New Moon Rising Read online

  “We are go,” says Martin.

  Montoya cuts across open dirt and down a slight hill before hanging a left on pavement, bouncing over the sidewalk. Rosa’s house comes up fast on our left, and he pulls to a stop half off the road. Thirty yards of uphill littered with scrub brush and a few trees separates us from the backyard fence. I hop out and bring my M4 up to point in the general direction of the home, finger tight to the housing above the trigger well. In seconds, I mentally plot a path from tree to tree to the fence.

  Capriati’s behind us, observing the area through his rifle scope. He announces he’s seen us, and says the back yard looks empty.

  “Confirm two individuals in the front room,” says Walters, the other sniper. “A woman and an unidentified man.”

  “Door team into position, yard team close in,” says Martin.

  We rush forward in a line, fanning out among the sparse trees. I run up to the nearest, bracing my shoulder against it while covering the slope ahead. Chad hustles up to another tree. As soon as his rifle’s up, I fast-walk to the next tree.

  “Ringing the doorbell in three… two… one…” says an unfamiliar man.

  “FBI!” shouts the same guy in the distance. “Everyone down!”

  I rush out from behind the last tree before the fence, which is chest-high to me. All of us climb over it with ease and stand there for a second or two observing the windows and back door of the residence. Men’s shouting accompanies a woman’s screams inside, but nothing moves in any window I have eyes on.

  The others around me start advancing, leaving me a few steps back. Movement pulls my attention to the right, at a cluster of thick twelve-foot tall bushes against the side fence, which is much taller than the part we entered. A dirty, white sneaker sits in mulch, beneath a pant leg of camouflage cloth. Bryce, the farthest of us on that side, walked right past it.

  That’s not an abandoned shoe; it’s a guy hiding.

  I swivel, training my M4 in that direction. “Federal agent! You, out of the bushes. Get on the ground.”

  Chad, Bryce, and Michelle whirl around to look.

  The bushes explode in a flurry of leaves as two young men bolt forward, both in green camouflage jackets and pants. One cuts left into a sprint for the rear fence while the second looks me right in the eye. At a flash of silver in his hand, I react on instinct and squeeze the trigger.

  Our guns go off at the same time.

  A hit like a baseball bat catches me in the left breast, knocking all the air out of my lungs. The guy twists to his left, a flash of fire spitting from the end of his pistol, but I have no idea where his second bullet went. The distant bang of a sniper rifle reaches my ears a half-second later. Staggering back and to my right, I fire again, wheezing, unable to breathe. My shoulder hits the ground at the same instant a ripple of gunfire goes off behind me, but I’m pretty sure my fellow agents lit up a standing corpse.

  The one who shot me collapses in a heap.

  Sprawled on the ground, I shift aim to the runner and try to yell “Stop!” but only make a sickly rasp of air.

  Chad takes off after the guy, clearing the fence like a hurdle jumper.

  Michelle runs up on the suspect and kicks the handgun away from him, keeping her rifle trained. A second later, she stoops and puts two fingers to his neck. “One suspect down. He’s still breathing.”

  “Agent hit,” yells Bryce over the radio. He skids to a halt beside me. “Sam, you okay?”

  I pat the vest and give a thumbs up. A porcelain-like shatter comes from the house, along with more men shouting. Scuffing and thumping beyond the fence makes me picture Chad and the runner tumbling down the hill.

  Bryce helps me stand up. “Welcome to the club.”

  “You’ve…” I gasp. “You’ve been shot before?”

  He nods. “Twice. Once without a vest, but it was a little .22.”

  “Not so little when you’re hit,” I say. Rubbing the vest doesn’t ease the pain much, but I do it anyway out of reflex. “Might have a cracked rib.”

  Chad appears at the back of the yard, dragging a delirious Hispanic man with a bloody nose. He looks young, barely twenty, and flops like a rag doll when Chad hoists him over the fence. At least my partner doesn’t throw the handcuffed guy face-first into the dirt. After handing him off to Montoya, he hurries over to me.

  “Sam…”

  “I’m fine. Vest took it.” I glance out the corner of my eye at the wounded man. “Did I…”

  Chad shakes his head. “You got him in the hip and the shoulder. Think you’re still pushing when you fire.”

  He’s probably right. I had that issue on the range. The M4 has barely any recoil, yet I still anticipate a big kick when firing, so I wind up hitting the target low. “Yeah. Guess I need more range time.” Maybe it’s not the kick at all, but my hesitance at having to kill someone? I don’t think any cop, or federal agent for that matter, really thinks about that until the instant they’re faced with a second or two in which to decide who dies. For my family, I can’t hesitate, and I know I won’t. That flash of silver, the suspect’s sudden motion, replays in my mind over and over. My reaction had been devoid of thought or evaluation, a conditioned response. I couldn’t have fired any faster unless I’d stormed in here looking to shoot anything that moved. That bastard was fast. Wonder how many hours he’d spent standing in front of a mirror practicing his cowboy quick draw.

  Radio chatter from Agent Martin declares the area secure, and calls in an ambulance.

  Chad claps me on the shoulder. “Good eyes. We all missed those two.”

  “The other one resist arrest?” I flick the safety back on, and hang the rifle on my right shoulder.

  “Yep.” He looks me over. “You hurt?”

  “Sore. Probably a broken rib.” A twinge of pain along my left side confirms just that when I try to breathe too deep.

  He pokes around the spot, making me wince and gasp. “Hmm. Probably only bruised. Or you’ve got an inhuman pain tolerance.”

  “Or I’m still full of adrenaline.” I smirk.

  The FBI swarms the house while we stand guard. Pain throbs in my side, but it’s more distracting than worrisome. As long as I don’t take giant gulps of air or move faster than a deliberate walk, I can even keep a straight face. Ugh. Danny is going to go nuts tonight. He hates seeing me with a cold, and the idea that I’d been shot is going to launch him right off the deep end.

  After the FBI removes Villero, three gang members, and one dead gang member from the house, we walk inside to check the place out. It’s a two-bedroom single-story that makes my home feel huge. Aside from some fast food cartons in the living room and a smashed glass door on the entertainment center, the house looks well-kept, but sparse. One of the bedrooms has a folding table with scales, bags of white powder, and smaller bags lined up in a shallow cardboard tray. No piles of cash lying around though.

  I stiff-leg it back to the living room where Rosa Melendez is seated on the couch, a frizz of carpet clinging to her cheek. She’s barefoot, in a simple coral-colored dress clingy enough to show she’s carrying no concealed weapons. Long, straight black hair hangs down enough to cover the handcuffs on her wrists behind her back. She looks both terrified and relieved. When we approach, she peers up at us with huge, brown eyes.

  “Miss Melendez? I’m Agent Moon, and this is Agent Helling. We’re federal investigators with the Department of Housing and Urban Development. We need to know about the nature of your relationship with Juan Villero.”

  “I have no choice. Please. I nothing to do with this. They kill me if I say anything. Steal my house.” Rosa trembles.

  Chad takes out a notepad and scribbles. “How much of a cut did you get from this operation?”

  Rosa shakes her head. “I nothing. They took the room. I cannot say no. I get no money. They only give me bruises. Worse if I tell police what they do here.”

  I’m inclined to believe her. It’s difficult to fake the fear in her eyes, though I sup
pose she could be terrified of deportation. She hasn’t been naturalized yet. “How long have they been here? Why did they pick you?”

  Rosa holds eye contact. “I coming from work last May. At night in parking lot, a man grabs me from behind with a gun. I afraid he rape me, but he no. Makes me drive him here, to my home. Looks around like he checking it to buy, and tells me he using the room for his people, or they shoot me.”

  “Last May?” asks Chad. “So, three months?”

  Rosa shakes her head. “No. A year ago.”

  I would sit next to her for this question, but not with my throbbing rib. Still, I lower my voice as sympathetic as I can get. “Rosa… were you sexually assaulted?”

  She stares down.

  “Shit,” whispers Chad.

  I grit my teeth in pain while stooping forward, and unlock her cuffs. She’s a victim here. I’m sure the FBI thought so too, since they didn’t cart her off with the others. Still, abused women have been known to go nuts and attack the police who show up to arrest their husbands. I understand why they left her restrained, but the scene is secure now, and she’s terrified.

  Rosa folds her hands in her lap, rubbing her wrists. “Gracias.”

  “We’d like you to come to our office and give a statement. Umm… Declaración del testigo. At this time, you aren’t being charged with anything. No se le está cobrando.”

  She bows her head. “They have people all over Los Angeles. In Mexico, too. They will take revenge if I tell you.”

  “These guys barged in and made you a prisoner in your own home.” Chad scowls at the rug. “If you help us out, maybe you stop this from happening to someone else.”

  Rosa fidgets.

  “Think about it a moment, okay?” I force a smile past my aching side.

  DEA agents stream in and out the front door with boxes. I lope over to the kitchen and look around. It’s neat and tidy, suggesting the thugs didn’t force her to cook for them. That this property went through HUD doesn’t strike me as being a factor in the gang’s operation. More likely, they preyed on a woman who they knew they could intimidate, and would be hesitant to go to the authorities. Some green card holders are afraid a simple parking ticket might get their permanent resident status revoked. Despite public perception, most of the people we work with are born here.

  A white business card on the fridge catches my eye. It bears a phone number in the middle, with ‘Marty’ written in sharpie marker below. I tug it out from under its magnet and take short steps back to the living room.

  “Rosa?” I hold out the card. “Is this yours or theirs?”

  She looks up at the card for a second before again looking me in the eye. “It’s mine.”

  “Who’s Marty?” I ask.

  Rosa shrugs and waves dismissively. “He is a fixing man. If the sink or toilet stop working, he makes it good again.”

  “Ahh. All right.” There are quite a few guys that troll these areas looking for work like that. More than a few of them undocumented. Might come in handy as leverage down the line, since unlicensed work on a HUD property could violate her agreement. Still, this woman’s had a rough time of it and I don’t have any desire to make her life even worse. I hand the card to Chad. “Would you mind putting that back on the fridge?”

  “Sure.” He takes it, tilting it in the light to read it.

  “Miss Melendez,” I say, “if you’d like to speak with someone who helps women who’ve been assaulted, we can arrange that for you at no cost.” A flash of pain in my side makes me shudder, but I grit my teeth, trying not to let it show on my face. “And a medical evaluation if you’d like.”

  Rosa looks up at me.

  “Speaking of medical evaluations.” Chad grasps my right arm above the elbow. “We can interview Miss Melendez in a couple days.”

  Grr. He’s got a point, as much as I hate admitting it. “All right. Please think about that counseling.”

  Rosa nods.

  Chad guides me outside. We hand the M4s in at the FBI truck, and I lean against it while he jogs off to get our car from where we left it two blocks east. Agent Martin, standing by the street amid a cluster of other FBI personnel, spots me and hurries over.

  “Agent Moon, what are you still doing here? Weren’t you hit?”

  I grimace, nod, and point at the impact spot on the vest. “Wasn’t quite done yet.”

  He chuckles. “I wish half my team was that dedicated. Still. You need to get checked out. I can get your debrief from Fortunato later. As soon as you feel up to it, send him your report of what happened back there. If there are any gaps that need to be filled, someone from my team will stop by.”

  “Sure.” I can’t quite smile, feeling light-headed. Not sure if it’s pain or that I’ve been sipping air instead of really breathing.

  Special Agent Martin helps me to the car when Chad pulls up. “Are you sure you don’t want an ambulance?”

  “Chad’s already here.” My eyes bug out from pain when I slide into the seat. Maybe a stretcher would’ve been a better idea after all. Still… the idea of getting out of the car hurts enough to keep me planted.

  “Okay. Straight to the hospital,” says Martin to Chad, before closing my door.

  “Ugh.” I lean my head back. “Danny’s going to lose his mind.”

  Chapter Six

  Lucky

  As it turned out, I walked away from being shot with two bruised ribs. They probably would’ve cracked if the guy had a magnum, but he only had a .45. Still, the doctor estimated about three weeks for the pain to stop. This, of course, resulted in Fortunato ordering me to stay home for at least a full week.

  I called Danny and Mary Lou one after the next, explaining I’d be getting home a little late due to work. Of the two, my husband got the truth of why I was late, and predictably freaked. Since my sister had all the kids to watch, I didn’t need her panicking. The X-ray and exam chewed up a couple hours, and Chad dropped me off at home around seven. By the time I walked in the door, the pain meds kicked in enough to reduce my agony to strong discomfort.

  Danny went into full nurse mode as soon as he saw the giant bruise from my armpit to the base of my ribcage. My left boob went purple due to subdermal bleeding, but it should clear up in a few days. Good thing Anthony’s been off breast milk for a while. I don’t even want to think about how much that would hurt now.

  My sister also flipped when she found out I’d been shot. She and Danny flew around the house like dervishes, taking care of things while I lay like a beached whale on the sofa, barely able to sit up. Tammy gave me a welcome home present of jumping into a hug, which hurt so much I had a whiteout. By the time I could see again, Danny had plucked her off me and explained that I’d been hurt and needed some ‘no pouncing’ time. Once Tammy understood, she cuddled up on my unbruised side like a living teddy bear. A four-year-old can’t do much around the house to help, but this kid gave up her playtime to comfort me. I cried for a good hour after I realized what she was doing. Talk about guilt. Not that she meant it in that way, but I couldn’t stop thinking about all the what-ifs, like not having a vest on or if the guy had shot me in the face.

  Two days later, Nico paid me a visit at home to get my version of what happened on the raid. The whole thing was still as clear in my mind as if it had happened only minutes before.

  So, yeah… a few days doing nothing but watching television while clinging to my daughter wasn’t boring at all. I savored every second of still being alive.

  ***

  It’s been almost a week since the raid, and I’m still sore as hell. At least I can take a full breath again. The hardest part about this has been resting and trying not to do anything physical. I never realized how mind-numbingly awful daytime television is―except for Judge Judy. Mary Lou brought her three kids over during the day all week long, and even gave me the first three seasons of Judge Judy on DVD, a lifeline, since watching actual daytime TV made me feel like an old woman.

  Tammy keeps up her habit of
cuddling by my good side, just being there, hoping she’s helping me feel better. Every few hours, I make sure she knows she is.

  Around one, suspicious giggling from the inner hallway gets me worrying. Mary Lou’s passed out in the recliner, Tammy’s tucked up beside me staring at cartoons, and the rest of the children are in the back, probably Anthony’s room.

  “Ellie Mae?” I call. “Everything okay?”

  Silence is not the correct response.

  When the giggling starts up again, I glance over at my sister, who’s seriously passed out. I feel bad bothering her since she’s been working her ass off between helping me and taking care of her household too. I grit my teeth and stand, leaving Tammy on the couch, and wobble down the hallway.

  Anthony darts across the hallway from his room to Tammy’s, naked, and covered in marker doodles. Seconds later, Billy Joe, my sister’s four-year-old son, streaks by, also wearing only marker scrawls.

  “Get back here!” yells Ellie Mae, from Anthony’s room.

  Ruby Grace, the two-year-old, babbles something about diapers.

  I amble up to where the two bedrooms stand across the hall from each other, then look left and right.

  On the left, Anthony and Billy Joe square off like a pair of drunken fencers, jabbing at each other with colored markers. On the right, Ellie Mae’s kneeling in the middle of Anthony’s room in her underpants, marker smears across her chest. Her dress hangs from the doorknob, mercifully clean, and a diaper holding an unspeakable mess lays out in all its glory in front of her. Ruby Grace, the perfect picture of an innocent bystander, is hip-deep in Anthony’s pile of stuffed animals. No marker, and all her clothes are where they belong.

  “What’s going on?” I ask, leaning on the doorjamb for balance.

  “Anthony messed his diaper.” Ellie Mae points across the hall. “Mommy’s asleep, so I had ta change him, but he runned off after wipies.”