Mexican Heat (Nick Woods Book 2) (34 page)

Chapter
37

The
Butcher went to bed early. His men had asked if they should send up some women
to his room, but he harshly told them “no” and headed straight for his bedroom.
He felt exhausted. Too tired to think straight. The past few days had drained
him.

The infiltration
of the prison to kill Hernan Flores. The huge assault on Juan Soto’s downtown
building. The distribution (and arguing that went along with it) of the money
from the bank heist.

Then
there had been the editing and formatting of the video of Juan Soto’s execution
-- it had to be perfect. And coordinating with various members of Congress who
were on the payroll of the Godesto Cartel. They sensed victory at hand, but
were so incompetent and carried such huge egos that the Butcher could barely
keep them on track and wrangled in.

All of
this had sucked every ounce of energy that he had. He’d had too little sleep,
too many adrenaline shots, and too many close calls.

Now, all
he wanted to do was sleep. And nine o’clock or not, he had ordered silence
among his foot soldiers. No partying tonight. No bumping music. No fighting or
womanizing.

The boss
man wanted to sleep in peace and the men knew to give him his way or face his
unpredictable nature. Blissful or not from all the successful actions, the new
head of the Godesto Cartel was just as likely to pull a pistol on you as the
prior head had been to cram down a bag of Funyuns.

The
Butcher undressed down to his boxers and pulled back the sheets. He kept his
Uzi and katana next to his bed, but he felt mostly at peace. He had two hundred
gunmen in and around the apartment building, and dozens of low-level gangsters
surrounding him on street corners for miles.

On this
night, when he was a mere day or two from achieving his short-term goal of
driving President Roberto Rivera from office, he didn’t need a bevy of girls or
a grandiose celebration with his men. He simply needed sleep. Just one good
night of sleep.

His first
step in what would be the total downfall of the Mexican government was nearly
complete, but he had pushed himself too hard these past few days. He wanted to
be fresh so he didn’t screw up his final moves.

Rivera
would soon either flee the country or be hauled off to prison in cuffs for his
role in the death of the SWAT team members, and the Butcher didn’t care which.

All that
mattered was that the Godesto Cartel was on the cusp of achieving in mere days
what Hernan Flores had failed to achieve in ten-plus years: a President allied
on their side, who would look the other way and allow them to seek expanded
distribution into America. And with that alliance (or “ignorance” of what the
cartel was doing by the President and his appointees), they would explode in
size and strength.

The
Butcher smiled. That wouldn’t be enough though. His ultimate dream? First,
topple the Mexican government in a few years. And then in the civil war that
would likely follow as states fought other states, he would create his own.

His own
independent state didn’t have to be big, at least not at first. But he wanted a
place in which the Godesto Cartel could be truly safe. A place so thorny and
strong that no foreign power would even bother with them.

And it
didn’t have to be good ground. Las Vegas had blossomed in the desert, after
all. The Butcher would take a mountain stronghold, or a wet, marshy area. They
would establish a puppet government, of course, since the people had to believe
they had some power. But once such a state was established, then the power for
him and the Godesto Cartel could really come. They could trade for military
hardware with other countries. Only a few would recognize the new cartel-backed
government. Maybe Syria, Iran, Cuba, and a few others. But that would be
enough.

They
could import tanks, anti-air missiles, maybe even some attack choppers. Such a
country only needed one thing to fuel it, and that was a strong income. The
Saudi’s had oil. Africa had diamonds. The Butcher would build his with drug
profits from the U.S.

And with
that thought, he turned off his light and climbed under the sheets.

Roughly
fifty miles away from the Butcher’s bedroom, the twelve-truck convoy of Shield,
Safeguard, and Shelter rolled out of the abandoned warehouse parking lot and
moved toward Neza-Chalco-Itza. The first leg of the journey was low to no
danger, so the men were not wired up tight or very alert. Their first goal was
to just get closer to their objective, and most of it was down an entirely safe
route. This was the men’s last chance to mentally prepare themselves for what
was to come.

The
trucks sped down the interstate, their lights flashing and their spacing tight.
They avoided using their sirens; few cars were out and those that were quickly
pulled to the side of the road. All the troops of S3 were ducked down in the
beds of the trucks, as facing outboard with intimidating weapons was both
unnecessary and likely to draw attention.

The men
sat or lay in the truck beds and shielded their eyes from the
sixty-mile-per-hour winds as they raced down the interstate toward their
target. In the bed of Truck 1 at the front of the convoy, the six members of
the Primary Strike Team enjoyed their last few minutes of tranquility.

“I can’t
wait,” Red yelled over the roar of the truck to Lizard, patting his M4.

“I don’t
have a good feeling about this,” Lizard said, just barely loud enough to be
heard over the wind. The small Puerto Rican pulled a wooden rosary that hung
around his neck out from under all his armor and rubbed it.

“That
Lizard, he’s always nervous as hell,” Bulldog hollered with a laugh, keeping
his heavy M249 SAW aimed toward the night sky.

“Not
everybody,” Red yelled back, “is a big, black thug from the tough streets of
Baltimore. Shit’s a lot scarier when you’re small fry like us, right, Lizard?”

“I don’t
have a good feeling about this,” Lizard repeated, shaking his head.

Preacher
yelled from the back of the bed, where he leaned against the tailgate. “Leave
him alone, Bulldog. He hasn’t ever not pulled his weight or had our back, and
the man’s got two Bronze Stars, so until you can claim the same thing, just let
the man worry.”

“You
know,” Bulldog yelled back to Preacher, “that half of what I did in the SEALs
can’t be recognized since it quote ‘never happened.’ Hell, I would have earned
a dozen Bronze Stars by now if they did. Though, you know, we SEALs have a
higher medal standard than Marines.”

Preacher
laughed and said, “Sure, just like you SEALs have tougher schools.”

That
elicited several laughs from the mostly Marine team in the back of the truck.
Preacher, a MARSOC Marine, knew most Force Recon Marines and MARSOC Marines
believed they were every bit as good as the SEALs.

“All
right, guys,” Marcus said, looking up from a map and squinting at an upcoming
sign. “Let’s get our game faces on and save all the testosterone for the enemy
instead of each other.”

The
former Marine drill instructor and Florida Gator football standout met each of
his men’s eyes, offering them brief nods or mere looks of respect. When he
arrived to the last one, Isabella, he was again stunned by her beauty.

She
smiled at him, hotter than ever in her helmet and heavy modular tactical vest.
He leaned over to her and said in her ear, “On the one hand, I wish Nick wasn’t
here. I think had he not been, I’d have had a better shot at you.”

He leaned
back and smiled at that, stretching his arms out in front of him. He laughed,
leaned in, and said, “But on the other hand, I might be as smitten with the guy
as you are.”

Isabella
grinned from ear to ear and leaned toward Marcus. “Don’t be so sure,” she said
with a wink. She then patted him on the cheek and said, “Watch yourself. No
stupid Marine stuff. Keep your head down in Neza-Chalco-Itza. This place is no
joke.”

Marcus
nodded at her and patted her leg twice. He leaned back in to her and said,
“I’ll keep my head down, and in all seriousness...” He paused, then leaned back
in. “I think Nick needed what you have. He’s been in a dark place.”

Isabella
made the smallest of nods and leaned back in a final time. “He wasn’t the only
one. We both needed it.”

The
convoy drove another few minutes and slowed, the twelve trucks dropping their
speed from sixty down to twenty as they turned onto an exit ramp toward the
slum of Neza-Chalco-Itza. The police trucks worked their way through ten more
miles of commercial and residential area, their flashing lights illuminating
buildings and homes on the dark night. The team members could feel the area
getting rougher and creepier. More empty commercial buildings, fewer working
streetlights, nervous people either fidgeting on corners or darting across
streets.

The
convoy passed a sign that said “Welcome to Neza-Chalco-Itza” in Spanish and
English below it. The team members knew the slum’s stats, though on paper it
was actually identified and listed as a city. It had been founded in the 1930s
and formed as a municipality in the ’60s. It was part of the greater
metropolitan area of Mexico City, and listed as twenty-four square miles
crammed full of one million residents. At least that’s what the city claimed,
but Mexican intelligence and the CIA believed more than four million people
resided, hid, or barely survived there, many of them with no identification, no
job, no life.

Neza-Chalco-Itza
contained 86 neighborhoods and a crime rate higher than nearly any other part
of Mexico. The city was poor -- so poor, in fact, that trash collection was
handled by carts pulled by donkeys in much of the city. The city also boasted
one of the largest landfills in the world. The sprawling landfill covered
nearly four hundred acres and had approximately twelve million tons of trash,
but had mercifully been closed in 2006.

That
hadn’t stopped the people from living there. Hundreds lived in and around the
landfill, digging and looking for valuables to sell or metal to salvage. And it
was near this infamous Bordo de Xochiaca landfill that the men of S3 headed.
Because just two blocks from one of the worst places on earth was a small
apartment building that held fourteen units.

From the
outside, it looked as old as all the hovels and shanties around it. But
numerous pieces of intel data had identified the place as one of the sites that
Hernan Flores had used as a safe haven through the years. And with some helo
fly-bys and foot intel, Mexican authorities had determined that the place had
been improved on the inside, while keeping the rough exterior in its rundown
state as a form of concealment.

Flores
had reportedly hated the place, but kept it as part of a fall-back position in
case of a worst-case situation. But since the Butcher had shanked Flores in
prison and taken over the Godesto Cartel, almost all intel pointed to the
Butcher spending most of his nights in the small apartment building. It was the
safest Godesto hideout and was surrounded by hundreds of foot soldiers on the
cartel’s payroll.

According
to the map on Nick’s lap, they were roughly two miles from the Butcher’s
fourteen-unit apartment building. So far, so good, he thought. They’d seen some
tough-looking men standing on a few street corners and the demeanor of those on
the streets had changed, from a slight look of fear of possible arrest to
increasing bravery and defiance.

No longer
was any fear shown of the convoy with its flashing lights and armed men, facing
out with menacing weapons. The last set of three men they had seen on a corner
hadn’t even budged at the sight of twelve police trucks roaring down the road.
They stood defiant and cold, facing the trucks with a look of smugness and
meanness that only hardened criminals carried.

They
certainly looked armed with their baggy clothes and cocky confidence. However,
since no weapons were visible, they were likely armed with pistols or knives.
Most of the residents in Neza-Chalco-Itza were too poor to own pistols. Down
here, even drug dealers were fighting for scraps and enough to live on. Unless,
that is, you were lucky enough to be in the employment of the Godesto Cartel.
But usually you had to earn those stripes the hard way.

Nick
could feel the hair on his neck standing up and his senses on high alert as the
convoy pushed deeper into the massive slum. They were in bad-guy country, for
sure, roaring down the pot-holed road at forty miles per hour. It would have
probably been safer to do the speed limit of twenty-five miles per hour, but
they needed surprise on their side and they’d already been spotted at least a
couple miles back. Nick just hoped the Butcher was still in the apartment
complex.

Intelligence
provided by Isabella, and backed up by analysts in the CIA, stated that if they
could just take him out, the Godesto Cartel would probably fall in on itself
and fracture into pieces. Losing Hernan Flores and the Butcher -- two of its
strongest leaders -- in such a short time span would prove fatal, intelligence
officials believed.

The
Butcher had four lieutenants under him, but there was little trust or
coordination among them, except for the direct orders provided from on top. In
the past, Flores had provided the experienced leadership necessary. He had
doled out favors and rewards, as well as the occasional piece of harsh
discipline. But mostly, he was well regarded and liked. And so he had created
stability, something rarely found in most cartels. The men under him, the other
cartels they were allied with, and the various government supporters who backed
them up and provided reams of intel, all had flourished under the smiling,
grandfatherly Flores.