24. Chapter 21 – Maddox
“I’m going on a fruit run,” my captain announced. “Madman, can you come with me?”
Opening my eyes from sleep, the plump curves of two wide hips were my first vision, followed by a heavy set of breasts, and a beautiful cherub face with tired green eyes.
She stood in front of the mat I’d taken, holding two emptied matching backpacks.
By its placement above our heads, the sun had risen hours ago.
I had laid down for an hour before falling asleep, discontent to leave half of Clube de Morte to their own devices while the moon still hung in the sky. I’d watched the two of them while they watched the night, but mostly, I’d listened.
Their voices were whispers beyond the sizzling of the struggling fire, but when a man lived in his own tomb, whispers were deafening.
My second defended me without my presence. Our captain observed all angles to protect those in her care. They knew Diaz’s badge meant as much as used toilet paper. The conversation had pleased me.
My transporter had been lying dormant under the guise of docility. He had smiled at Santos with promises of safety, then pricked me with drugs and threatened the family I never knew. He played the part well, but it was time he revealed his purpose. It was my next task after this.
She was too precious, my ángel. How would she use those beautiful curves to seduce me? I would simply return the gun to her if she asked, unable to say no to this woman’s desires—as long as it remained out of Diaz's grasp.
I knew many ways to kill a man. Murder through bare hands was far more satisfying.
Patience was a virtue—perhaps the only one I had. I would escape once I had my answers from Diaz and assurances of my people’s safety. I’d waited twenty years for a taste of freedom. A few more days were of little consequence.
So now, I waited.
Licking the film of sleep from my lips, I grabbed the bag of candy I’d stashed beyond the mat in a small hole of dirt, and withdrew a lollipop.
Unwrapping it carefully, I shoved it in my mouth and savored the sweet, chalky taste.
A poor substitute for toothpaste, but a better breakfast than nothing.
Placing the plastic debris back into the bag and covering it with a small layer of earth, I rose to my knees and tugged one bag out of her hands, clenching the vinyl between one fist. Maintaining eye contact with my prey, I continued to rise until I stood, towering over her.
“As you wish, my captain.”
Her cheeks stained a pretty pink, but she said nothing more.
She turned to give several calm orders to the surrounding survivors, but I did not hear them over the thud of blood in my ears.
The things I wanted to do to this woman.
The firsts I was desperate to have with her.
My cock thickened painfully in my still-damp jeans, stiff from yesterday’s rainfall.
Would she try to peel them off me? Sex in prisons was not tender or timid. It was rough, bestial. Men rutted like animals to release the pain of their existence. She was different. I had no desire to treat her as a means when she was my end.
I had seen how she watched me yesterday. Cautious. Curious. Hungry.
My captain was a woman fully committed to the task in front of her. My lips twitched as I awaited her seduction.
We walked in silence around the river bend and bypassed the copse of fruit trees she’d harvested the day before. She led me deeper, guiding me toward the plane.
“Are we not getting fruit?” I went along with her pretense.
She drew a breath and filled her lungs, as if preparing for war. She let out the air in a rush, her hurried words spilling out along with it.
“Okay, so I might have lied. About the fruit. I mean—not about the fruit—we are going to get fruit, but first I need your help with something else.” She bit her bottom lip so hard it looked like it could pierce the skin.
I sucked on the candy harder, rolling it around my tongue. I would lick the blood off like an animal if she’d let me.
Raising an eyebrow, I crossed my arms across my chest and swallowed my smile. “How can I help you today, my captain?”
Her nose twitched like a trapped bunny in a snare. I loved watching my competent pilot lead us to safety with the confidence of a general. I loved watching her squirm beneath my stare even more.
“Okay, so, we need to get rid of the drugs.” Her green gaze implored me to understand. “If rescue comes today, and it might, we can’t let them discover the cocaine.”
She stepped closer to me and the scent of the borrowed shampoo wrapped around me like a blanket. “I swear, I have no idea where they came from, or how Jamie is involved in that, but we need to get rid of them, and I need to look for clues like Nikki and I tried to do the other night.”
The whispers had told me all of this.
I was prepared to hide the evidence if it would keep her safe.
Of all my crimes in the last twenty years, evidence tampering was not my concern.
The bundles worth millions were also my insurance.
I had no intention of returning to prison, but I would burn this jungle to the ground before allowing Marley to go in my place. I would only need a few.
Slowly, I nodded. “Okay.” I dipped my head toward the plane. “Lead the way, my captain.”
“You can call me Marley, you know,” she mused before stumbling away on the softened, wet earth.
Those shoes would be the death of her. I would take a new pair off a corpse to replace them.
“Marley is your name—it says nothing about your ranking or your value to the group. As captain, you are the leader. My leader.”
We walked a good distance before she spoke again. “Is that why you hate your name?”
My birth name. Maddox Alexander Torres. A sneer formed on my lips before I could stop it.
“My name was not given to me out of love. It was assigned to me in an orphanage. Prisoner 3124 has more meaning.”
The nuns had not been kind in their treatment of a boy abandoned at birth by parents they assumed to be addicts. They’d enforced with their heavy hands and closed fists as penance for my parent’s sins before I’d escaped their prison at eleven, seven years before I landed in the penitentiary.
A life of prisons. I’d only had one small taste of freedom before this, and now—I would never be imprisoned again.
“I see.” She stopped and turned to scrutinize me with saddened eyes. “I’m sorry, Madman.”
Empathy was a rare emotion, only shown to me by a handful of people. It was easier to be seen as a madman than to be seen as a human, but with the way she looked at me …
I wanted to be seen by her. But not here or now.
I stalked forward. She needed a man unbound by the rule of law to destroy evidence, and that was what I would give her.
She moved beside me, walking in sync as the plane came into view. The jungle on both sides hummed with its usual sounds of insects and a few monkeys in the distance, but no jaguars in sight.
Good. Another cat attack would interfere with the seduction.
She froze when we were within ten feet of the looming metal carcass, her muscles stiffening visibly in my T-shirt. Unconsciously, I reached for her, stroking a soothing palm down her back.
She leaned into the touch before pivoting on her heel to walk around the tail-end of the plane to the other side. My captain did not let her fear get in the way of her duties. A true leader in Clube de Morte.
The rain had taken away the evidence of the attack, only a few burnt logs remained in the spot she’d made a fire.
The cockpit door was still open, and the cargo hold still cracked a few feet on hydraulic hinges.
The stench of rotting corpses was worse than before, so dense I could taste it on my tongue.
She laid her backpack on the damp ground and looked up at me with hesitant eyes.
“So, drugs first?” She wrung her hands. “Then—we look for Jamie—then … fruit?”
Yes. Fruit.
“Okay.” I nodded and spit out the last of the lollipop’s paper wick, then moved toward the cargo hold.
Lifting from beneath the door, I pushed upward with most of my strength.
The grating sound was painful as the hinges gave in.
I swallowed my gag as the smell burned my nostrils, determined to protect my ángel.
“I didn’t mean you had to do it!” she exclaimed as I moved to climb in.
My glare would have cut through stone. “You are not entering this plane, Captain. I will do it.”
I pulled myself into the dark cabin. The green emergency lights flickered, lighting the bay in the glow of ghosts. My eyes adjusted to the dim space before spotting the open luggage that contained the bricks of cocaine.
One by one, I dropped them to the ground. I saved one for later, tucking it just behind the cargo door. I could not carry two easily when navigating jungle terrain on my own. One would be enough to pay for passage.
Frowning, I considered my previous visit to this metal carcass. My second in command had left two on the ground in the jaguar aftermath. Where had they gone?
A small folded piece of notebook paper, similar to the one I’d found in the cockpit, had several scribbles of coordinates written on it in blue ink. I stuffed it into my pocket and dropped the emptied suitcase through the opening.
Eyes now stinging from the toxic air, I ripped open each suitcase to ensure no other bricks had been stuffed inside.
I found only a small wallet full of American bills—another useful bargaining tool—and stowed it away with the note.
Then I searched through the bags for a clean T-shirt and a pair of women's sneakers that looked to be about Marley’s size.
I found both, a large black shirt that had to be from one of the dead men’s packs, and a pair of hiking boots. I held them to my chest when I slid out of the chamber, having finally reached my limit of breathing in filth.
Marley paid no attention to me when I slid through the small gap. Her gaze had fixed on the small mound of cocaine encased in plastic at my feet.