The Badlands Brigade (A Captain Gringo Adventure Book 12) Read online

So when he heard Golondrina following him up the alley he stopped, turned, and asked, “Where in the hell do you think you’re going, senorita?”

  “Por favor, I do not know. La adelita does not question her soldado. She just follows where he leads, no?”

  “Goddamn it, you’re not my adelita. I don’t want an adelita!”

  “For why do you spurn me? Am I too old and ugly for you?”

  He laughed despite himself. She had to be a well preserved sixteen or so and except for the swollen eye, the face he remembered by match light hadn’t been anything a guy threw out of bed for eating crackers. He said. “I think you’re very pretty. But in case you didn’t notice, I’m on the run from the law.”

  “Si, we are both wild desperados. We have nobody but each other. It’s you and me against the world, no?”

  “No. Wait a minute. I wasn’t thinking. You’re going to need some money to make it home to your village. Let’s see what I’ve got on me.”

  She started to cry.

  He started to tell her she was being silly. But he knew she wasn’t. She’d just told him her people had sold her into bondage and the one’s who’d bought her would doubtless give her a hell of a shellacking if she fell into their hands again.

  He didn’t see how she was going to get away from them without help, either. But damn it, he had enough on his plate and it just wasn’t his problem!

  She was still tagging along when they came to the end of the alley and he swung right toward the center of town. Up the street he could see the plaza’s gay lights. Was it possible El Paseo was still going on? It felt like forty days and forty nights since he’d picked up that stupid cheating Chirivita. But in truth it had only been an hour or so, and like most people in the tropics, the Costa Ricans were night owls. Up ahead El Pasco was just starting to get down to business, and half the strollers were still shopping for a bed partner in the cool tropic night.

  That was a break. He wouldn’t stand out as much on the still-crowded streets closer to his hotel. At the moment, whether the hotel was staked out or not was a more important consideration than the waif trailing him along the narrow walk.

  As they came to a corner, so did a couple of cops, coming around the block from the far side. The two cops blocked their passage and Captain Gringo stiffened, frozen in place. Golondrina moved up beside him and locked her arm through his. How in the hell was he supposed to go for his gun with the dumb dame hanging on his right elbow?

  One of the cops squinted at them and said, “Oh, it is the chica from the Llamas house. Are the two of you going to El Pasco?”

  Captain Gringo forced a laugh and answered, lightly, “We, ah, ran out of tonic water.”

  The cop who knew Golondrina laughed back and placed a finger at the side of his nose as he said, “Ah, yes, one does get the thirst on such a warm evening.”

  But the bastard with him said, “This hombre matches the description we have, no?”

  The first cop peered harder at Captain Gringo in the tricky light before he nodded and said, “By God, you’re right. Forgive us, señor, we are only trying to do our job. Do you have some identification?”

  Captain Gringo had all sorts of identification. He reached in his jacket for, let’s see, the Canadian passport? as he asked, still lightly, “What’s going on muchachos?”

  “There has been a killing in the neighborhood, senor. We think it was a crime of passion, although the woman in the story insists otherwise. She said her husband had a fight with a tall blond foreigner and ... no offense, but...”

  Captain Gringo cut in to say he understood as he handed over the fake passport. The cop who took it struck a match, which would have upset the tall American less had not he seen the same light that illuminated, the passport was giving them a better look at his features. Naturally he wasn’t registered at the hotel as a Canadian journalist, but the next time either of them saw him they’d remember his face, damn it!

  Golondrina asked, “When did this fight you speak of take place, officer?” And when one of the cops said, “Just a few minutes ago. Our sergeant is still questioning the widow on the other side of the block,” Golondrina laughed and said, “Ah, in this case my caballero has the how you say, alibi?”

  “You two were, ah, involved in other matters at the time?”

  “Por favor, officer, I am supposed to be a lady!”

  The cop laughed as he handed back the passport to Captain Gringo and put two fingers to the bill of his cap as he bowed to Golondrina, saying, “But of course, senorita. Do not worry. I am a man of the world. I shall not speak of your private life to the people you work for, eh?”

  Then he turned to his partner and added, “Come on, let’s see about the alley down that way. We know what these two have been up to and it’s not a matter of concern to the police, eh?”

  As they walked away, Captain Gringo realized he hadn’t been breathing for a while. So he sucked in a long sweet gulp of night air as Golondrina laughed and said, “You see? I told you it was you and me against the world. Am I not a good adelita, my soldado?”

  Captain Gringo took her in his arms and said, “You’re the best little adelita in the world.” Then he kissed her. He could tell from the way she kissed back that she wasn’t as innocent as she looked and she’d just shown him she was smarter. He heard a distant laugh. The cops were playing smart ass, too. They’d moved off into the shadows and stopped to see what the couple they’d stopped would do next. Captain Gringo made the kiss longer and hotter than he’d intended and then he led Golondrina away toward the lights of the plaza. He didn’t hear anyone following them. She clung to his arm as if she intended to nurse it, fat and healthy, as she asked, “Now that I am your adelita, where are we going—off to the jungle for to join the brigandos?”

  He said, “I’m not in that line. I’m a soldier of fortune, and the first thing we have to do is get you out of that maid’s uniform.”

  “Oh, then you are taking me to your place for to sleep with me, no?”

  “No. I don’t dare return to my hotel tonight. But the tiendas are still open. So we’d better buy you a dress the people looking for you won’t be able to spot a block away. If we get you one of those fluffy white blouses and a flouncy fandango skirt, maybe a mantilla comb for your hair, it should change your whole outline.”

  “Madre de Dios, you must be very rich, Deek.”

  He supposed he was by her standards. Between them, he and Gaston had maybe a thousand left and everything including human life came cheaper in these parts than back home in the states.

  As they got closer to the lights of the plaza he could see her better. He’d noticed she was nicely stacked when he kissed her and now that she as no longer looking like a pup about to be kicked, Golondrina was prettier than he’d remembered. A pretty girl in livery drew attention and she’d said the nasties she worked for had gone out. That was something to think about. He said, “You’d better stay here under this pepper tree while I run over to that dress shop, there, and get you a disguise.”

  “You will not leave me, here?”

  “Don’t be silly. We make a great team and I need you, now that I’m starting to think ahead. Stay here. I’ll be right back.”

  Not waiting for an answer Captain Gringo legged it across the corner of the plaza to the little shop with all the noisy dresses in its window. He found a fat woman with a moustache lurking like a spider. She looked so happy to see him he knew business must be lousy, but he didn’t dicker on the prices of the blouse, skirt, and mock ivory mantilla comb he picked out, guessing at Golondrina’s size. The shop mistress wrapped them, telling him how lucky his woman was to have a man with such good taste as well as a generous nature. He told her she was swell, too, and headed back to where he’d left Golondrina.

  He got there just in time. Two guys were trying to haul the little mestiza off somewhere, and though she was putting up a good struggle, they had the girl a couple of pepper trees down the dark side street by the time Captain Gringo
caught up with them!

  They never knew what hit them. One of them was saying something dumb about Golondrina not having to play hard to get when Captain Gringo dropped his package, grabbed each from behind by the hair, and banged their heads together like coconuts, hard.

  That put them both on the ground, of course. But while one seemed to be completely out, the other made the mistake of sitting up, holding both hands to his ringing skull, so Captain Gringo kicked him in the face. Since nobody’s head could really sail for a field goal with a body attached to it, he just flattened out on the pavement to make like a bear rug for the next hour or so.

  Golondrina clapped her hands and shouted, “Ole! Muy Toro! I did not know you were so possessive of your adelita, but I am so happy to know you love me, too!”

  He scooped up the package, grabbed her by the elbow, and hauled her after him as he said, “Keep it down to a roar. Who were those hombres?”

  “Oh, just some boys I know. I told them I was with someone tonight, but you know how silly some men are. Where are we going in such a hurry?”

  “Someplace dark. I noticed a gap in the buildings just ahead and we have to find someplace for you to change. It might be a good idea to be well away from here before those morons come to life again, too. Run the part about knowing them past me again. Are you saying you know either of them in the, ah, biblical sense?”

  “Silly, I do not do wicked things with pobrecitos like them. They work in the neighborhood. One delivers charcoal and the other is his friend. They have been fresh with me in the past, at the back door, but this is the first time they have been able to speak to me alone and I think they got carried away, no?”

  He didn’t answer. He knew some men in these parts considered it open season on a country girl like Golondrina who had no family men in town to protect her. The guys he’d decked had probably been drunk in the first place and hadn’t gotten a good look at him in the second, but he sure was leaving a lot of people on the ground this evening. When and if they recovered they’d be looking for Golondrina too, and damn it, San Jose wasn’t that big a town

  They came to the narrow slit of darkness he remembered. He pulled her in after him as he groped his way along the rough stucco walls on either side. The slot led deep into the block of patio housing all around. They came to a dog leg and found themselves in a small secluded alcove. He said, “Okay, I think we can work through to the far side. But first change into this outfit I bought.”

  “You wish for me to undress, here in the open?”

  “We’re not in the open. We’re in the nearest thing to a private dressing room I could come up with on such short notice. Hurry it up, Golondrina. I can’t see you. It’s dark as hell in here.”

  She took the package and tore it open as she murmured, “I am so embarrassed. I have no underthings. I shall have to make myself naked for to put on these other clothes, no?”

  “Look, I said I can’t see you.”

  “I can see you. A little bit, anyway. You are a big black shadow and I am feeling so funny in my legs, Deek.”

  He was feeling a little funny himself, considering. He’d just had more woman than he liked to remember being that dumb with, and his hastily made plans regarding Golondrina hadn’t included sex until she brought it into the discussion. He growled, “Change your clothes, damn it. I swear I couldn’t tell in this light if you were a boy or a girl.”

  He was telling the truth. Her outline was only a faint blur in the inky depths of the niche and the only thing he really wanted was to get the hell out of this mess he seemed to be sinking deeper and deeper into by the minutes. Golondrina giggled and started making rustling sounds with paper and cloth as he listened for the sound of anything more important headed their way via the dark passageways on either side. He asked, “How are you coming?” and she said, “I have taken off the terrible uniform they made me for to wear. Am I really to be your adelita, Deek?”

  “I. said so, didn’t I? I’m going to send you into my hotel alone to fetch my friend, Gaston. Once the three of us and our money get together, we’ll be able to figure the best way out for all concerned.”

  “Would you kiss me again for to make me feel like your adelita, Deek?”

  He sighed and moved closer. “Adelita” was the Latin American version of Robin Hood’s Maid Marian. The girls down here had some weird romantic notions about the camp followers tagging along after bandit and rebel gangs. Most of the adelitas he’d seen on the owlhoot trail had been treated more like pack mules than sweethearts; but they all insisted they were doing it for love, so what the hell.

  He took her in his arms to reassure her with a brotherly kiss. That’s when he discovered she was stark naked, and as she wrapped her arms around him and flattened her warm nude body against him he didn’t feel so brotherly after all, but there was a time and a place for everything, for God’s sake! He said, “Look, I like you, too, but …” and then she was kissing him, hot, and he couldn’t say anything with a mouthful of tongue, and his hands full of even nicer stuff. She slid one hand down between them and started to fumble at his fly. She popped another button with her clumsy groping and he decided the least he could do would be to help her with his damned pants.

  So between them they got it out. She stood on tiptoe to ride his shaft like a naughty naked witch on a broomstick, sliding her moist clit up and down as she clung to him. He reached out behind her and got a palm against the rough stucco so he could lean forward and, without having to be told how, Golondrina stood on one toe and raised the other leg like a ballet dancer as she dropped one hand to guide his erection in.

  It felt astoundingly good, considering he’d just had it in another maneater that evening, but their position was ridiculous even if he hadn’t been fully dressed. He hooked an elbow under her upraised knee. Then he picked her other leg up to get it over the other elbow as he held both palms to the wall behind her, with Golondrina’s suddenly wildly moving little buttocks and groin cradled between his arms as she gyrated on his stiff shaft with her hands locked over the nape of his neck. She gasped, “Oh, I am so happy. But would it not be nice if you, too, took your clothes off, Deek?”

  “Yes, but later. This is a stupid thing to be doing this close to all those cops and at least three victims in various states of disrepair, Doll!”

  She laughed and said, “I know. But don’t you like it?”

  He did. He ejaculated hard in her as he felt her muscles contract on his shaft in a healthy primitive orgasm of her own. She threw her head back and shouted, “Oh, Santa Maria, Jesus y Jose! I am going loco en la cabeza from being your adelita!”

  “I noticed. For God’s sake, do we have to tell the whole neighborhood?”

  “I am sorry, I lost control of my passion. Are you angry with me?”

  He thrust wistfully as he sighed and said, “Hardly, but let’s get you dressed and out of here before we’re arrested for indecent exposure and other things too numerous to mention!”

  She laughed and said, “Si, I no longer feel embarrassed to be naked in your presence,” as she let him withdraw and” lower her to her feet again.

  It only took her a few moments to dress and when they next appeared in the light of the plaza she was looking radiant as well as a lot different. He led her to the far side of the plaza and they took a side street toward his hotel as he briefed her on what she was to do and say when she went alone to fetch Gaston. She told him she understood and he was beginning to notice she thought fast on her feet or in any other position. So he found a sidewalk cafe where he could wait while she went on ahead. After she’d left, he sat down and ordered a cerveza. It tasted great. For some reason he felt a little hot and thirsty all of a sudden.

  It was going to be all right. It had to be all right. He’d told the girl what to say to Gaston so that the sometimes suspicious little fellow soldier of fortune wouldn’t waste time scouting out a possible ambush. If Gaston got to this cafe with the money from the hotel safe before any of the three of t
hem got picked up ... what?

  They were smack in the middle of Costa Rica—a small country, even for these parts, but the nearest seaport was a good day’s journey east or west and the damned cops would start by blocking all the trails out of town.

  It took three beers, four cigars and a million years for Golondrina to return with Gaston. Gaston thought they’d made good time and in truth the passwords Captain Gringo had given the little mestiza messenger had made the Frenchman hurry. But Gaston was one of those worldly knock-around guys who never seemed to be moving fast or indeed doing anything at all suspicious enough to invite questions.

  Sergeant Gaston Verrier, late of the French Foreign Legion, had been born and reared almost to puberty in the slums of Paris where the police hit first and asked questions afterward. He’d killed his first man before he’d started shaving regularly, but the police hadn’t asked him too many questions as he made his way up in the world. Gaston was a generation older than Captain Gringo, but even as a youth he’d been a small semi-invisible and street-smart type people didn’t notice in a crowd. His English betrayed a French accent, but he’d been in Latin America since Louis Napoleon had sent the legion to back the ill-fated “Empire” of the late Emperor Maximillian in Mexico. Having been one of the very few survivors of the siege of Camarón, and noticing the Mexicans under Juarez seemed to be winning with monotonous regularity, Gaston had thought it only practique to switch sides and, while the legion no doubt found this most annoying, he’d held a commission in the new Mexican army long enough to speak Spanish with no accent at all. Several unpleasant political changes in Mexico had accounted for a change in Gaston’s fortunes by the time he and Captain Gringo had first met on the wrong side of a Mexican firing squad. But Gaston could still pass for a Latin American and, yes, he had brought the money from the hotel safe.

  As the three sat around the tin table sipping some fresh drinks, Gaston let Captain Gringo fill him in on his recent misadventures before he lit his own smoke, settled back with a sigh, and said, “Eh bien, we are paid up at the hotel until next Monday, but I agree we may have worn out our welcome in Costa Rica.”