Deadeye (19 page)

Ten minutes later, the deck tilted as the chopper entered a wide turn. That was when Lee caught a glimpse of the palm trees, the whitewashed house, and a dusty parking lot. About fifteen windshields glinted in the sun. “Get ready,” the pilot said. “We're going in.”

The ground came up fast, and the skids hit with a thump. Riley was yelling, “Out! Out! Out!” and his deputies began to exit through the starboard door because that was closest to the objective. Lee had been told to wait until the last member of the SWAT team was on the ground before jumping herself. So she was seated when the pilot said something unintelligible and tried to lift off.

A deputy fell out of the door as something struck the aircraft and exploded. Lee was thrown across the cabin as the chopper crashed and flipped over on its side. Lee's left shoulder absorbed most of the impact, and it ached as she struggled to her feet. She could smell the strong odor of fuel as she fought her way forward. The copilot had bailed out by then, and she arrived just in time to see the pilot climb out.

That left Lee free to do likewise. She could feel the seconds passing as she turned back. The kerosene-like smell of helicopter fuel was thick in the air, and all it would take was a spark to set the fumes off. She was standing on the copter's port side, which meant that the starboard door was
above
her.

Lee jumped, managed to grab the door frame, and pulled herself up as all hell broke loose nearby. There were four guard towers, with a machine gun mounted in each. Snipers had neutralized three of them, but the tower closest to Lee was operational. And it looked like the gunner was determined to hose the chopper down. The 5.56mm rounds made pinging noises as they hit the alloy fuselage, and Lee heard a loud whump as one of them sparked a fire.

A sudden surge of adrenaline helped Lee roll over the door frame and drop to the ground. Then it was time to turn and run. Lee could see what she assumed to be the slave house up ahead. The whole idea had been to land as close to the building as the pilots could.

Lee's legs were pumping hard, but she was out in the open, and the machine gunner could see her. He turned his pintle-mounted weapon to the left, and began to chase Lee with a steady stream of bullets, confident that he would catch up with her.

Lee glanced over her shoulder, saw the columns of dirt jumping into the air, and threw herself sideways. Death missed her by inches, and a single report put a stop to the machine-gun fire. Lee looked up to see a stick figure fall out of the tower and smack into the ground.
Better late than never,
Lee thought to herself as she came to her feet.

Lee was running toward the slave house when she heard the rhythmic bang, bang, bang of a semiauto as well as the sharp staccato of a submachine gun.
Theirs? Or ours?
Lee wondered as she drew the Glock. She was halfway to her destination when the ground opened up in front of her and a man with a machine pistol stuck his head up out of the ground! He saw Lee and opened fire. Fortunately, the bullets went wide as she triggered a response. Lee saw the D-Dawg's head snap back and knew it was a lucky shot. Then, as the body dropped out of sight, she realized that there was a tunnel below. Her thoughts were interrupted by a shout. “Maricopa County Sheriff's Department,” Riley said. “Open up!”

That seemed to indicate that one or more gang members were holed up inside the slave house. With plans to use the women as hostages? Yes, and that was the very thing Riley had been most worried about. But the loss of the helicopter combined with a spirited defense had been enough to slow the SWAT team down.

Lee approached the hole in the ground with her weapon held in both hands. Then, ready for anything, she peered down into a vertical shaft. All she could see was a body sprawled below. Lee put the pistol away, turned to descend a series of metal rungs, and dropped into the tunnel.

*   *   *

Omo was pissed. Nothing was going right. After the first copter took a hit from an RPG, the second diverted to a spot that had been designated as LZ-2. It was closer to the main house than the building that he and the members of the gang squad were supposed to secure. Plus, Omo knew that Lee had been on chopper one and felt a tight knot in his gut.

The moment their helicopter touched down near the main house, the deputies were met with heavy gunfire. They jumped to the ground and began to run. Stick took a hit, jerked spastically, and fell. Kirby screamed a series of obscenities as he ran forward, firing the ancient MAC 11 that served as his main weapon. The deputies used palm trees, planters, and ornate fountains for cover as they returned fire. Van had given up on securing the objective until he could suppress the fire that was coming out of the house. Every now and then, a well-dressed man or woman would emerge from a door or window yelling, “Don't shoot!”

Potential customers? Trying to get clear? Yes, that was how it appeared—and the plan was to let the chase teams round them up. But the attack had gone wrong, and Van was afraid to let anyone get behind the members of his squad. What was to stop a D-Dawg from pretending to be a customer? So Van ordered his team to detain them. “Facedown on the ground!” Fossy yelled. “With your arms spread!”

Six of them were lying facedown next to the swimming pool when someone began to shoot at them from the house. Whether that was an error, an effort to silence potential witnesses, or an act of vindictiveness wasn't clear. Bodies twitched as the bullets smacked into them and two people stood. They had just started to run when Fossy shot them down.

Omo heard a thump as Van fired his grenade launcher. That was followed by the tinkle of broken glass and a muted explosion. The firing stopped.

The team made its way past the pool to the point where sliding doors provided access to the interior of the house. One of them had been shattered by stray bullets. Van pushed it aside and led the squad into a beautifully appointed great room. Omo saw a huge fireplace, a seating area furnished with white couches, and a scattering of what might have been real zebra skins on the tile floor.

He was still taking that in when someone yelled, “Get them!” and a series of menacing growls were heard. Van turned as four gray pit bulls charged into the room and converged on him. He was screaming as the dogs ripped into his flesh and Omo entered the fray. He was carrying The Equalizer, and the dogs disappeared in a spray of blood and bone as the 12-gauge went boom-clack, boom-clack, boom-clack. One dog remained and was worrying at Van's leg. Omo couldn't fire without hitting the officer as well. He was reaching for a Colt when Fossy shot the animal in the head.

Omo was about to kneel next to Van and apply first aid when Manny Hermoza entered the room. His hair was slicked back, diamonds sparkled on his droopy goat ears, and he was wearing a black sport shirt. One of the gang leader's wiry arms was wrapped around the neck of the woman held in front of him—and a huge pistol was clutched in his free hand. “Back off!” he said loudly. “Back through the door and into the pool.”

Then Hermoza stopped. A look of surprise appeared on his face. “Coco? Is that
you
?”

Coco did the logical thing which was to shoot at him. Anything to shut the bastard up. But she missed—and Hermoza didn't. There was a loud BOOM, and the left half of Coco's head disappeared.

Omo's Colt was on target by then. It seemed to fire of its own accord, the barrel jerked upward, and the woman screamed as the .45 caliber slug creased her side and entered Hermoza's body. He uttered a grunt and let go of the woman in order to place a hand on the wound. Then he fell face forward onto a white couch.

The woman was Hermoza's common-law wife Carla. She tried to run but didn't get far. Kirby shot her in the left knee and she crashed into a piece of statuary, which shattered as it hit the floor.

Hermoza was dead. But what about Lee? Doors slammed as deputies entered the room, and somebody called for a medic. Half the battle was over. But gunfire could be heard in the distance.

*   *   *

Lee was forced to step on the D-Dawg's body as she lowered herself into the underground passageway. The tunnel was lit by bare bulbs, which dangled from the ceiling at regular intervals. For the first time since exiting the chopper, she had a chance to call in and keyed her mike. “This is Lee . . . Can anyone read me?” There was no reply. Because all of them were too busy to answer? Or because she was underground? Not that it made any difference.

Moving quickly, Lee made her way south. Or what she thought was south toward the slave house. She was forced to bend over because the ceiling was low. She could hear the sound of gunfire, and it was getting louder. Then Lee saw someone drop into the tunnel ahead of her. She wished she had a silencer but didn't. As the D-Dawg turned, the only thing she could do was drop to one knee and fire.

The noise was extremely loud in the enclosed space. Lee rushed forward as the body fell, put another bullet into the gunman, and peered up through the vertical shaft above him. No one looked down at her, so she began to climb the wooden ladder one-handed.

As Lee stuck her head up through a hole in the floor she saw three men, all of whom had their backs turned to her. They were firing out through shattered windows. “Get back!” one of them yelled. “Get back, or the bitches die!”

Lee took a quick look around. The women the man was referring to were huddled in a corner. All of them were wearing masks, which suggested that they were norms. She knew they could see her and raised a finger to her lips.

Then Lee ducked out of sight and lowered herself into the tunnel below. She kept the pistol pointed upward as she whispered into the mike. “Riley? Anybody? This is Lee. Do you read me? Over.”

There was a burst of static. “This is Riley. I read you. What's your twenty?”

“I'm in a tunnel under the room where the girls are being held. I poked my head up while the Dawgs were shooting at you. There are three, repeat three perps, and about eight girls.” There was a pause, as if Riley was consulting with someone, followed by another burp of static. “Are you carrying a flashbang? Over.”

Lee couldn't remember. She checked. “Yes, I am.”

“Okay, climb up there, and get ready. When I say ‘now,' toss it into the room. Avoid the hostages if you can—and
don't
fire your weapon. You might hit one of us.”

“Got it,” Lee replied. “Give me thirty to get in position. Let's move soon . . . They could decide to drop through the hole any moment now. Over.”

“Copy that. Make your move.”

Lee freed the grenade from her vest, climbed up the rungs, and put the Glock in its holster. “Now,” Riley said, and the suddenness of it caught Lee by surprise. She pulled the pin, lobbed the grenade into the room, and closed her eyes. Her hands covered her ears as the device detonated.

That was Lee's signal to draw her pistol. She heard a second bang as a battering ram struck the door, and Riley entered the room, weapon at the ready. “Down! Down! Down!” he shouted, and to her relief the D-Dawgs obeyed. They were still seeing afterimages from the flash and were well aware of the fact that they were outnumbered. Lee knew the SWAT team was amped on adrenaline, so rather than pop up out of the hole, she announced herself first. “Good work,” Riley said. “You can come up.”

Lee put the Glock away and pushed herself up into the room. Riley and the rest of his people were securing the D-Dawgs, which left her free to speak with the prisoners. All of them wore white dresses, and their wrists were secured with plastic ties. “Hello,” Lee said. “My name is Cassandra Lee. I'm a detective with the Los Angeles Police Department. You're safe now . . . Nobody's going to hurt you.”

One of the girls said, “Thank God,” while another began to sob, and a third started to shake. Lee produced a knife and flicked the blade open. But, before cutting anyone loose, she had a question to ask. “I can't see your faces and probably wouldn't recognize them if I did. Are all of you prisoners? Is somebody hiding among you?”

“No,” one of them replied. “All of us are prisoners.”

Having watched for any signs to the contrary, and having seen none, Lee began to cut the ties. “Which one of you is Amanda Screed?”

“She isn't here,” a voice answered. “I was with her in LA . . . A man named Wheels kept us in his garage. But then, after he took us into the red zone, people came to take Amanda away. I haven't seen her since.”

Lee felt her spirits plummet. Eight women had been rescued. That was good. But Amanda, the girl she'd been sent to find, was missing.

*   *   *

Momma was dead. Omo's cousin Juan was dead, too, having been shot to death trying to defend the family compound and the casita Lee was sleeping in.

Stick was dead. And so was Van, who had been ravaged by El Cabra's dogs and succumbed to his wounds a few hours later.

Throw in the dozen or so deputies killed by the Aztec terrorists, and that added up to a lot of funerals. So many that Lee had to buy a black dress. It wasn't her fault. She knew that. But it seemed as if death followed wherever she went. And that feeling continued to dog her as she went to the memorial services, fought to maintain her composure, and battled to cope with all of the reports that she was supposed to fill out.

Though appalled by the cost, Sheriff Arpo had been pleased with the raid, and for good reason. Not only had El Cabra and his gang been eradicated, eight young women had been rescued, and the resulting publicity was extremely good for his department. Which was to say good for him and his chances of reelection. And that was reflected in his attitude toward Omo, who had been recommended for a medal.

But while the failure to find Amanda Screed wasn't that important to Arpo, it was a big deal back in LA, where the bishop continued to pressure the mayor. And according to all accounts, the politician was riding the chief like a horse. So when Lee asked McGinty for more time, he'd been quick to grant it. Especially in light of the successful raid.