Regret No More

by Seb Kirby

  Franks sought to be reassuring but his words had the opposite effect. “No. We traced the call but the trail was dead by the time we could get there to check it out. It was made from a bar somewhere in Tijuana but the bar owner couldn’t or wouldn’t recall anything.”

  “So what do you want?”

  “We want to protect you.”

  “In return for what?”

  “In return for your help in finding Alessa Lando.”

  “And what makes you think I would be of any help? You must have so many more able people?”

  “We know what you did in Florence, James. How you got under the Lando’s skin. How you blew them apart. We think if anyone can find a way to Alessa Lando it’s you.”

  “You mean you want to use us as bait.”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  I could feel my anger rising. “Then what would it be if it wasn’t that? Now Matteo’s coming after my family, you think you can find a way to use that to ensnare him and then somehow smoke out Alessa.”

  Franks glanced over at Julia again. “You have a lot to lose, James. We’re dealing with people who will stop at nothing to avenge what they see as a wrong against them.”

  “So, this is a threat, isn’t it? You’ll lead Matteo to us if that’s the only way of getting to Alessa?”

  “I’m not saying that. Just that if there were others on my side who might be thinking along those lines we could talk them out of it if you offered a better way to get to her.”

  “And it’s just a coincidence that Matteo has waited all this time to come after us?”

  He didn’t answer. “Look, I’m here to help. Accept that help.”

  With that, he stood to take his leave. “Think about it, James. What’s best for you and your family. We’ll talk again in the morning.”

  Julia came and sat close as we waited for the sound of Franks’ vehicle to fade into the distance. “Jim. Tell me it hasn’t started all over again.”

  I couldn’t get Agent Franks’ words from my mind.

  You have a lot to lose, James.

  It was a threat. And what he’d said was right.

  In the three years since Julia’s escape from Florence, we’d built a new life as the Harringtons. No one would have called it glamorous but we had most of what we wanted and we were happy.

  I had a job in Weymouth, giving mortgage advice with The Dorset Building Society. It wasn’t as interesting as my work in London with the radio station but it had its merits. Helping young couples find a way to move into their own home for the first time was a reason for quiet satisfaction.

  Julia had found work in a gift shop that sold paintings and pottery produced by local artists. It was a long way from her career in conservation at the Clinton Ridley Studio in Mayfair but, again, her work had its interests and satisfactions as she saw local artists making sales of their work.

  The Dorset Building Society encouraged employees to work with local charities and I was now a volunteer with the Weymouth Food Bank on The Esplanade. Local families came to collect food twice a month.

  What the families needed was work and money. What they got, with the recession biting deep in places like Weymouth, was help to put just enough food on the table to keep their family together. It was a blow to the self-esteem of each and every one of them to come to the Food Bank and ask for help; I knew that. I felt the anger and shame of every one of them. My troubled upbringing in Birmingham had left me with no illusions about what they were going through.

  It wasn’t all about hardship. I was coaching football again and had risen to the rank of deputy manager of a team of fifteen year-olds who played in the Weymouth League on Sundays. They were as committed and as enthusiastic as the players I’d coached in London. The lads played each match to win and tried hard to apply the tactics I was teaching them.

  It wasn’t glamorous but it was what we wanted.

  Julia was recovering from the ordeal of Florence. It would take more time but she was gaining perspective every day on what had happened.

  She’d taken a break from work to prepare for the birth of our baby. The prospect of our first child was the greatest satisfaction of all.

  We were safe.

  We were happy.

  We did not want anything to change.

  Chapter 6

  It was a short drive yet it was a million miles away if you were on the wrong side.

  The responsibilities of Wolfgang Heller’s profession demanded high-class travel but with anonymity, so he was making the drive across the border to Mexico in a hired Buick. It was big enough to be comfortable yet not ostentatious enough to get him noticed.

  The border crossing looked like any other tollbooth at an expressway where you pulled up and paid the fee. That was until you noticed the lines of vehicles held up on the opposite lanes trying to get in being hauled over to be searched. You could enter the Third World with ease but leaving it was another matter. Heller was waved through into Mexico with a nod and no need to show his passport.

  The assembly plants nestling just on the Mexico side soon gave way to the desert and the giant fence that kept the world out from the US. Here and there he could make out the crude wooden crosses left on the high wire mesh fence to commemorate those who had tried to make it into the land of prosperity but had failed. There was a large number of them. For Heller there was no excuse for failure no matter what the circumstances. He shouted as he drove past. “Losers!”

  It was just a short hop to Tijuana and Avenue de la Revolucion, a flea-bitten strip with gift shops selling knock-off watches, with poisonous cafes and countless stores selling cloned prescription drugs to an American middle class that couldn’t afford them in their own country. And off the main strip, there were the prostitute dens and the all-day joints dealing in drugs. No wonder the whole town was so poor when everyone was trying to sell the same things. No wonder that the whole place was presided over by a painted donkey passed off as a zebra. And no wonder that there were twelve other painted donkeys lying in wait. The paucity of the illusion reminded him of everything he found unsatisfactory about the town.

  Yet the Landos had a history here. Heller would never have come to a town like this but he knew if he worked for Matteo he would have to tolerate the place as long as he wanted it that way.

  Heller would have to find a way of telling him that the hit had not succeeded, that the target in San Diego was no longer there when he called.

  Chapter 7

  It was approaching eight PM when two police vehicles drew up outside the house. I could see three silhouetted figures through the glass in the front door. One of them reached out and rang the doorbell.

  “Charles Harrington?”

  “Yes.”

  I opened the door a crack.

  “Can we come in? We have some questions.”

  He was young and he introduced himself as Detective Inspector Martin Reid. His two uniformed colleagues stood silent beside him.

  “Can’t we do this some other time? My wife is sleeping.”

  “That would be Mary Harrington?”

  “Yes. Who else?”

  “It’s urgent. We’ll take up as little of your time as necessary.”

  I opened the door to let them in.

  “How do you know Agent Franks?”

  His eyes were taking in the disorder in the room. It looked bad, I know. We’d decided we couldn’t stay here after Franks’ visit. Julia went to bed to rest but couldn’t sleep. I started packing everything we might need into our travel luggage. Now it was sitting there as suspicious as a murder of crows, evidence waiting to be collected.

  I decided to stall. “Agent Franks?”

  He showed me a photograph of Franks that looked like it had been taken from a records database. “Do you know him? It’s a simple enough question.”

  The two million dollar price on our heads meant we could trust no one. Money of that order loosened tongues. That applied even to those as dependable looking as DI Re
id.

  “I don’t know him. Why are you asking me this?”

  He told me Franks had been found dead. Franks had used his satellite navigation to find us on his visit here and our coordinates were still programmed into the machine. The police knew exactly where to come.

  I wanted to ask how Franks had died but I knew any concern I showed would be interpreted as proof I was lying. I had to show no interest.

  “I’m sorry for his loved ones, Inspector, but I have to tell you this means nothing to me.”

  “Even though we found the co-ordinates to this house on his satellite navigation?”

  “I can’t be held responsible for that. Maybe he had a reason to come here.”

  “And what might that be?”

  “How could I know? He never came. I’ve never met him. He could even have had the wrong address.”

  “So you can’t help.”

  “How could I?”

  DI Reid’s attention returned to the luggage. “You’re thinking of traveling?”

  “Annual holiday. We’re visiting my mother in Edinburgh.”

  “I think you’ll understand that we’ll need to keep in close touch with you. In case we have further questions.”

  “Of course.” I gave him a false address in Edinburgh. “You can contact us there.”

  Within an hour of their leaving I had the luggage packed into the Land Rover and Julia and I were on our way to London.

  It would not take Reid long to realize I’d given him a false address which in itself would tell him I wasn’t being straight with him. But this was preferable to waiting it out in the house not knowing who would get to know we were there.

  Chapter 8

  Alvaro Gutierrez liked the fear that came to all around him when anyone spoke his adopted name, El Romero.

  As El Romero he had a reputation. The trademark enforcement of his will was to return the bodies of those who had gone against him to their families with their hands cut off and their tongues ripped out.

  His power extended to every aspect of life in the Baja. Those in the police and in local government who were not on his payroll were so aware of the dangers of taking on his Soto cartel that they offered no threat. Some said he was the most important man in Baja, if not in the whole of Mexico.

  To be feared and to be hated were necessary evils to maintain the absolute control over the Soto cartel that was required if he and each and every one of its members were to survive. The pickings were rich indeed, fuelled by those well-dressed and well-educated gringos who couldn’t get enough of the cocaine he shipped up from Columbia.

  Absolute loyalty, absolute control was essential if they were to defeat the twin evils that stalked them. The Vargas cartel headed by Johnny Rivenza was a constant menace, all the time trying to move in on the Baja when it had been agreed amongst the council of cartel owners in the whole of Mexico that the territory belonged to El Romero. And there was Pedro Martinez, the new chief of police who, like so many before him, had threatened to close down the cartels and the drugs trade with them. Unlike the others, Martinez had not been swayed by the promise of money or threats to himself and his family. There were even those who were saying Martinez was in this for real.

  So, sad to say, the conflict around El Romero had cost lives. He wished it didn’t have to be that way but this was about survival, pure and simple.

  He turned to Luiz Reyas, his right hand man, who was waiting for his instructions. When recruited Reyas had twenty small star tattoos on his right forearm, meaning he’d killed twenty men. Now the number was over one hundred. It was a testament to the difficult times in which they lived.

  “Luiz, I want you to keep a close watch on the German.”

  “Senor Heller?”

  El Romero nodded. “I don’t trust him. I want to know everything he does.”

  Luiz replied, “You have my best efforts, El Romero. But it will not be easy to keep track of such a man.”

  “Luiz, I can help. Rui will place a tracker in the German’s phone.”

  El Romero had confidence in Rui Velasquez who was to the cartel all things technical. He had the skills needed to keep surveillance on police and military radio and Internet communications. He provided the means they drew on to find safe passage across the border with the consignments and he was expert at bugging rooms and phones. The lives of Soto members too many to count had been saved by his intelligence.

  Luiz wasn’t yet convinced. “There will be problems if Heller finds out.”

  “He will not. Velasquez has never failed to find a way. He’ll steal the phone while Heller sleeps, fit the bug and replace it. The German will never know.”

  El Romero’s thoughts turned to how he’d become involved with the German. It had been difficult to agree to help. El Romero had thought long and hard before saying yes. But he did owe an obligation to Alfieri Lando who all those years ago had sent men to the Baja to help him seize control and establish the cocaine route into the US and, as a reward for Alfieri’s help, into Italy. With Alfieri dead, what else could he do when Matteo came to him to ask for the favor of assisting Heller in his mission in the United States? There were problems enough here in Tijuana, he knew all too well, without bringing in new, difficult to understand problems from outside. Yet an obligation is what it was and he’d agreed.

  It was different with the earlier obligation, the matter of the Blakes. Matteo had spoken as if he should know them, a sign, perhaps of his isolation when seeing events pass before him from prison. There were those in Europe who were better placed than him to capture the two million. Life was complicated enough here. He was content that he’d discharged the obligation by contacting the right people there.

  Luiz broke the train of thought. “The German is back.”

  El Romero looked up as Wolfgang Heller was shown into the room. “Well?”

  Heller kept eye contact, even though his body posture told that he had not brought positive news. “The house in San Diego was empty. The Ravitz family was no longer there.”

  “A tip off?”

  “Is there another way of explaining it?”

  Why did the German make everything he said into an accusation?

  El Romero tried not to show his pleasure at the thought of Heller leaving again sooner than planned. “A message from Matteo. You’re needed in Austin.”

  Heller looked straight back. “I’ll be out of here on the first ’plane.”

  Chapter 9

  The late night traffic was light as I steered our Land Rover onto the motorway that would take us to London.

  It hadn’t taken long to get going. We’d decided to shed our identities as Mary and Charles Harrington. We would soon be found if we continued to use anything in their names and going back to Julia and James Blake was also out of the question. So, cash and new identities would be required, at least until we could find a way past the threat to our family.

  It had felt like I was staging a robbery as I’d used the Harrington bank card for the last time in the ATM in the deserted street in Weymouth before we’d set out. The cash appeared in the form of fifty crisp twenty pound notes. When I’d tried to repeat the request, the machine displayed a polite ‘refer to your bank’ message and offered no more money.

  There was no doubt this would add to police suspicion but there was no other choice.

  As we traveled on there was an intense shower of rain that lowered visibility and meant I had to concentrate fully on the road ahead. Julia, sitting beside me in the front seat, had concerns that would not wait. “Are you sure we should be doing this, Jim?”

  She’d fought back well from what happened in Florence. It had been three years of steady recovery from the trauma of the sexual degradation that Alfieri Lando had subjected her to and three years of steady recovery from the heroin addiction he’d forced upon her. Her recovery was based on establishing routine around known events at known times that could hold no threat. The news that we were expecting our first child after so man
y years of hoping had given her a real lift. Preparing for the birth of our son had become an important part of the healing routine.

  I knew what was troubling her. “The antenatal appointments.”

  “We’re going to miss them.”

  “We can get into the antenatal system in London. I’m sure it’s every bit as good.”

  “I wish we didn’t have to run like this with so little time to prepare.”

  I tried to calm her. “The important thing is you leave the worrying to me. We can find a way through this.”

  She managed a smile. She looked as beautiful as ever.

  I told her that the danger we’d been placed in posed the greater risk, not just to us but to our child.

  “What choice do we have? Our cover is blown. The threat from Matteo Lando is immediate, I’m sure of it. And if the FBI can find us, the Landos or anyone else after the reward will be able to find us if we stay where we are.”

  “I know that, Jim. But I wish there was another way. The FBI. Maybe they would help?”

  “We’ll try to get their help. And help from the police. But only when we’re somewhere no one will be able to find us.”

  As I drove on, Julia checked for news on her iPad. “It’s here. A local news report from the Weymouth newspaper.

  Man found dead in abandoned vehicle appears to have been shot. Police await post mortem result.

  “And no mention of the FBI?”

  She stroked the screen to make sure she had the full story. “It could be just that the reporter hasn’t been able to file the whole story yet.”

  “Or, the FBI doesn’t want it to be known they’re involved.”

  “Jim, why would they want to do that?”

  “It happens.”

  “You’re making me more scared.”

  “I didn’t mean it to come out that way.”

  “So we run.”

  “We run. And then we find out who we can trust.”

  We traveled on until the traffic slowed as we came off the motorway near Hounslow and began to pass through the London suburbs.