“Andros!”
“Sir!” Niko straightened. What was the lieutenant doing in the field at this hour?
“
El Jefe
has arrived. He wants to see you. Come with me.”
Niko put down his hoe, feeling every eye on him as he followed. Great. Just what he needed. Another reason for the other trainees to hate him. They already picked on him because he was American and because someone had let slip that he was a distant relation to Alvarez. They resented him because in a physical fight he could best everyone but their trainers, and it wouldn’t be long before he could take those guys out, too.
If there was one thing he’d learned in jail, it was patience. And he’d always fought dirty.
Still, he’d tried to fight only during combat lessons. Hadn’t always worked, and a guy had to defend himself, but he went out of his way not to stir up trouble. He needed to excel and get promoted out of here. Otherwise he wasn’t going to make any progress toward his revenge.
A few of the villagers he’d made friends with muttered good luck in the local Indian dialect. The other trainees mostly stared at him with a mix of resentment and glee, depending on whether they thought he was going toward an undeserved reward or a deserved punishment.
When he reached the end of the row, Niko stopped to knock the dirt off his shoes and pants. Across the shaded lane a jeep waited. The lieutenant indicated that Niko should sit in back.
As soon as his butt hit the seat, the jeep took off. The road was mostly paved, with just a few places where the rain had washed the asphalt away. Without being too obvious, Niko took a long look at the valley, in case this was his last time in the fields. Even though the work was hard, the place had a wild beauty that appealed to Niko. Odd, but sometimes he felt more at home here, more in touch with the farming ancestors on both his Spanish-Mexican and Greek sides, than he ever had back in Pasadena.
It sure as hell beat being confined to a prison cell twenty-three hours out of every day.
It didn’t take long to reach the main hacienda where the overseer and the lieutenant had their offices. Niko stepped into the cool, tiled entryway and felt completely out of place in his sweat-stained cotton shirt and work pants. Remembering his manners, he removed his hat and followed the lieutenant toward the back.
Niko had never been inside this building before, and tried not to gawk at the heavy oil paintings of ancient
Dons
and
Doñas
gracing the walls or the various clay and wooden statues sitting in little alcoves spaced at random intervals along the hallway.
Niko had a feeling the paintings might be of some of his great-great ancestors on his mother’s side, but he didn’t dare linger to take a longer look. Of course, for all he knew, Alvarez had bought this place fully furnished and the paintings were of someone else’s family.
Realizing he was focusing on trivial matters in order to still the nerves churning his gut, Niko instead concentrated on making a mental blueprint of the building’s interior. He had to remember that his purpose here was to gather information to allow the authorities to take down Alvarez. Anything that might help an assault team navigate the premises would help.
The mental exercise calmed him, so that by the time the lieutenant stopped in front of a heavy wooden door carved with a variety of geometric shapes, Niko felt a little more of his confidence return. The lieutenant knocked, then after some signal Niko didn’t catch, opened the door.
“You will go in alone,” the lieutenant said.
Reminding himself that getting closer to Alvarez was why he’d agreed to this in the first place, Niko stepped into the room.
“Ah, Nikolos, finally we meet face-to-face.”
Niko had already become skilled at hiding his emotions, otherwise his shock over Alvarez’s appearance would have put him in a position of weakness. The crime lord looked like any other middle-aged businessman. His thick, black hair and mustache were neatly trimmed. Instead of the more elegant bones that his mother’s purely Spanish side had inherited, Alvarez’s face had a broader structure that indicated native blood. From the gossip among the villagers, Alvarez’s mother had come from a line of Peruvian royalty.
Niko couldn’t judge the man’s height accurately since he was sitting down. Underneath the sheen of a custom silk suit, his upper body appeared stocky but not fat.
The only sign that this man was one of the most ruthless criminals in the Americas was the coldness of his eyes. His lips offered Niko a welcoming smile, but his eyes seemed to strip him bare. A flare of anger and resentment answered that violating stare, but Niko tamped it down. He couldn’t afford to let Alvarez see any of his real feelings. Not yet.
He’d have to get a feel for what the man wanted from him. Was it blind subservience? Or did he want Niko to fight him so that Alvarez felt he’d earned Niko’s respect, or at least obedience?
Uncomfortably aware that if he screwed up now, he could ruin things, Niko wished he’d had time to change into a clean trainee uniform.
“Sir,” he finally managed, keeping his head up without actually meeting those chilling eyes again.
“I am very pleased with your progress, Nikolos. The lieutenant tells me you have settled in nicely and have gone out of your way not to fight with the other trainees outside of class. You’ve come a long way from the boy who shamed his father so by nearly getting kicked out of school for fighting.”
“Thank you, sir.” Niko had actually calmed down a lot after his parents read him the riot act when he stole a portable CD player. He’d become a model son until the incident with the explosives. Once he’d decided to join Alvarez’s world, he’d started picking fights and getting into as much trouble as possible. All in the name of tarnishing his good name.
It had worked. He was here, and Alvarez didn’t realize he’d been set up.
So far, so good.
“Having you work in the fields has started your transformation into a man. However, I have much bigger plans for you. I need you working for me, so that I may send reports back to your family about how their precious boy has fallen so low.”
Niko flinched. He couldn’t help it. His parents had warned him that Alvarez liked to play mind games, but it had never occurred to Niko that Alvarez would taunt his family with Niko’s fall from grace.
I’m sorry,
Mamá
.
Niko consoled himself with the fact that Pop knew the truth. And one day he’d be able to tell the rest of the family. In the meantime, he had to bear whatever Alvarez dished out.
Alvarez chuckled. “Ah. I see you still care about the opinion of your annoyingly upstanding family. It will be such a pleasure to break you of that concern.” He shook his head. “But that is for later. For now, I have a new assignment for you. One of my managers on a small smuggling route has lost his assistant and security guard. You will take over the position.”
Niko let a little of his excitement shine in his eyes. “Thank you,
jefe
.” Let Alvarez think he was happy about getting off the plantation because of the status. What really mattered to Niko was taking the first step toward winning Alvarez’s trust.
“When do I leave?”
“Immediately. You will ride back to town with me and I will explain your duties. Then you will be flown to meet your new boss.”
“
Sí, jefe.
”
Alvarez grinned. “Ah, Nikolos, I think you and I are going to get along just fine.”
Yeah, you go ahead and think that, asshole. I’m going to fucking ruin you, then laugh while you cry.
Two Years Later
Andes Mountains, Peru
“I
have a surprise for you, Nikolos.”
Niko’s fingers clenched on the phone’s handset.
“You should be receiving a delivery any moment. How I wish I could be there to watch your expression in person, but watching the security feed will have to suffice.”
Niko winced over the gloating tone in Alvarez’s voice, a sure sign that his loyalty was about to be severely tested.
As if summoned by Alvarez’s words, a knock sounded on the door. “I think it’s here,” Niko said. Taking a risk, he hung up on his boss. Alvarez couldn’t watch him in real time—the connection between this remote mountain fortress and the fortress in Ixtapa, Mexico couldn’t handle live streaming—but Niko knew he had to keep his features schooled. Alvarez would definitely receive a copy of the security tape from the camera in this room.
Striding over to the door, Niko yanked it open. One of the compound’s guards stood on the other side. Without a word, he handed Niko a small padded envelope, then turned and disappeared back down the hall. Niko’s stomach sank. The chunky outline of a videotape pushed through the envelope.
For a moment he debated whether to take the tape to his quarters. That was the one place where Alvarez hadn’t installed surveillance devices. A surprising grant of privacy.
But in the mind war going on between him and Alvarez, Niko had learned that the crime lord craved feedback. He tended to lash out harshly when denied seeing Niko’s reaction to unpleasant news or requests that pushed Niko dangerously close to his moral boundaries.
So Niko walked over to the small television set with video player in the corner.
Pulling his shoulders back and steeling his will, Niko hit PLAY.
His hard earned self control fled as an image of his Aunt Madalena appeared on the screen. Niko glared at the security camera in the upper left corner of his office, before returning his attention to the screen.
Aunt Madalena sat in the visitor’s chair in Alvarez’s office in Ixtapa. A bruise darkened the skin of her left cheek, but otherwise she appeared unharmed. Her long, black hair cascaded over her shoulders, instead of being pulled back in her typical bun. She wore a loose, white peasant blouse and a skirt made from the special fabric Alvarez provided to all of his mistresses.
No!
“Niko,” his aunt began, speaking in Spanish, “I have been told by Jaime Alvarez to give you the story of how I became his mistress.” Her shoulders shook as she inhaled. Niko kept his face expressionless, tamping down his horror and fear.
“You will be aware that Señor Alvarez has captured my husband, Anastasio Andros.”
Niko nodded. He’d received word last month that one of Alvarez’s teams had set a trap and Uncle Tasi had been caught. Another case of the DEA failing to protect one of their own. It made Niko question the reliability of his own contact. But so far, the man had lived up to his promises, passing on messages to Niko from his father during their once-a-year check in.
Niko had been trying to find a way to free Uncle Tasi, but Alvarez kept his uncle at the Ixtapa compound, while Niko had been assigned to work out of the Peru location for the past few months.
“I—” His aunt licked her lips. “I vowed to rescue my Tasi. In my vengeful pride, I made a deal with Alvarez. If I spent one night in his bed, Alvarez would free Tasi.”
Ah, Aunt Madalena. How could you have been so naïve?
“As perhaps you have guessed, Alvarez has not honored his end of the bargain.” Her dark eyes looked pleadingly into the camera. “Nikolos, if there is any honor left in you, I am begging you. Please set your uncle free. I—”
Her words were cut off by a slap from Alvarez. Then the crime lord turned to the camera. “Nikolos, I am sending a plane for you. I wish to hold a family reunion here in Ixtapa.” Alvarez’s smile was pure malice, and Niko knew with cold certainty that either his uncle or his aunt wasn’t going to survive the week.
“I look forward to seeing you soon,
hijo
.”
Niko bared his teeth at the hated nickname. Alvarez, in his twisted way, had decided to treat Niko like the son he’d never had. It sickened Niko to hear the pride in Alvarez’s voice. He particularly hated listening to Alvarez gloat during the recordings he made for Niko’s parents, telling them how deeply entrenched in the criminal underworld their son had become.
Keeping his emotions in check, Niko turned off the television. Then he headed to his quarters. Only when he was alone in the bathroom with the water running to make sure no noise was picked up by listeners in the hallway, did he let his anger come out in a scream that went on and on, dragged out from the bottom of his soul. When he’d decided to go after Alvarez, he’d never anticipated that other family members would become involved.
Talk about naïve.
The thought that his sweet aunt was now under the crime lord’s control, forced to submit to Alvarez’s sick sexual appetites, brought bile to the back of his throat. Niko barely made it to the toilet in time to spill the contents of his stomach.
When finally the heaving stopped, he lay on the cool tiles, trying to figure out some way to free his aunt and uncle. But Niko didn’t have enough power to challenge Alvarez yet. And he hadn’t been able to make any contacts outside of Alvarez’s organization that might help him.
Dios
, please forgive me, for I have failed them.
Some time later, he pushed to his feet. While he showered, he shoved his anger, fear and grief down deep. The best he could do was stay alert and be ready to act should an opportunity to free either one come up.
One Year Later
Ixtapa, Mexico
“P
ardon,
Derecha
, but the buyer is waiting for an answer.”
Niko stared out the second-story window toward the Pacific Ocean. Outside, the air was crisp and fresh. Bright with sunshine that sparkled on the waves. Inside this former Spanish fort, deals were cut to transport drugs into the United States, guaranteeing the ruin of countless lives.
With Alvarez out of town, Niko, who’d been nicknamed
La Mano Derecha
by those within the organization, was in charge of okaying the deals. Without turning around, Niko said, “Tell him he can have half of what he’s requested now. Once he’s proven that his money is good and that his organization is professional enough to stay out of trouble with the cops, we’ll talk about the rest.”
“I will give him your decision.” In the reflection within the window he saw the man nod respectfully at Niko’s back before leaving and closing the door behind him. He knew it grated on the man to have to take orders from a twenty-three-year-old. Alvarez’s unprecedented, rapid promotion of Niko had earned him a shitload of enemies.