“Which rental, east or west side?” Charlie asked, his heart now pounding. “No, wait. West side. It’s bigger, and has more land.”

  “Well, one way to make sure. Just come up the bosque behind the house. If the signal is still as strong, we’ll know,” Gordon said. “That’s when we move in.”

  “These people working for Brooks have to be ex-military. Maybe not Eddie himself, but certainly those from the copter. Or I guess they could be ex-cops who’ve worked in the field, maybe even SWAT. They’ll be on high alert during the hours just before dawn. That’s usually the best time for raids. They’ll know that.”

  “So, we confirm the signal tonight, then make our move in broad daylight, right after a hearty breakfast? Theirs, not ours.”

  “Yeah, but we won’t go in Special Ops mode. We’re going to be transients, maybe trespassing,” Charlie replied.

  “Yeah, expect the unexpected. I like that. Who else we going to invite to this event?” Gordon said as they reached Rio Grande.

  “Let’s work out the details on the way back. I’m still up in the air about telling Ruth. Don’t want to get her hopes up.”

  “She’ll know, especially if we get Nancy involved.”

  “So, maybe we do this mostly by ourselves—with just a little diversion on the side.”

  * * *

  “This shopping cart sucks,” Gordon grumbled as he pushed it down the bike path that paralleled the bosque and the network of irrigation ditches. The metal cart contained dusty, dirty sleeping bags, a couple of rolled-up foam pads, coats and clothes, a large cooler, and everything else they could borrow from the homeless shelter to create the illusion. “The ground seemed a lot harder last night.”

  “Well, at least now you know why the transients try to stick to the streets and sidewalks when they’re hauling their stuff around. Wanna carry my backpack?” Charlie said, grinning.

  “We’re lucky the estate backs up to the bosque,” he added. “I’m betting the residents along this stretch of the valley are used to seeing homeless campers.”

  “Well, we should blend in real well. These filthy clothes reek.”

  “Be grateful it’s early November in New Mexico instead of the middle of summer. Or ’stan, with the temperature 105 outside, bodies in the street, and man-eating flies.”

  “I’ll be grateful only when we get Rene back,” Gordon responded.

  Charlie nodded, feeling down into the pocket of his shabby, oversized denim jacket and touching his sidearm. One thing he liked about his partner was his attitude when the shit hit the fan. There were never any “ifs”—only “whens.” They’d always come back from their missions with positive results. And now that it was personal, that made it all the more important to be a team again.

  He’d also held back on the obvious opportunity to give Gordo a hard time. His partner was disguised as a pregnant Hispanic woman. His skin had been darkened slightly, his jeans enhanced with hips—not to mention his chest and belly. He wore a baseball cap fitted with bangs and a ponytail. Nancy had also added a trace of pale lipstick.

  “Thanks for not mentioning my pink sneakers—or the rest of this, bro. I’m having a hard enough time trying to walk like I think a pregnant woman walks. And Nancy wasn’t much help. She’s got a nice ass, but she walks like a cop.”

  “Pushing the shopping cart probably helps cover any stride differences. I enjoy watching a Western woman’s hips when they walk, but in ’stan, there are so many clothes you just can’t see the action—if there is any. Remember the time we had to acquire the village Johnny Jihad for the spooks?” Charlie asked.

  “First time I was a woman carrying an M4, but at least it was easy to hide in all that fabric. Got us into the compound and face-to-face with our target.”

  “The good ol’ days, huh?”

  “Yeah, but with just a pistol and a GPS tracker in my fake wristwatch, I feel underaccessorized.” He looked down at the phony belly bump. “And with child.”

  “Better slow down, we’re supposed to be tired from all this roaming around,” Charlie warned. “Here comes the fence.”

  The estate had a large backyard with a five-foot-high chain-link fence and a narrow, padlocked center gate. Beyond was a pasture of tall grass. A loafing shed to one side contained four horse stalls, empty at the moment, and a few bales of sun-bleached hay. Clearly, whoever lived here now had no livestock.

  A hundred meters farther east on the property was a four-foot-high solid wall, probably of stucco-coated cinder block, with a big, metal, double gate. Beyond was a flower garden, mostly roses, and a patio with outdoor furniture and a pool. Next was the rectangular six-bedroom house—according to the architect’s plans they’d studied—courtesy of Claudia the Realtor.

  “And there’s the security,” Gordon mumbled, looking out of the corner of his eyes at two men in dark pants and blue jackets standing beside the metal gate, halfway to the house.

  “Ignore them. Here we go,” Charlie said, veering left. He got in front of Gordon, helping him maneuver the shopping cart containing their faux worldly professions off the bike path. They continued down the sloped slide of an embankment to a dirt utility easement that ran parallel to the fence.

  “Hard enough ground here to keep rolling. So far so good,” Gordon commented.

  Charlie made a point of not looking directly at the men in blue jackets, but noted that one of them was unlocking the big metal gate.

  He stopped in front of the small gate in the outer chain-link fence, screening his partner from the men’s view. Gordon reached into the shopping cart, brought out the bolt cutters, and reached under Charlie’s arm to snip off the Master Lock with a dull thunk.

  “If they saw that, I’d be surprised,” Gordon said, stepping back and dropping the bolt cutters and lock into the shopping cart, covering them with an old jacket.

  Charlie turned around and opened the gate as if he owned the place. “Come on in, Miss Sweeney.”

  “It’s Mrs. Sweeney, smartass,” Gordon replied, pushing the cart onto the grassy yard. It bogged down in the moist, thick turf almost immediately.

  “Hey!” one of the guys yelled from across the pasture. “This is private property. Get the hell out of here before we call the cops.”

  Gordon stopped and turned to look at the two men jogging toward them. “Can I shoot them?”

  “Mrs. Sweeney, we promised DuPree we’d keep the casualties to a minimum. If they get close enough, we’ll just stick with Plan A.”

  “I still prefer Plan B.”

  “Maybe later,” Charlie replied, reaching into the old cooler and bringing out a bottle of cheap wine.

  “You assholes deaf?” The smaller of the two men called out, hurrying up with his companion. Smaller was a relative description, the short guy was probably six-two.

  Charlie tried out the mellow, half-drunk tone he’d rehearsed more than once. “Dude, don’t call my pregnant girlfriend an asshole. That’ll bring our baby, well, her baby, bad luck. We’re just taking a short cut over to Rio Grande. We’ve got to catch the bus to the free clinic behind Old Town,” Charlie said, taking a swig of what was really warm water, then setting it back into the cooler. “You want her to have the kid right here on the lawn?”

  The tall guy stepped around them and looked at the gate. “What the fuck did you do to the lock?” he demanded, stepping into Charlie’s face.

  Gordon groaned, grabbing his baby bump and wavering.

  Both sets of eyes were on Gordon when Charlie made a two-handed draw and Tasered both of the goons in the chests.

  In less than two minutes the men were unconscious, courtesy of knockout injections, then bound hand and foot with strong zip ties and dragged into some brush. Both had been carrying handguns.

  These were unloaded, then thrown over the road into the irrigation canal beyond. The men had wallets and IDs identifying them as residents of Pennsylvania. No surprise. These, Charlie and Gordon kept. One had car keys, and Charlie threw them into the canal as well.

  Charlie and Gordon had done this kind of thing before and they moved quickly and efficiently. Keeping low and screened from view, Charlie kept watch while Gordon shed his cross-dressing enhancements and they advanced to the wall with the double gate.

  Gordon crouched at one side of the gate, Charlie at the other, and they waited. Charlie’s cell phone vibrated, and he brought it out to look. A text message said “Signal coming from SW corner bedroom—R?”

  One of DuPree’s people—a tech—was east of the property, down the street, trying to narrow down Rene’s game signal. They now had a location on the boy’s likely location in the house. “Southwest corner,” Charlie whispered to Gordon, who nodded.

  Last night, Charlie had covered Gordon while he moved in close enough to watch the rear of the estate for about an hour. Both had stuck to cover and moved slowly, using their advanced training to advantage.

  Gordon had observed a guard inside the rear of the home, watching toward the bosque with binoculars, probably with night-vision capability. He’d also reported that one of the bedroom windows facing the rear—the one in the southwest corner—was blocked off except at the very top. It was the logical place to keep a child prisoner, with the only escape route blocked. So far, last night’s recon was paying off.

  They waited another five minutes, then heard the patio door open and footsteps coming closer across the tile floor. “Darren! Jack! Where the hell are you?” the man called. He walked over to the gate, opened it, then stepped out onto the lawn.

  “Hi,” Charlie said softly.

  The man jumped, startled, then turned toward him, grabbing for a pistol at his waist.

  Gordon Tasered the guy in the back and he went down on the grass. Charlie thumped him on the head with a lead-filled sap. Gordo crossed from the other side of the gate, then turned off the juice.

  “Hope he peed himself. Wish we could just shoot them and get it over with,” Gordon whispered, pushing the knockout drug into the man’s neck with a syringe. “Recognize the voice?”

  “Guy who did the talking last night outside the helicopter,” Charlie responded as he applied the zip ties. Then he took the gun and wallet from the semiconscious man, who was well on his way to dreamland.

  “At least now we know for sure they’re not security for a celebrity traveling incognito,” Gordon said, dragging the inert figure next to the wall, out of view from the house.

  “Yeah. If this had been Johnny Depp’s hideaway, we’d be screwed for life,” Charlie added.

  “About time for that diversion?” Gordon looked at his watch.

  “Yeah. I’ll send the request.” He thumbed his phone and sent the text message he’d prepared two hours before.

  They waited just outside the wall, with their pistols directed toward the gate. There was the possibility that any diversion might panic those inside instead of merely distracting them. Impatient, he looked down at his watch, forgetting it was there to reveal his location to the SWAT people, not to help with timing the operation.

  They heard a pop, then a distant shout Charlie knew came from the eastern side of the estate. The engine of a Realtor’s car parked in the driveway of the other vacant house down the street had just caught fire.

  Four minutes went by, then they heard the sound of a siren coming from the south. The fire department of the Village of Los Ranchos was only a few miles to the south, which had made this part of the plan very convenient.

  Charlie took a quick glance into the patio area. No one was visible and he could see into a den and small kitchen alcove through the eight-foot-high windows facing the back. “Time to move,” he said.

  He went through the gate first, pistol out, with Gordon covering. Sprinting to the right, Charlie ran all the way up to the solid building wall just beyond the glass. Crouching, he watched the interior as Gordon came though the gate, closed it silently, then made his way quickly across the patio. Both were wearing rubber soles and neither made a sound crossing.

  They waited, watching, then ducked back as Eddie came down a hall into the den, then crossed over into the second kitchen alcove. He walked to the cupboard and opened what turned out to be a classy half-height refrigerator. He took out two bottles of beer, judging from the shape and color, then disappeared back down the hall.

  Charlie looked over at Gordon, who nodded and made a slicing motion across his throat with two fingers.

  The sound of the fire engine came closer, then wound down to a stop. They could hear big engine sounds and more shouts.

  Gordon just a few steps behind him, Charlie moved for the door, hoping it hadn’t been locked by the guy now sleeping outside the gate. Otherwise, he’d have to stop and pick it. It was now or never.

  Chapter Nineteen

  The door, thankfully, was still unlocked and they both slipped in easily, taking positions on either side of the hall. Charlie had an image of the layout in his mind, and knew the hall was the center line of a sideways H, splitting left and right to back rooms on either side. There were two smaller rooms halfway down the hall, one an exercise room, the other a big bathroom, then the hall ended farther east, splitting again left and right. The hall on the left led to another bedroom and the four-car garage. The right hall led to more bedrooms farther south, splitting halfway south back to the east into an enormous front room running the entire length of the house.

  According to intel via Nancy, Rene was probably in the southwesternmost bedroom, the first passage to the right. Charlie inched around the corner, pistol aimed down the hall, then hugged the wall. He ducked low and went around the corner. The hall was empty except for several generic southwestern landscapes along both walls. They reminded him of those at a bank or in a dentist’s waiting room. Inoffensive and boring. He inched farther down, sensing that Gordon was right behind him.

  With a hand signal, he told Gordon to cover their butts. Charlie continued down the hall alone, moving quickly now. He came across an open door and took a quick look inside. It was a bedroom, as expected. The bed was unmade, a suitcase sat on a chair beside a nice-looking dresser. He listened for a moment, then stepped inside. A quick search verified that the room and the small adjoining bathroom were empty.

  Charlie came back out, looked over at Gordon and shook his head, then moved to the far southern end of the hall. This bedroom door was closed and padlocked from the outside. The installation was crude but effective, and would have really pissed off the landlord.

  Gordon stayed at the opposite end of the hall, waiting in ambush for anyone venturing to the back of the house. Charlie picked the lock. He removed it, then turned the knob, crouching low and leading with his pistol.

  Charlie stepped inside and smelled pizza. A box lay atop the dresser, containing two untouched slices and a third with several bites in it. There was a half-full bottle of Coke beside it.

  “Rene? It’s Charlie,” he whispered. The bathroom door was open but he couldn’t see anyone on the throne or in the shower. The room window had been blocked by a storage cabinet with louvered doors which reached almost to the ceiling.

  He heard an electronic voice, the sound of a crash, and realized it was coming from down low. Charlie lowered himself to the hardwood floor and looked under the bed.

  Rene was lying there, his game clutched to his chest, frozen in fear. Then he recognized Charlie. “You here to get me?” he said, his voice trembling.

  “Yeah, to take you back to your mom,” Charlie whispered. “But don’t talk or make any noise. We’re going to sneak out of here, if that’s okay with you.”

  Rene didn’t move except to nod.

  Charlie set his weapon down, then reached out a hand. Rene took it, and Charlie pulled gently.

  Rene slid out from under the bed, still hugging his game to his chest with his other arm.

  “Shut the sound off for now, Rene,” Charlie whispered.

  Rene stood, with Charlie’s help, then let go of his hand long enough to turn off the audio.

  “Where’s Gordon?” Rene whispered, looking toward the door.

  “Down the hall, guarding us.” Charlie looked at the boy’s bare feet. He had no socks or shoes, probably to slow him down if he somehow got outside. At least he could move quietly.

  “Take my hand and don’t make a sound,” Charlie said, leading Rene to the door. “Outside, I may want to carry you a ways. That okay?”

  Rene nodded.

  When they stepped out into the hall, Gordon looked over and smiled, giving a thumbs-up. Then he motioned for them to approach.

  When they got to the center hall, Gordon held up his hand. They stopped and listened. They could hear a conversation in the front room. One person was Eddie, and the other, presumably, Lawrence Brooks. It was time to leave.

  Charlie put away his cell phone, having sent a prearranged signal, then nodded to Gordon. Charlie picked up Rene, and moved past Gordon and quickly down the hall toward the back of the house. With the boy under his arm, he hurried through the combination den and kitchen. He kept going, opening the French doors, then stepped outside and turned to his left. Moving past the windows to the wall, he set Rene down behind him, out of sight from the inside, then crouched, watching through the glass into the den.

  Gordon moved quickly, joining them.

  “Take Rene and get behind the garden wall,” Charlie whispered. “My turn to cover your back.”

  “Ready, bro?” Gordon whispered to Rene, who nodded.

  “Make a move and the kid’s dead,” Eddie yelled. They turned toward the far side of the patio, where a door led to the garage. The door was wide open now. Eddie was standing there, aiming an assault rifle at them from the hip. Behind Eddie was Lawrence Brooks, judging from the Internet photos they’d previewed. He was holding a phone, but no weapon.

  Charlie stood and Gordon turned to face Eddie, with Rene behind them both now.

  “I can shoot through you and take out the boy,” Eddie said. “Hand him back.”

  “You’re too late, Eddie. A SWAT team is moving in right now. I’ve already sent them the signal,” Charlie replied. “Give up or get dead.”