“He knows you, pinche white boy.”

“Now, that doesn’t sound nice,” Blake said. “I might have to wash your mouth out with soap, but first I’ll call Mendez and chat first. He might not think it’s worth cleaning up.” Blake reached for his phone, wondering why the hell Mendez wouldn’t tell him about a sideline operation, not overly surprised when the man answered on the first ring.

“This better be important,” Mendez growled, his tone as biting as Blake’s gun in Eduardo’s forehead.

“Are you running some sort of slave trade operation on the side you didn’t tell me about?”

“Why is this important?”

That would be a “yes”. Mendez knew about the women and just didn't tell him. He’d analyze why that felt so off later. “It’s important,” Blake replied, “because one of the girls told Kara she’d been contacted by the feds and that she was wearing a wire tonight. You all but got taken down. She saved everyone’s asses.”

“Kara,” he said flatly. “My secretary.”

“That’s right. The same one holding a gun to one of your men’s heads right now for being a pinche Mexican who almost destroyed you. We need to talk, Mendez. I’m going to deal with the problem this woman was about to cause and make her go away. Saving you from complete annihilation covers my contract. I won’t operate with half the facts. We re-negotiate or I’m done.”

Silence. “We should talk in person.”

Blake ground his teeth. “Let me think about that while I save your ass. I’ll get back to you.” Blake hung up, but didn’t drop his gun. “Mendez might know what you’re doing, but he has no patience for stupidity like what happened with these two women. I’m handling them. You go think about how you’re going to convince Mendez you should stay alive.” He let his gun drop and stepped back from the car. The windows of both sides of the car rolled up a moment before it pulled away.

Blake joined Kara to walk side by side toward the truck. “The son of a bitch knew about the women and didn’t tell me. He wants me to find out who’s skimming drugs from him by playing head of security and he tells me half the story.”

“I gathered that,” she said, “but we have another problem.”

“Of course we do.” They stopped at the hood of the truck.

“Juan works in the finance department at the corporate office. He’d have the means to doctor the reports Mendez gets on product moving in and out of the restaurants.”

“But you caught discrepancies. Wouldn’t he stop that from happening?”

“I intercepted the reports before they went to finance. My guess is I caught what he hadn’t had time to fix.”

“And you know what?” Blake asked. “The only reason this matters to me is that it means you’re a target. I couldn’t give a rat’s ass who's stealing from the cartel unless it helps us find the women they kidnapped, and Alvarez. When my brothers get here, we’ll have resources we don’t have now.”

“Then why aren’t they already involved?”

“Yeah, well, there’s only one problem with my brothers. They really are the good guys.” Blake left that piece of good news hanging in the air, walked to the truck, and climbed in.

Kara joined him and shut her door. “If they’re the good guys, what are we?”

“Not ‘we’, sweetheart. Me. Just me, and I’m Alvarez’s worst nightmare. I’m the guy who doesn’t give a damn if he dies as long as I take him with me.” He started the truck and pulled onto the road. Neither of them spoke but the air was suddenly thick, the tension in the small space thicker.

Several minutes passed before Kara said, “I care.”

“What?”

“If you’ve already decided you’re going to die, you will and I care. I don’t want you to die.”

“Don’t. Don’t care.”

“Too late.”

“Kara—”

“When are you going to get it into your thick head that you can’t control me, and that includes what I feel. You can’t stop me from caring, and if you think I’m going to sit back and watch you go on a death mission, you’re the one who’s sadly mistaken.”

Blake felt like he’d been punched in the chest. He didn’t want her caring, and her fighting for him, to matter anymore than he wanted to care for her. But at least she’d solidified his decision. He had to get her out of this city, and his life, before he dragged her to hell with him and they burned together.

***

“She actually told them one of the women was wired?” Kyle asked, scrubbing his light blond bearded jaw. “That was freaking genius. It made her a hero, not a traitor.”

Blake glanced at the adjoining hotel doorway where he could hear Kara talking with the women, trying to comfort them and convince them that despite leaving all they knew as their life behind, everything was going to be fine. Pride swelled in Blake over how Kara handled herself. And Kyle was right. Her actions tonight had been genius. “Yes, well, smart as it was, it won’t matter. I’m getting her out of this.”

“Good luck on that one,” he said. “Not only is her sister missing, but that woman is so sharp she managed to drug you and get away with it. She has fire in her eyes. She’s not going anywhere without a fight.”