Chapter 15
Bo figured he had maybe an hour to live, less than that if The Flea kept it up.
After dropping Matt King out of his airplane somewhere over the remote jungles of Brazil, Richter had taken them into Paraguay, landing on a small strip along the meandering Monday River. Two black SUVs, which judging from their radios and grill lights did double duty as police vehicles, pulled alongside the plane when it came to a stop. Bo and the others were stuffed inside the back of one of the SUVs, still handcuffed, and the motorcade headed to the northeast toward the sprawling warrens of Ciudad del Este.
The Flea sat in the front passenger seat, turning every so often to leer back at the prisoners, paying special attention to Alma.
“Your friend is jaguar bait by now,” he said. “We could have dropped him into the Paraná or the Iguazú, then he would be fish bait.” The little man laughed. “But there is too great a danger that some passing tour boat or barge might have found his decomposing body before the fish ate him up. The jaguars will make a fast meal of him.”
Alma shivered and turned to look out the window, which only served to urge him on.
“I wonder if he was alive when he reached the trees.” La Pulga shrugged. “He seemed a man of delicate constitution. I think it more likely he had a heart attack as soon as the wind hit his face.”
Alma threw her head back and screamed, “Would you just be quiet?”
“Interesting,” he said. “If you were so fond of him, then why do you take up with your guide?”
Bo leaned forward. “Hey, Flea! Want me to look around for a phonebook back here so you can see over the dashboard?”
La Pulga darkened. “You are so amusing,” he said. “Yes, I am short. You are probably not aware of this, but Richter is famous for several things, chiefly, removing the feet and hands of people who owe him money. There are a wide variety of instruments and tools at his warehouse that I am anxious to try.” He turned to study Bo up and down before a wide smile spread across his face. “I think that you and I will be the same height very soon. In fact, I may even be a little taller than you when we are finished.”
Richter’s SUV peeled off as soon as they reached his two-story warehouse in the outskirts of Ciudad del Este. He and the brown woman went into the front of the building with the bald goon, leaving La Pulga and Tigre to see to the prisoners along with two other men that Bo did not recognize, both with jaguar tattoos on their forearms and each carrying a short-barreled SMG on a single point sling around his neck. Tigre and The Flea tromped up the metal stairs in front of prisoners, while the two jaguar boys brought up the rear.
Tigre took a key from the pocket of his jeans and opened a large padlock on the metal door at the top of the stairs. Bo’s heart sank when he walked in the room and saw clear plastic sheeting fastened to the floor with black gaffer’s tape. There were metal rings affixed to the far wall and a couple of five gallon buckets to use as makeshift toilets. Kidnapping and human trafficking was nothing new to Fernando Richter.
Just as La Pulga had promised, a variety of bone saws, machetes, tinsnips, and hoof nippers hung on a peg board beyond the plastic sheeting.
Tigre and the Jaguar boys secured everyone’s cuffs to the individual metal rings on the far side of the room while La Pulga went to a desk beside the pegboard. He’d obviously been here before and knew his way around.
He shuffled through the desk a moment, then came back with a narrow metal cylinder the size of a long flashlight. A thick copper wire protruded from the sides of the tube three quarters of the way up, coiling around the last six inches of the device. La Pulga’s thumb rested over a red button in the center of a rubber handle.
“The inventor of this little machine called it The Cat,” he said. “A strange turn of events. Don’t you think? The Flea, wielding The Cat.” He chuckled at his joke and ran the copper coil along Alma’s thigh, pushing the button.
She screamed, throwing herself backward at the sudden shock.
Bo lunged, flailing with his free hand and narrowly missing a handful of La Pulga’s sweater.
Instead of retreating, The Flea turned The Cat on Bo, driving the coil into his chest. Pinned against the wall with nowhere to go, Bo jumped and twitched like a piece of frying fish. He slumped against his cuffs when La Pulga released the button, exhausted, stifling a whimper. His tooth was on fire again, and to make matters worse, he was sure he’d just cracked a couple more.
Eva and Alma both screamed.
Steven stood, holding up his free hand. “Just stop it! My father will pay double, but we all have to leave here alive.”
“That is funny,” La Pulga said. “Your father has already agreed to Richter’s terms. Eva’s family may be a bit more problematic, but nothing he cannot handle.” He turned to Alma, giving her a quick jolt with the coil. “I will get back to you in a moment, my darling. First things first, though. Mr. Quinn and I have a little appointment.”
Bo raised his head and gave a weary chuckle. “I thought Richter liked me . . .”
“He liked you better than Matt,” La Pulga said, nodding for Tigre to unhook Bo from the ring. “Not enough to keep you alive.”
* * *
Soledad borrowed a minivan to drive Jericho and the others across the Tancredo Neves Bridge into Brazil, and then the Friendship Bridge from Brazil into Paraguay. Legally, the Americans should have had a visa to enter each country, but Soledad explained that no one would stop them unless they did something stupid to draw attention to themselves.
“Like launching a raid on a known drug lord and smuggler?” Thibodaux said.
“Exactly that sort of thing,” Soledad said.
They reached Richter’s warehouse outside Ciudad del Este an hour and a half after leaving the Medinas’ cattle ranch. They watched as a slender woman in high leather boots stepped outside to retrieve something from one of three black Suburbans parked alongside the concrete building.
“Yuck,” Thibodaux said. “She looks like she’s spent too long in the roaster.”
“That must be Violeta,” Pete Quinn said. “Richter’s girlfriend that Justino told us about. Dark skin, bleached blond hair.”
Soledad gave a low whistle. “She has the body of a twenty-year-old.”
Thibodaux harrumphed. “She better give it back,” he said, “’cause she’s wrinklin’ it.”
Violeta took a moment to scan the area outside the warehouse, missed the minivan completely, and then disappeared back inside.
“How do you plan to do this?” Soledad asked from behind the wheel.
“Richter’s not expecting us,” Jericho said. “I think I’ll walk up and knock on the front door.”
“There appears to be a side entrance,” Miyagi said. “I suggest Jacques and I approach from there, while you make your more direct approach.”
“Where do I go?” Pete Quinn asked.
“You’re with me, Dad,” Jericho said. “Soledad, thank you.”
“I will be here when you come out,” she said.
A sign above the entrance in bold red and black lettering said FERNANDO RICHTER SHIPPING CO.
“We’re at the right place,” Jericho said under his breath. “Makes things easier.”
“Okay, son,” Pete Quinn said. “This is new to me. When you say knock on the front door, you mean—”
Jericho flung open the metal door and shot the two men with guns on the inside, twice each, center mass.
“Knock, knock,” he said. “Just like that.”
Pete Quinn raised his eyebrows and gave his son a nod. “That’s kinda what I envisioned.” He scooped up one of the dead men’s SMGs.
“You know how to use that?” Jericho asked.
“I do,” the elder Quinn said.
Three more of Richter’s thugs came down a long hallway, firing as they approached. Quinn took out the leader with two shots from the Beretta and chased another back around the corner, winging him, but failing to deliver a killing shot.
Pete sent half the thirty-round magazine from his SMG downrange with one pull of the trigger. Fortunately, some of the rounds dropped one of Richter’s men.
“Take it easy with that, Dad,” Jericho said. “Short bursts.”
The second shooter poked his head out again down the hall. Pete dropped him, but spent the last fifteen rounds of his magazine doing it.
“Short bursts,” he said. “Got it.”
Bullets snapped off the wall behind them sending both men jumping for cover. Quinn brought up the Beretta in time to see Violeta slump forward, Miyagi’s blade in and then out of her dark brown throat.
“Goats,” Miyagi said, slipping back into the shadows.
“Why does she say that?” Pete asked.
“Long story,” Jericho said.
Thibodaux’s hushed voice came from the same alcove where Miyagi had disappeared. “It’s me, Chair Force. Don’t shoot.”
“We’re good,” Quinn said.
“Richter’s through there,” the Cajun said. He held up three fingers, his good eye and the Taurus trained down the hall. “Three more goats, but Emiko and I got ’em. You take care of Richter.”
Jericho was already moving toward the office. Quinn flung open the door and handed it to his dad, cutting the pie until the man inside came into view. As he suspected, one more of Richter’s men stood inside guarding the boss. This one was a bald thug wearing a black muscle-mapping shirt. Quinn got off the last round from his Beretta, rushing the shot and catching the big man in the shoulder, missing his vitals. Surprised at being hit, the man lowered his SMG and took a step back. Richter stood in the middle of the office, both hands flat on top of a wooden desk as he rose from his chair.
Pete sprang past Jericho, throwing himself at the bald thug, plowing into him and pummeling him with his fists. Jericho had seen the aftermath of a few of his dad’s fights. The bald guy didn’t stand a chance.
On his feet now, Richter reached for a metal box. His pistol empty, Quinn drew the long gaucho blade from the sheath on his belt and pegged the man’s hand to the top of the wooden desk, the razor-sharp edge facing outward.
Richter squealed in pain, the metal from his many rings clicking against the wooden desktop. He grabbed the wrist of his injured hand and stared down at the blade.
Quinn heard a roar behind him and turned to see his father punch Richter square on the chin. The force of his blow sent the man flying backward, slicing his hand down the centerline and leaving the blade behind, still impaled in the wood.
“Where’s my son?” Pete Quinn said, the bald man’s SMG in his hand now as he loomed over the screaming drug lord. Richter pointed upward, at the ceiling.
“Behind you, Quinn-san,” Miyagi said. She surveyed the wounded Richter and the unconscious bald man. “I’ll take care of them,” she said.
“Jacques?” Jericho asked.
“Out back,” Miyagi said. “Tending to two other goats.”
Jericho took the pistol from the box on Richter’s desk, press-checked it to make sure it was loaded, and then motioned upstairs with the muzzle.
“Let’s go get Bo.”
They cleared the stairs to the second floor in four steps, taking up positions on either side of the door.
“They’ve heard us coming,” the elder Quinn said.
Jericho nodded, the pistol at high ready. “No doubt.”
A scream came from inside the room that made Quinn’s bones ache. There was no doubt it was Bo.
Jericho looked at his father.
“You ready?”
Pete Quinn answered by putting his foot to the door, hooking around the threshold with the short barreled SMG as if he’d grown up kicking doors. Jericho followed him in, bringing the interior of the room into view over the top of his front sight. A gap-toothed thug stood to the right of three badly beaten prisoners—two women and one man—a pistol in his hand. Quinn dropped him with two shots, wheeling immediately to the left. Bo lay on the floor, chained to a metal ring by one hand, while a small man, not much larger than a boy, stood over him with what looked like a cattle prod.
Pete Quinn emptied the magazine of his SMG into The Flea’s chest, causing him to jump and twitch in place, dancing like a marionette.
“Short bursts,” Pete Quinn said, dropping the empty gun and running to his boy.
Bo raised his head, staring dumbfounded.
“Dad?”
Pete fell beside his son, cradling his head in his lap.
Jericho watched the door until Thibodaux appeared there a few moments later. “We’re clear,” the Cajun said.
“This one has the keys,” a young man who had to be Steven Grey said, pointing toward the dead gap-toothed thug.
The blond woman beside him closed her eyes, fighting back tears. The taller one with auburn hair didn’t even fight it.
Quinn unchained Steven, then gave him the key so he could release the rest while he went to check on Bo.
“What the hell, Dad?” Bo said, wincing as he sat up on one elbow. His right front tooth was nothing but a jagged shard and had to be terribly painful.
“How bad are you hurt?” Pete Quinn asked.
“Honestly, it would probably take me less time to tell you what’s not hurt.”
Pete closed his eyes and shook his head. “I have to call your mother and tell her you’re all right.”
“I say again, Dad. What the hell?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean,” Bo groaned. “What are you doing here?”
“You sent an SOS. What did you expect me to do?”
Bo shook his head, looking incredulous. “I don’t know. Call Jericho . . .”
“Well.” Jericho sighed. “I for one am glad he came along, baby brother. Turns out our old man’s pretty good at taking care of meatheads.”