Sea of Cortez

by Garry Ryan

  Arthur handed her two US dollars. “Gracias.” He added a packet of raw sugar to the coffee, sipped and put the cup down on the table. “You were saying?”

  “All that’s happened has brought a bit of clarity. This is what it’s like when the killers are free to go about their business without fear of someone like me hunting them down.”

  Arthur shook his head. “It wasn’t obvious before?”

  “Not to me.”

  “It was obvious to the rest of us.” Arthur took another sip of coffee.

  “You’re going to rub my nose in it?”

  Arthur set his cup down. “A little.”

  Lane looked at a gathering of tourists at the reception desk. “I’ve been that much of a pain in the ass?”

  Arthur nodded. “You shut us all out. Christine took it the hardest, of course, because she’s the most sensitive. Matt did his best to hold things together because that’s what he does.”

  “And you?”

  “I’ve been waiting for you to come back to us.” Arthur lifted his coffee and sipped.

  The late afternoon sun baked the backs of their necks, the sides of their faces and their calves between their socks and the hems of their shorts. Lane had made sure to slather his sunburnt feet with aloe vera before leaving. They walked around the southeast corner of the whitewashed concrete cemetery wall. The gates of the cemetery were chained shut. A cross was sculpted portal-like into the wall beside the ornate black iron gates.

  The concrete sidewalk between the cemetery and the road was mined with manure. Two horseback riders approached. Lane and Arthur stepped to one side. There was the scent of horse, the schnick schnick of the leather tack, a raspberry from the horse and a nod from the rider, whom Lane recognized. That’s the guy who warned Fuentes not to mess with the sea.

  “Beautiful animals,” Arthur remarked as they walked to San José, its church and the weekly evening gathering of artists.

  A silver Ford pickup passed them, braked, pulled next to the curb, stopped and idled. The tropical air intensified the stink of differential fluid, grease and partially digested petroleum. The Ford’s paint was mottled with what looked like salt stains. The passenger window was open. As Lane and Arthur walked past, Lane half expected to find a weapon pointed their way. Instead he saw a thirty-something driver with a thick head of black hair and a greying goatee. The driver leaned right and smiled, then asked, “Señor Lane and Señor Arthur? Me llamo — my name is Alejandro.”

  Lane stopped and took a closer look at the man who relaxed with both forearms embracing the steering wheel. He wore faded jeans and a black T-shirt with a few tattered white letters visible on this side.

  Alejandro said, “A mutual acquaintance said to look out for the two of you. He called me a back-up plan.”

  Lane heard a mixture of American, Mexican and Canadian accents in Alejandro’s English. Still, after what he’d seen this morning, Lane was reluctant.

  “Everybody knows about the murder of Celia Sanchez.” Alejandro lifted his eyebrows so they were visible above the frames of his Ray-Bans.

  Arthur took Lane’s elbow and they began to move toward San José. They ducked under the mauve blossoms of a jacaranda tree. Fifty metres further along, Alejandro’s truck pulled up and stopped. Alejandro climbed out of the truck, rattle-slammed the door, walked up to Lane, handed him a cell phone, crossed his arms and waited with his feet shoulder-width apart.

  “Paul, it’s me.”

  I think this may be the second time Cam has called me Paul. “Who is this Alejandro person?”

  “He’s one of ours. Keely Saliba recommends him. So do I. Do you want to confirm with her as well?” Cam sounded amused but also a bit sarcastic.

  You want frank? Well, then, here we go. “It’s fucked-up down here. Do you have an identity on the young woman murdered this morning?”

  Harper said, “Celia Sanchez. Former mistress of Ignacio Fuentes. Apparently his wife said it was over and Celia didn’t believe it.”

  Lane nodded at Alejandro. That confirms your story. “The entire fucking murder has been sanitized. I saw a couple of guys haul the body away last night. A crew cleaned up the blood and shit this morning. I bet people are beginning to wonder if she ever really existed.”

  “What did you expect?” Cam’s blunt tone added weight to his words.

  Lane felt the old rage in his belly. “Don’t you fuck with me!”

  Cam began to laugh. Lane looked at Arthur, who was smiling. Then Lane turned to Alejandro, who was stone faced.

  The sweet stink of sewage and diesel fumes hung in the air. Lane tried not to inhale.

  Cam coughed. “Good to have you back. Being around you for the last few months was like eating pabulum in a Vietnamese restaurant. Bland when I’m expecting some spice. Either San José is agreeing with you or you want to get on the next plane home.”

  Lane shook his head and cocked his arm to throw the phone onto the roadway to be run over by a bus or one of those vans doubling as a taxi. A black open-track pace car rattled by, Rock Star written across the side. The passenger smiled and cupped his hands, ready to catch the phone.

  “Señor?” Alejandro asked.

  “What?”

  Alejandro was leaning his backside against the front fender of the Ford. “Phones are very expensive here.” He pulled his glasses down onto the tip of his nose so Lane could see his eyes. They were green and intelligent.

  “Lane?” Harper asked.

  Lane put the phone to his ear. “What!?”

  “Alejandro’s on your side.”

  “From where I stand it looks like everyone is on the side of money and guns. Fuentes makes his own laws here.”

  “Maybe right now he does.”

  “What the hell does that mean?”

  “It means that the tourism industry makes more money for Mexico than the drug trade does. Change is coming to Mexico. We need to work with Alejandro so that those changes will make our streets safer as well.”

  Lane opened his mouth to say something, then thought better of it.

  Harper said, “For once I want to take care of the supply side and the distribution side at the same time. I’m tired of putting Band-Aids on the gang problem at our end. There is a willingness on the Mexican side to shut down the suppliers. If we shut down the distribution side, then we can shut off some of the money. The gangs won’t play if there’s no money in it for them. They’re capitalists at heart. I just need someone to tell me which players are at the table down there.”

  “What makes you think I should trust Alejandro?” Lane looked at the man lounging against the truck. Alejandro shrugged his shoulders and looked away.

  “Years ago, Fuentes killed Alejandro’s mother and sister. He wants El Guapo more than we do.”

  The roar of a fast-approaching vehicle made Lane look left. A pair of white Suburbans blasted past with a roar of V8 power.

  Alejandro looked left over his shoulder. “Fuentes and his crowd are on the way to the art show. Are we going or not?”

  “I’ve got to go.” Lane pressed END on the phone and handed it to Alejandro. Then he reached for the passenger-side door handle. “Let’s do this.”

  Alejandro stood up straight, walked around to the front of the truck and climbed in behind the wheel. Lane opened the passenger door and climbed in; Arthur followed. The cab smelled of tobacco, sand and grease. The floor was cluttered with empty water bottles. Arthur slammed the door, Alejandro shifted into first, the clutch shuddered and the transmission whined. Lane looked at the odometer. It was broken, as was the speedometer. It flipped over to sixty, then flopped back below zero.

  They travelled in silence for about two kilometres before Arthur asked, “What’s the plan?”

  Alejandro leaned forward and glanced at Arthur. “We watch Fuentes and his gang, see who they talk with, especially the people who talk quietly. This way we get the lay of the land.”

  Lane watched the traffic just in case Alejandro was too busy t
alking to notice. The way the drivers weave in and out, it’s chaotic.

  Arthur asked, “Aren’t you afraid of being labelled a maricón if you’re seen with us?”

  Alejandro nodded, slapped the wheel and smiled. “Being a maricón will help me become even more invisible.” He slowed for a major intersection where traffic seemed to come from all directions. He crossed the road ahead of a bus that came close to clipping their rear bumper. Then he found a place to park out front of one of the shops selling cigars, tequila and Viagra. Alejandro looked at Lane and Arthur. The Latino lifted his chin and looked to the right. Lane looked ahead to where the pair of Suburbans was parked in front of the courtyard. A bodyguard dressed in black pants, black shirt and a jacket tapped his hair, which was slicked back over the top and over the collar. “I will walk one side of the street and you will walk the other. Just watch me. We cover each other’s backs, agreed?”

  “Okay.” Lane followed Arthur out the door and onto the sidewalk. Alejandro put his sunglasses on his head and crossed the street. By the time they reached the cathedral steps, the streetlights were blinking themselves awake.

  They walked past the open doors of the cathedral, then down a street with narrow sidewalks. Bright shops were adorned with colourful plates, blankets and mariposa bead-work. The Fuentes entourage consisted of El Guapo, his wife, their children, a nanny and three bodyguards. Police dressed in navy blue stood behind the traffic cones and nodded politely as the group passed. The police did the same for Lane as he walked along, his eyes expecting El Guapo’s reflection in shop windows.

  Alejandro took another ninety-degree turn. Lane and Arthur followed. The art in the shop windows changed from the usual brightly coloured pottery to earth tones and African sculptures. The language began to shift from Spanish to English.

  Fuentes walked up the cobbled street and entered a gallery called La Hortencia. Lane turned to look into a shop across the street, then stepped inside. He looked at a polished stone sculpture inside the window. He watched one of the bodyguards, who turned his head left then right to keep an eye on approaching traffic. The man pulled a handkerchief out of his coat pocket, revealing the handgun slung under his left arm. He bent over and wiped the surface of his cream-coloured alligator boots. Lane peered inside the shop. Fuentes was greeting a tall white-haired man wearing a blue shirt. Another man wore a black muscle shirt, revealing tattoos up and down each arm. He completed the look with a ponytail and a handlebar moustache. He approached the pair and joined in conversation.

  “I’ll be right back,” Arthur said. He left the shop, crossed the street, climbed the steps and walked past the bodyguard, who dismissed him with a glance. Moving deeper inside, Arthur accepted a proffered glass of white wine and stood in front of a painting. The painting’s intense reds, blues and mauves depicted an impossibly long-limbed woman on her back on a stack of mattresses. The bottom mattress hunched its spine over a fish bowl. Arthur struck up a conversation with Fuentes’s wife.

  Jesus, Arthur! What the hell are you doing?

  An hour later they watched the white Suburbans drive away. Then they walked over to Alejandro’s Ford. It groaned as they climbed in, and complained some more when Alejandro started it up and drove back the way they had come.

  “Where are we going?” Arthur asked.

  Alejandro said, “You need to see something.” They drove about three kilometres, passing tour buses and taxis. They turned and followed a road up the hill and parked in front of a restaurant called A la Mar in Cabo. Alejandro got out. Lane and Arthur followed. The man at the front door nodded at Alejandro but studied Lane and Arthur before gesturing them inside. Alejandro went to the right side of the restaurant, up a flight of stairs as steep as it was narrow to a room with a bar and a balcony open to the city. The waiter waved Alejandro over and sat them at a table topped with ceramic tiles.

  Lane looked at Alejandro, who said, “My friends run this restaurant and have the best seafood and cold drinks. The wine comes from Mexico and so does the tequila. It’s all good.”

  “What you like, amigos?” the waiter asked.

  They made their orders. After the waiter left, Alejandro asked, “Who was that guy with the tattoos and ponytail?”

  Lane said, “Manny Posadowski.”

  “From?”

  “Calgary. He is high up in the Angels.” Lane watched Alejandro gazing at the lights of Cabo San Lucas.

  Arthur asked, “Who was the guy Manny and Fuentes were talking with?”

  Alejandro nodded. “Luis Bonner. He lives at Palmilla.” He nodded in the other direction toward a hill rising at the tip of a peninsula. The lights of the houses rose like steps all the way to the top of Palmilla.

  “We’re missing some pieces,” Lane said.

  The waiter brought their drinks. A margarita for Lane. White wine for Arthur and red for Alejandro.

  “Which ones?” Alejandro sipped the wine. A brief smile flashed in his eyes.

  Lane closed his eyes when the brain freeze from the blended margarita hit him. I’ve never tasted tequila like this. It’s smoother than Scotch, and the limes have such intense flavour. They must grow them out back. This is potent and delicious.

  Arthur and Alejandro waited.

  Lane opened his eyes. “Manny handles distribution and sales back home.” He tapped his chest with an open palm. “Fuentes takes care of production.”

  “Bonner is the banker. He lives here in the winter and during the summer has a mansion in La Jolla, California.” Alejandro pointed at Palmilla. “Some of the wealthiest people in the world have houses on Palmilla.”

  “And La Jolla.” Arthur lifted his wine glass. “This is delicious, by the way.”

  “Alex is cooking us grouper. It was caught earlier today. The wine will go perfectly with the fish.” Alejandro raised his glass. “You are in for a rare treat, my friends.”

  “Who handles the transportation from here to the States and into Canada?” Lane asked as he took a slow sip of margarita.

  “He is the missing fresa. They call him Keystone.” Alejandro stared at his wine glass.

  “What exactly is a fresa? A tourist, maybe?” Arthur asked.

  Alejandro stared at his wine. “Strawberry. It’s our word for someone who is rich, white and arrogant.”

  “Keystone?” Lane asked.

  “A nickname for the drug pipeline.”

  I recognize that look in Alejandro’s eyes. He isn’t seeing red wine; he’s seeing blood. Lane sat back and looked at the lights on Palmilla. “Who owns the house at the top of the hill?”

  Alejandro smiled. “Bonner.”

  Feeling a little light-headed, Lane locked the nail of his right forefinger behind his thumbnail, held it up, closed his right eye and flicked his middle finger at Bonner’s house.

  Arthur asked, “What the hell are you doing?”

  “Imagining knocking Bonner off his perch.”

  WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 12

  chapter 10

  Uncle Lane,

  It was good to see you and Indiana together the other night. I knew that he was missing you. He slept so well that night.

  I’ve been thinking about what you said about not letting Lola affect us. As far as I can tell that’s very easy to say. She’s Dan’s mother. She’s Indiana’s grandmother. Dan’s sister Linda moved away right after high school to get away from her. And if my mother’s any indication of a person’s inability to change, Lola will always be like this. With the damage she’s done to Linda, Dan and you, I think it will be better if Indiana grows up away from all of that. It took me a long time to even think about forgiving my mother. To tell the truth, I may never forgive her totally. And what Lola did to you was so cold and calculated. Indiana needs to be protected from people like her. People like that do damage so callously and use all kinds of excuses to rationalize their abuse when it’s really about getting what they want.

  By now Matt will have told you that Indy and I have moved back into the house. Just don�
�t let him know that I know. I’m also considering changing my name back to Lane.

  Don’t worry about Indy and me. Matt and Sam are taking good care of us. And yes, I’m still going to class.

  Love,

  Christine

  Uncle Lane,

  We’re doing just fine here. Sam is watching over Indy as if he senses that the little guy needs to be protected.

  Christine is still very angry about what happened and is determined to protect Indy from the kind of abuse she experienced as a child. I can’t really blame her for that.

  The funny thing is that the families we were born into gave us an appreciation for the kind of family you and Uncle Arthur created.

  We’re doing fine. Hope you and Uncle Arthur are enjoying a quiet and restful vacation. Have you seen any whales yet?

  Matt

  Lane sat out on their pool level patio drinking a coffee he’d carried down from the lobby. He thought about Christine, Indy, Matt and Dan. He thought about what he’d learned last night about the drug operation and what it would take to dismantle a cartel.

  “In every culture in the history of the world people drink beer because they like beer!” The male voice carried across the pool, then echoed back from the walls of the resort. Thankfully, for a moment at least, the drunk’s volume was washed away by the sound of a wave crashing against the shoreline. Lane pulled out his phone and checked the time: eight thirty. He leaned left and spotted a black-bearded thirty-something man in the pool. He wore a white ball cap. His hat, head, shoulders and cerveza were visible above the water. He spoke at two women wrapped in towels, sitting on a pair of blue lounge chairs.

  “Beer is the most important fermented drink in history. It served as a water purifier in many societies!” He raised his bottle to the sun as if to illustrate his point.

  A girl of five or six ran along the edge of the pool. She wore a pink dress and a tiara.

  “HEY, KID!” The drunk waved at the child.