Except when they were dead, he’d said. I didn’t like the idea of Noel languishing in a jail, but I was more worried about his dying. He said Lupe was part of the cartel.
What if they had a beef with Noel?
Maybe she wanted Mo back and he wasn’t delivering. Or maybe she wanted Noel back and he’d refused. I’d seen enough news stories on the cartel to know they didn’t fool around. They killed people on a whim.
Would Noel be their next victim?
CHAPTERTHIRTY-THREE
Noel
When I came to, I was sprawled out on the hard floor. It was the middle of the night. Or at least I thought it was. The cell was so dark, I could barely make out bars that imprisoned me.
My head was killing me, but I managed to crawl over to the bars of the cell between me and Dax. I squinted and could just make out the form of his body still on the floor. It worried me that he hadn’t moved since the first time I saw him when Bastion tossed me into my cell.
Fear that he was dead gripped me.
I'd sent Dax off on a personal mission and if he died because of me, I wasn't sure I could live with myself. I'd never managed to get over losing Bastion except it appeared that I hadn't lost him. He was very much alive and nothing like the man I’d remembered. Well, that’s not true. I knew he could be a son-of-a-bitch and vicious. It was part of the reason I’d hired him. We made a good team because while I could hold my own in a fight, I had a more reasonable attitude. He and I were like bad cop good cop. The difference now was that he’d turned his wrath on me.
I couldn't blame him for being angry. I’d be pissed too if I’d been left to rot in a jungle prison. At the same time, I would have recognized that the team either thought I was dead or couldn’t extract me.
Bastion’s plan was taking things too far. I had to make him realize that I hadn't abandoned him. At least not without a thought. Maybe I should have gone back in, but at the time it would have been a suicide mission.
"Dax. Dax, can you hear me?"
He didn't answer, but I heard breathing. I sat leaning back against the jail bars putting my elbows on my bent knees and my head in my hands as if that could stop the intense throbbing in my brain. It made it difficult to think straight. I had to ignore the pain and figure out a way to get Dax and me out of this, or at the very least Dax out of this.
Human trafficking. How the hell was Bastion going to make that stick? I blamed getting knocked out for the slowness of my brain in making the connections.
Mo. He was the connection.
Mo wasn’t my biological son. That meant there was a strong possibility that Lupe was involved in this scheme. If that was the case, it seemed unlikely Mo was hers either.
I closed my eyes as the ramification of that hit me. Jesus. The poor little guy. How did Lupe and Bastion get him? Was he kidnapped from a family? Had his parents been forced to hand him over as a payment to the cartel?
If he was taken from his parents, he would need to be returned to them. The idea of losing him broke my heart. How could someone so quickly become so important to me?
It was the same with Harper. My whole life, I'd been a lone wolf, doing my own thing, avoiding commitments or entanglements except those involved in doing business. And now, in the span of a couple of months, two people had become as essential to living as air and water. If only things could be different and we could be a family. But even if I got out of this, I was a danger to both of them. They were both better off without me.
Groaning from the next cell broke me out of my depressing thoughts. I turned quickly, wincing as the throbbing in my head intensified. "Dax. Dax wake up."
"Oh fuck."
"That's my thought exactly. How bad is it?"
In the darkness, I could barely see Dax. Just enough that I could tell he rolled over onto his back.
"The last time I felt like this was after a three-day bender in Tijuana involving too much tequila and too many women."
My lips twitched upward. If Dax was making a joke, chances were he'd be okay. "If we survive this, I'll be sure to take you to Tijuana."
"That's all right. I'm getting too old for this shit."
Dax was around my age, which wasn’t old in the scheme of things. But this kind work could take a toll, especially if the missions went sideways, as this one had.
"I take it you know El Pirata," Dax said. "The guy has a real hardon to get revenge on you.”
"It's Bastion James."