not in the fucking cards for him? And, contrary to Beatrix’s belief, Sax thought with a bitter grin, he was
not
too old to raise a new one.

The staging area for the gyrocopter came up way sooner than Sax expected, even though it was only about three hundred yards from the crest of the rim. Up there, the Ponderosa pines thinned out, and boulders were strewn across the rocky mesa. The flatbed had been forced to leave the vehicle in an area cleared of pines, leaving them vulnerable to the eyes of any passing cartel clown. And, since the flatbed had a Leaves of Grass logo on the door, the weed cultivator, Crybaby, had driven it farther into the forest. True to his name, he sat cringing in the driver’s seat, waiting for something dangerous to happen. Sax parked his ride back there away from the road. Tobiah, to his credit, was crawling all over his tiny helicopter making sure things were up to par. For a bowl-headed nerd who had likely been the ultimate recipient of Indian burns and noogies in school, he’d turned out to be pretty brave. Maybe being tormented had an upside to it.

Wolf saluted Sax. “Boss. I accompanied the vehicle up the mountain a few hours ago. No one has driven by since, but I suggest we get this thing in the air pronto, the better to catch the perps. I’d like to be home by lunch. I’ve got an important Costco run to make.”

Sax knew that Wolf was shitting him. But he’d like to be home by lunch too. He’d left Bee strict instructions not to leave his house, to stay put until he returned. Until they actually took out Tormenta—and even after that if he had enough loyal, vengeful goons—he didn’t want Bee going anywhere unaccompanied.

Sax told his Prospect, “Lytton’s inspector got back to us. He went through that nail salon’s payroll. Nearly half the women weren’t being paid at all. The other half didn’t even begin to approach minimum wage. Major fucking scam.”

“Total sweatshop,” agreed Wolf. “He’s got a hundred of those salons across the state in his back pocket. Who knows how many impoverished Mexicans he’s taken advantage of? How many more vics have to fall prey to his endless quest for Benjamins?”

Sax snorted. He knew Wolf hadn’t suddenly developed a charitable side, all concerned about undocumented migrant workers. He just wanted to find an excuse for why he was so gung-ho about getting this guy. That was all right. Guys could fool themselves as to what their motives were as long as the end results paid off. The end justified the means.

Tobiah’s gyro was built for one and had no enclosed cockpit. Sax was glad it wasn’t painted bright red or yellow like most he’d seen. In fact, it looked homemade.

“I can land in a very small space.” Tobiah explained the size of the clearing. “I’ve landed before between two Quonset huts up at Leaves of Grass, maybe the size of a putting green. I can take off from this dirt road. This baby can fly slower and lower than anything else, so I can scope out any potential hatches or anything suspicious in the ground.”

Sax nodded. “Good man. You know the terrain, the general area we’re trying to scope out.”

Tobiah pointed to a notebook mounted inside the gyro’s windscreen. “Google Maps is loaded. Looks straightforward to me. I saw a few suspicious areas I intend to check out, one where there’s a weird patch of green grass when the image was taken in September. I’m going to glide past that area with the engine off.”

Sax said, “I’ll start walking uphill when you take off. No sense hanging around here waiting for you. Wolf, you got your smoke canisters?”

Wolf slapped his utility belt. “Ten four. I’ve got some spares in my saddlebags if you want to carry some, too.”

When in Rome, do as the Romans do
. Sax figured he might as well look like he had Utility Belt Syndrome too by clipping some smoke bombs to his belt. “Sure. What sort of radio you going to use when you’re up there?”

Tobiah lifted a helmet off the gyro’s only seat. Like the brain bucket of Leo’s ATF contact, it had a built-in headset. Tobiah slapped it onto his head and put the visor down like he was about to weld something. It was good to have technical people on your side. From a box behind the driver’s seat he withdrew a hand-held radio, which he gave to Sax. “There’s a clip for your belt.”

Sax sighed. “Okay, Red Baron. I agree with Wolf here. Let’s get this thing in the air before those morons wake up from their stupor.”

“Ten four,” said Tobiah, echoing his nemesis, Wolf Glaser.

Tobiah buckled himself into his seat. Sax glanced at the simple setup—looked like Tobiah had a control joystick, a throttle, and rudder pedals.

Tobiah looked at his two companions meaningfully. Sax and Wolf glanced at each other. Was there something he’d failed to tell them? Tobiah had a sappy, overwrought look that made Sax uncomfortable.

“The sun never sets on a Bare Bones patch,” he intoned.

Wolf made a face as though he smelled a dead animal. “What’s
that
?”

“It’s a Bare Bones saying!” cried Tobiah. He looked to Sax. “Haven’t you ever heard of it?”

Sax shrugged. “No. But you know, I’ve been out of the loop for a while.”

“What a doofus saying,” scoffed Wolf.

“I sort of like it,” said Sax. “It’s like those Air Force slogans. ‘We do the impossible every day.’”

Tobiah pointed at him. “Exactly! And no, I didn’t just make it up. It’s like an armed forces motto. ‘Be all you can be.’”

Wolf rolled his eyes. He could barely cross his arms over his chest with all the paraphernalia he had strapped on over his bulletproof vest. “Oh, brother. Next thing you know, we’ll have secret passwords.”

Sax clapped Wolf on the shoulder. “Lighten up, Prospect. You want help with that rotor?”

“No, it’s got an automatic start,” said Tobiah. He couldn’t resist one last corny saying before he took off. “Into the wild blue yonder!”

The other two men stepped back as Tobiah started his rotor blades. He gained lift almost immediately, although he nearly collided with some Ponderosa branches on lift-off. The ultralight managed to clear the trees around them with amazing precision, pitching and rolling into steep turns until he was out of sight heading toward the ridge.

The men headed up there, too. Sax tried to talk about light subjects, such as the green patch of grass Tobiah had seen, or an area on the satellite map that looked distinctly like a metal hatch door. But Wolf expertly steered the conversation back to things
he
wanted to discuss, like sex.

“That was a mindblower when you let us into the game room. Never expected to see anyone nail that nun. Man did she have that just-fucked look, her hair all tousled, her lips all puffy like a supermodel.”

Sax didn’t know whether to feel smug or offended. “Well, I nailed her all right. Tobiah looks like he’s already up to that right-hand water tank.”

“Is she your old lady? I noticed yesterday she had a jean jacket with a
PROPERTY OF
patch on, but no name.”

Sax definitely felt smug now. “Yeah, Madison is having my name made for her.” He couldn’t ask Wolf if he had enough ammo—that much was obvious, so he said, “This should be a pretty easy op. I toss these smoke bombs, the goons come out, and this time we’re not discriminating between Tormenta and goons. We bury them all.”

“Bury them all,” echoed Wolf, his eyes gleaming with fervor. “But listen. What’s it like? Banging a lady who used to be a nun? Does she just lie there? I noticed that racy collar she used to wear. Someone said she was into BDSM.”

“None of your fucking business. I’ll thank you not to ask personal questions about my
old lady
, if you don’t fucking mind. But no. She doesn’t just ‘lie there.’ And yeah. We both like a little bit of the old kinbaku.”

“What’s that? Some kind of sushi? Ooh, food play! I like taking some hot melted caramel and—”

Sax’s radio crackled. He whipped it off his belt, glad for an excuse to stop talking to the horny Wolf Glaser. “Sax here.”

Tobiah’s voice was as crackly as a collect call from the Congo. “Sax. I’ve got a visual on that green patch of land, and there’s definitely a trap door of some sort. Head there immediately. I’ve cut my engine, but I’ll head back to that water tank to start it up. Can you get a visual on Google Maps?”

Wolf thumbed his smartphone to find the green grass. “Got it.”

“Out,” said Tobiah.

“Double time,” Sax told Wolf.

Wolf had to run with his semiautomatic rifle banging across his back, holding the smartphone, every canister and implement known to man crashing around his hips. He must’ve been wearing an extra eighty, a hundred pounds of garbage.
Better him than me
.

The men jogged uphill, having to break away from the fire trail to make a beeline for the green grass. Sax didn’t figure anyone was concerned with curb appeal. That wasn’t why their grass was green. More than likely people emptying out dishpans of water.

The initial phase of the op was extremely simple. The hatch was easy to open, and each man threw one can of smoke down the ladder into the pit. Then they closed the hatch and ran back to a good vantage point about fifty yards away from which to pick off the idiots who came pouring out.

At first, it was like they were taking turns. Sax picked off one goon first. The guy was wearing a bulletproof vest, so Sax just easily got him in the head with his Glock. Wolf did the honors with the next one, nabbing him in the throat with an operatic spray of crimson against the early morning periwinkle sky.

Sax blew away the third one who was actually still in his bathrobe. Men were piling up so quickly around the hatch he hoped newly emerging ones wouldn’t stumble over them.
We should give them more time to run, spread them out more thinly.
He pressed his radio button. “Tobiah. Have you noticed any other door where men are emerging? I’m thinking there might be a back door.”

Tobiah had circled around by the water tank and started his engine again. Now that their cover was blown, there was no point in him continuing to glide. “Let me head back your way. Haven’t seen any yet, but that would be a smart thing to do. Having only one exit can be mighty—who the fuck is that?”

Sax has to rise to a standing position from where he’d been using a fallen pine as a breastwork. Some half-wit was out there waving his arms around even though he held an iron.

“That’s not one of Tormenta’s men,” Sax surmised.

Tobiah said, “No. He looks sort of too…too
groomed
to be one of the guys hiding in the bunker. Let me zoom in for a closer look.”

“Watch out!” yelled Wolf from his breastwork about forty yards to Sax’s left. No one else was coming out of the bunker, so they’d probably have to go in. Wolf raised his binoculars to his eyes.

“I’m careful.” Tobiah’s voice crackled as he made a steep turn around the arm-waving guy.

Wolf shrieked, “It’s Santiago Slayer!” just as someone positioned closer to the water tank took a shot at Tobiah’s flying machine. The round hit the rudder and the gyro seemed to shudder in its trajectory. Whoever was shooting from the tank, they had
not
exited through the hatch. Santiago Slayer was warning them about this other entrance, more than likely. Wolf screamed, “Tobiah! Make your move! White Queen to H5! White Queen to H5!”

There was no point in maintaining cover now, and Sax had to find out where this new shooter was. The guy had already squeezed off three more rounds at the gyro, and Tobiah was doing his best to get back downhill using Wolf’s chess moves. But just as Sax stood to clamber over the fallen tree, the unmistakable
click
of a pistol’s hammer sounded behind him.
What. The. Fuck.
How had someone snuck up on him like that?

“Drop your weapon,” the guy said cornily in a strong Mexican accent. Sax was relieved that Tobiah made it back down the hill out of range of the shooter, though he was trailing smoke. There wasn’t much room down there for a crash landing, but the ultralight hopefully wouldn’t need much room if the controls still worked.

Sax did so, turning with raised hands. The guy stood almost as a silhouette on a boulder, making him seem more imposing than he probably was. From this angle, both his teeth and the chains around his neck glinted. His pants sagged so low he would definitely trip if anyone chased him, and his Nike Jordans were unlaced. Surely Sax could get the drop on this guy.

The sagger sneered at him, holding his piece sideways in the useless gangsta style. “We wanna know how you found us. This place is unfindable.”

The baby gangsta twitched when Sax just put his hands on his hips. “You want to know how?”

“Yes. We want to know how.”

“I’ll tell you how. When you guys looked up the serial number on our drone plane, you also bought something else.”

The baby gangster’s face turned to stone, letting Sax know he’d hit on the right facts. “What? Who was stupid enough to buy something when hacking someone else’s account?”