The Edge of Trust: Team Edge Read Online Free Page B

climb into his throat.
    “I retrieved my money from my friend’s pocket and pissed on it.  And then slowly, with much care, I sliced off his eyelids.  To ensure, you see, that he would have to watch me rape, then mutilate, his wife.  He tried to scream but could not.  I did not kill him.  To this day he will not speak.”
    A chill whispered through Dillon’s chest.  It wasn’t the words, but the demeanor by which Sanchez said them.  This kind of evil did not discriminate.  Dillon had thought he’d meet fury.  He hadn’t.  In fact, if apathy was the glove in which evil slipped its hand, then Sanchez wore the challis well. 
    Dillon leaned back wondering what the man’s weakness was.  If, in fact, he had one.  “You keep your friend supplied in Ray Bans?”
    “You find me amusing?”  Sanchez stubbed out his cigarette and leaned back against the booth, managing to look both offended and pleased.
    “I don’t find you…anything.” 
    “Perhaps that is your mistake.”
    “Look around you.”  Dillon angled his head toward the middle of the bar.  “How many of those men are yours?  How many are mine?”
    Sanchez glanced around, and for a moment uncertainty played across his features.  Then he laughed.  “Yours?”   
    Dillon shrugged.  “Warring cartels and all.  Plus, I do have five million dollars.”
    “ My five million dollars.”
    “Not at the moment.”
    Sanchez searched Dillon’s face with those opaque eyes.  “I wonder.  Will you beg for your life or pray for God’s mercy when I kill you?”
    Dillon gestured to the bartender and wondered what this man knew of mercy.  “Mind if I have a beer?”
    “A drink before death.  A bit cliché, perhaps,” Sanchez inclined his head, “but not unexpected.”
    “Glad to be predictable.  I’ll take a Dos Equis.” 
    “Make it two,” Sanchez said to the bartender.  “Would you like a steak as well?  Or a cigarette perhaps?”
    Dillon didn’t bother to answer. 
    A moment later, two bottles of beer clapped the table simultaneously.  The sound ricocheted around the still-quiet room.
    “My patience is wearing thin.  Where is my money?”
    Dillon took a long pull on his beer.  “And here I thought Mexican hospitality insisted on pleasure before business.”
    “If we were here for pleasure, I would have killed you by now.”  Sanchez slid his palm across the grip of his .44.  “Who are you working for?”
    Dillon would have preferred the slam of a fist.  A demand.  Macho posturing even.  Anything other than this mild civility.  The way Sanchez absently caressed his weapon made Dillon want to carve the other man’s arms off at the shoulder.  “I work for myself.”
    “How do I know you’re not DEA?  ATF?  Federales?  A rival cartel?”
    “Why would I return your money if I were?”
    “Why would you not?”
    “A man could disappear forever with five million dollars.  Surely that buys a little trust?”
    “And a bullet in the head doesn’t worry about such things.”
    Dillon eased into a smile, provoking.  “You don’t want to do that.”
    Impatience finally erupted on Rafael’s face.  Intrigue tempered it.  “And why the hell not?”
    “First, because you still don’t know where your money is.  And second,” Dillon pulled out a small gold locket from his front shirt pocket.  Dangled it like a pendulum.  “I believe you gave this to your daughter last year on her third birthday.  Dreena must miss it terribly.”
    Rafael’s perfect, golden features blanched white.  His eyes bulged in fury.
    Dillon clapped the locket into his open palm, thinking ah, so there’s the rage.  Sanchez’s family, or at least his child, was his weakness.  “She’s a beautiful little girl.  Sunshine and strawberries.”
    As Sanchez stared at the locket resting idly against Dillon’s hand, his face took on an impressive tic.  “I am going to kill you.”
    “Uh, huh.  So.  Here’s the deal.  Four days ago