Code Name: Camelot (Noah Wolf #1)(70)

He leaned very close to Noah and spoke softly. “I will tell you this,” he said. “I do not know where to get such things. However, there is a man who might help you with what you seek, if he believes that you are true.” Raul flicked his eyes toward Eduardo, the bartender. “Eduardo has an uncle, Pablo Ortiz. He comes here sometimes, just to drink and to play with the girls. He is a man who can find anything, it is said, but I would not wish him to know that I told you his name.” He sat back in his chair, once again.

Noah nodded, and smiled. “Thank you,” he said. “I won’t say a word, but I do appreciate it.”

“I hope you do not. Se?or Ortiz might not approve of my giving out his name, and I could find myself in a bad position.” He suddenly burst into a big smile. “But you and I, John Baker, we are now friends, and friends protect each other, si?”

Noah smiled just as broadly. “They do, they sure do. Don’t you worry about a thing.”

Raul nodded, as if coming to a conclusion. He leaned close again, and spoke in low tones. “You’re still looking for more things to buy, besides what you asked about a few moments ago?”

“Yes, I still need some other things, too. Do you have…”

“I know people,” Raul said. “If you wish to see Se?or Ortiz, then you will be spending some time here for the next few days, for no one knows when he will come in. I will tell others that I know, people that I trust with my life, that my friend John Baker has money to spend.”

“Thank you, Raul,” Noah said. “Thank you, I really mean it. Like I said, I’m new at coming to places like this, so I appreciate all the help I can get.”

Raul smiled and nodded, and began paying attention to the girl beside him. Noah was smart enough to recognize that he’d been dismissed for the moment, so he turned to Felicita and motioned for her to follow him to another table.

“Do you need another drink?” Noah asked her, and she nodded enthusiastically. He went to the bar and got another beer for himself, and watched as Eduardo poured a drink for the girl from a special bottle he kept under the counter.

“Twenty-five dollars,” Eduardo said, and Noah gave him thirty. He picked up the glass and the bottle and returned to the girl at the table.

“I’m curious,” he said. “Why is a beautiful girl like you working as a prostitute in a little dump like this?”

The girl’s eyes fell to the table, and she suddenly looked as if she were about to cry. “You are disgusted by me,” she said, but Noah reached out and laid his hand on top of hers.

“No, sweetie, not a bit. I’m just wondering how you ended up here, that’s all. Don’t worry, I like you a lot, and I’m going to be very nice to you.”

With her face still pointed at the table, she picked up under her eyebrows to look at his eyes. “You like me?”

Noah smiled, and reached out to put a finger under her chin and raise her face so that he could look at it. “I do,” he said. “I think you’re very pretty, and you seem very sweet. You just don’t seem like the kind of girl who usually ends up in a place like this.”

She shrugged her shoulders, and gave him a weak smile. “My mother, she died when I was only eleven years old,” she said. “I did not have a father, and no other family. I lived on the street for a while, I don’t know how long, until a man named Diego found me, and he—he taught me how to make money, with the sex.” She flicked her eyes toward the bar. “One day, a few months ago, Eduardo saw me, and he said I was too good to be on the streets that way, so he bought me from Diego. Now I work here, and he helps to keep me safe. He helped me get off the crack, that Diego made me use.”

Noah shook his head. It wasn’t hard to figure out the proper, human response to the story he had just heard. “You poor thing,” he said. “But you’re safe now, here with Eduardo?”

She smiled. “Yes, he keeps me safe, and he lets me keep some of the money I make. Diego, he took everything, but Eduardo is good to me. He is good to all his girls. I’m very lucky to be here.” She reached out and caressed the side of Noah’s face. “Can I do something for you? There is a little room, in the back, where we could go.”

Noah looked at her for a moment, but kept smiling. “What if,” he began slowly, “what if I wanted you to come back to my hotel with me for the night? How much would that cost me?”

Her eyes went wide. “I would have to get permission from Eduardo,” she said. “Let me go and ask him.” She jumped up and hurried to the bar, and Noah could see her whispering furiously with the bartender. Eduardo looked over at him, and Noah gave him a big smile and a thumbs-up sign.

Eduardo winked at him, and smiled. A moment later, Felicita hurried back over to Noah. “He says it would be one hundred dollars, but you must bring me back tomorrow. I must be here by lunchtime, is that okay?”

Noah nodded. “That will be fine. Do I give Eduardo the hundred dollars?”

“Yes, or give it to me and I will give it to him now.”

Noah pulled a hundred dollar bill out of his pocket and gave it to the girl, who hurried over to the bartender once more. When she came back, she was beaming from ear to ear. “Se?or John, tonight I will show you all the things that I can do to make a man very, very happy.”