Indulgence (344 page)

As far as living arrangements, he didn’t need much, just a
bedroom with heat, an efficiency kitchen with a hot plate and microwave, and a
decent bathroom. He’d been able to upgrade his unit in one long weekend. He had
plans for the other side, too, but everything was on hold now.

After the breakup, he thought maybe if he and Gina worked
together, some of the chemistry would come back. He stopped calling her and
tried to move on. But no one was like Gina.

He didn’t want to share her with anyone, even guys on the
force who casually knew her. He didn’t want her too close to Kozinski. He
didn’t want anyone stealing a look, catching one of her smiles, or smelling her
perfume. It all belonged to him. It was all he wanted, and he’d pay any price
for it.

So when she got sweet on the SEAL, something flipped in
Sam’s mind. He walked through a doorway of no return, a place of desperation.
Suddenly, his obsession with her turned into
he couldn’t live without her
.

Tito had let him know about the sweep going on and how
successful the task force had been. He knew it was only a matter of time before
the operation was called and everyone would go their separate ways. He also
knew Gina would make complaints about him and he was facing a dishonorable end
to his career.

He tried not to think about it. If he could reason with her,
love her in the manner that which he knew she needed, she’d see the folly of
her ways. She’d see that he could save her in every way she needed saving. If
she felt the power of him inside her, could see how good they were together,
then maybe there would be a happy ending.

He didn’t want to kill her. He wanted her to surrender to
him. Tell him she’d been wrong and he was right. He was the right man for her.
He needed to hear that.

Tito had been released and Sam knew right where to find him.
Although he wasn’t supposed to, he found him at one of their cribs in an
abandoned house covered in graffiti. On any other day, Sam would have brought
backup, but today he felt like absolute Teflon. He kicked in the front door
with his boot and chambered his shotgun.

“Nobody move.”

People started scrambling out the doors and windows anyway.
Glass broke. Chairs were overturned. Sam scanned the darkened room filled with
marijuana smoke and found Tito in the corner, passed out with a needle in his
arm.

No one was going to challenge him. He figured with so many
of their leadership down at the station, there wasn’t anyone in charge.
Everyone he’d seen looked to be underage.

Three quick strides across the room brought him to Tito’s
feet. Sam grabbed him by the front of his shirt and Tito shook like a rubber
chicken, his head lolling back and his mouth drooling something white and
foamy.

Sam thought perhaps he was OD’ing. But Tito opened his eyes,
at first lazy and glazed over, then full of panic as he recognized the big cop.

He reached down and picked up Tito’s kit, tossing the
needle. He threw the boy over his shoulder, carrying the shotgun and kit in his
right hand. Again, no one challenged him as he made his way back to the pickup
truck on the street.

Tito slung against the side of the passenger door in a
semi-coma as Sam started the engine.

“You fuckin’ piece of shit,” Sam spewed.

Tito responded with a warm smile. Sam had an EpiPen in the
first aid kit he carried in the back of his truck, and damn, he was going to
use it on the kid. He needed him to play one more part, and then to hell with
him.

Tito looked like a zombie in a bad movie, Sam thought.
Almost too scary to take him to the pancake house, but the kid was hungry, and
Sam needed him to stay awake, while not looking too jittery. So he let Tito
order anything he wanted. Sam had lost his appetite.

From the red vinyl booth, syrupy sweet music happily playing
in the background, Sam dialed Gina. He wondered if she’d pick up. He had a Plan
B if not. But she did.

“Hello?” She sounded groggy.

“You turn in early?”

“It’s not early. It’s after eight.”

“Only time we went to bed that early was to fuck ourselves
to death,” Sam said. Tito looked up from his pancakes, and smiled as syrup
spilled from his mouth onto his shirt.

“Sam, the only reason I picked up this phone was because I
hoped you’d seen the light. Everything’ll be over in a day or two. You know I’m
going to tell Kozinski what went down.”

“Well, he’s kind of busy right now. Don’t know if you’ve
heard, but they’ve been making sweeps. Got a ton of guys.”

“Good. I thought they were going in on Monday.”

“That’s what he told me too. Seems we’ve both been left out,
for some reason.”

She didn’t say anything.

“One thing I thought you might want to know, they can’t find
Mia.”

“Well, I’d expect she’d be smart enough to lay low.”

“You didn’t tip her off, did you?”

“Hell no. I wouldn’t do that. You know me, Sam.”

He rubbed the front of his pants under the table. Tito
looked at him with a scowl. “Yes I do, Gina.”

“So that’s it? Mia’s missing?”

“And we know where she is. She’s with Carlos. I got little
Tito here, one of Carlos’s runners. You remember, the kid who rolled on him?”

Tito frowned and stopped eating. Sam knew he was considering
bolting from the booth. Sam put his boot into the kid’s crotch and glared at
him. He placed his right hand over his weapon.

Tito was going to stay put, for now.

“So, where is she?”

“She told Tito to get you. She’s in a building down past
Seaside. He’s going to take you to her. I think she can convince Carlos to give
himself up. You want in on that?”

Gina hesitated. He could tell she knew something. “Sure I
do,” she said. “But I thought Carlos was on his boat.”

“Where did you get that information?”

“I thought that’s where Koz and the team were expecting to
make the arrest.”

Sam knew she was lying.

“Well, we got lucky. We have the better intel. Tito lied to
the sergeant.”

Tito’s didn’t look at either of them.

“Kozinski doesn’t know about this? Gina asked. “Don’t you
think we should call him?”

“You want the whole fucking task force there?”

“If it’s Carlos, we’ll need backup.”

“So listen, I’m going to be your backup. Tito will take you
to the location and I’ll follow behind. Don’t want them to see me. But they
trust you, so you want this?”

“Why can’t you just give me the address, we can call it in?”

“Because Tito won’t give it to me, and he’s the assurance
you’re coming.”

With the trap set, Sam watched as his plan went off without
a hitch. He dropped Tito off at Gina’s apartment complex, and watched him stand
under a streetlight until she came down. The two of them took off. Sam had
stashed a thousand dollars on the kid, and told him there would be another
after they got to the duplex, so he was fairly sure the kid would cooperate.

He followed Gina’s car to the building. From the outside, it
still looked abandoned, the lot covered in weeds that stood four feet tall.
Next door was a brick warehouse that was also abandoned and had all the windows
shot out of it. He was thrilled to be able to bring her home at last.

Tito unlocked the door, just as Sam had instructed him, and
they both went inside. That was Sam’s cue to go around back to the door
bordering the back alleyway. He slipped into the cool cavern and waited for his
eyes to adjust to the dark. He heard them talking on the other side of the
building.

“I dunno. He said to just wait here,” he heard Tito say.

“He? Wasn’t it Mia you talked to?”

“Oh, yes, ma’am. Sorry.”

“How did Mia know to get hold of you?”

“I guess it was through Carlos. Tell you the truth, I’m just
the messenger. As soon as this is over, I’m outta here.”

“So I guess Carlos doesn’t know you gave him up?”

“Shhh. Careful about that. Don’t want him finding out before
it’s time. I didn’t give him up. I told the cops he was on a cruise, like he
told my sister to tell me. I told them he’d be back Monday. He told her that
too.”

“So he came back early,” Gina said.

Tito chuckled. “The fucker never left.”

Sam came up behind where Gina stood and with one arm placed
a flannel scrap laced with chloroform cocktail across her mouth and nose. At
first she stiffened, but then as she inhaled the gas, went slowly limp and
stopped struggling.

“Holy shit,” Tito’s hands were splayed out to the sides,
waist-high.

“Shut up and help me,” Sam commanded. He could see Tito
hesitate. “You do want the other grand, or are you good with just one?”

Tito didn’t say anything, but started to pick up Gina’s
feet.

“No, asshole, come over here and get her shoulders. I’ll
take her feet.” Sam wanted to make sure a generous portion of Gina’s skin cells
and hair landed on Tito’s clothes. Her drool ran down her chin, and over the
boy’s wrist. The boy didn’t notice Sam had work gloves on.

He directed them to the bedroom with the black satin
comforter. Tito had to kneel on the bed to get her properly laid out on a
pillow. Sam took her shoes off and cuffed her ankles to the lower lip of the
bedframe. He pushed Tito aside and cuffed her wrists to the headboard.

“Okay, wow. What are you going to do with her, man?”

Sam stood up and arched his back, cracking it. He gave a
wink to the kid and got the reaction he expected. “Nothing she doesn’t want
done.”

“Is Carlos coming over?”

“Fuck Carlos,” Sam said.

“But I thought you said he had set all this up for you.”

“He did, he did. He just doesn’t know it yet.” Sam was
grateful the kid had been an easy target. “Come on,” he said as he tugged on
the back of the kid’s head, “let’s get you your money.”

They closed the door, which locked from the outside. Tito
didn’t notice. He also didn’t notice Sam had removed his gloves.

“So what are you going to do with your earnings?” Sam was
placing the silencer on the barrel of his .38 while he walked behind Tito. The
kid didn’t have a clue.

“Shit, I gotta get out of Dodge. Probably Mexico to stay
with my cousin.”

“That sounds like a plan.” Sam reached around as if to give
the kid a hug, but slammed the barrel of the silencer against his temple and
pulled the trigger. Tito’s head exploded all over both of them.

Sam had to wait for all the blood and brains to stop falling
around him, and to let the pieces of Tito fall off his clothes. He cleaned his
eyes with the back of his forearm, and looked at the detritus that had been the
kid.

“You did good, kid. Sorry it turned out this way.” He leaned
forward and searched Tito’s shirt, finding the packet of money still in the
bank envelope. It mattered little to Sam if it was all there.

Armando had ground his teeth so hard his jaw hurt.

Showdown at the harbor.

He stopped by Fredo’s apartment picked up Fredo and Rory.
They threw their bags in the back, Fredo taking shotgun.

“I did tell Kyle,” Fredo began, “and man, was he pissed.”

“That was dumb, Fredo.”

“He reminded me how dumb you are all the time about Mia. I’m
here, my good friend and brother, to watch over you. I’m your guardian angel.”

“Like hell you are. You just complicated things.”

“Oh, like Mr. Armani, Super Stud, things aren’t complicated
enough now?” Rory chimed in “You got a thing about this gang? This some form of
payback?”

The Scorpions had kidnapped Mia over a year ago and Armando
fell into that trap too. Kyle, Cooper, Fredo and Gunny rescued them.

“You going for a repeat, Armani?” Fredo asked.

“I don’t care. Mia’s in trouble, and that’s just what I do.”

Yes there were some similarities, he thought. He’d gotten
the call from Caesar the last time. And yes, that one really did take him by
surprise, but then, the gang was after guns and the guns they mistakenly
thought the SEALs would steal for them. They were really stupid to think such a
thing. But they’d used Mia as bait, which was a big mistake on their part.

“This time I’m pretty sure Carlos wants a deal.”

“What makes you say that?”

“Because he told me Mia was his insurance policy. He
promised he wouldn’t hurt her.”

“Right. And you believed this scumbag? I’m telling you,
Armando, you’ve got your head all twisted. That lady friend of Mia’s got you
all thinking with your
little
brain.” Fredo shook his head in disgust.

“She has nothing to do with it. Besides, it’s not little.”

“Like hell. It’s just too much of a coincidence,” Fredo
added, ignoring Armando’s retort. “I didn’t know better I’d think you went all
tofu and shit on me, like Cooper did last year. That stuff will rot your
brain.” Fredo turned to Rory in the back seat. “You know what they make tofu
out of? Fermented soy beans, man. They can’t even get cattle to eat that shit.”

Rory shared Fredo’s laughter. Then Armando drilled a glare
at him from the rear view mirror. Rory got serious in a hurry. “So, what’s the
plan, Armani?”

“We go there and I reason with him. I got my Invisio.”

“I feel you. So Rory and I sit in the truck and jack off,
right?”

“No, if need be, you save the day. But I think the guy is
going to be reasonable. Something just isn’t adding up right. Piece of the
puzzle missing, and I’m going to find out about it. If I fail, you guys will be
my seconds. And if you don’t want to do it,” he pulled over to the curb
abruptly, screeched on the brakes, coming to a complete stop, “you get out
right here.”

Fredo and Rory shared a look.

“Fuckin’ nothing better to do on a Saturday night,” Fredo
mumbled.

“I had a date,” Rory said cheerfully. Fredo began to swear.

“So which is it?” Armando asked.