He shouted Rina’s name as he entered. With the selfishness of a person in love, he hoped Milena’s captors had let his girlfriend go. Milena met him with a beer in her hand.
“Where’s Rina?” he asked, impatient and confused.
“She went out to run. You didn’t see her? She took the same road we came up on.”
“Dear God,” he said, collapsing into one of the armchairs in the living room.
“What is it?”
“Did a white truck and a gray one come up here?”
“No one’s been here since you left, just the maid to ask if we wanted tortillas a little while back.”
Luis told her what he had seen and shared his fears with her.
“It’s my fault,” Milena lamented. “You should have left me last night. Today everything would be resolved and everyone could rest easy. Now Rina’s life is in danger. Bonso will be ruthless when he realizes he’s made a mistake.” Milena did not cry, but her grave voice and tone made Luis’s hair stand on end.
“I don’t think it’s Bonso; I saw one of them, and he didn’t seem the type. But I’m still scared. They’ll come back soon, when they figure out there’s been a mistake. We need to leave. Get a backpack, I’ll go for the bags of groceries and some bottles of water,” he said, grabbing a pair of binoculars from the mantel.
“If they’re coming back, let’s stay here. When they come, we’ll make the trade and Rina will be safe.”
“That’s not an option,” he responded. “We don’t know who they are. Come on, hurry, and grab a jacket or a blanket, whatever you find. I’ll explain on the way.”
Before they left, he scribbled a number and a few words on a piece of paper and left it on the table for Rina’s captors. Minutes later, they plunged into the forest, following a barely marked path. Luis warned Milena to walk on the gravel and avoid the dirt where she might leave footprints. After four hundred yards, they came upon a sudden drop surrounded by boulders and he thought they could veer off without showing where they’d gone. They wound up on an outcropping and continued further down until they reached a small valley. Soon afterward, they climbed up again in the opposite direction from where they’d been. A half-hour later, they came to rest in a leaf-strewn clearing where the last rays of sunlight filtered through.
He would have liked to activate the GPS on his phone, but it was better to leave it off. It must have been what led the guys in the trucks to them. He turned on the cell phone he had bought with Milena’s dollars from the waiter in La Marquesa and confirmed the captors hadn’t left any messages. They didn’t seem to have returned to the cabin. He turned the phone back off.
He looked at Milena, who had been silent throughout the walk. She was staring at some wild mushrooms, bent over without flexing her knees.
“Are they edible?” he asked. “Do you know anything about mushrooms? I have enough food in the backpack.”
“I’m not looking at them because I’m hungry,” she said, and dropped a piece of wild mushroom, disappointed.
She took the bottle of water he passed her and sat down beside him.
“Do you think they’ll take long to get in touch with us?”
“I hope they do before nightfall. In these forests, the temperature can drop below freezing.”
“And when the guys in the trucks call, what’s your plan?”
“I don’t know. Talk to them, figure out who they are, negotiate to get Rina free. But we can’t stay there in the cabin with our hands tied. We’ve got to grab the bull by the horns,” he said, and then laughed at the confusion on Milena’s face. She had a surprisingly lopsided grasp of colloquialisms: one moment, she could rattle off a string of insults with the best of them, and next thing you know, she’d hear the most common phrase ever and be utterly lost.
“The important thing is to save Rina, even if we have to barter. Promise me you’ll do it. I’m already lost, much more than you can imagine.”
Luis was about to protest, to insist that her fatalism was absurd, but he held it in. There was something in Milena’s words far grimmer than resignation, and there was something dead in her gaze. She seemed a person who hoped for nothing, who was going nowhere, who had already stopped being.
“What happened in Spain, Milena? Why are they pursuing you?”
She looked at him apathetically, filled her lungs, and started talking.
“I’d have preferred you never found out,” she said, scraping at the dust with a thin stick. “Everything started when I met the Flamingos.”
37
Jaime, Vidal, and Rina
Thursday, November 13, 6:15 p.m.
“Take her to the meeting room, I’m going there now,” Jaime said. Patricia had informed him that the truck carrying Milena was in the parking deck at Lemlock’s offices.
It was a serious risk, he thought, putting his business into direct conflict with the mafias running prostitution. If that evening’s meeting with Salgado turned out bad, he and Lemlock would face vengeance for hiding the Croatian. But that was the price he had to pay: a successful negotiation with the ex-director of prisons depended on the interview he would have soon with the prostitute.
When he stepped into the meeting room, he took one look at the girl and saw it wasn’t Milena. With her glasses and hat off, there was no mistaking it. Rina looked at him fleetingly: with all that had happened, she still had the courage to face to him.
“If you had identified yourself, this wouldn’t have happened,” she said.
Jaime ignored the comment and turned to Patricia, who gave her account. Luis and Milena should still be at the cabin. He looked at the wall clock. There was no way to get the Croatian in time for their meeting with Salgado, the traffic at that hour would make it impossible. And that was without even considering the added complications Luis might bring. He decided not to waste time on them and to concentrate on the thorny meeting he had ahead of him.
“Rina, there are things about Milena you don’t know,” he told her. “You and Luis are in danger every second you spend with her. Her bosses are after her, and they don’t care if they leave a trail of bodies in their wake. And right now, the life of a deputy director at El Mundo is hanging by a thread. My intention was to get Milena somewhere safe and separate you from her so you’d be safe, too.”
“You could have told us, no?”
Again, Jaime ignored her comment.
“Can you call Luis? A truck is leaving right now to pick them up.”
“We just tried,” Patricia said. “It looks like his phone is off, or else he’s not getting a signal. Anyhow, they’re on their way and they have a written message from Rina to Luis. I’m hoping that convinces them.”
“Good. Keep calling his cell and find Vidal to go with Rina. She can rest in my office,” Jaime said to Patricia, and then, looking at the girl: “It’s better if you spend the night here.”
Minutes later, Vidal was back at Lemlock’s offices, assuming his mission was over now that they had Milena. He was happy when he heard of the confusion, and even more when his friend rushed up and hugged him.
“I’m an idiot. But how could I know?”
“Don’t be hard on yourself, you did what you thought best,” he said. “Anyway, don’t worry, Lemlock will take care of everything. I’m here to protect you.”
She looked at him, perplexed.
“I’m not worried about me,” she said anxiously. “I’m worried about Milena and Luis. The bad guys are after them right now.”
“That’s what I’m saying. Lemlock’s resources are enormous!” he said with pride.
Even so, she wasn’t convinced. She dug a finger into her ear.
Vidal didn’t know what else to say, worried he would make his friend’s mood worse. What would Jaime do in a situation like this? How could he make her feel secure under his wing? He imagined a mature, assertive version of himself, and Rina hanging from every word, swayed by his resolute movements. But all that occurred to him was to ask if she wan
ted something to drink, and she didn’t even seem to hear him. She switched hands and picked at the other ear.
But two hours later, after eating something in the private room Jaime used when he slept at the office, Rina seemed more relaxed. Vidal’s chatter seemed to put her to sleep and she ended up resting her head on her friend’s shoulder. He sighed, thankful. Everything was back to normal now that Luis was out of the scene.
38
Claudia, Jaime, and Tomás
Thursday, November 13, 8:20 p.m.
She knew she hated him the first time she laid eyes on him: Víctor Salgado reminded her of her father, but without the blood ties that made him bearable. Claudia greeted him with a curt nod to avoid any physical contact, and sat at the extreme opposite of the round table. They were in the private room in the restaurant San Angelín. Jaime was about to shake his hand, but he held back and did the same as Claudia. He and Tomás sat beside her in silence.
Salgado was a tall man, more fat than stocky. Everything about him exuded independence. He was drinking whiskey from a glass, making its ice cubes click rhythmically. To Claudia, there was something obscene in the movement, as though he were masturbating. He gave her a cheeky look and placed a thick Cuban cigar in his mouth, and two seconds later an assistant emerged from the terrace, match in hand, to light it. His body seemed to fill the room, as if everything in it belonged to him, including those present.
“There’s no need for introductions, Don Víctor,” Jaime said. “We can get straight to the point.” But the host made a sign, interrupting him, and a waiter came in and took the new arrivals’ order.
“True, there is no need for introductions,” Salgado said once the waiter was gone. “But first, I would like to extend my sincerest condolences to Doña Claudia. I was friends with Rosendo before you were even born. Life pulled us apart with the years and yet I always cared for him, whether he knew it or not.”
The revelation caught Claudia off guard. Salgado must have been near seventy, a little less than her father’s age, so their knowing each other would make sense. But she didn’t like the thought of Franco having ties to an ex-prison chief with such a nasty reputation. Something about his manners evoked an earlier time, one of black-and-white photographs, thick moustaches, and wide pants. An earlier time that hadn’t been better.
“That will make things easier, I suppose,” Jaime said. “If you’ll allow me, Colonel, I’ll speak with complete clarity. A pimp is now holding a deputy director from El Mundo captive to get back a woman who worked for him. For some reason, he’s convinced we have her. As you may know, this woman was highly prized by your friend Don Rosendo, may he rest in peace. She has disappeared, and we’re afraid for our friend’s life. If Señor Emiliano Reyna comes to a tragic end, it would be a gratuitous and unnecessary scandal.”
“Bonso doesn’t seem to be aware of the consequences of what he’s doing,” Tomás interrupted. “Just for starters, next Monday Claudia and I will be dining in Los Pinos with the president. You can imagine the problems that could arise if we were to bring up the kidnapping with him, let alone the execution of an important figure at the newspaper. The Mexican government would go to no end to solve it.”
Salgado looked at Tomás as though he barely registered his presence. Again, he stirred the ice in his drink. The man clicked his tongue with a condescending smile and explained.
“We’re all part of the same food chain. The problem is, some of us don’t recognize or don’t want to know where we stand. It’s been a long time since the presidents of this country, and others like them, have been on top, and they know it. Others don’t: Rosendo Franco never found out, and until the end of his days, he still believed he was master of the universe.”
“Well, if he wasn’t, he did a damn good job pretending to be, because he always got whatever he wanted,” Tomás said.
“He lived a full life thanks to my intervention. Otherwise he would have exited stage left, so to speak, after stealing the Croatian.”
“It’s hard for me to believe a prostitute has that much importance,” Jaime said.
“It’s a fact of biology that goes over my head, over yours, over Bonso’s. Let me go back to the food chain. The real peak has to do with money and how it’s handled. What do the president, the owner of an international consortium, and the head of a drug cartel have in common? All three of them need financial avenues they can channel their fortunes into, legal and illegal. The real masters of the universe aren’t the heads of state or even the businessmen on the Forbes list; they’re the movers and shakers of the big investment funds and the brokers operating on the elastic borders of legality. They’re the ones who make Peru’s GDP shoot through the roof because a mineral nets record prices, or allow Greece to breathe another six months in exchange for turning over their financial markets or some public–private business enterprise.”
There was absolute silence at the table.
“Chapo Guzmán was the most powerful capo in Latin America and the most wanted man by the DEA and Interpol. But he was living hand-to-mouth before they caught him, he wasn’t an executive director working nine to six to manage the commercial and financial logistics necessary for an international operation like the production and distribution of drugs. The people who really hold the power are the ones moving the Sinaloa cartel’s billions of dollars through hundreds of investment accounts scattered throughout the world. An ‘honest’ president will leave office with fifteen or twenty million dollars in his possession; a less finicky one will do so with two or four hundred million. Bigger or smaller, it’s a number that can’t be tied to family members or put in a friend’s name. It’s been a long time since you could count on a trustworthy friend: loyalty’s gone out of fashion. A millionaire from the Forbes list hides fortunes from the taxman in the course of his life. Beyond real-estate investments, you need professionals to launder your money.”
“What does this have to do with Milena?” Claudia said.
“Well, it seems Milena turned into the apple of one of those masters of the universe’s eye. I don’t know the details, but at some point, they sent her to Mexico to get her out of the middle of some unforgivable mess. Someone high up either loves her or hates her a lot, because the instructions were very precise: keep her alive, never lose sight of her, and go on pimping her out. Not a month goes by that these people don’t ask for information about her.” And almost to himself, he added, “And in the past few weeks, it’s been much more frequent than that.”
“Much more frequent than that? What does that mean?”
“Nothing, I’m just trying to say that very important people are interested in Milena. People you can’t say no to. The same ones who take the bankers’ and politicians’ dirty money. Their names aren’t known to the public, yet no politician would refuse their requests. They are the true power. So no, I’m not going to lose everything I’ve earned in life. The president will hear your complaint, he’ll call the attorney general, they’ll move heaven and earth, and yes, maybe it will be bad for Bonso. But free Milena? Never. She’ll end up in Costa Rica or Argentina in an arrangement not too different from the one she has in Mexico.”
“It’s hard for me to believe a secret bookkeeper could influence the decisions of the president or carry more weight than you, Don Víctor, with all your experience controlling security forces,” Jaime said.
“If I was twenty years younger, I’d be running one of those financial outfits instead of this. You can do without us, but not without them. We’re not talking about secret bookkeepers; these are absolutely legitimate brokers who manage billions of dollars. The financial circuits need them because they offer investment funds with the highest return rates on the market. When the money’s laundered, they reinvest it in bonds, they speculate on currencies in the shady fringes where laws restrict most firms from operating. And everyone turns to them. They don’t have faces, but if they set their mind to it, they can change Mexico’s credit rating at Standard & Poor’s. The
president may or may not have his fortune in their hands, but he will never ignore a recommendation of that magnitude on the part of his own revenue secretary. Wouldn’t you agree?”
“But he also wouldn’t be indifferent to the outcry if the deputy director of the country’s main newspaper was murdered,” Claudia said.
Salgado eyed her up. Fifteen years before, he would have hit on her, and thirty years ago, he would have knocked her off her feet.
“You’re certainly right about that, good-looking. In these matters, blood always comes with a price. Now that they’re better informed, they have no reason to hold onto your deputy director. I’m sure he’ll be set free in the next few hours. But make no mistake: the Croatian will have to go back or the bodies will keep piling up until she does. And from now on, they’re on your conscience.”
Salgado was arrogant, Jaime thought, but he was no fool. Setting Emiliano free would rob them of their opportunity to turn to the president during the lunch Claudia and Tomás had referred to. Not even they, with all their feigned ingenuousness, would dare ask the state to intervene in the case of a foreign hooker.
“Then tell me one thing, Don Víctor. Have you never been curious to meet Milena, to know her secret?” Jaime asked.
“I knew Milena, in the Biblical sense,” he answered, making a gesture to excuse himself to Claudia. “Very beautiful. A little shy. I don’t understand the passions she inspires. But as far as her secret, nothing. And I advise you all to follow my example: it would be the kiss of death for her and for whoever decided to snoop around. The order given has been to keep her alive. But that order ceases the moment she begins to talk about whatever happened in Spain.”
As they left, Claudia commented that the man had seemed to her an intolerable braggart. Jaime thought that behind his self-reliance was an individual scared of change and of the possibility of becoming obsolete. Tomás just said he was a dangerous son of a bitch. The three of them agreed that before they went on protecting Milena, they had to find out about her past.
Milena, or the Most Beautiful Femur in the World Page 19
