The Omega Team: Hot Target (Kindle Worlds Novella) (7 page)

A black truck cleared ground and bounded over a hill. Two men were inside the cab but others clung to a roll bar and carried AR-15s and M4 Carbines. Across the road, more SUVs raced from cover, loaded with armed men. They circled Athena and Rafael until a thick cloud of dust made it hard to see.

They were outnumbered and without weapons on foreign soil. Athena only hoped these men wouldn’t let their bullets do the talking for them.

Borrego Ranch

Athena stood her ground as if she had the right and glared at the men who circled their car. She couldn’t see their faces. Headlights blinded her until she had to block the light with her hand. Rafe didn’t bother shielding his eyes. He held his head high, defiant. Madero blood would not allow anything less.

Six trucks and SUVs carried armed men. They had them surrounded. A door creaked open and boots hit the ground, crunching in the dirt. Athena strained to see who it was through her splayed fingers.

“What are you doing on Borrego land?”

The voice shocked her. It was the voice of a woman.

“We’ve been hired to find out who killed Hector Borrego,” Athena said.

“Hired? Who would pay to know such a thing? The police were content to let the investigation grow cold.”

“Vice President Esteban Ruiz hired my private security agency. I’m Athena Madero with the Omega Team, out of Tampa, Florida in the United States.” She dared to take a step closer to the woman. “And you are?”

“Outraged. Ruiz doesn’t care about Hector Borrego.” The woman raised her voice and crossed her arms. “He’s up to something and you are part of his plan. Why should I not kill you now?”

“Please…my sister is only trying to do the right thing,” Rafe said. “Let her go and you can do what you want with me. I’ll be your message to Ruiz.”

“No, Rafael.
Don’t
!” Athena shoved her hand to his chest to stop him.

“And who are you?” the woman asked.

“Rafael Madero. Athena is my sister. She deserves to live. If you want justice for Hector, she is the one you can trust to get it.”

“This is very brave of you, Rafael. Foolish, but brave.” The woman waved a hand and three men raced toward Rafe with guns drawn.

Athena stepped in front of her brother and held up both her hands to stop the men who would take him down. Others in the shadows raised their weapons and aimed at them. She prayed no one would shoot.

“Don’t, Athena. Let me do this,” Rafe said and shoved her aside.

Her brother didn’t understand. She would fiercely defend him no matter what it cost her. She wouldn’t stand by while a drug cartel butchered him. She would’ve done the same for any member of her team who tried to sacrifice their life for hers. She had taken the role of leader for a reason. She would do anything to make sure her team returned home alive.

The men had Rafe on his knees in the dirt and they held his arms. One man yanked his hair and thrust a machete to his throat. The men looked to their leader and waited for her to give the order.

“No! Don’t touch him.” Athena dug deep for anything that would stop this ruthless woman from killing Rafael. “I found new evidence today. I don’t trust Ruiz to process it. That’s why we’re here without him or his men to protect us. Do you believe me?”

“What evidence?”

The woman came into the light. Strands of her long dark hair wafted in the breeze. She wore tight jeans and a red jacket, surprising Athena with her sense of style. Her stunning beauty was totally unexpected.

Athena dug into her pocket and retrieved the shell casing, still wrapped in a latex glove.

“The police at the original crime scene got it wrong. They reported Hector Borrego had been shot point blank. That wasn’t true. The driver side window shows a fracture pattern that is from a bullet at a higher velocity. It had to be a sniper.”

She held out the casing—keeping it protected in the glove—and dared to hand the cartridge shell to the woman. If Athena wanted to be trusted, she had to trust in return.

“I figured the shooter took a position along that ridge behind you. When I went up there with Rafael, we found it wedged into a boulder. Whoever shot Borrego signed his work and left his brass behind. Pretty ballsy.”

The woman narrowed her eyes at the casing before she shifted her gaze to Athena. She didn’t say a word as she pondered what Athena had shared with her. Eventually the woman stepped toward her and handed back the ballistics evidence.

“I have nothing to lose by trusting you with this proof. If you can find out who killed…Hector—and publically put a name to the face of his killer—I can live with that.” The woman shrugged. “Besides, I can always have you killed, even in your precious land of the free.”

Athena let out the breath she’d been holding until the woman walked over to Rafael who was still on his knees and held by her men.

“I would still like to take you with me, for different reasons now.” The dark-haired beauty trailed a hand down Rafael’s cheek to his neck and chest. “But I do not think your sister would be patient enough to wait until I had my fill of you.”

Rafael glared at her and fought the men holding him. His defiance only made the woman laugh.

“Such passion.” She patted his cheek. “Yes, I would enjoy you far too much, my brave one.”

She smiled and turned her back on him before she vanished into the shadows.

“Release them,” the woman ordered. “
Vámonos!
”

“Please,” Rafael stood and called out to her as she climbed into an SUV. “Honor me with your name. Who are you?”

“My name is Camila Borrego.” She softened her voice. “Hector was my father.”

In a fleeting glimpse of rare frailty, Camila let them see the grieving daughter who had lost her father. Even a dangerous man like Hector Borrego had a family who had loved him. Camila didn’t stay. She shut the door to the SUV and called out to her men in Spanish. They gunned their engines and pulled out in a cloud of grit, leaving Athena and Rafael under the bluish haze of the moon.

Rafael turned his back on her and kicked at the dirt at his feet. Athena didn’t need light to sense his anger and frustration. It radiated off him like heat.

“Who would’ve figured it? Borrego had the love of a daughter.” The minute she said it, Athena wished she hadn’t.

Rafe stopped pacing and turned toward her with his face dusted in moonbeams.

“Not a day goes by that I don’t dream of the woman Ariana would’ve become, how she would’ve looked like her beautiful mother and been blessed with her heart.” Rafe’s eyes watered in a glistening hue of blue from the moon. “Don’t talk to me of Hector Borrego and his good fortune for having a daughter who loved him. I don’t want to hear it.”

Rafe climbed into the car and slammed the door.

Lo siento, mi hermano.
Perdóname.

A tear drained down Athena’s face as she stood in the dark, wishing she had the words to beg his forgiveness. But there were no words to comfort him. Those words did not exist.

She had no idea how much this case would rip at her brother’s heart. He’d teased about having a death wish, but now she wasn’t certain it had been a joke, after he’d so easily offered his life for hers.

Not even a machete to the throat had stopped him.

Athena had to help Rafael heal, and make him want to live, or she’d be forced to watch him crash and burn in front of her eyes. He’d reached out to her for a reason and she was only now beginning to understand the depth of his pain—and how powerless she’d be to stop his self-destruction.

***

Hotel Inglaterra

After midnight

It had been far easier to sneak out of the hotel than to find a way back to their rooms unnoticed. Rafe had insisted on returning the car he’d stolen, in case the owner hadn’t noticed it missing. That took time. To gain access to their private hotel suite after midnight, Rafael had pilfered a maintenance uniform from housekeeping and accompanied Athena as if she’d come looking for help in the lobby and found it.

“If anyone from the hotel asks, I’ll tell them Rafferty has a backed up toilet,” Athena told her brother. “No one would come to see that.”

“I wish you hadn’t said that aloud,” Rafe said.

When they returned to the suite, Jacquie was first at the door to greet them. Rafferty and Landry were putting a dent in the mini-bar. Athena gave a hand signal for them to wait to speak.

“Let’s reclaim our privacy. Jacquie, you know what to do.”

Without a word, Jacquie nodded and went to her computer to jam the signal for Ruiz’s listening devices. Until further notice, they would have their privacy. Athena’s team gathered in the common living area and took up spots on the sofa and chairs.

“Okay, it’s done. We’re free to speak.” Jacquie ran a hand through her blonde hair and joined Athena on the sofa. Her face looked flushed. “We were worried. You were gone so long. I wanted to call, but I knew I shouldn’t, not when you were in stealth mode.”

“Good instincts.” Athena winked at her. “We found something at the crime scene. We suspect this is evidence the police never found.”

“From five years ago?” Jacquie asked. “Was it exposed to the weather?”

“Yes and no.” Athena explained how the shell casing had been protected from the elements because it had been set into a notch in the stone. “Fingers crossed we get a lucky break on finding a useable latent print.”

“How do you know for sure it’s from five years ago?” Jacquie asked. “Maybe the Vice President of hand kissing had it planted.”

Athena stopped and stared at Rafael.

“I hadn’t thought of that. She could be right. We shouldn’t accept anything at face value or we could be playing into the hands of Ruiz.” Athena handed her the shell casing wrapped in latex. “Scan for prints and run it against our databases to see if we get a hit. Let me know when you have a name.”

Rafael sighed.

“I’m tired. The shower’s calling my name and I’m hitting the rack,” he said as he pushed off his chair. “Wake me if you want to talk.”

He stared at Athena until she said, “Yeah, okay.”

She sat beside Jacquie on the sofa as the men headed for their bedrooms and shut their doors. Jacquie kept her eyes on Rafe until he disappeared into his room before she said anything.

“Is everything okay with him?” the young woman asked.

“No, not even close.” Athena drew a frazzled breath. “Start your search. If you don’t get an easy hit, there’s always tomorrow. I have an autopsy to attend bright and early. There’s nothing like a shriveled corpse to start your day.”

Athena couldn’t stop thinking of her brother. She knew Rafael had to be exhausted, but sleep wouldn’t show him any mercy. Not tonight.

***

1:00 AM

Jacquie gloved up and carefully removed the spent shell casing from the rolled up latex bundle Athena had given her. When she had it positioned for a first pass, she had the brass surface scanned with the handheld fingerprint device she had brought from Omega headquarters. She took an image of the whole shell and its base to make sure she would capture any fraction of a fingerprint left behind by the shooter. When a partial appeared on the scanner with enough arches, loops, and whorls to identify, Jacquie grinned.

“Gotcha.” She shoved her large black framed glasses up her nose.

She uploaded the captured image into the Omega Team computer server and started the process of running a scan against the many databases they had from the United States and international resources. In the dim light of her bedroom, she watched the comparison rejects flash across the screen, washing her in a pale green light. The flashing digitals mesmerized her as if she were entranced by a roaring fire.

“Come on, baby. Gimme a hit. Momma needs to sleep.”

She settled in and kept her eyes on the screen, knowing the adrenaline coursing through her veins would keep her from getting much rest. Jacquie searched for the face of a killer and she got a rush knowing that she would be the first to know his name

***

A steady rain bled down Rafael’s bedroom window, capturing the city lights in its glistening veins. The gentle patter did not soothe him. It only reminded him that the world would be cleansed, but nothing could be done for him. The choices he had made were his forever, even the guilt he carried in his heart for Elena and Ariana’s deaths.

Rafael lay on his bed in the dark, feeling like a condemned man. He had showered but put on jeans and a T-shirt, knowing he wouldn’t sleep as he waited for a knock on his bedroom door. The shell casing Athena had found would finally bring justice. It had been long overdue.

He didn’t care what happened to him. He hadn’t cared about that since Elena and Ariana were brutally taken from him. But tonight his gut twisted over how Athena would look at him. She would know he’d crossed a line. There’d be no hope of return. He had no business being a part of the Omega Team—men and women worthy of the ideals they fostered—and he had no right to claim Madero blood. Not anymore.

When his thoughts drifted to Jacquie, his eyes burned and he shut them tight. Her sweet face came to him in the dark, along with the velvet feel of her skin. Her innocence shined through her eyes and in her gentle smile. She would never share her body and soul with a man like him. She deserved better.

The man he used to be died five years ago. He just hadn’t buried the body.