Page 90 of Miguel

They hadn’t counted on us going for their blind spots. For their most vulnerable areas.

Turned out, the gringos had not only guns, guns they fucking stole fromus, but humans as well. And guns, sure, they were valuable, but the skin trade was far more lucrative for people like them.

They hadn’t counted on the fact that we knew they were knee-deep in that shit, rising in an attempt to rival the cartels. If we’d grown too cocky, too confident and lax, then they’d grown worse.

Armed to the teeth, we’d attacked, blowing into their buildings that they had scattered across the city where they kept women locked away and drugged up in cages. We freed them and then blew up their provincial homes.

Mayan drove women away in a truck, dropping them off at a safe house and tipping off the police so they could be dealt with and get the help they needed. It was a good thing a good majority of the cops here were in our pockets, pockets we kept fat and dripping with pesos and dollars.

I was dressed in all black, waiting behind layers of milpas, the corn stalks higher than my head. I blended into the shadows. We all did. This was like second nature to us. If they would have known that we played hide and seek in the fields at night when we were only five, they never would have risked keeping their stolen product in the middle of fucking nowhere.

We camouflaged ourselves well enough, lying in wait while our other members freed the women from their other locations.

We waited until they got the call, until chaos began to ensue and they sent half of their guards out to save what couldn’t be salvaged.

“Pendejos,” Loco whispered at my side, though there was a note of glee in his voice.

Because once those guards drove away, they’d find themselves ambushed. Dead on the side of the road, while others would be caught by the cops.

We didn’t like involving police in our business, but gringos didn’t fare well in Mexican penitentiaries, and we would ensure they couldn’t be extradited back to their homeland.

Loco would make sure they suffered.

He had friends from when he’d been locked up years ago, people who were still fucking loyal to him.

Vengeance would be fucking sweet.

Once the vehicles took off, spraying clouds of dirt, I gave the signal.

Loco cackled softly as we moved with the wind, ensuring our steps matched the rush of air that moved the stalks. Anyone looking out would assume it was the weather and not the devils come to drag them to hell.

The vest strapped to my chest itched my neck and armpits. Tactical gear was uncomfortable as shit, though necessary. The gun felt warm in my palms, my pulse strumming a steady beat in the night, building up into a crescendo of vengeance that I could taste on my tongue. Like sweat and metal, it gave a cold tang that tightened my throat.

At the edge of the corn stalks, I gave a two-fingered signal to the group on my left. We broke apart into sections, covering each other’s backs as we charged towards the building.

The guard at the front was surprised to see shadows coming towards him, and before he could call out or scream, a bullet blasted through his skull and he dropped to the ground like a sack of potatoes. Blood and brain matter spilled out beneath him, squishing beneath our boots as we pushed through the door to the factory they’d claimed as their base to store the shit they stole from us.

The inside was quiet, desolate. Most of their members gone to their own deaths and incarceration. Yet despite that, it quickly became a chaos zone. Bullets winged past my ears. I ducked behind a steel pillar just as a bullet zinged against it, creating a shower of sparks over my head.

Loco laughed, the sound echoing across steel walls. I snuck a peek just as another bullet went flying, only this time I caught sight of the shooter. With a series of hand gestures that my hermanos saw, we formulated our plan.

Loco, of course, walked right out in the open, using himself as bait and a distraction. He didn’t give a fuck that the bullets whizzed too close to him. That they nicked his skin and left him bleeding. He relished in the violence, but he also had faith in the devils at his back.

While they were busy shooting at Loco, I whirled, eyes already trained, finger on the trigger. I knew the others were as quick as I. Shots rang out simultaneously, bodies thudded to the floor.

I lowered my weapon a single fraction, eyes scanning the dimly lit factory. Loco stood ways in front of me, a sly grin twisting his lips as he turned to face me.

“You crazy son of a bitch,” I muttered.

His brows waggled up and down and he laughed. “That was way too fuckin’ easy–”

White hot pain as a bullet whizzed into my arm. I flinched, though the rest of me moved on instinct, fingers tightening around my own gun, mouth opening as I cried out for my prez to move aside. A pasty ass man revealed himself, bloody and crying out as his shots went wild all around us.

I lifted with my injured arm, my aim off by a mere fraction. A mere fraction was all it fucking took. A little to the side and my aim missed; instead of going through his skull, it went through his fucking cheek.

He screamed as a hole blew into his face and dropped to the ground.

As soon as he fell, Loco was there, cackling above him like a demon. His foot shot out, sending it straight to his groin in a way that even had me wincing.

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