“That obviously increases the difficulty level.”
“And there’s a further element to consider. All three need to occur within a short time frame. If there’s latency between the deaths, it will open the door for the others to set up alternative partners, which defeats the purpose.”
El Rey studied Tovar’s face. “Since when is CISEN in the antidrug business?”
“That’s outside of the scope of this assignment. But we’re in the do-whatever-the-president-says business, if that’s a broad enough hint, and the decision has been made, for whatever reason, that this group has to go.”
“Timing?”
“Within the next ten days.”
“Impossible. It will require careful planning. Can’t be done in that time. Sorry.”
“It has to be.”
El Rey shook his head, as if admonishing a child. “You’re asking the impossible, and I’m not going to rush into anything and get killed because of poor planning by clueless bureaucrats. I want to see Bernardo. If you don’t have the stomach to tell him he’s dreaming, I will.”
Tovar frowned, and then his tone softened, conceding defeat. “How much time do you think it will take?”
“I need to research the particulars. The admiral’s still in the hospital?”
“Yes. He has multiple gunshot wounds.”
“I saw something about that on the television. Was that you?”
“No. Apparently he has many enemies. The cartels included.”
“It was sloppy enough.”
“We agree on that.”
El Rey opened the file and stared at the photograph of the admiral for several long moments. “Is there anything else?”
“I need your commitment.”
“As I’ve said, I can’t do it on your schedule, and I won’t know how long it will take until I’m able to do some research.”
Tovar looked unhappy, but nodded. “When can you let me know? Time is of the essence.”
“I’ll need a few days. And some logistical support.”
“Such as?”
“Access to your database. This will require as much information as I can get my hands on.”
Tovar considered the demand. “I can arrange for you to have remote access, but they don’t want you anywhere near headquarters. You don’t exist, and we don’t want to do anything to change that.”
“Yes, I can appreciate that if something went wrong and it were to become known I was connected with you…well, it wouldn’t play well.” He glanced out the window. “Drop me off two blocks up, on the right. There’s a Greek restaurant there. I’m hungry and tired. I’ll find my own way home.”
“Contact me tomorrow morning, and I’ll get you into the system.”
“I’ll call you in three hours. No point in delaying.”
Tovar depressed a button, activated the intercom, and instructed the driver to pull over at the restaurant. El Rey sat forward as the big car moved over two lanes.
“What’s the budget?”
“There’s no set figure,” Tovar said, his eyes darting to the side.
“Any time the sanction is international, it introduces expenses that are orders of magnitude greater than a domestic action, especially on a high-profile target.”
“We are not without experience in these matters,” Tovar snapped.
“Good. Then you won’t be surprised when I have costs calculated. There will be no negotiation. Whatever I think will be necessary will have to be provided without question. Is that a problem?”
“No. Within reason.”
El Rey’s voice was almost inaudible as the car slowed.
“You want me to take out one of Mexico’s top naval officers, the archbishop of Tijuana, and a celebrity American film star, and do it without anyone suspecting anything. There’s nothing reasonable about that.”
“As I said, we understand what we’re dealing with. You’ll have whatever support is necessary.”
Tovar watched El Rey collect his bags and melt into the procession of pedestrians on the busy sidewalk near the restaurant. He waited until the car was moving again, slipped a cell phone from his pocket, and made a call, his voice a murmur as the limousine continued along the wide boulevard. The vague sense of unease the assassin’s presence inevitably caused lingered like the taint of ptomaine, and his eyes roved over the liquor bottles in the side compartment as he considered flushing the sour taste of fear away with a few swallows of liquid courage.
Chapter 7
Carla Vega strode across the busy floor of the network, nodding to several colleagues as she went, everyone in their usual mad scramble and too busy to slow down. She approached the corner office where a black-haired woman in a tailored cream-colored blouse and designer slacks sat behind an imposing desk in a glass-enclosed lobby.
“Good morning, darling. You look fabulous today. You have to tell me where you got that outfit,” Carla gushed as she greeted her friend Lupe, the receptionist for the network boss who ran the news division. They kissed each other’s cheeks, and Carla whispered to Lupe, “What’s this all about?”
“I don’t know. He just said he needed to see you first thing. Beats me. You know how he is.”
“Nothing more? Sounds ominous.”
“I wouldn’t be too worried. He worships the ground you walk on. You’re a ratings diva, as if you weren’t aware.”
“Well, we’ll see what the Gorgon wants.”
Carla took a seat on the contemporary leather slab sofa in the antechamber, prepared to wait the obligatory five minutes required for her superior to establish whose time was the most valuable, and was surprised when Lupe’s line buzzed and she looked up.
“He says to go right in.”
Carla glued her famous smile in place and breezed into Silvino Galindo’s office, trailing a cloud of expensive perfume. Galindo rose as she entered and motioned to his conference table.
“Carla, as always, a pleasure. Please have a seat. I’ve ordered coffee.”
“Thank you, Sil. You know the way to a woman’s heart.”
“Hardly. If I did, you’d think I’d have mounted a better offensive in any of my three marriages.”
“Their loss. And what’s that saying? Number four’s a charm. How is Adriana, anyway?” Carla traveled in the same social circle as her boss, and liked the newest Señora Galindo, who was three years younger than Carla and thirty fewer than her husband.
“Oh, full of energy and ambition. Just what the doctor ordered,” Galindo said, and they both pretended that the office gossip wasn’t filled with rumors that the enigmatic Galindo would soon have an opportunity to explain to the hungry tabloids why his latest romantic entanglement had crashed and burned. Adriana was an actress of marginal abilities but renowned libido, whose magnetic performance in the telenovela Corazón Valiente had attracted the powerful division head’s eye. Love had found a way to bridge the age difference, Galindo’s considerable family fortune and the exposure he could bring to an enterprising thespian’s career in no way responsible for how quickly and deeply Adriana had been swept off her feet.
“Be sure to give her my regards.”
They made small talk until Lupe entered with the coffee service and deposited it on the table, and then Galindo got down to business with none of his customary circumlocution.
“I couldn’t help but notice you all over the news yesterday. That was spectacular footage of the attack on the admiral.”
“Yes, it was rather, wasn’t it? But it was more Blasio’s doing than mine. I just stood there and looked pretty while he caught the shot,” she said, crediting her cameraman.
“You certainly have a talent for being in the right place at the right time, though, don’t you? But I don’t recall green-lighting a trip to Ensenada,” Galindo said, his casual tone always a warning to those who knew him well.
“Well, I don’t bore you with all my whims, Sil. I’m fully aware that you have more important fish to fry than my every human-interest
story.”
Galindo poured her a cup of coffee, the fine china cups gleaming in the fluorescent office light, and they sat quietly as they attended to their drinks like chess players before an important move.
“Still, I do like to know what my star reporter’s up to. A boat christening is hardly the stuff someone with your stature should be wasting her time with,” Galindo said with a fake smile, the reprimand clear in spite of the flattering words.
“What’s that American saying? All’s well that ends well. Our footage was by far the best of the attack on the boat. We’ll get a lot of mileage out of it. Providence blessed us, which is all I can ask.”
“It was brilliant, no question. But I do have a concern. You can’t help but be aware that we’re grooming you to be the next anchor for the evening news, ahead of several of your colleagues who have considerably more experience. I think you’re perfect for the job, but it’s not an easy sell to the stodgy old farts I have to convince, and it doesn’t help when I’m blindsided by your having disappeared to Baja, regardless of how well it turned out. To be a real contender for the job, you can’t be involved in controversy. I thought we’d discussed that.”
Carla nodded, seeming to agree even though her pulse was thundering in her ears. So this meeting was all about control. She hadn’t told him because he would have sent someone more junior, and she had ulterior motives in trying to get to the admiral. But this wasn’t a battle she needed to fight – she had other, more pressing objectives.
“A very valid point, and believe me, controversy was the furthest thing from my mind when I went to a boat christening. Obviously I had no way of knowing it would turn into a battle zone.” She fixed him with doe eyes and beamed a megawatt smile. “Perhaps we should discuss some of my upcoming projects, to make sure I stay out of trouble?”
“I’d like that. What does your month look like?”
She took him through three stories she wanted to pursue, knowing he would shoot two of them down – as with their neighbor to the north, the media in Mexico was largely a public-relations machine for the pecuniary interests that ran the country, and each network was owned or funded by one of the political parties whose coverage of their political adversaries was always so lurid and exaggerated that nobody believed anything they reported. Carla’s network was fortunate enough to be the apparatus for the sitting president’s party, but in spite of the position of relative power from which it operated, she still had to tread lightly on certain topics, which were usually the ones that interested her the most.
After he had predictably declined the decoy stories, she arrived at one of the ones she really needed approval for: covering an awards ceremony in Hollywood in six days, which was the type of vapid fluff she despised but Galindo ate up. He was a career man who viewed his role as one of providing entertainment, which conflicted with her belief that the job of a news reporter was to investigate real issues – topics that were sensitive, even dangerous. They’d butted heads over it, but had arrived at an uneasy truce where she sought approval for anything of consequence, even if she often misrepresented her reasons for wanting to cover a story.
Both were comfortable with the game of cat and mouse that ensued, Galindo’s role to try to figure out the level of discomfort one of Carla’s tangents might produce with his masters and quash the more inflammatory before she could pursue them, and Carla’s to offer only the most innocuous of reasons for wanting to dig into anything. The relationship seemed to work, even if occasionally her famous temper got the better of her in volcanic flare-ups that were the delight of the gossip columnists that covered the trade.
“The People’s Choice Awards? What’s the local angle?” he pressed, probing for anything that might reveal her true motives.
“Several of our stars have important crossover roles and have been nominated for honors. It’s an important stepping-stone to the Oscar coverage, which I’ll also be doing.”
“How long do you foresee being in Los Angeles?”
“No more than two days. The usual red-carpet thing, some interviews, party coverage. I’d really rather you send someone else, but I know how you like to stick me in evening gowns,” she teased.
“That’s better than you wanting to tackle one of the narcotraficantes or take on state-level corruption,” he said, referring to her last two bombshell research projects, the latter of which had resulted in enough public outcry to bring about the arrest of a state governor for corruption – unfortunately, one of the president’s party’s brighter lights. Galindo had let it be known that his ass had endured a roasting, although she thought he was secretly pleased that his star reporter had proved her mettle.
“This will be commentary on whose shirts the celebs are wearing and how short the starlets’ dresses are.”
“You had me at short dresses. Consider that on the schedule. What else do you have?”
She floated two more ideas, the second of which tied into her trip to the U.S. He approved both, and they spent a comfortable fifteen minutes bantering about who was rumored to be sleeping with whom and at which soirees they could expect to run into each other. Carla actually liked Galindo, their differences notwithstanding, and because of their status in the Mexico City entertainment hierarchy, they saw more of each other at events than they did at work, which was fine with her. She’d lulled him into lowering his skepticism over her story choices, and had gotten approval for both of the jobs she secretly wanted to cover, without tipping her hand. Carla had no doubt that he would have blown a gasket had he suspected the truth, so what he didn’t know was actually best for them both.
“Well, as always, a pleasure, Carla. Do keep me in the loop if you decide to take any more unscheduled trips,” Galindo said as they parted.
“Absolutely, Sil. I mean, what are the odds that another helicopter will be shot out of the sky on my watch?” she said with a wink and a toss of her hair, leaving him off-balance, as always, wondering what he’d missed in their discussion. “See you tomorrow night at the museum opening.”
“Oh, is it Tuesday already? Yes, will do. See you then.”
He watched as she strode out of his office, her butter-soft chocolate leather pants doing justice to her every graceful move, and shook his head. She was a thoroughbred, but like all stars, could be a handful. His thoughts turned to his wife and her latest demands, and the banal discussion with Carla receded into the soup of office mundanities swirling around in his head.
Carla stopped at Lupe’s station and thanked her for the coffee.
Lupe leaned toward her and whispered conspiratorially, “Did you slip one past him?”
Carla pretended surprise and then winked. “What would be the point of coming to work if I didn’t? Are we on for lunch today?”
“I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”
Chapter 8
Atlangatepec, Tlaxcala, Mexico
The first faint rays of dawn painted the eastern sky with orange and pink. On the horizon, a line of plum-colored clouds darkened where the peaks of the surrounding mountains jutted into the heavens like crooked teeth. Lieutenant Fernando Briones peered through a pair of binoculars from his hiding place behind a barn a quarter mile away from the edge of a dirt airstrip, his radio volume turned low, the engine of his Ford Lobo truck idling. He checked his watch impatiently and glanced at the officer in the passenger seat, who, like Briones, wore a dark blue bulletproof vest with Federales stenciled in white across the back, and clutched an M16 assault rifle with nervous fingers.
“Still no sign of anyone,” Briones murmured. The stakeout, in a rural agricultural area fifty miles from Mexico City, had been mounted in response to a tip about an inbound shipment of methamphetamines that was supposed to arrive at dawn in the hold of a private plane. It was to be picked up by members of the Knights Templar cartel and distributed in the capital’s barrios, where the cheap drug’s consumption had reached epidemic proportions along with a steep rise in associated violent crime. Under ordinary circumstanc
es, the shantytowns that housed the untouchables of Mexico were as dangerous as any in the country, but since the cartels had begun distributing meth to the poor there, bloodshed had exploded and now rivaled the most infamous favelas of Brazil.
“Here comes the welcome committee,” the officer said, watching two Cadillac Escalades bounce down a dirt track that led to the far end of the rutted runway.
Briones whispered into his radio. There were four other federal police trucks behind the barn with him, each with a complement of heavily armed men in the truck beds, wearing full assault gear including helmets and facemasks, and another half dozen vans and trucks on the other side of the runway behind a complex of storage sheds.
The narco-traffickers’ SUVs coasted to a stop in a cloud of dust, headlights illuminated, and the doors swung wide. Eight men emerged, four with submachine guns, and surveyed their surroundings as they stood by the vehicles.
Briones’ radio chirped back confirmation that his officers were ready to move, and he returned his full attention to the gunmen. The shipment tip had come anonymously, no doubt from a rival gang trying to make life miserable for their competitors, but Briones didn’t care. If he could stop one day’s flow of meth, he’d be happy. Too many were paying with their lives for the damage the drug did, and it was now the number one problem for the anti-cartel task force in Mexico City, heroin and cocaine having fallen out of favor as the cheaper synthetic took hold.
The air smelled of freshly turned soil and freshly cut grass, and the pasture next to the airstrip glistened with dew as the sun rose into the sky like an angry Aztec god. Briones cocked his head, ears perked, as the faint hum of an approaching plane droned from the south. He swung his binoculars toward the sound and spotted the outline of a Beech Baron 58 twin-engine prop plane against the brightening sky.
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