Exposed (4 page)

“I’m not hung up on her,” Ethan argued. “She’s just an old friend. Like a sister.”

Okay, not at all, and she sure as hell looked nothing like the girl he’d grown up with anymore. The body on her was impossible to ignore.

He remembered exactly what those trim curves had felt like up against him yesterday, and how his body had reacted. In an extremely un-brotherly manner he hoped she hadn’t noticed because he’d been quick to set her away from him.

Vance put on that shuttered expression he used whenever he was hiding something. “Dunno.”

Evers and Schroder exchanged knowing glances before looking back at Vance. “Dude, even a stranger would know you’re holding out on us with that look.”

Vance shook his head, his face totally blank now. “Nope. Don’t know anything.”

“Bullshit,” Schroder said with a grin.

Ethan sighed. “She’s working with the U.S. Attorney’s office on the Fuentes case, all right? I’ve known her since she was five and want to make sure she knows what the hell she’s up against, check that she’s taking steps to protect herself. All right? Happy?” Yeah, he knew she was smart and all grown up, but he still needed to know she was being cautious. Marisol held a special place in his heart, always had.

Schroder lost the grin. They all knew about
el Santo
and the other enforcers out there hunting each other in the turf war raging while Fuentes was trapped behind bars. “Oh.” He slanted a look at Vance. “Like Cruz’s sister, huh?”

Vance’s face went even stiffer, a sure sign he was covering something. He was the worst poker player on the team, which was why Ethan and the others loved playing him.

Schroder pounced, pointing at Vance. “Right there. Right there that tells me what I need to know.” He snickered to himself. “Is she hot?”

Vance dropped the I-don’t-know-anything act and grinned. “She’s not hard to look at.” His gaze shot to Ethan. “Not his usual type, though.”

“I have a type?” he demanded in annoyance. First he’d heard of it.

Now all three of his teammates looked at each other. “Yeah,” Vance said with a shrug.

“Really? And what type is that?” He raised an eyebrow and folded his arms across his chest.

“Young, hot and a bit uh…shallow.”

“Whatever,” he scoffed. It wasn’t like he had a wide variety of women to choose from with his work schedule, not outside of one-night stands or a weekend fling. The good women weren’t interested in light and casual for very long and he couldn’t blame them. He was tired of it too. “Anyway, it’s not like that with her, so you guys can find something else to hypothesize about.”

“What’s really got his panties in a twist,” Vance added, apparently done with holding back now, “is that she’s more interested in her work than in him. Barely gave him a second glance when we saw her yesterday. His ego’s smarting. Fun to watch, actually.”

Ethan rolled his eyes. “You three feel free to stay here and gossip some more. I’m getting some coffee.”

It’d been three long days of pre-dawn wakeups and not hitting their hotel until almost midnight. They still had another meeting to get through tonight before he could head to their hotel and crash, and the moment they got a lock on their current target’s location, they’d be heading out with the DEA boys to grab him. Here Ethan was trying to help watch out for Marisol, and she couldn’t be bothered to give him the time of day.

He strode out to the kitchen area where his other three teammates were chowing down on cold pizza from last night. The coffee pot was almost empty. “How old is this?”

“Just made it ten minutes ago,” Bauer answered between bites. His plate held no less than half a dozen crusts and he didn’t look like he’d be slowing down any time soon. Biggest guy on the team meant one of the biggest appetites, too.

As he poured the little coffee that was left into a mug and started a fresh pot, Ethan frowned. If he was honest with himself, Marisol brushing him off wasn’t all that was bugging him. Bumping into her yesterday had been a shock, and not an altogether pleasant one.

Seeing her in that skin-tight yoga outfit and looking into those sea green eyes, a shock of male awareness had shot through him. Then when he’d caught her, the feel of her lithe curves pressed to him had made it impossible to see her as anything but a woman rather than the-girl-next-door he’d grown up with. He’d worked hard at reminding himself she was the latter the past few times he’d come home to visit, purposely maintaining that mental barrier between them. Safer that way.

He knew when a woman was interested in him, and knew Marisol had had a crush on him off and on over the years. Even up until he’d left the Corps he’d sometimes caught her looking at him with that quiet yearning he didn’t want to encourage.

The ironic thing was, now that she was all grown up, she’d looked at him with friendly recognition and nothing more. She’d been composed, a little remote. Why did that bother him? Hell, maybe his ego
was
smarting that she was ignoring him.

With the dregs of the coffee in hand, he left the room and stepped outside into the parking lot for some privacy and fresh air. He texted Marisol again, the early evening air was warm and muggy against his skin.

Really need to talk to you. When’s a good time?

Not expecting a response any time soon, he started to slip the phone back into his pocket and was surprised when it buzzed. He whipped it back out, read the text.

Busy at work. Will try to call you tonight if not too late.

He responded immediately.
Call me no matter when
.

She answered a moment later.
Okay
.

Putting his phone away, he wasn’t convinced she’d actually follow through. But this was too important for him to let go. So if she didn’t call, he’d have to take matters into his own hands.

****

The smell of the place still made him feel ill. Stale air, old people and an underlying scent of sickness that pervaded everything, combined with a heaviness to the air that came with being in what amounted to a warehouse that held people waiting to die. Souls and minds trapped in shells of bodies, forced to linger until their hearts finally gave out.

Bautista entered the care home and took the elevator to the third floor. The nurses at the desk there smiled at him but he didn’t acknowledge them, just continued on to the last room in the corridor that looked out over the park across the street.

Not that his
abuela
had ever been able to enjoy the view.

He’d still insisted she have this room though, in the most state-of-the-art facility in southern Florida. It was the least he could do for her while she waited to die. And God knew he could afford it.

They’d propped the head of her bed up a little, had the foot elevated slightly so her knees were bent. The IV and gastro tubes were taped to her face and arm, braced with towels and special pillows to keep her muscles from seizing completely. Her deep blue eyes were partially open, staring sightlessly across the room while soft Latin music played from the top-of-the-line sound system he’d bought for her a year ago.

“Hi,
abuelita
,” he murmured, bending to kiss her forehead, right where one of her surgical scars bisected the skin between her eyebrows.

Her eyelids flickered and eyes moved slightly, settling in his direction before wandering again.

Bautista set about adjusting her pillows and spent a few minutes manipulating her contractured limbs. She had only a few inches of movement at her elbows and wrists and they had to ensure she maintained that small range of motion. Her mattress was specially designed to reduce pressure points and help avoid bedsores.

The physical therapists worked hard to keep what little motion she had left. He knew, because he checked the room often, without them knowing. Remotely, using the hidden surveillance cameras he’d installed on three sides of the room. He watched the staff carefully to ensure they were doing their jobs and not abusing his grandmother, and he paid them well for it. If anyone dared abuse her here, they’d suffer dearly.

And he’d kill anyone who harmed her.

Even after all these years he hated coming here, hated seeing her like this. For twenty-two years she’d lain like this, a vegetable. At least in the past few years he’d made enough money to ensure she had what comforts he could give.

He lowered his weight into the leather easy chair beside her bed, forced himself to talk to her. About nothing, really. The weather. About the view of the park she would never see.

He didn’t know if any of his words registered but he knew the pitch of his voice did. His grandmother still recognized his voice, knew when he visited. Her pulse rate would quicken when he spoke to her, then settle, and her eye movement would slow. He liked to think his presence relaxed her. That was why he came twice a week when he was home in Miami. Well, that and guilt.

He still felt responsible for what had happened to her. If he’d been home that day instead of off looking to escape from his own troubles, he might have been able to stop them. Would have shot those cowardly fuckers that had broken into his sweet
abuelita’s
house looking for cash and jewelry they could turn over fast to buy their next fix of drugs.

His brave grandmother hadn’t cowered from them though. Oh no, she’d stood her ground and told them off. The neighbors had heard her shouting right before one of them had taken a baseball bat to her head and caved her skull in.

That day he’d lost what little he had. A relative who’d given a lonely, bullied little boy a safe place to stay, and showed him the miracle of unconditional love.

He’d walked in to see the paramedics carrying his grandmother out of the kitchen on a stretcher, her head wrapped in bandages. Her blood had stained the linoleum floor, had splattered the cheerful yellow rose wallpaper near the table where he’d sat and done his homework and eaten home cooked meals. They’d taken him away and he’d bounced from foster home to foster home until he wished he’d died defending her that day.

Bautista blinked, clearing away the images imprinted in his mind, consciously uncurled his fists on the armrests of the leather chair. His time in the Army had saved him.

It had also made him into what he was today: a trained killer. He’d gained and perfected the skills he used to take lives. Then he’d met Perez, and the man had given him the one thing he’d craved most in the last twenty-two years.

Revenge.

Perez had given him his first job as a contract killer. Not a calling that Bautista had been looking for, but one that had come to him. And it suited him perfectly. He’d known it from the moment he’d first realized why Perez had approached him.

He’d listened to the intel on the two targets; two low-level drug runners that were causing Perez trouble in Miami, both who had recently been paroled from prison for another murder they’d committed. He’d recognized their faces instantly as his
abuelita’s
attackers. Perez had done his homework. Somehow he’d known Bautista would jump at the chance to take them out.

From that moment on, they’d been dead men walking.

Bautista had hunted them down relentlessly, paid them back for what they’d done. Tortured them for hours before finally caving in one of their skulls with a bat while the other one cried and sniveled in the corner, begging futilely to be spared the same fate.

Since then he’d dispatched many others to hell with those first victims, and he slept just fine at night.

His gaze slid over to his grandmother, past her to the medical equipment and monitors she was hooked up to, her treasured framed icons of the Virgin at her bedside, passed down from her Spanish ancestors. Her pulse and heart rate were calm, her respiration rate relaxed. Because he was near.

So many times he’d wanted to tell her what he’d done, but he hadn’t. He knew she would have hated what he’d become, that she wouldn’t have condoned his idea of justice and he never knew who might be listening anyway. The only reason he was still alive, still free, was because he was always so careful. Careful enough that no one ever found out who he really was.

A tap at the door made him look up. His heart lurched when
her
face appeared in the opening. He rose from his chair automatically, all his muscles locked.

Julia gave him a warm smile from the doorway, her expression soft. “Had a feeling I might see you this week,” she said. “Want some company?”

“Sure,” he said, a strange sense of relief filling him as she stepped inside and shut the door. She’d been volunteering twice a week at the nursing home for almost three months now. He’d gotten to know her pretty well, both from their conversations and the background check he’d done on her.

That flow of information only went one way though.

She was the only person he’d ever really talked with here, aside from the doctor in charge of his grandmother’s care. He didn’t care for company, but with her he didn’t mind. In fact, he found himself hoping he’d see her every time he came here.

Julia crossed over to his grandmother’s bed and perched on the foot of it, glanced at the monitors. Another smile lit her face, her mink brown hair shining in the sunlight streaming through the windows. “She loves it when you come to see her.”

Bautista sat again, hating the sudden awkwardness he felt. He knew all about her, some of it by underhanded means, and she knew next to nothing about him. It felt like a violation of sorts. “I’m glad to come.” He owed his grandmother that much at least.

“I wish all the patients here were as lucky to have such a devoted family member. Most of them lie in their beds day in and day out without anyone but the staff visiting them.”

“She was good to me.” Better than anyone ever had been, or ever would be.

She’d taken him in immediately, no questions asked, when his addict mother had died of an overdose, and done everything in her power to steer him away from the lifestyle that had killed her only child. Walking him to and from school each day, helping him with his homework. Consoling him with hugs and homemade cookies when he broke down in tears when the bullying became too much. Keeping him on the straight and narrow.