Jase pointed to his drawing of the fourth floor, focusing Kate’s attention there. “The inside stairwell is down at the end of the hall. An easy way to get in and out, unless for some reason we get trapped in the apartment.”
“So what’s our plan?” Kate asked. She wore black jeans, black sneakers and a black T-shirt, her long hair plaited into a single braid. She was ready, and after he and Bran had spent the afternoon reconning the building and the surrounding neighborhood, so was he.
“We wait and watch,” Bran said.
“From what I could find out, Zepeda usually gets home at night a little after 2:00 a.m.,” Jase said. “About the time the bars close. Sometimes he’s alone, sometimes he’s with a couple of his scumball friends. Once in a while, he brings in women to entertain them. He likes to keep his buddies happy and in his debt.”
“If that happens tonight, we postpone,” Bran said. “We don’t have a deadline, and we don’t want the women getting hurt.”
“We can handle a couple of his drugged-up pals,” Jase said. “But the less people involved the better.”
Kate looked up at him. “What happens once we get inside the apartment?”
“The first thing that happens is you stay out of the way,” Jase said. “We need to focus on Eli. It puts all of us in danger if we have to worry about protecting you.”
Kate’s chin shot up. “You won’t have to worry about me.”
Amusement slipped through him. She was so damned independent. He liked that about her...most of the time. “That’s good. Just don’t forget it.”
“I can see the blood lust running hot in both of you,” Bran said. “You want this guy and I don’t blame you. But we need to be sure the bastard’s guilty. I know it looks that way, but we need to be sure.”
Jase nodded. “With any luck, he’ll tell us something that’ll connect him to the murder. Information we can give the police.”
“What happens if he won’t talk?” Kate asked.
Jase’s gaze swung to Bran, and a silent communication passed between them. “That’ll be up to Zepeda,” Jase said.
Bran’s hard smile looked completely ruthless. “Yeah. Maybe he’ll confess.”
Kate fell silent. Jase said nothing, either. There was no mistaking Bran’s meaning.
“Let’s start at the beginning,” Jase suggested, focusing back on the maps. “We’ll run through plan A a few more times and come up with a decent plan B.” He checked his heavy stainless-steel watch. “We’ve got plenty of time, long as we’re in place before Zepeda gets home.”
Unfortunately, later that night as they waited in the darkness behind the apartment building, Eli showed up with three of his friends and three working girls to entertain them. The night was a bust.
The following night wasn’t any better. Eli arrived with four guys and a woman. The only thing good was that after they left, Kate invited Jase up to her apartment as she had the night before, and he spent the hours before morning in her bed.
The third night they got lucky. At two thirty in the morning, Eli parked his Caddy in its usual spot in the lot behind the building and got out with just two members of his crew. One was short and stout, Latino, with thick arms and legs. Jase recognized him as Roberto “Berto” Valenzuela.
The other guy was African American, not as tall as Eli but lean and solid, his arms ropy with muscle. One of his eyebrows was scarred, his nose flattened. Delroy Peyton was a former middleweight boxer.
The men headed for the back door across the alley that led into the building. It opened near the stairwell but also accessed the elevator in the entry.
“Stay out of the way till we’ve dealt with Eli’s men,” Jase said, crouching next to Kate behind a dumpster. Bran made himself invisible behind a thick shrub on the other side of the back door.
Kate nodded at the reminder. She looked more determined than frightened. All of them were dressed in black, and a heavy layer of clouds shuttered the moon, providing good cover.
Both men were armed to the teeth, Jase with his .40-caliber Kimber in a holster clipped to his belt, Bran with a Glock 9 mil beneath his black T-shirt, along with various and sundry smaller caliber pistols.
But using the guns to disarm Zepeda’s men was a last resort. Gunfire in the middle of the night was the last thing they needed.
This late, the old brick building was quiet. As Eli approached, Jase caught the end of the dirty joke he was telling and the men’s raucous laughter. Still chuckling, Eli slid his key into the lock on the back door. The lock clicked open, and Jase and Bran stepped out of the shadows.
Zepeda’s men reacted but not fast enough. Bran’s elbow jammed into Valenzuela’s stomach, doubling him over. A sharp, side-hand blow to the back of the neck took him out. Bran wrapped a hand around Zepeda’s nape and shoved him up against the brick wall, held him there while Jase dealt with the boxer.
Peyton swung a death blow, which Jase managed to duck. More than one jaw had been broken by that fast, hard right hand. Since punching it out with a former professional boxer was probably not the best idea, Jase looped an arm around Peyton’s neck, dragged the guy back against his chest and squeezed. Peyton clawed and kicked, but Jase was bigger and stronger, and the guy finally went limp.
When Jase looked up, Bran had his Glock pressed beneath Zepeda’s chin. “We just want to have a little chat,” Bran said to him. “Alone.”
