K-9 Shield (New Mexico Guard Dogs #3)

Chapter One

People were—or they became—what they pretended to be.

And Maggie Caddel had been pretending for a very long time.

Plastic cut into the sensitive skin of her wrists. She wasn’t sure how long she’d been here. Getting dripped on from a leaky pipe overhead, told when she could eat, when she could stand, when to speak. Her tongue felt too big for her mouth now. Thirst did that. She’d pulled against the zip ties too many times to count. It was no use. Even if she managed to break through, there was nowhere to go. Nowhere she could run they wouldn’t find her.

A thick steel door kept the animals out but kept her in. Maggie shifted away from the cinder block wall. She’d somehow managed to fall asleep, even with the echoes of shouted orders and footsteps outside her door. Another drip from above ripped her out of sleep. It splattered against the side of her face and tendrilled down her neck.

This place... It held an Aladdin’s cave of secrets she’d worked the past year to uncover. But not like this.

Not at the expense of ten American soldiers dead. And not at the expense of her life. The war waging between the federal government and the New Mexico cartel Sangre por Sangre had already cost so much.

A metallic ping of keys twisted in the lock. Rusted hinges protested as the door swung inward. El Capitan framed himself in the doorframe. His eyes seemed to sink deeper in their sockets every time they went through their little routine. Darker than should be possible for a human. If that was what he was. Judging by his willingness to interrogate, torture and starve a random war correspondent, Maggie wasn’t sure there was any humanity left.

She set her forehead back against the wall. It was starting again. The questions. The pain. She wasn’t sure her legs would even carry her out of this room. “I’m guessing you didn’t bring me the ice cream sandwich I asked for.”

It’d been the only thing she could think of that she wanted more than anything else in the world. Other than being released.

El Capitan—she didn’t know his real name—closed in. Strong hands pulled her to her feet and tucked her into his side. The toes of her boots dragged behind her, and it took another cartel soldier’s aid to get her into the corridor.

The walls blurred in her peripheral vision. She’d spent the first few days memorizing everything she could. The rights and lefts they took to the interrogation room. The stains on the soldiers’ boots, the rings they wore, the tattoos climbing up their necks. El Capitan, for instance, wore the same cologne day-to-day. It’d been overly spicy and would ward off demons in a pinch, but the ski mask usually hiding his face had taken some of the bite out. Given the chance, all she would’ve had to do was smell him to make a positive ID.

But he wasn’t wearing the mask anymore.

Which meant he wasn’t worried about her identifying him anymore.

Because they were going to kill her.

Both gunmen thrust her down into the chair she’d bled in for the past...she couldn’t remember how many days had gone by. Three days? A week? They’d all started to stitch together without any windows in her cell to judge day or night. Like she’d been kept in a basement. But this room had a small crack in the ceiling. Enough for her to know they’d dragged her here in the middle of the night.

Maggie let the sharp back of the chair press into the knots in her shoulder blades. The wood felt as though it was swelling as it absorbed her sweat, her tears—her blood. Could crime labs pull DNA from wood? She hoped so. It would probably be all that was left of her given what she’d witnessed.

“I’m losing my patience with you.” El Capitan rubbed one fist into the opposite palm. Like warming up his knuckles would make any difference against her face. “Where are the photos you took? Who did you give them to?”

Same old game. Same old results. That first day had been the hardest, when she had no choice but to be mentally present every second, to experience every ounce of pain inflicted. But now... Now she’d learned how to step out of her body. To watch from above while the Maggie below suffered at the hands of a bloodthirsty cartel lieutenant trying to clean up the mess he made. “What photos?”

The strike twisted her head over one shoulder. Lightning burst behind her eyelids. The throbbing started in her jaw and exploded up into her temple. And that was all it took. To detach. Disassociate. She wasn’t in the chair anymore. Some other woman was. A part of her that was strong enough to get through whatever came next. She could stand there and observe without ever feeling that man’s hands on her again.

“We’ve been through your home. We’ve been through your car. Next, we’ll question everyone you care about.” El Capitan was in a mood today. More hostile than usual. Desperate.

Maggie couldn’t help but like that idea. That he was feeling the pressure of getting results out of her. That she’d held him off this long. The Maggie in the chair was having a hard time keeping her head up. She dropped her chin to her chest. “If you get ahold of my sister, tell her I want my green sweater back.”

“You have no idea who you’re dealing with, do you, little girl?” The cartel lieutenant stuck his face close to hers. Even separated from her body, she could smell the cigarettes on his breath. “What we can do to you, to your family, your life. All you have to do is give me the photos you took that night and this ends. You’ll be able to go home.”

Home? She didn’t have a home. Didn’t he realize that? All she’d done over the past two years was disappoint her friends, her family, her coworkers. Investigating Sangre por Sangre ’s growing influence throughout the Southwest was all she had left. And she wasn’t going to let them get away with what they’d done. No matter the cost.

Except no one knew she was here.

No one cared. Certainly not her ex-husband.

Not even her editor would know where to start.

No one was coming to save her.

And the photos she’d taken of that tragic night—when the cartel had slaughtered ten American soldiers and disposed of the bodies in an ambush meant to capture the cartel founder’s son—would rot where she’d hidden them. Maggie licked her broken lips, not really feeling the sting anymore. Her head fell back, exposing her throat, as she tried to meet El Capitan’s eyes. Sweat prickled at the back of her neck. “It’s hot. Can I have that ice cream sandwich, please?”

The lieutenant fisted a handful of her hair, trying to force her to look at him, but Maggie wasn’t in that body. All he was looking at was a shell. A beaten and bloodied ghost of the woman she used to be. “Take her out in the middle of the desert and leave her for the coyotes to chew on. She’s worthless.”

He shoved her body backward.

Gravity pitted in her stomach a split second before the Maggie in the chair hit the floor. The back of her head hit the cement, and suddenly she didn’t have the strength to stay detached from that shell she’d created. In an instant, she was right back in her body. Feeling the pain crunch through her skull, realizing the warmth spreading through her hair was blood. Her vision wavered as she tried to reach for that numbness that had gotten her through the past few days, but it wasn’t there anymore. Shallow breathing filled her ears. “No. No. Don’t do this. You can’t do this.”

“Clean that up. I want this entire room and her cell scrubbed down.” El Capitan threw orders with a wave of his hand as he headed for the corridor. “Make it so no one will know she was ever here.”

Two sets of hands dragged her upright. Every muscle in her body tensed in defense, but she’d lost her will to fight back days ago. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. She was going to make something of herself. This story...this was supposed to change everything.

Maggie tried to dig her heels into the cement, but her added weight crumbled pieces of the floor away. Her arms hurt. This was it. Everything she’d done to rewrite her life had been for nothing. Tears burned in her swollen eyes. “Please.”

The men at her sides didn’t respond, didn’t lighten their grip. Didn’t alter their course. They pulled her through a door she hadn’t known existed in the shadows until right then. One leading directly outside.

She’d been so close to escaping without ever even knowing.

A thud registered from behind her. Then another. She tried to angle her head around, but it was pointless. Pointless to hope El Capitan had charged back into the room with a change of mind. She was going to die.

A groan rumbled through her side a split second before the gunman at her left dropped to his knees. He fell forward. Unmoving. She didn’t understand. The second soldier marching her to her death released his hold, and she hit the floor. Another groan infiltrated through the concentrated thud of her heart behind her ears.

Then...nothing.

For a moment, Maggie wondered if the head wound had caused damage to her hearing or her brain had short-circuited. Then she heard him.

“Don’t try to move. You’re badly injured, but I’m going to get you out of here.” Something wet and rough licked along one of her ears. “Gotham, knock it off. Don’t you think she’s been through enough?”

A small whine—like a dog—replaced the sensory input at her ear. A dark outline shifted in front of her. Masked. Like El Capitan, but that wasn’t... That wasn’t his voice.

Maggie cataloged what she could see of his eyes through the cutouts in the fabric. She’d never met this one before. She would’ve remembered. Her vision wavered as a set of muscled arms threaded beneath her knees and at her lower back. He hauled her into his chest, and there wasn’t a single thing she could do to stop him as darkness closed in. “You’re not one of them.”

S HE ’ D LOST CONSCIOUSNESS .

Jones Driscoll brought her against his chest, back against the wall, as he scouted for an ambush. Sangre por Sangre ’s half-destroyed headquarters were settled at the bottom of a damn fishbowl in the middle of the freaking desert. Any number of opportunities for the cartel to take advantage. He’d managed to knock out a couple of the cartel lieutenant’s direct reports back in the interrogation room, but the man of the hour had managed to escape down one of the corridors. Ivy Bardot—Socorro’s founder—would give him hell for that. Months of research, of tracking Sosimo Toledano’s movements, of trying to build a case for the federal government to make a move. And Jones had blown it the second he’d laid eyes on her.

He moved as fast as he dared straight out into the open. Cracked New Mexico earth threatened his balance as he headed for the incline that would take him back to his SUV. His legs burned with the woman’s added weight, but Gotham wasn’t helping either. The husky kept cuing his owner with every hint of human remains buried in this evil place.

Low voices echoed through the disintegrating parking garage. The structure was on the brink of collapse, yet satellite imagery and recon reported an uptick in activity over the past three days. Most recently utilized as a hideout for Sosimo Toledano, identified as Sangre por Sangre ’s prodigal son. Heir to the entire organization, if and when the feds managed to capture the big dog. Seemed Sonny Boy was trying to make a name of his own. Ever since Ponderosa’s chief of police had come back from the dead for revenge against the cartel, there’d been an increase in attacks on the small towns fighting to stay out of cartel business. Homes ransacked, residents running from public parks as gunfire broke out, businesses broken into and burned to the ground—all of it leading back to a single shot caller: Sosimo Toledano. Local police couldn’t keep up with the onslaught and turned to Socorro.

But what was it about this place Sangre por Sangre couldn’t seem to let go of? An explosion had weakened the supports months ago, the foundation was failing, water was penetrating the walls and eroding the floors. Yet the cartel lieutenant had abducted, questioned and tortured the woman in his arms. Caddel. He’d called her Ms. Caddel. No first name.

Jones backed them into the shadows at the sight of two gunmen taking a cigarette break under the overhang of the underground parking garage, staying invisible. That was his job. To get in and out of enemy territory without raising the alarm. To discern the cartel’s next move and calculate their strategy before they had a chance to strike. He’d lived and thrived in combat zones for half his life, but this... He studied the outline of the woman’s face highlighted by a single flare of a lighter a few feet away. This felt different. What the hell could Sangre por Sangre want with one woman?

Laughter ricocheted through the hollow cement darkness. One move. That was all it would take, and the soldiers would be on him. Wasn’t normally a problem. He lived for the fight, to be on the front lines of defense. Just him and his opponent. Protecting a woman who’d been beaten to within an inch of her life was a whole other story. It would be hard to engage while worrying about whether or not she was still breathing.

Gotham pawed at Jones’s cargo pants. A low groan signaled he’d found the scent of human remains close by.

“Shh.” Pressing into Gotham’s paw with one leg, Jones hoped to quiet the husky’s need for attention. They were probably standing on an entire cemetery, given Toledano’s recent crimes against humanity. But there wasn’t anything he could do about it right now.

“You hear that?” One of the gunmen faced toward Jones’s position. Though his lack of response said he hadn’t spotted them yet. Too dark.

Gotham jogged to meet the nearest gunman. A low warning vibrated through Jones’s throat, but the husky didn’t pay him any mind. Jones adjusted his hold on the unconscious woman against his chest in case he had to make a jump for his dog.

The nearest gunman swung his rifle free from his shoulder, taking a step forward as Gotham waltzed right up to him, and a tension unlike anything Jones had experienced laced every muscle in his body. A smile broke out across both soldiers’ faces, and the second took a knee, hand extended. “Where’d you come from?”

Hot damn. Gotham had provided a distraction, giving Jones the chance to get out without raising suspicions. Jones sidestepped his position, keeping to the wall as the gunmen searched for something to give the dog.

Joke was on them. Gotham only ate a certain brand of dog food and jerked pig ears.

He tightened his hold around Ms. Caddel as one of the spotlights swept across her face. Matted blond hair streaked with dirt and something like liquid rust caught in his watch. Not rust. Blood. His gut clenched as he got his first real good look at her swollen eyes, the cuts along her mouth, the bruising darkening the contours of her face. This woman had been through hell. But he was going to get her out.

Jones hiked the incline he’d descended to get into the structure. Sand dissolved beneath his weight, but he put everything he had into keeping upright with an added hundred and thirty pounds. Just a little farther. He could almost see his SUV on the other side of the barbed fence in the distance. He cleared the incline and stepped onto flat ground.

A yip pierced his senses.

The sound fried his nerves as he recognized Gotham’s cry for help.

He turned back. The husky was hanging upside down by one foot in the soldier’s extended hand, arcing up to bite at the man’s wrist. Another series of laughs drew out a full bark from his dog. Setting Ms. Caddel down as gently as possible on flat ground, he tried to breathe through the rage mixing into his blood. He might not like being weighed down by a K9 sidekick who’d rather chase his own tail than pay attention to anything Jones had to say, but no one touched his partner.

He descended the incline, not bothering to keep to the shadows this time around. Two armed gunmen didn’t stand a chance against a combat controller employed by the most-resourced security company in the world.

Surprise etched onto one gunman’s face as he locked on Jones’s approach. The guy unholstered a pistol at his hip and took aim.

Jones dodged the barrel of the weapon, sliding up the soldier’s arm. He rocketed his fist into the gunman’s throat. A bullet exploded mere inches from his ear and triggered a ringing through his skull. Grabbing onto the cartel member’s neck, Jones hauled the attacker to the ground. They fell as one. He pinned the gunman’s hand back by the thumb until a scream filled the night. The gun fell into Jones’s hand as the second soldier lunged.

The second bullet found home just beneath the bastard’s Kevlar, and the soldier dropped Gotham as his knees met the earth. The K9’s yip and quick scramble to his feet let Jones know he hadn’t been hurt.

Jones pressed one boot into the gunman’s chest and rolled him onto his back.

“What did your boss want with her? The woman you were supposed to execute.” He hiked the soldier’s thumb back to increase the pressure on the tendon running up into the wrist and forearm. Once that tore, there’d be no squeezing saline solution into a contacts case or a trigger for the rest of his life. “Why take her?”

The resulting scream drowned out the ringing in his ears.

“She was there!” The cartel member shoved into his heels, trying to break away from Jones’s hold, but there was no point. The harder he tried to escape, the more damage was done.

“Where?” he asked.

“I know who you are.” A wheeze slid through crooked, poorly maintained stained teeth. That was the thing about cartels. Every member worked for the good of the whole, but that relationship didn’t go both ways. No dental coverage. No health coverage. Just a binding promise to die for the greater good. “I know who you work for.”

“Then you know I won’t stop until every last one of you are behind bars.” Clutching the gun’s grip harder, Jones pounded his fist into the soldier’s face. Bone met dirt in a loud snap that knocked the son of a bitch unconscious.

Gotham raced to Jones’s feet as he shoved to stand, coming up onto his hind legs.

“This is why you’re not supposed to leave my side. How many times do we have to talk about this? There are mean people in the world. Guys like that don’t care how nice you are.” Jones wiped down the handle of the pistol with the hem of his T-shirt and dropped the weapon onto the gunman’s chest. Scratching behind the husky’s ears, he headed for the incline to get the hell out of there. “Though I’ve gotta say, your distraction was on point.”

Jones pressed his palm into his ringing ear. It wasn’t so much the noise that bothered him. It was the percussion. He’d bounced back before when a gun had gone off next to his head. This time shouldn’t be any different, but he’d check in with Dr. Piel when he got back to headquarters.

He hiked the incline to the spot he’d left the woman he’d pulled from the interrogation room. Only she wasn’t there. Jones scanned the terrain, coming up empty. She couldn’t have just walked out of there on her own. He’d known men overseas who wouldn’t have been able to string together a sentence with the injuries she’d sustained. “I wasn’t gone that long, right?”

Gotham yipped as though to answer.

A pair of headlights burst into life a hundred yards past the barbed fence. From his SUV. The beams cut across him a split second before they redirected around. Jones shaded his eyes with one hand and pulled his cell from his cargo pants pocket with the other. Seemed Ms. Caddel hadn’t been unconscious, after all. Clever. Then again, it made sense. A woman in her position couldn’t be sure of anything after going through what she had. Trusting the man who’d pulled her out of that torture chamber most assuredly didn’t come easy.

Jones called into headquarters and lifted the phone to his good ear as the first ring trilled. Then started jogging to catch up with the SUV. “That’s what I get for leaving the keys in the ignition.”