Free The Border Lords by T. Jefferson Parker

of guns. I hear these things, Mateo. I don’t make them up.
    Ozburn grinned. In fact, he was making part of it up. He knew for a fact that Blowdown had come that close to busting Ron Pace, a young California gunmaker, last year. Sean had worked that operation. But Pace had gotten lucky and his thousand pistols had made their way south to Mexico and into the hands of Herredia’s sicarios. He knew also that Pace and his pretty partner in crime had vanished from the U.S.A. So Ozburn wondered if Pace might be under the wing of Herredia, possibly even making guns for him. Guns were more valuable than gold in Mexico because you couldn’t get them legally. The fact that Mateo would have this conversation about the possible sale of Love 32s told Ozburn that such a thing was very, very possible.
    Mateo cracked a rare smile. His teeth were large and dilapidated and the bicuspids were rimmed with gold.
    —They are made by the devil in hell, just for us.
    —See, I was right.
    —Maybe some truth.
    —Tell Carlos I want to buy a hundred of them and I don’t expect them to be free. I can move them and make some good bucks if the price is right. Because I’ll tell you something, Mateo—at the rate your killers are getting themselves killed in my houses, I need a new profit center.
    Mateo’s smile brought another quick ripple of fury to Ozburn’s brain. He’d benched three hundred seventy pounds in the gym a week ago and he wondered how it would feel to strangle bare-handed the sinewy Sinaloan. Good indeed. But he’d have to settle for less right at the moment.
    So he leveled his pale blue eyes on Mateo and growled at him. It was a short, supple snarl. His lips were back and his teeth were sudsed with saliva.
    Mateo smiled sleepily but looked toward his gunmen near the beer cooler. They ambled over. From under the table unfurled Daisy, her back bristling, her head down and teeth bared at them.
    One of them swung his coat back to draw his sidearm, and Ozburn launched. He was six feet four and weighed two hundred forty pounds but he was fast as a thought. He had his autoloader pressed to the man’s forehead before the sicario could get his gun up, and his free hand placed around the throat of the gunman beside him.
    Ozburn growled again, this time at Daisy, and she dropped her tail and hung her head and slunk back under the table. Then Ozburn lowered his gun and took his hand off the man’s neck.
    —You guys sure get jumpy after a few beers. Sorry about the safe house shoot-up but that’s your problem, amigos, not mine. I’m not taking the rap for that or anything else the North Baja Cartel brings upon itself. Tell Carlos I won’t charge him a cleaning fee for my messed-up home. Tell Carlos anytime he wants to pull his boys out of San Ysidro and Yuma, that’s fine with me. I’ll get more rent on the open market, and no brains in my nice clean kitchens. And tell Carlos I want to buy a hundred of those Love 32s.
    He growled again, just a quick one, just a snarl, then clicked his tongue, and Daisy bounded out from under the table and led the way to the waiting car and Leftwich.
     
     
    Ozburn watched the rugged hills bounce past. He felt jacked up and itching for Seliah, no surprise there. Leftwich offered him the ancient, battered silver flask and Ozburn took a gulp of the powerful blend. Leftwich claimed to have invented it at seminary.
    “How did it go, Sean?”
    “Mateo’s suspicious but he can’t put me at the safe house. And he’ll have to tell Herredia I want the guns.”
    “Perfect.”
    Ozburn felt the drink melt down into him. It tasted of smoky tequila with a soft undertone that reminded him of honeydew melon. Woody and clean and just a little sweet. It was always cool, which was odd, considering the flask rode in the priest’s jacket pocket pretty much twenty-four/seven. Ozburn suspected cucumbers because of their unique thermal properties. Leftwich told him there were eight ingredients in it but wouldn’t