Stone Cold

by Kristi Belcamino

  “It’s okay,” he said. “Follow me.”

  He led me, again by the hand, around the far side of the infinity pool where it seemed to drop off over the cliff.

  Instead, there was a small ledge on the other side where water that lapped over the side of the pool gathered and was funneled back into the pool’s filtration system. He stepped down onto the ledge, which was about three feet below the edge of the pool, and tugged on my hand for me to do the same. Beyond the small ditch-like gulley was about a foot of concrete and then a sheer wall of nothingness that dropped down into the valley below.

  I tried not to look but felt dizzy just knowing it was there.

  A noise erupted from the house as someone inside noticed us, and we both ducked as a volley of gunfire erupted.

  Ian pulled me down to a crouch in the narrow ditch of water. The water lapped at my chest, and I shivered uncontrollably.

  At the same time, we heard a preternatural growl that echoed through the night. Instinctively, I poked my head up and saw a man facing us with a large gun. A crouched dark and shadowy figure was coming in fast.

  As the man raised the gun to fire at my head, the large cat pounced. There was a deadly snarl and roar, and the man screamed in pain and terror.

  He and the large cat plunged into the pool with a splash. The water immediately turned red with blood that spread in a circle from where they had submerged.

  Ian grabbed my hand and we ran, splashing through the ditch to the other side near the pool house. Within seconds, Ian jumped on a four-wheel, all-terrain vehicle and gestured for me to hop on behind him. The engine roared to life and we tore off into the jungle along a dirt path. I had my hands clasped around his waist and my face pressed into the back of his shirt.

  It was only when we’d put some distance between ourselves and the house that I was able to breathe normally.

  “What about the cat?” I said.

  He didn’t answer, just shook his head.

  “What the hell is going on?”

  “We’re meeting Nico in town. He will explain all.”

  Nico? Here?

  44

  Nico clasped Gia in a huge hug as soon as she and Ian slipped into the small house in the downtown area. Relief filled him. He was crazy thankful that she was unharmed.

  “I’ve been betrayed,” he said. “I’m so sorry you were brought into this. It was Anthony. He has been trying to kill me.”

  Halfway to Mexico City, Nico had received a phone call from the manager of the financial group that handled his investments.

  The man had apologized profusely for calling Nico directly but had decided it was worth the risk of angering the drug lord to confirm the transfer since it was such a large amount.

  Nico had authorized no transfer. But maybe this had something to do with Anthony’s maneuverings of Sylvia’s accounts, which were separate from Nico’s investments.

  “I’m glad you called,” he said. “I’ve been busy. Remind me what transfer you are referring to?”

  It ended up that someone had used Nico’s passwords and other security measures to authorize the transfer of his largest investment account of $500 million dollars into an offshore account. The transfer would essentially clean him out.

  “The reason I’m calling is because when you set up your account, you ordered a personal call be made to you on any transfers of more than $50 million and that they be verified with your secret code.”

  “Yes,” Nico said. “Thank you. Please cancel the transfer.”

  “Forgive me, but can you provide me with the code first?”

  “Of course,” Nico said. He rattled off the numbers of code in three parts, interspersed with other words throughout several sentences. It was set up that way to prevent anyone who might be listening from paying any attention to the numbers he said. To the driver, it sounded like this: “The appointment was for ten. I understand. But there are still four items to take care of. I think they said it would be done by the fifth.”

  Then, using the same precautions, all of his security passwords were changed.

  As soon as Nico hung up, he told the driver to turn around and head back to San Miguel de Allende immediately.

  Anthony had betrayed him.

  Any meeting in Mexico City would involve an assassination attempt.

  He’d hole up at his estate and figure out what to do next.

  However, as soon as he thought this, he realized his home was a target. Which meant Gia was in danger. He dialed Ian.

  “I will go there immediately,” his friend had said. “We will meet at my place. Don’t worry. I will keep her safe.”

  Nico was, nonetheless, sick with worry until Ian and Gia walked into the rental apartment.

  “Why do you think he wanted me dead as well?” Gia asked now.

  “I think he wanted to kill you and Rosalie,” he said. “Or at least make sure nobody knew she was mine. He knows she would inherit everything I own. Well, anything left that he hadn’t already taken. He was named the beneficiary of my estate when Sylvia died. I’d recently ordered him to make arrangements to change my will and name Rosalie as the recipient of my trust.”

  Before he finished, Gia was dialing her cell phone.

  “You okay?” she said and then, “Rosalie? Okay. Good. Keep the doors locked. Tell Eva we were just attacked by one of El Jefe’s closest confidants. He knew everything. Tell Eva it’s probably time to head home.”

  Gia hung up. “It’s all good.”

  “Thank God,” he said. He realized he’d been holding his breath until she hung up.

  “He stands to inherit everything from you?” Gia asked.

  “Yes.”

  Gia’s face did something odd. It was a look he’d never seen before. It was pity and concern. Her voice was soft as she said, “I think you better look at whether he killed Sylvia, too, Nico.”

  Horror shot through him. She was right.

  He hugged her close. She was patting his back. It felt good.

  For so long, for so many years, he had been the one who everyone else turned to for comfort. And yet, here in this woman’s arms, he let himself go. He allowed himself to sink into her embrace, as she—so much smaller and younger than him—gave him strength through her touch.

  She held him and smoothed back his hair, her lips brushed his brow in the briefest kiss.

  After a few seconds, he pulled back.

  “Now that I know Rosalie is safe and you are safe, it’s time to go find Anthony.”

  45

  If Nico thought he was going after Anthony alone, he was crazy.

  “Let’s do this,” I said.

  “Gia?”

  “I’m going to need at least two guns. I like something smaller with heavy fire power. Preferably a Glock or Ruger.”

  Nico stared at me for a few seconds and then said, “Okay.”

  I hid my smug smile.

  “There is a place I think he might be staying.”

  Ian spoke up. “I just heard from your house manager,” he said. “None of Anthony’s men survived.”

  “That means he has no idea how it all went down.”

  “We need to spread the word,” Nico said. “I’m dead. Gia’s dead.”

  “I’m on it,” Ian said. “Be back soon.”

  After Ian walked out, Nico began to pace the small space.

  “The way I see it,” I said. “He has to play it one of two ways.”

  Nico stopped pacing and turned to me.

  I continued. “He puts on a show, grieves you publicly, vows to find who did this, and so on.”

  “Or,” Nico says, nodding and cracking his knuckles. “He bails now. He puts the second part of his murderous plan in place and disappears.”

  “But if he does, he forfeits the money you left him in the will, right?”

  “Right,” Nico said, brow furrowed.

  “You know him. Which card is he going to play, Nico?”

  Just then Ian came rushing into the h
ouse. “Anthony’s apartment in the city was firebombed.”

  Nico didn’t even blink. “Was there a body inside?”

  “Yes.”

  “Can it be identified?”

  “They said it was burned too badly,” Ian said, visibly shaken.

  Nico turned to me. “Want to know what card he played? He played the joker.”

  According to Nico, if anything happened to Anthony, all his money would be funneled to a trust he’d set up, ostensibly, to help starving children in Guatemala. Anthony had talked Nico into doing the same. Nico’s will actually said that if Anthony was not around to inherit Nico’s fortune, all the money would go to this trust.

  Nico opened his phone and tapped his fingers for a few seconds before thrusting the device at me. “Look at the name of the trust.”

  It said: The Patrón Partners.

  “His favorite tequila.”

  “It’s him,” I said. “The trust is still him.”

  Nico turned to Ian. “Can I borrow your car? We need to get to the airport asap.”

  “How about a helo?” Ian said.

  “You’re kidding?” I said. Where was he going to get a helicopter?

  “Give me ten minutes.”

  The helicopter landed in a private area of the airport, not far from where Nico kept his small Lear jet. He’d received a text on the flight over and had handed his phone to me to read.

  It said that Nico’s pilot and plane had taken off from the airport ninety minutes earlier with a flight plan that purported to have them landing in Chiapas a half hour ago. But airport officials said no plane had landed. It had possibly gone down somewhere in the jungle.

  Once the helicopter took off again and we were walking toward a squat building, Nico told me he’d chartered a private plane to take us to Belize. Anthony had once mentioned that he dreamed of retiring on a remote island near there.

  Five hours later, we landed at a small airstrip in Belize. Nico stood as we landed, crossing the aisle to peer out the windows until he shouted triumphantly. “Yes!”

  Nico’s own private plane was on the ground.

  Inside the airport, we asked for directions and immediately headed to the office of the airport director and manager.

  The director was a bearded man with dark skin and brilliant white teeth that made his smile contagious. He took us into his office and shut the door before he said that Nico’s private plane had come in without authorization a few hours before. Shortly after it landed, coming to a stop at the far end of the runway near the jungle, armed soldiers had met the pilot. He had surrendered. He’d claimed he had no passengers. He said when he had heard of El Jefe’s murder, he had become scared for his life and fled. He was seeking asylum in their country.

  The bearded man who’d said he was in charge of all airport affairs looked at Nico. “Clearly reports of your death were exaggerated.”

  “Mark Twain,” Nico said and smiled.

  Then he took out a thick wad of cash and peeled off several bills. “Would you mind allowing those rumors to stay circulating in your country for at least another day.”

  “Dead man walking,” he said with a smile, scooping up the bills from the table.

  “Do you think your men know who I am?” Nico asked.

  “I don’t think so. In fact, I was merely making an educated guess. I don’t think anyone really knows exactly what you look like.”

  “Fantastic,” Nico said. “If you could arrange for a car and maybe an armed guard, my partner and I would like to take care of some business in your country. We hope to be done by tomorrow, if possible, and then back on our way home. If I were trying to lay low in Belize, where would I go?”

  “Easy. There is a new development that caters to expats on the north end of the island. It is difficult to get to, so it remains somewhat isolated. If you take a boat, you can cut at least an hour off your trip. Most people do that. Some, however, drive, and it takes longer. The current roads aren’t well maintained, and the new roads aren’t yet developed.”

  “That sounds like a good place to start.”

  “And it might be worth knowing that, just in case the pilot was lying about not having any passengers, my men searched the jungle area next to that end of the runway. They found tire tracks and what looks like a recent puddle of transmission fluid.”

  “He had a car waiting.”

  “A four-by-four vehicle, it appears, from the huge tire tracks.”

  “Which makes me think there would not be a boat involved in the trip.”

  “Can you arrange for us to be on a boat in the next hour?” Nico took out the wad of cash and again peeled off several bills and slid them across the desk to the man’s waiting palm.

  “Of course,” the director said. And then he turned. “Thank you for your donation to our literacy campaign last year. It was very generous.”

  Nico gave a polite nod to acknowledge it.

  “You have friends everywhere,” I said.

  “And enemies.”

  Our boat kept close to the shore, often staying under the canopy of trees that overhung the areas without a beach.

  At one point, the boat operator abruptly killed the engine and pointed, grinning.

  A large gray shape was swimming toward us just below the surface. About two feet away from the boat, a snout with two dark wide nostril holes poked out of the water for a second. The holes closed and the nose dipped back down.

  Manatee.

  Then the creature stuck its head up enough to look at us, so we could see its eyes before it dipped back down. It did this a few times and then swam away.

  “Just checking us out, I guess,” I said.

  The boat operator started the engine again, and we took off. Every once in a while, he would point to the shore or to the trees, alerting us to crocodiles in the water or on shore and a few monkeys screeching in the trees above.

  Before long, we pulled into a small cove. A tiny dock stretched out about twenty feet. The boat operator had killed the engine as soon as we rounded the corner of the cove. He was paddling us the rest of the way in.

  The shore contained about a dozen squat, white-stone structures. Some were still under construction. The finished ones had small patios facing the cove. All of them were surrounded by lush tropical plants. The jungle seemed to lie directly behind all the homes.

  Nico handed the boat operator some cash. “Can you meet us back here in an hour?”

  “Yes.”

  Nico paused and then said, “If we are not here, wait ten minutes, and then go back to the airport director and have him call the police.”

  The man nodded, tucking the money into his shirt pocket.

  Even though we had spoken in low voices, two heads peeked out of the door of the house closest to the dock.

  Then a third.

  This time, a body followed the head.

  A man dressed in khaki shorts and a white T-shirt.

  Anthony.

  He was out the door and around the side of the house before our feet hit the dirt at the end of the dock.

  Nico pulled ahead of me in the chase. Soon we were behind the row of houses, racing through a backyard area with a pool and patio and on a dirt path carving through the jungle.

  The greenish light made it hard to distinguish shapes. Everything blurred into the object next to it. Bushes crowded each side of the path, creating a seemingly impenetrable wall. If Anthony had tried to break through, he would’ve left the carnage of broken foliage behind, so we kept running straight ahead. After about five minutes, the path opened up to a clearing. Nico pulled up short at the entrance, head swiveling. The trees formed a canopy above the clearing so the light was still a greenish hue. It was possible the noises had been there the entire run through the jungle, but when we paused, the insect and animal sounds rang out in a cacophony of noise that undulated around us.

  Nico’s body heaved with exertion, but he was not panting loud enough for me to hear. I was trying to catch my b
reath without making any noise, as well. My ears were alert to any possible sound indicating which way Anthony had run. Then Nico jutted toward one section of the clearing with his chin. I saw what he meant. A few bushes there had bent branches. He’d gone that way. As we raced across the open space and grew closer, I saw that from this angle there was a small path carved out right there. Nico plowed through it, and I was right at his heels, trying to stay closer this time. It was less than five minutes to the next clearing, this one much smaller. We were about to enter it when Nico stopped so suddenly I smashed into his shoulder. He crouched and held up a hand behind him. Instinctively, I crouched as well and then poked my head over his shoulder.

  There was a large animal coming through the bushes somewhere close. My heart raced in fear.

  Then I heard the click. It was the safety of a gun being released. It came from the side of us. I turned to see Anthony holding a gun, pointing it right at Nico’s temple.

  “If you hadn’t come here, everything would’ve been just fine,” he said. “You could have arisen from the dead and gone on to rebuild your empire, Nico. Why did you have to chase me down? Why couldn’t you let me live in peace?”

  Nico turned his head so the gun was aimed at his forehead.

  “You don’t deserve to live in peace.”

  “I have given my best years to you. Now it’s my turn.”

  “Anthony, I would’ve given you anything you wanted,” Nico said. His voice was a mixture of disappointment and grief. “I would have handed you $5 million to come live here like a prince instead of a fugitive like you are now. Why didn’t you come to me?”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “What have I ever done to cause you to doubt?” Nico said.

  Anthony’s face scrunched up. He looked uncertain. He didn’t answer. I saw him swallow. The gun in his hand was shaking.

  “Anthony?” Nico said. “Put the gun down. We can work this out.”

  “I didn’t want to kill you,” he said. “Or Sylvia.” He let the name hang there and seemed to be searching Nico’s face, which remained expressionless.