Mexican Heat (Nick Woods Book 2) (11 page)

The
Butcher remembered a quote from Alexander the Great, which he completely
accepted as truth. The quote was, “An army of sheep led by a lion is better
than an army of lions led by a sheep.”

The
Butcher inspected the man who’d gone from a suave middle-aged man to a fat,
dumpy grandpa. The Butcher noticed crumbs on the shirt of Flores’s protruding
stomach and he knew that Flores had been eating his favorite food prior to his
arrival.

He’d
probably just eaten an entire bag of Funyuns, he thought. And by the look of
his flushed, red face, he’d probably drunk enough to get three men wasted.

The
Butcher put aside his repulsive feelings toward Flores and got down to the
point of the meeting.

“Have you
made up your mind about the attack?” the Butcher asked. “I’ve had two
additional sources confirm that the President will be there.”

Flores
smiled and sat down in his chair. The Butcher never changed. He always acted
how he fought -- straightforward, economical, and aggressive.

“Would
you like something to drink,” Flores asked, “before we get started?”

“No, we
need to move quickly if we’re going to pull off this attack,” the Butcher said.

“Ah, yes,
the attack,” Flores said, turning and looking out over the capital city of
Mexico as he swallowed down more Jack and Coke. He wondered how to explain it
to this man.

Yes, it
was true that an opportunity lay before them. Multiple sources reported that
President Roberto Rivera would be meeting with the mayor of Mexico City in an
outdoor ribbon cutting in just a few hours. Rivera had confirmed it himself
through his most trusted source, just to be sure. But how did you explain to
this simpleton that one had to balance the use of force, and that though an
incredible opportunity stood before them, now was not the right time?

Attack
and appear too heavy-handed, and pride might persuade the people to fall in
behind the country’s colors. Nationalism was a powerful force, and no one --
even a poor Mexican peasant -- wanted to live in a weak country. Flores had
spent years pushing propaganda that made Rivera and his predecessors appear
corrupt, uncaring, and ineffective in providing services to the people. And so
the people had come to care little about their government. 

But if
they made the government look too weak, and if the cartel suddenly appeared as
a heartless bully, then they might lose the people. It was a delicate balancing
act, and a mighty hard thing to explain to a man who never left home without a
duffle bag full of weapons.

Flores
turned and looked at the small man, who stood surrounded by the cartel leader’s
four body guards. He had to admit that the Butcher had come far, trading in his
ridiculous ninja-like attire from a few years ago for sharp suits that he wore
with an open collar. But his aggressive nature was as present as ever, so
Flores finally opted for the direct answer.

“No,” he
said. “We’re not moving against the President today.”

“Why
not?” asked the Butcher. “We know he’s going to be there and even if we fail to
kill him, we will further show the people that their government is powerless.”

“You’re
right, and that’s why we’re not going to do it. What if the people rally behind
the government after this attack? Have you not seen the footage of the
thousands who have gone downtown to view the damage on the Presidential Palace?
They’ve placed flowers along the outer walls and some have even cried for those
we killed. This isn’t the government raiding people’s homes or taxing them too
much. This is us attacking a government that, in case you've forgotten, is
necessary.”

The
Butcher wanted to scream at the weak man before him. They were so close to
complete victory. He decided to make one final pitch.

“But we
could have so much more power without any central government,” the Butcher
said. “What does it actually do? They can’t stop crime, they can’t take care of
the poor, they are too corrupt to even enforce their own laws. All of these
things the cartels do better. We don’t need any government at all.”

Flores
sighed.

“Don’t
you see?” Flores asked. “If we topple the entire government, there would be
consequences. Probably America would invade or send forces here to support
pro-democracy forces. It would be better to have a government as it is, but
with one of our men in power. Then we would have a truce with the government
and our profits would be maximized. We could live without fear with our
families.”

“I have
no family,” the Butcher said.

Flores
turned away from him, exacerbated.

The
Butcher threw his bag down, lowered his voice, and growled, “We’re missing a
huge opportunity here. It’s a big mistake. A huge one.”

He looked
at Flores with disgust, then reached down, grabbed the handles of his duffle
bag, and growled, “Call me if you change your mind.”

And with
that, he turned, shouldered the nearest bodyguard out of the way, and exited
the office.

Chapter 13

Two weeks
had passed since Nick Woods had been introduced to Marcus and the other
candidates. In that time, a lot had happened.

Nick had
selected his team, outfitted them, and deployed an advance party of four men to
scout their operating area.

The men
of Shield, Safeguard, and Shelter were the real deal. Bad-ass trigger pullers
who wanted to get into the shit regardless of the odds. For some men, action
beat boredom, as long as the action was for a good cause and not some
irrelevant bullshit ordered by some
harebrained
politician.

Nick was
reminded of a World War II story he’d read about. An officer had stood in front
of a group of Gurkha Special Forces -- men from
Nepal
who served as an elite division for Britain. The officer had asked the Gurkha men
for volunteers to parachute in behind Japanese enemy lines. Only a few of the
men stepped forward and the British officer was stunned that so few of these
legendary fighters would volunteer for a mission.

It defied
everything the British officer had heard about the Special Forces soldiers.
Then, one of the men who hadn’t volunteered sheepishly raised his hand and
asked if he could have a parachute. That if he could have a parachute, he would
go on the mission, as well, with the others who had volunteered. Instantly the
rest of the men raised their hands with smiles and volunteered to go as long
with the rest if they were issued parachutes.

That’s
the way Nick felt about the men of S3. They would have volunteered to go on the
mission even if they’d been told they would have to walk there, and even if it
required arriving in Mexico without weapons. They still would have gone, and
they would have stolen, borrowed, or bought weapons as they could.

These men
were fearless, tenacious, and hungry for revenge after being briefed on the
exact details of the SEAL team ambush. They wanted payback. And blood. Lots of
it.

But even
if they hadn’t known about the ambush, they’d be raring to go. Not because they
were bloodthirsty killers, but because they possessed a combined hatred of
bullies and thugs. The mere thought of so many Mexicans having their lives
destroyed by the cartel was enough to motivate these men.

They’d
already risked their lives in places like Bosnia, Afghanistan, and Iraq to help
protect those who couldn’t protect themselves, and they were more than willing
to do so again.

Now, the
men of S3 were pulling up to the Texas-Mexico border. Nick’s CIA contact had
suggested that Nick’s company “lease” armored
Yukons
from the federal government. He’d even had ten of them delivered to Camp
Lejuene, convinced that Nick would agree.

“They’re
‘surplus,’” the contact said, raising his fingers and putting quote marks
around the word surplus. And he even smiled with a big shit-eating grin. “And
the lease paperwork has already been filled out and approved. We just need your
signature.”

Nick
stared at the man.

“You’re
getting them at a great deal, too,” the man said, smiling, and throwing in a
wink for good measure.

He
apparently had misread Nick’s look, but Nick wasn’t amused.

“We going
to put American flags on them?” Nick asked.

Immediately,
the contact sensed trouble.

“No,
why?”

“Well, we
might as well,” Nick said. “Thanks for the offer, but we’ll pass. We’ll
purchase vehicles ourselves, and if I need anything else from you, I’ll let you
know.”

And with
that Nick walked off. He then delegated the task of acquiring vehicles to a few
of his men. He wanted various styles -- SUVs, compacts, even a couple of
trucks. And he wanted them in different colors and in various exterior
conditions. The overarching idea was that they not stick out in any way, shape,
or form.

No fancy
wheels. No dark tint. Nothing sporty or aggressive.

Nick knew
the contact thought the
Yukons
would be a
welcome gift -- they were armored, after all -- but Nick didn’t plan on rolling
to his destination in a formation of matching vehicles, impressive though that
might have been.

Instead,
Nick wanted his men to infiltrate Mexico without Hernan Flores ever learning of
the team’s existence or entry. Not that this was easy to do. The contact had
“suggested” that the entire convoy show up at 2 p.m. and he and a foreign
diplomat from Mexico’s government could get them through the checkpoint with
all their weapons and gear. The contact had promised quick entry through a
checkpoint manned by special Mexican troops whose loyalty to President Rivera
was beyond question.

Nick
thought the idea bordered on sheer lunacy.

“If we
want Flores to know we’re coming so badly, why don’t we just issue a press
release?” Nick asked.

Nick
fought with the contact for the next two days and finally convinced
headquarters to obtain vehicle passes that could be handed out to the men. The
passes were dated with a three-day window from the Mexican government and would
allow entry of a vehicle through any Mexican checkpoint without it being
searched. The passes operated like diplomatic pouches, except they were for the
entire vehicle and its occupants.

In Nick’s
mind, his plan was KISS simple, though he couldn’t imagine how much
hand-wringing had gone on while the deal was negotiated, since no such pass
existed. But that was a problem for the bureaucrats. It was their job to
negotiate. Not his.

His goal
was to get the team in safe, and under the radar. He knew there was no way the
Godesto Cartel would have enough men to watch every border crossing for
twenty-four hours a day for three days straight, especially since his men would
be entering in unmarked, impossible-to-profile vehicles.

And even
if the Godesto could watch that many crossings -- Nick figured there were
probably hundreds of them across the border -- Flores’s men would be too spread
out to strike any of the vehicles. Flores would have too few men to go
toe-to-toe with the well-trained, well-armed men of S3.

Even if
he did, that was no sweat. Nick was bringing thirty-two men to this fight. He
could afford to lose a vehicle or even two or four of them as they crossed
over.

But
saying he was bringing thirty-two men to the fight wasn’t exactly accurate.
Besides the thirty-two men, he was stuck with three others, all of whom he had
argued against.

Problem
number one was his contact, who was the original CIA agent that had volunteered
to approach Nick. The CIA had insisted that Nick had to keep the man as a part
of Shield, Safeguard, and Shelter, and take him with them to Mexico.

Nick had
bitched to no end, but lost that battle. Nick was instructed to “hire” the man.
No exceptions. He could reportedly shoot and fight, but Nick still considered
him dead weight.

Problem
number two was even worse. Nick had blown a gasket when he was informed that
besides his CIA contact, he’d also have to bring along a cultural expert.

“We’re
there to hunt down Hernan Flores and destroy his organization,” Nick said. “Why
the hell do we need a damn ‘cultural expert?’”

“We’ve
reviewed your plan,” the contact, who was now unfortunately a full part of S3,
said. “And the strategists at the CIA believe you’re going to need a cultural
expert to prevent saying or doing something offensive. Public opinion is
crucial in this operation. You’ve said so yourself.”

“He
better be able to shoot and take care of himself,” Nick said. “I’m not babysitting
any damn paper-pushers. And I’m definitely not assigning men to protect his
ass.”

“Actually,
he is a she,” the contact said.

“What did
you say?” Nick said, advancing toward the man.

“I said
he is a she. It’s a woman. Not a man.”

“No way,”
Nick said. “No way in hell are we taking a woman on the front line. Are you out
of your mind? The last thing these men need is the distraction of some hot
little filly.”

“She’s the best cultural expert we have,” the contact said.

“Then we
don’t need the best. Give me the second best, or third best. As long as it’s a
man.”

“There
are no second or third bests,” the CIA contact said. “There may be a thirtieth
best, but all our other experts are working with the State Department or ATF or
DEA. There’s no way we can get our hands on any of them. She’s the best option
we have. She was raised in Mexico and spent most of her life there.”

“I’m not
taking on some native,” Nick said. “How do we know she’ll be loyal?”

“Her
father was killed by a cartel, and her brother died in a nasty street fight,”
the contact said. “He was jumped by a gang and stabbed to death. Just thirteen
at the time.”

“What’s
her occupation? Just a housewife or mom who sought asylum in America?”

“No,
you’ll like the sound of this,” the contact said. “She’s educated and began her
career as a lawyer, but after seeing some corruption in the judicial field that
allowed some drug dealers to go free, she dropped the legal profession and
became a cop. Worked her ass off and made a name for herself and was later promoted
to detective.”

“Why’d
she stop being a detective?” Nick asked.

“The
truth is pretty gray, but our DEA folks believe she came to think some police
higher-ups were getting paid off. Some weird things started happening. Some
cases taken away from her. Some witnesses killed when they were supposed to be
protected. Some last-minute getaways from folks they were on the way to
collar.”

“She turn
them in and then they turned on her?”

“No, even
better. A couple of the police higher-ups died in suspicious circumstances.
Drug deaths, they were listed as, but most in the police department believed
she did it.”

“How’d
she end up with us?”

“The
cartels put a price on her head. She had to run to America or end up on the
front page of the paper.”

“Not
bad,” Nick said, “but she has to qualify in front of me and I get final say on
whether she’s a go or not.”

“Fair
enough.”

“What’s
the final thing?” Nick asked. “You said there were three problems.”

“The
final thing is we have to put a Mexican liaison on the team. A man who can
coordinate with Mexican authorities so there’s no blue-on-blue action. I know
you already have men who can speak Spanish, but this man is to help keep the
Mexican authorities informed of the unit’s activities.”

Nick
started to protest, but decided he knew how he’d handle this man. Besides, he
was ready to get in theater and start hunting. There’d already been way too
much talking, so he agreed with little arguing.