Page 52 - Hunter - The Vigil

Lupe gingerly probed Andrea’s shoulder. “The collarbone looks intact,” she said. The nurse
pulled back the collar of Andrea’s shirt and looked at the bite marks. “I don’t know…maybe some
kind of toxin?”
“Oh, shit,” Andrea said, still chuckling to herself. “The fucking monster poisoned me.” Tears
of fright glistened at the corners of the detective’s eyes.
Lupe frowned. “What is she talking about?”
Vince shot Andrea a warning look, then motioned to Raimundo. “Give her one of those glasses.”
The gang leader handed one over, and Andrea took a grateful swallow.
Raimundo stared down at the wound stretching across Taggart’s shoulder and shook his head.
“That’s it, man. I’m done. I helped you take care of this girl, but I’m not going up against those
things again. You got the badge, you call the damn Feds. Call the fucking Marines. I don’t care.
Just leave me out of this.”
“We don’t have any badges,” Andrea snapped. Gasping, her head fell back against the cushions,
but her brown eyes fi xed angrily on Vince. “IA suspended us this afternoon. Every damn one of us.”
Vince’s fi sts clenched. He closed his eyes, collecting himself, then looked back at Raimundo.
The gang leader was giving Gabreski a cold, calculating stare.
“Well, well, well,” Raimundo said quietly. “Big, bad Vince Gabreski ain’t a cop no more.” He
took a step toward Vince, almost nose to nose with the big man. “Maybe you want to come work for
me now, bitch.”
Vince laughed at the gang leader, but there was a brittle edge to the sound. “Don’t go thinking
anything’s changed, you little shit. We’ll beat whatever IA’s cooked up against us and be back on the
job before you know it.” He pointedly turned away from Raimundo and picked up a glass of rum from the
table. “Andrea’s right about one thing, though. Right now, we’re it. There’s no one else to back us
up, and honestly, I don’t know who the hell would believe us if we told them what we saw back at that
warehouse. I do know that if we don’t do something soon, Darnell and maybe a whole lot of other people
are going to die, and I’m not going to let that happen.” He pointed at Raimundo. “The question now is
what are you going to do? Those things killed your boy. What are you going to tell the rest of your
hombres when they ask what happened to Manuel? No one’s going to respect you if you let that slide.”
Lupe fi nished taping a bandage to the front of Andrea’s chest and looked up at the two men.
“Don’t listen to him, Raimundo!” she said. “He’s going to get all of you killed! I told you this
would happen, sooner or later —”
“Shut up, Lupita!” the gang leader pleaded. To Vince, he said, “Okay, goddamnit! I’m in. But
what the hell do we do?”
Vince tossed back the rum and bared his teeth in a wolfi sh grin. “First, we’re going to go fi nd
those Russians.”