Behind the Mask (Undercover Associates Book 4) (43 page)

It was a decent plan.

He and Rio split off from the group at the edge. Rio stayed silent as they slipped through the underbrush. At a stop-off in the shadows, Rio offered Hugo a sidearm. It was a white platinum Smith & Wesson—a custom job, from the looks of it. “Slides in and out of your boot like butter and the action is beautiful,” Rio said.

“I like blades,” Hugo said.

Rio tipped his head as if to remind him that he was drugged and sluggish. “It’s one of my favorites, this one.” He pressed it into Hugo’s palm, the grip first. “And you’re going after Zelda.”

Hugo took it also because a man like Rio had intuition, and you wanted to heed that when possible. Also, it was more than a weapon; it was a gesture, and Hugo respected a man who spoke like that. It came to Hugo that if he got cut down, Rio could probably do something for Zelda out there.

“Thank you,” he said, slipping it into his boot.

The idea was that he and Rio would work as a team at the center, spearing through to get Zelda. Rio would be his invisible partner. Rio could pretend to hold him prisoner if it came to it, and they could do something that way.

A
nother cut, and
then a space of rest. Zelda felt the blood run fast now. She looked away, lightheaded, thinking about savinca flowers, the wild red streak of blooms across the green fields outside Hugo’s home. Cole would get that formula to Julian. Those two men would get along well, actually. Those beautiful flowers would be saved.

God, she’d had so much beauty in these past days—spending time with her sister, being able to help her. Feeling like a family with Hugo and Paolo. Loving Hugo. She loved him—she really did. Maybe he didn’t love her back, but her love wasn’t conditional. She loved him, and it felt amazing, like something good inside her heart. Being with Hugo made her feel like her old self. Better, really.

She felt the blood and thought about the
Savinca verde
.

“Perhaps we should proceed to the main event.” El Gorrion picked up the blade.

He touched her just behind the anklebone, cold and sharp on the fleshy indent he meant to slice into.

“When I sever this muscle, it will pull up into your leg most painfully.”

He waited, watching her.

She furrowed her brow, feeling strangely removed from the situation, maybe because she’d lived it over and over in her dreams so many times, and that made it seem less dire. She’d lived through the worst of it already. She was ready.

H
ugo and Rio
headed in the side. Rio cut apart a section of barbed wire with practiced efficiency, then Hugo held the chain link fence, and Rio clipped that. They tossed the tools and stole in.

El Gorrion’s men were milling around inside, a group of them talking some hundred yards away near a hut. Noisy trucks passed back and forth with men hanging out the back. The compound was arranged like an army base, with crude roads on a grid between metal huts, and lights strung up on poles. Lots of light. Lots of shadow. Vehicles were parked all around—perhaps intentionally; they’d make good cover. Some distance behind the first group were maybe a hundred men around an outbuilding, and more beyond that.

If this was how many waited on the side of the compound, it meant that there were a lot more men than they’d imagined.

It meant they’d take longer getting to Zelda.

The soldiers hadn’t noticed the two of them yet, but they would soon. That was the plan.

It was time. Hugo caught Rio’s eye.

Rio nodded.
I have your back
—that was what the nod said. Hugo trusted Rio—he was the kind of dangerous man you wanted with you in a fight. But there was something else there in the killer’s eyes, a certain calm that Hugo didn’t like. This would be a hard fight—there were too many men—but Rio seemed calm, even indifferent. Some indifference was critical in a fight—worrying about getting hit was the fastest way to get hit—but Rio struck him as too indifferent. Too dark.

Rio caught his eyes and something passed between them, a kind of understanding.

Rio nodded and moved off, disappearing into the shadows. It was time. Hugo lowered his mask, pulled a pair of blades from his bandolier, and threw.

Cries went up and a man staggered. The field erupted in a deafening chaos of gunfire.

He began his trek toward the mass of men. Into the shooting.

Many scattered. Many didn’t. Those who didn’t kept shooting.

This was bad.

Hugo kept on as they shot, heart pounding, throwing as fast as he could, hitting the worst-seeming threats. He could hear gunfire from the side—Rio, taking out the men. Some of them fell, more of them broke off and ran. Still some stayed and shot, most taking cover behind vehicles and huts. It was a battle of nerves as more appeared and shot. They were shooting wild, frightened. Why weren’t they running? Had El Gorrion threatened them? Their families?

He was hit in the left thigh, like a punch to the leg. He forced himself to keep walking through the lightning burn of it, to keep throwing blades. He could feel the blood warm on his leg, spreading. It hurt like hell, and every time he put his weight on that leg, he wasn’t sure it wouldn’t collapse under him like a house of cards. But he kept on—image was important. He felt the zing of a bullet at his ear. A nick.

More blood. More warmth.

Then the assault weaponry started. The Associates, coming from behind. That sent a lot of men running. Everything was blood and confusion suddenly.

The focus was off Hugo. He took off at a run for the center of the compound where they believed she was being held, leg blaring with pain, blood running down his neck. Legions more men appeared and he had to stop and fight again. Tossing, walking, bleeding. He began to feel faint. The drugs. Maybe the blood loss.

The pattern of the fallen told him that Rio had stayed with him, but there were so many men, too many. Could they do enough damage to get to her?

Men kept appearing. He was tiring, losing blood.

S
he took a
breath, centering herself. She could trust herself to handle things. To do her best.

Shouts and gunfire sounded in the near distance. El Gorrion waved lazily, dispatching one of the men to investigate. Then he turned to her. “You think this is funny?”

“No,” she said simply.

He turned her ankle, positioned it. Then he inspected his implements, taking his time, trying to unnerve her.

More gunfire. Were the men celebrating? She felt sick. The shooting grew in volume, intensity.

El Gorrion rose, moving toward the door.

A respite. String together enough of them and you had a life. Zelda took another deep breath.

There were more shouts and shots. Not a celebration; the place was under attack.

Could it be?

From the door, El Gorrion gave her a sly glance. “It works also if he comes to us.”

Her blood raced.

El Gorrion and his three men flattened themselves on either side of the door. She worked furiously at the bonds, with renewed effort, now. Hugo needed her. And Jesus, if Hugo looked in, he’d see only her. He’d come in. it was like the nightmare, her not getting free. She could sense when he was near.

“It’s a trap!” she screamed.

El Gorrion grinned. She felt sick.

“Don’t come in!”

The door darkened and Hugo bounded in, staggering, mask off, neck and shirt bloody.
Hugo
. He’d fought his way to her.

She cried out as El Gorrion’s men closed around him. They struggled, kicked, and finally took him down. It didn’t seem possible, but they had him. He’d been drugged not so long ago, of course.

He faced her, cheek to the ground, a boot on his head. Five men holding him down. He’d been wounded—in the thigh.

“Hugo,” she whispered.

El Gorrion strolled across the place and stopped between them. She cried out in frustration as he blocked her from looking into Hugo’s eyes. She needed him. She always had.

“Is this Kabakas?” he asked.

“I’m Kabakas,” Hugo said.

El Gorrion crowed in rapid Spanish. “And here he is. As I had always said, Kabakas is nothing but flash. You remove the mask, the sword….” He toed Hugo’s neck. “He is nothing but a fairy tale.”

A new man came in with a pair of swords—the souvenir kind. “Thank you,” El Gorrion said, taking them and swinging them in the pattern that Hugo typically did. “I could never get a man in the eye with a blade as you could, but I made a rather fair facsimile out in the Yacon fields. You leave only one man alive. It is convenient—it meant I had only one person to plant, to pay. I found a man with exceptional storytelling talent.”

Her heart jumped into her throat. It was just as Hugo had told her—the Yacon fields massacre was a setup. Hugo gazed at El Gorrion grimly, listening, seeming to wait. For what?

El Gorrion was Dark Kabakas. She worked furiously at her bonds.

El Gorrion smiled an oily smile. “Heroic Kabakas did not seem so heroic after that.” He strolled a few steps, going on about what he’d done, and once again she had the connection with Hugo.

“I love you,” Hugo said.

He loved her.

“Hugo,” she whispered. The love felt like an old friend, like it had always been there. Hugo had always been there, and she was happy to be with him now. She never wanted to be away from him. “Hugo,” she said. The name contained everything.

And then somebody kicked him. The kick stung worse than any cut El Gorrion had made. She could endure her own injuries, but not Hugo’s. It frightened her deeply, the power their connection gave to El Gorrion. But at the same time, she found strength in that connection. It was bright and beautiful and it stretched forever.

“I love you, Hugo,” she said. She felt like they were somewhere forever together. But oh, he was bleeding badly—the whole side of his head.

Soldiers began crowding in the door, lining up around the sides. She yanked at the ropes. El Gorrion was going to chop Hugo with the blades.

But then El Gorrion turned to her with a grin on his jowly face, and she realized she was wrong. He’d chop her first.

She took a breath and eyed Hugo. She wouldn’t scream; she’d live and die in his eyes.

Hugo eyed her back. She’d learned to read Hugo in these past days, and the calm she saw now baffled her, but she let herself fall into it, trusting him.

El Gorrion advanced, slow steps, or maybe it was the adrenaline kicking in, slowing things. It seemed slow motion when some of the soldiers standing around the edges of the dim space began to cry out and fall. What was going on?

There were shouts and shots. The men all around seemed to be fighting amongst themselves. Suddenly Hugo surged to his feet. He took a soldier on his right with a blade and the other with a gun.

El Gorrion spun on him, and Hugo lunged. The movement was pure animal, knocking him to the ground.