“Pack a bag.”
I nearly jump out of my skin when I hear Jamie’s voice behind me. I didn’t notice him entering the clubhouse. Ever since Carnie burst into the cabin and told us about our DEA guests, I’ve been holding my breath, worrying about what’s going to happen if Lowell decides she wants to come on in and make trouble. A part of me has been ready to duck out of the back exit and jump on my bike, burn off down the dirt road that leads back toward civilization, head away from the compound and from my friends here simply so that my presence doesn’t cause issues. Carnie told me to ‘stay the fuck here’ though, and despite how badly I wanted to run, I managed to do as I was told, keeping out of sight until the DEA cars sped off down the long dirt track back in the direction of town. Now, down in the compound, Jamie looks like he’s about to go on a killing spree. My stomach is doing backflips as he storms across the clubhouse toward me. “What?”
“Pack a bag. We need to get out of here.”
I can’t be hearing him right. Surely he can’t actually be suggesting we leave Freemantle? “I can’t go anywhere, Jamie. I’m not leaving my dad here.”
He makes a frustrated growling sound; when he reaches me he takes hold of me by the wrist, pulling me toward the exit. “We have six days, sugar. Six days before anything bad happens to your father. That gives us six days to go figure this shit and get our asses back here.”
“You’re trusting Ramirez to stick to his word? Are you mad?” He has to be if he’s being even remotely serious right now.
Steel and ice flashes in his eyes. The cold blue of his irises seems even colder as he sighs, guiding me outside. “Sophia. I don’t trust him, no, but he’s not going to do anything, believe me. He wants to be holding the pliers when it comes down to it, and he wants an audience. Ramirez loves to fuck with people. He’s not going to break the rules to his own game. Not when it’s so much more satisfying to have us scrambling, trying to figure this out.”
A sinking feeling low in my gut tells me this logic is madness. I want to yank my arm free and confront him in the middle of the court yard, ask him if he’s really being this na?ve, but Shay and Keeler are standing in front of the workshop, watching us, and the last thing I want or need is Shay cat calling at us as we fight in front of them. I’m liable to try and claw her eyeballs out of her head.
“Where the hell do you think we’re going to go?” I hiss. “You told me when we first met that Maria Rosa’s the only person crazy enough to go up against Hector, and in case you haven’t noticed we’ve had her locked in a fucking basement for the past six months.”
In the distance, plumes of orange dust rise up from the horizon—Lowell and her DEA friends still high tailing it back to their base. Jamie heads in the direction of the cabin, anger pouring off of him in palpable waves. “She was our best bet, sure. She wasn’t our only bet, though. There’s someone else.”
I don’t like the sound of this someone else. Anyone powerful enough to take on the Los Oscuros cartel has to be seriously dangerous themselves, and undoubtedly into some really fucked up, illegal activity. “Who, Jamie? Who the hell are you talking about? And why am I really worried right now?”
He slows, his urgency abating ever so slightly. Letting go of my arm, he scrubs his hands over his face, groaning. “Perez,” he says. “Julio Perez.”
My head starts spinning in the most disconcerting way. “Julio Perez? The man you had collect me from Ramirez? The man who sells women? The man you despise?” I can’t comprehend what’s going on in Jamie’s head right now. He has to be desperate to even consider this move. He hasn’t told me much about the tense nature of the relationship he shares with Perez, but I do know he has something on him. Something bad. Information on one of those hard drives that could put Perez away for a really long time. The last time they met, when Jamie came and took me from him in the middle of the night, Julio swore he was going to find a way to free himself from Jamie, and at the time I got the distinct impression shooting him in the back of the head wasn’t something Perez had ruled out.
“He’s not likely to be too happy about doing me a favor,” Jamie says through gritted teeth. “He hates me, but he hates Hector more. Los Oscuros poses direct competition to both his skin trade and his drug trafficking. If he can get Ramirez out of the picture, his income goes through the roof, especially since he has connections in Mexico.”
“But he’s not going to do anything that gives you more leverage over him. That’s just madness, Jamie. He’s gonna tell you to go fuck yourself.”
“We have a twelve hour ride ahead of us. I’ll have figured out that part by the time we get there.”