Some Churros and El Burro

By William Dylan Powell

Tomas “Chispa” Busch works for the notorious Sangre Cartel of Sinaloa. But as the cartel’s resident IT nerd and electronics consultant, his real passion is fixing things. After annoying one of the cartel bosses, the bookish Chispa is sent to Chicago to deal with a competitor in the MDMA market. His assignment: eliminate the competition within 24 hours, or join them—in a shallow grave.

Tucker Mitchell is a college student with big dreams in the world of big finance. And he’s gaining free-market street cred by selling the hottest brand of ecstasy in Chi-Town. One of the city’s Great and Good, he’s determined to stay on top of his game and maximize returns until graduation. Even if it means doing so with the help of a black-market gun.

A cross between Narcos and Revenge of the Nerds, this quirky Chicagoland story of fish-out-of-water explores what happens when people are taken out of their element and put to the test. Because when you don’t stay in your lane on the South Side of Chicago, you’ll need more than good insurance to cover your ass.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Down & Out Books
• Release date: Nov 1, 2019
• ISBN: 9780463508459

Book preview

SOME CHURROS AND EL BURRO

Guns + Tacos Season One Episode 5

William Dylan Powell

Series Created and Edited by

Michael Bracken and Trey R. Barker

Copyright © 2019 by William Dylan Powell

All rights reserved. No part of the book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

Down & Out Books

3959 Van Dyke Road, Suite 265

Lutz, FL 33558

DownAndOutBooks.com

The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

Cover design by Zach McCain

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite ebook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author/these authors.

Visit the Down & Out Books website to sign up for our monthly newsletter and we’ll deliver the latest news on our upcoming titles, sale books, Down & Out authors on the net, and more!

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Some Churros and El Burro

About the Author

Preview from the sixth episode of Guns + Tacos

A Beretta, Burritos, and Bears by James A. Hearn

Just East of Cosala, Sinaloa, Mexico

Chispa sat in his rusty Chevy Lumina, draining the last of his horchata. An open copy of Empires of Light sat in his lap, the sweat from his hair dripping on the pages. He’d pulled into the gate five minutes ago and knew the guards were watching him; probably people inside the palacio too. Maybe even Dante Garcia himself. But he couldn’t help procrastinating. It was like the very idea of entering the place where Dante Garcia slept was being rejected by his brain. Eventually, though, he could delay no more.

The door squeaked like a coffin as Chispa opened it and stepped out. As he approached the house, a small jet took to the sky from Dante Garcia’s private runway, and Chispa badly wished he were onboard. Wherever it was going. The door opened before he could knock. Dante’s lieutenant, Alejandro, looked harried.

"What were you doing out there, Chispa? Come on. He’s getting loco in there."

Why did El Patrón ask me to help Dante Garcia? Chispa thought. Of all people it had to be Dante Garcia. It couldn’t be old lady Vargas, or El Scorpion’s brother, who lets me play Red Dead Redemption II on the PS4. It had to be Dante Garcia.

A few years ago, Tomas Chispa Busch was just another foot soldier for the Sangre Cartel. Orphaned. A dropout at age fourteen. He did what he had to for survival. But bored standing lookout at a police station one day, he fixed a diamond-encrusted iPhone X Los Payaso had dropped during a shootout at Las Tetas Sports Bar & Grill in Mazatlan. Shortly thereafter, he rewired El Pastor’s Ford Raptor to play De Sinaloa Para El Mundo by Calibre 50 whenever the alarm remote was pressed. Then he installed a surveillance center and media server at Antonio El Demonio’s house, mostly so El Demonio would know where his wife was at all times. Finding a real passion for the work, he spent the rest of his childhood doing his best to educate himself in all things electrical.

Soon people came to him for all kinds of electronics and computer work, dubbing him la chispa, the spark.

Chispa followed Alejandro between the giant brass lions at the front door, through the home’s gilded center hallway, beneath its outsized family portraits and paintings of matadors, and to a spacious office at the back of the house.

On one wall hung a large, curved screen with a video feed featuring a man wearing blue overalls at an auto shop. Outside the shop’s door, a foot of snow stood on the ground. The man looked cold and scared. Dante Garcia was screaming at him through the computer.

"Your spreadsheet is jodido, pendejo. You think I don’t have people all over Chicago lined up to replace you? This ain’t MetLife, motherfucker. This ain’t All Things Considered. I will cut off everything, sew it all back where it don’t belong and send you to the bottom of the lake in a god-damned barrel."

Calm down, Jefe. It’s not that bad… The face on the screen froze, the man’s mouth an awkward shape. One gold tooth caught the light from a nearby welder.

You see? Dante Garcia turned to Chispa. "This is why I call. Seven thousand on this maldito laptop, all the best cameras, the best satellite internet. This choppy, broken mierda is what I get."

Okay, Señor Garcia, said Chispa, poking at some computer keys and wiggling some wires, Let me see what I can do.

As Chispa poked around, the frozen face on the screen came back to life.

"Can

Reviews for Some Churros and El Burro

[Gary Carter · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is the 5th season in the noir Guns & Tacos series. If you like noir with an edge these are for you. This is the second one of the series I have read and they both have not let you down. Each of the novelettes have been written some of the new freshest names on the noir scene. I highly recommend this series to all fans of highly original noir.