Finally, with a motion so quick José could not follow and the target surely never anticipated, Santos slipped a blade from his jacket sleeve, palmed it, and in one swift slash, slit the man's throat. The mark clutched both hands to his neck. Blood spurting from between his fingers, his eyes wide and vacant, he fell to his knees and toppled face down on the asphalt.
Santos squatted beside the body and slowly wiped his knife on the man's jacket. He removed the cigarillo from the corner of his mouth, glanced at the tip, and ground the butt out. He placed the remains in his jacket pocket. "Sé el nombre." I know the name.
Seven minutes, José confirmed, glancing at his watch.
"A good soldier knows when to keep counsel," Santos said, grinning up at José with perfectly even, white teeth that flashed with startling beauty in the scarred face. "And when to speak."
Dios. Now they would both have to answer to Diego Vargas for what happened here.
There was no doubt at all in José's mind. El Diablo had not only made a pact with the devil, but él está loco.
Chapter Two
"You're a big coward!"
Isabella sneaked another peek around her sister's shoulder in the dim lighting of Stuckey's Bar. "No, I just don't like taking risks."
"Same thing," taunted Anita, flashing her wide, sexy eyes heavily rimmed in blue shadow. Her tarty-eyes look, Consuelo claimed.
"Chaquitas, silencio," Consuelo commanded. "Stop bickering." She reached across the circular table to cover her younger sister's pale, slender hands with her own blunt-fingered one. "Bella." She spoke slowly as if to a child or a dimwit. "We went over this already. Tonight you are a fully grown and very desirable woman."
"Sí, and not an automaton," Nita piped up.
The girl fell silent as Consuelo glowered at her and turned back to Isabella. "You are going to flirt and dance, and maybe meet a delicious and very sexy man."
Isabella clapped her hand over her mouth and giggled between her fingers. The Margaritas and Piña Coladas had begun to affect her. "I think I'm a little tipsy."
"Good," Connie replied. "You need to loosen up. You are fearless in that courtroom where you work way too many hours, but Madre del Dios, Anita is right. When it comes to men, you are un cobarde."
"A big, fat coward," Nita repeated.
Isabella eyed her evening attire. Dress neckline practically down to her belly button, thanks to Nita's wardrobe. Dangling from her ear lobes, the red and gold earrings borrowed from Mama. Hair a tumble of thick curls that hung around her bare shoulders rather than the usual tight knot she forced them into. She didn't look like an overworked and uptight lawyer tonight.
Bella caught the misty look in Connie's eyes. No, she looked exactly like the pictures scattered around their mother's house of their beautiful dead sister Maria.
A pain shot right below Bella's ribs, deep into her bones, and throbbed like a migraine. She knew when Connie thought of Maria, gone these many years, she wanted to stick herself away in a nunnery and spend her days on her knees bargaining with God to take her instead of their innocent sister. But God didn't want Connie's lighted candles and Hail Mary prayers.
"Connie," Bella interrupted softly, knowing where her sister's thoughts had wandered.
"You should march right over there." Connie wagged her forefinger under Bella's nose. "And sit down in the empty side of that booth where that man has been hanging out for over an hour and ask him to buy you a drink."
"Yeah," Nita added. "He's been checking you out, girl, for the last ten minutes. I see those snappy green eyes whipping around the room and landing right on you."
Isabella frowned.
"I'm telling you, the man can't take his eyes off of you." Anita brushed thick straight bangs off her forehead, swiping at the beads of sweat that glistened on her round, pretty face. "Trust me, chica. The man wants you."
Isabella sneaked another look at the man across the room. "He's looking at the door. He's waiting for someone," she protested.
"You have a chance to get out of that stuffy district attorney's office and meet someone for a change," Connie insisted, glancing casually at the stranger in the corner booth and meeting his direct gaze. "Muy hermoso."
Bella followed her gaze. At first glance, she'd thought the man was Latino, but now she saw he was a strange mix of something else, maybe middle eastern, maybe Hispanic, but definitely darkly exotic and very easy on the eyes. "He could be a serial killer," she mumbled.
"He's too clean," Anita said. "It's just talk, Bella, and a little dancing."
"You're the clever one, Bella, the law school graduate with top honors, already an assistant district attorney." Connie gave her sister a gentle shove. "Now it's time to get a life outside that job."
"Just go over and say hello on your way to the little girls' room or something," Anita urged.
"And on the way back," Consuelo added, "see if he wants to dance." She grinned and watched Isabella make her way towards the bathroom, her hips swaying gently.
Isabella looked back at the two of them perched on their chairs where they wiggled their fingers and smiled. She dipped her lashes down once and tossed her head like a proud mare. She could do this.
Because Guadalupe Juan Diego Rodriquez had been born on December 12, the feast day of the Virgin Guadalupe, his mama had named him for La Virgen de Guadalupe and also for Juan Diego, the Mexican to whom the virgin appeared in 1594.
Lupe didn't care about the origin of his names, but he did feel unreasonably blessed. He had been a happy baby and became a cheerful man, and at this moment he delighted in the prospect of passing along information to a man he considered his friend as well as his employer.
The paper he'd tucked into his pants pocket and which he would, within the next hour, deliver to his connection, was muy importante, significant enough to bring down the man who'd been responsible for the deaths of many young Latinos. Thus, Lupe admitted to himself that he did this work gladly, and not solely for the money.
But, of course, the money was welcome.
At the moment, however, he glanced nervously around the dark streets. Having no car, he had walked the twenty blocks or so from the apartment of his girlfriend to the club. Twenty very edgy blocks because at first he was certain someone followed him.
He zigzagged back and forth, left turn, right turn, making the twenty blocks closer to forty, in order to shake off the phantom shadow that tailed him. Crossing himself and kissing the Virgin of Guadalupe medal that hung around his neck, he made the final turn and ended up at the rear parking lot of Stuckey's Bar.
He lit a cigarette and leaned against a car parked at the darkest corner of the lot. From there he observed the movements of patrons and workers who regularly moved in and out of the popular singles bar.
Five, ten, twenty minutes passed while he smoked yet another cigarette, grinding out the butts on the asphalt beneath his feet. Nothing suspicious. Absurdo, he chastised himself. He was acting foolish. The only danger was in his stupid imagination. No one had followed him.
Since Francisca had become embarazada – with a strapping baby boy he hoped – Lupe had been increasingly edgy and nervous, like una vieja mujer, an old woman. Now that he was to be a father, perhaps it was time to put this dangerous business behind him.
Rafe took another long pull on his beer and let his eyes glide one more time around the softly lighted room. Stuckey's Bar was a classy place with high-end clientele from the looks of them. Agents, lawyers, all kinds of L.A. power brokers. He wondered briefly why his informant had chosen a fancy-priced singles bar like this for their meet.