A/N: Thanks so much all you reviewers!
You have so often "complained" about my cliffhangers, that I feel I owe you a warning. I look for cliffhangers. I try for them. If I can't end on a cliffhanger, I'm bummed. Sometimes I won't post until I can get to one. So please don't be too surprised when I leave you on a cliff, okay?
Pearls Before Swine
"Well?" demanded Enriquez once they stood inside the empty room. "Where are they?" The room had an open window and one door to a tiny bathroom, not unlike the prison El had locked Sands in for detox, except Sands's room was interior and had had no window.
"Here," El said, kneeling down and prying out one of the bricks. The hole was dark and appeared deeper than it was. "Go ahead and take them." He sat back on his heels and looked at the men. "If anyone should want to share these diamonds, I would not oppose them. I just ask to be left alone."
Enriquez shoved his gun into El's face again. "Shut up!" he yelled. "Get them out here!"
El shrugged and reached in. He was not surprised that no one wanted to reach an unprotected hand into the dark unknown, but he knew he had fixed the leaky pipe, and the small chamber was now quite dry and vermin free. His hand fell on a spare sleeve pistol, and he maneuvered it into his empty sleeve, while still making "feeling around" motions as if he searched for the diamonds. He found the velvet bag and brought it out. Enriquez grabbed for it, but El snatched it just past the man's hand and dumped its contents on the floor.
Beautiful faceted gems tumbled and scattered, refracting sunlight in sublime twinkling beams. Better than pearls before swine, El thought, admiring the graceful treasure. Time stopped in the room, until Enriquez, torn, pulled his gun away from El's face in order to turn and regard his rapt men with suspicion. "No one move," he ordered, aiming the gun vaguely between two of his men. "Mariachi, pick those up."
El picked out the man he guessed was more the leader of the thugs. He resembled El Cucuy, Sands's man who had betrayed him for money. "Should I?" he asked, innocently.
Enriquez swung the gun back to El. "Do it!" he yelled.
El looked at "Cucuy," who smiled slowly. "No," said the thug. "Rata, you get them."
El stood up. Enriquez pointed his gun at the Indian, whom El guessed was Rata. "I am in charge here!" Enriquez screamed. "Dole, shoot Tino!"
"We will share the diamonds!" shouted "Cucuy," aiming at Enriquez.
A tinderbox that needed a spark. El shook his pistol free of his sleeve and shot Enriquez in the heart.
Two other men shot "Cucuy." Rata turned his gun on them. One of the remaining men, seeing El as the real enemy, shot at him, but El was already leaping for the window, shooting. Rata and three other men fell before he reached the window, but explosive pain ripped through his thigh and El slammed to the floor. The calculating part of his brain still functioned, desperate. One man left. El forced open his eyes, saw the man raise his gun, and he squeezed his own numb trigger finger.
But his gun was not in his hand.
El looked at the man in despair, and another shot sounded in the room. The last thug collapsed out of El's range of vision. Behind him, in the doorway, smoke trailing from the barrel of his gun, stood Sands.
"Sands," El croaked.
The agent cocked his head very slightly. El could almost see the intensity of his listening. "Are they all down?" he asked.
"Si," El said, fighting waves of pain and nausea. "What kept you?"
Sands entered the room, slowly. When his foot encountered a body, he squatted down and patted the man down. "There you go again, El," he said, standing. "Assuming I'm on your side." He leveled his gun accurately at El. "Drop your guns and move away from the diamonds."
"I can't," El said, feeling something like grief at another betrayal.
"Don't fuck with me, Mariachi. I'll make you the eighth corpse in here if you get in my way."
El was likely to be the eighth corpse soon, anyway, just from blood-loss. He could feel shock setting in. Part of him wanted to wail that he'd been shot, but a sudden stubborn streak refused to let him ask Sands for help.
"Sands, I have never lied to you," said El. "And I would have given you the diamonds."
Sands moved on to searching another corpse, his gun never leaving El. "Half. I decided half isn't good enough. Couldn't figure out how I would get you to lead me to them, though."
"You contacted the Delgados?"
Sands said nothing. He searched another body.
"What are you doing?"
"Making sure they're dead. Looking for cash, guns . . . maybe coke." His voice caught on the last word.
The edges of El's vision were shrinking as if he were seeing the room through a gray tunnel. "You know what your problem is, Sands?" Even his own voice was sounding far away. "You don't trust the right people."
Now Sands was collecting the diamonds. "Are you going to live?" he asked, as if it were of only casual interest.
"That depends . . . on you," El said, before sinking into darkness. He had time to wonder if he would ever wake again.