Before Nightfall - Kat Martin Page 0,22

filtering through him. He set the bottle back down on the table.

“You took a chance just meeting us tonight. We won’t repeat anything you’ve said or interfere in your operation in any way. You have our word on that. But we aren’t leaving Monterrey without the boy.”

Diego relaxed. “A compromise, then. I know where to find you. I will see the boy is returned as soon as this is over.” Rising, he finished the last of his beer, turned, and made his way through the crowd toward the entrance, pausing briefly to speak to the girl with the long black hair. Both of them laughed, and Diego disappeared out the door.

Colt turned to Lissa and Alex. “If they go in with a massive army of men, they’ll need to bring Spearman and the cartel segundos down. Timmy could get hurt.”

“Or killed,” Lissa said.

“So what are we going to do?” Alex asked.

“Only one thing we can do. Get Tim out before the task force goes in.”

* * *

LISSA WALKED IN front of Colt and Alex out of the cantina, and Alex drove them back to the casita. He was staying in the city with a woman, which probably explained some of his eagerness to accompany them to Monterrey.

He would be picking them up in the morning, driving them to San Pedro Garza Garcia, an urban center about eight miles southwest of the city. According to Señor Cortez, El Puñal’s compound, which overlooked the basin, sat near the end of a road winding into the Loma Larga mountains.

As soon as they were back in the casita, Lissa used the information Cortez had provided to find the area on Google Maps.

“The place looks like a fortress,” she said, studying Google Earth photos on her cell phone, satellite images of the house and grounds. “How are we going to get in?” She glanced over her shoulder at Colt, who stared at the screen from behind her.

“More importantly, how are we going to get out?” He rubbed the back of his neck. “Alex will be here in the morning to drive us up there. Once we get a look at the place, maybe we can find a chink in Spearman’s armor.”

Lissa hoped so. But the task of getting in and out without being seen seemed impossible.

“In the meantime,” Colt said, “it’s late. We need to get some sleep.”

Lissa cast him a glance. “What about sleep being overrated?”

Colt’s mouth edged up in amusement. “True, but we really need to be at the top of our game if we’re going against a guy they call The Dagger.”

She sighed. “You’re right. We’ve got to stay focused on Timmy.” She didn’t want to imagine the boy’s fear, being with a man he didn’t know, worried about his mom and sister, afraid he might never get back home.

Colt must have sensed the depth of her concern. “On the other hand, it’s important to get the best night’s sleep possible, and I know exactly the way to make that happen.”

The glimmer of heat in that cool blue eye drained some of the tension from her shoulders. Lissa managed to smile. Reaching out to take the hand he offered, she let him lead her down the hall to the bedroom.

* * *

THE MOUNTAINS ABOVE the metropolis of San Pedro Garza Garcia were rugged: jagged granite outcroppings shoving up from the earth, dense scrub vegetation that included the occasional cactus or palm, and thick deciduous forests.

Luxury homes dotted the lower slopes, the streets lined with leafy trees and colorful blooming flowers, but farther up the hill, the terrain turned forbidding, a hostile no-man’s-land.

Using GPS coordinates, they located Spearman’s house at the end of the road at the far edge of the city: a huge two-story U-shaped white structure with a red-tiled roof. It was completely surrounded by a ten-foot wall.

The good news was the terrain would provide the cover they needed to get close to the residence without being seen. The bad news was it was going to take a miracle to find a way in.

Alex parked his girlfriend’s SUV out of sight in the heavy foliage a quarter mile down the hill and they all got out of the vehicle. Wearing the camouflage cargo pants and T-shirt he’d had in his gear bag, Colt joined Alex and Lissa, who both wore lightweight camo.

Before they could come up with a plan, they needed intel, needed to know what they would be facing. They split up and took off in different directions, each taking

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