Does the Feeling Go Both Ways?

Chapter 1-4

The piece of cardboard provided a little bit of protection from the coldness from the floor. Landon sat on it and leaned back against the wall. He was fairly certain the presence of the cardboard was more of an oversight than a kindness. He shivered. October hadn’t been a bitterly cold month so far but it hadn’t been Indian summer warm either. Landon idly wondered how much of the cold he felt was real and how much a symptom of damage done to his body. The last round with Perez had added two broken fingers to his list of woes along with a long dripping slice down his forearm. That gash wasn’t terribly deep, just enough that so far it hadn’t clotted and continued to ooze blood in a slow fashion.

He tried to estimate time. His cover had been blown for about forty-eight hours if the head injuries hadn’t totally screwed his sense of time. If Nina had called the number, if the DEA deemed him retrievable, if they had the slightest f*****g idea where he was…That was a hell of lot of ifs.

Nina stopped hiding her little pilfering antics from him, occasionally going so far as to pass him things to hide in plain sight. It was a game. She also added stealing his watch to her list of amusements. She’d take it and about the time he realized it was missing he’d find it in his pants pocket or tucked in the holster for his cell phone.

He watched other things she did with equal interest. She read a fair bit. He picked up her e-reader at one point and was mildly surprised to see as many non-fiction and tech manuals on the menus as erotic romance books.

And then came the first night Jorge beat her up. Okay, it might not have been the very first time, just the first time Landon was aware of it. Jorge had stormed out of the house taking some of the men with him, not Landon or Perez though. Landon waited a good twenty minutes after Sotolongo left before he knocked softly on the bedroom door.

“Nina?”

There was only the small sound of crying from the room. Landon hesitated. Everyone in the house had a pretty good clue what had gone on an hour earlier. If someone caught him checking on her, what excuse could he give? He decided he’d claim he thought Sotolongo would be even madder if Nina dropped dead, Bringing with him a ziplock full of ice from the kitchen, he slowly opened the door. Nina was curled on the bed, crying. Her makeup was a mess. A darkening bruise surrounded one eye and her lower lip was bleeding. He handed her the ice and went to the bathroom to look for aspirin or Tylenol. He brought her a couple of tablets of Tylenol and a glass of water. She looked pathetically grateful for his actions. It wasn’t much. He’d really have liked to do more, but there was a lot of danger involved in that.

That night bound them together a little closer.

More than a week later, Nina’s regular chauffer had other duties, and Landon found himself assigned to take Nina shopping.

In the car as he pulled out of the driveway, she began to talk to him.

“Do you know why he beat me?” she asked.

“Sotolongo has a temper.” Landon said neutrally.

“He wants a baby. He f***s me every couple of nights. All three minutes of dealing with him huffing and puffing on top of me…It’s been a year. No baby.”

Landon wasn’t sure what to say in response. “Do you want a child?”

“What I want is irrelevant, but what I would like, is for him not to hit me anymore. I think he’s shooting blanks.”

“Um, possibly.”

“I’m afraid if I don’t get pregnant soon, he’ll kill me.”

“Do you have someone you can go to?” Landon asked.

“No. I don’t have any money of my own and no friends to speak of. I want you to have s*x with me and get me pregnant.”

Landon damn near wrecked the car.

“I’m not asking you to love me or raise my baby or anything. I need to get pregnant and…you’re at least not nasty.” She paused a moment. “And you’re kind of hot.”

Landon laughed. “Thank you, I think.” If they were exchanging more secrets, did he trust her with one of his? It had nothing to do with his assignment. “I’m sorry but I’m gay.”

“Really?”

“Yes, I’m afraid so.”

“I don’t need a relationship. All I have to do is hike up my skirt and bend over. Surely you can get it up for a woman for five minutes.”

“Sorry, Nina, but if this goes wrong and Sotolongo finds out, he’d cut my balls off.”

* * * *

“Two minutes to drop zone,” yelled Thompson over the sound of the helicopter rotor. Trey and the other four guys gave him a thumbs up. A second helicopter followed close behind. Working on a second pair of leather gloves over the first, Trey stared out into the night. The combined team had run a practice on a site owned by the DEA. There were some rough spots in the scenario, because of different backgrounds but all in all, it had gone smooth enough.

The helicopter slowed into a hover, and the door was flung open. One of the DEA guys was the first down the rope. Trey was next. Both hands gripping the rope tightly, no safety harness, Trey slid. The friction from the rope burned through the top pair of gloves and stung his palms. As soon as he hit the ground, he stepped away and ripped off the destroyed gloves, dropping them in the dirt as he hurried across the field toward the fence that surrounded three buildings. There was no information as to which building Landon was apt to be in.

Trey and Joe Thompson were assigned to start with the left most building, searching it as rapidly and as thoroughly as possible.

Thompson picked the lock on the door and he and Trey slipped inside. The building appeared to be one big open space partially filled with crates. They crept down four separate aisles in sequence, making sure Landon Cross wasn’t a dead body dumped between crates. There was no sign of him, however as they finished that part a guard came around the corner of the last stacks of crates. One hard, unexpected blow to the side of the head and the man went down. Joe and Trey quickly ziptied him and put a piece of adhesive tape over his mouth.

They continued their search, beginning with an office along the side of the building and then descending into a lower level.