“Evening here. I’m sitting on a big old cushy couch, in front of a blazing fire, getting ready to watch a movie on my forty-two inch high def.”
“I take it you are not on the boat, unless you’ve upgraded.”
“Nope, I’m in Arizona.”
“Now, there’s some good news for Mexico,” he teased, then added, “and for me. I’ve heard some disturbing news about the escalating violence south of the border.”
And north of the border, I thought, but I said, “You know how the press is. They exaggerate.”
“So you say. Does this move mean you’ll stay in Arizona until I get back?”
“Uh, not exactly.”
“What does that mean, exactly?”
Evidently the Trob hadn’t shared my latest with him, so I told Jenks about my job, and that I would be commuting into Mexico on a daily basis. He didn’t like the sound of the commute part and said so.
“Jenks, it’s only thirty-five miles to the mine, and the road is good.” I didn’t mention that it is also pretty much deserted. However, since I was on my own clock, I hoped to find a bus that ran in the mornings, drive ahead of it all the way to Cananea so it covered my backside, and do the reverse each afternoon. When I told him of my plan, he seemed to relax. He also liked it that Craig was coming to stay with me.
“You rented a house right on the border?”
“Practically. In Bisbee, and it is a beauty.”
“Bisbee is a beauty?”
“Depends on where you look, according to the locals. There’s historic Bisbee, where Jan and I stayed last December. It’s chock full of what I call New Age cliff dwellers, who, according to Doctor Craig, consist of a big gay population. Old mining town turned artsy. I love it, you would hate it.
“Then there is Warren, where old miners retired, and worker types find affordable housing. Lots of cottage style homes in need of beautification, only a few really brought into this century, but pretty cool in a blue collar kind of way. The house I’ve rented is new, and according to my mailing address, is in Bisbee, so I call it cowboy Bisbee. Whatever, it’s built in a cow pasture, but smack dab on an eighteen-hole golf course. Go figure.”
“You’re on a golf course?” He sounded intrigued, so I tossed a lure.
Picking up a brochure I read the course’s bragging points. “They have a par six, which means nothing to me, but it’s called the Rattler, and is the longest golf hole in the Southwest.”
“I definitely gotta play that one.”
“How about, say, next week?”
“Sorry, I would love to, but no can do. Craig’ll keep you company.”
“Not like you do,” I purred, trying to sound sexy instead of downright desperate.
“I hope to hell not. Honey, I hate to do this, but I’ve got to get going. Already late for a meeting. I’m really glad you’re living in Arizona and found a nice house. I know how rentals can be. I’ll call you tomor— You know what? I have this old friend, Ted Burns, who lives south of you somewhere, in Mexico. Guy I worked with in Desert Storm. He married a Mexican and moved down there to farm. I’ll email him, find out exactly where they are. Maybe you can visit them.”
“A farm? What do they grow, cactus?”
“Her family has been farming that land for several generations, so they must have some kind of cash crop. He’s retired Navy, so I guess they can live pretty good south of the border. Might be a fun trip for you and Craig if they’re nearby.”
“You know me, have car, will travel.”
He chuckled. “Boy, are you easy.”
“Come home, and I’ll show you how incredibly easy I can be.”
“Promises, promises. Sorry Hetta, you know I have to stay here until we wrap this thing up, and this time I don’t want anything to interfere.”
I almost sniped, Anything, meaning me? but bit that back. Instead I tried inveiglement. “Oh, did I mention that this house is on the sixteenth green, and a golf cart comes with the rental?”
“Why didn’t you say so? Screw the project, I’ll be right there.”
“Talk about easy.”
“Golf course or no, I wish I was there with you, right this moment, but it can’t be. Only a couple of months longer. Sorry.”
I sighed. “Me, too.”
We said our goodbyes and I checked out my email before crashing for the night.
According to my inbox, I’d won the lottery in three countries, someone from Liberia wanted to deposit several million dollars into my bank account, and my penis is too small. I deleted everything but the one from the marina office in San Carlos.
I read it once, sucked air, read it again. A man came looking for me, they said, but when the office people wouldn’t give him my email address or phone number, he left a message: Mind your own business and stay away. Lamont.
“Lamont?” I yelled into the empty house. “That’s Nacho!”
A rush of fear, mixed with excitement and, okay, call me fickle, a slight shiver of lust, sent me scrambling for wine. I hadn’t seen Nacho since Christmas eve on that Baja beach, when he shot at me. I’m a sentimentalist, I guess.
I returned with a large glass of red, and reread the message. Mind my own business? That’ll be the day, but what does he mean. Stay away? From where? The boat, or him? Both? He’d used his a.k.a.: Lamont, as in, Lamont Cranston, The Shadow.
Answering the email, I instructed the marina office personnel not to, under any circumstances, tell anyone where I was, hoping I wasn’t too late. Okay, that felt better, but who had I told about the job in Cananea? Only half the regulars at Barracuda Bob’s, and the guys on the dock. Hell, why hadn’t I just taken out an ad during the Super Bowl?
Thinking about it some more, though, I realized not any of them knew I was living in Arizona. Not even the harbormaster knew. All they had was my email address and my prepaid cell number. Relieved, I double-checked the door locks, and found a romantic comedy on STARZ. Of course, I promptly fell asleep on the couch, finally dragged myself to bed after midnight, where I tossed and turned in restless frustration.
Flashbacks of what I call Fun With Nacho and the Thugs came flooding back. I first saw him in a panga, a small fishing skiff, in the company of Paco, who turned out to be a member of one of the most dangerous gangs in the world, Mara Salvatrucha 13, commonly known as MS-13. As if that wasn’t bad enough, Paco was not only a methhead, but a deranged psychopath who preyed on just about anyone who got in his way.
What I didn’t know, until much later, was that Nacho probably saved Jenks and me that day, when he prevented Paco from killing us on the spot, for a can of gas.
Thanks to Nacho, Paco was no more. I figured Nacho, who vanished after the shootout on the beach, was long gone from my life, but evidently not. What on earth, though, did his message to stay away mean? From what? Whom? Where? Crap.
I was, at long last, soundly sleeping when my alarm clock chirped "The Yellow Rose of Texas".
Doble crap.
Chapter 10
La cárcel de Cananea Está situada en una Mesa Y en ella fui procesado Por causa de mi torpeza.
(The jail of Cananea Is situated on a plateau And in it I was processed on account of my stupidity.)— Corrido (folk song) by Rubén Fuentes Written during the Revolution of 1910
I’ve dealt with commute nightmares in Tokyo, San Francisco, Brussels, and Paris, but nothing topped my first day on the road from Naco to Cananea.
Something, an accident I suspected, blocked the main highway, creating a backup comparable to a Los Angeles freeway. After two hours I finally realized the problem wasn’t the wreck I’d suspected, but a Mexican military checkpoint that sprang up since I’d passed this way yesterday. I dug out my passport, my Mexican tourist card, and car registration, the things they normally check. I didn’t have a work permit, but it would never occur to them that I needed one. After all, I am a Gringa.
Nearing a huge ALTO sign, I rolled down my window. When he spotted me, the uniformed inspector’s mout
h fell open. With a look that said, what in the hell is this red-haired Gringa doing out here by herself, he gave me a flat-palmed stay right here sign, whirled, and strode to a nearby tent. I sat tight while another man waved others around me. Within two minutes the first one was back, with another officer on his heels. Neither looked amused.
Number two soldier leaned down, peered into the window, chuffed his cheeks, and demanded, “Why are you on this road?”
My first response would have been, “Because I prefer driving on pavement?” or some other smartassed comeback, but for once common sense prevailed. “I am on my way to Cananea.”
“Why?”
I didn’t think, because it’s there, would win friends, so I blurted, “To visit the mine.”
He did a double take. “Excuse me?”
“I consult at the mine,” I explained, then remembered I didn’t a have work permit. “Temporarily.”
Obviously having a problem wrapping his mind around the concept, he didn’t know what to say, so I explained further. “I am an engineer, and I was just hired by the mine.” I handed him Señor Pretty One’s business card. “You can call my jefe, Señor Orozco.”
He snatched the card and went back to his tent. I was sleep-deprived, hungry, and needed to pee, so the ten minutes he was gone seemed interminable. Finally, as I was eyeing a nearby bush as a possible pissoir, he strode back, gave me my business card, actually smiled, and said, “You may pass, but you must be careful on this road.”
“Can I ask what the trouble is?”
“Please, you go.”
“Okay, thanks, I think.”
I made a pit stop at the next Pemex station, paying their exorbitant five-peso bathroom fee. The military presence on the road was heavy, but no one messed with me again until I reached the mine’s main gate. The old man and dog who normally slept there were gone, replaced by soldiers.
Once again, I went through my song and dance as to why they should let me pass—don’t these people talk to each other?—and was told to wait. If this was the kind of commute I faced every day, the Trob and I were in for some serious renegotiations on my contract.
I waited, sandwiched between a line of what looked liked sullen fourteen-year-olds packing automatic weapons, and glowering miners hopefully packing nothing but attitude. Both groups eyed me suspiciously, making me feel guilty of something. By the time a bedraggled Maria arrived on foot fifteen minutes later, I’d broken into a light sweat despite the almost freezing temperature.
Maria convinced the military dudes that I wasn’t some kind of norteamericana subversive, and as we headed for the office in my car, she clued me in.
“When the troubles started yesterday afternoon, Señor Orosco told me to call you not to come here today, but you did not answer. I left a message.”
“Sorry, my Mexican cell phone doesn’t work in Arizona. I’ll give you my new US number. Did you call Mr. Wontrobski?”
“Yes, he said he would tell you. He did not?”
Crap, I’d turned off my cell after talking with Jenks and was so groggy this morning I flat forgot to turn it on. “He probably tried, Maria, but I missed his call. Oh, well, here I am. What is going on?”
“After the judge in Mexico City ruled this strike illegal, the strikers are very angry because they can now lose their jobs and be replaced. They have control of some facilities, and would not allow us to leave last night. We slept here, but the soldiers have arrived to stop…el alboroto.
I grabbed my Spanish-English dictionary. Alboroto: uproar. “Why are they, uh, uproaring now? Haven’t they all quit work anyway?”
“Oh, yes, they do not work, but most still receive pay from the union. Now, they might never work here again. They have homes and family. Some have lived here for many years. And now there is a problem with the union. The leader left for Canada with all the money. It is very complicated.” She looked about nervously, moved closer, and whispered, “Poison.”
“Poison?”
“They say bad things are in this air, and maybe the water. We are not to speak of it.”
Poison? I looked around for a facemask and oxygen cylinder, but finding neither, went online to see what she was talking about. Between a Mexican newspaper article and the handy dandy Spanish translator program in my laptop, it didn’t take long to find out why I was hired to put together a list of equipment required for a quick revamp.
A volunteer group of occupational health professionals wrote a scathing condemnation, alleging the mine was deliberately run into the ground, with no effort made toward maintenance, repairs, or safe mining practices. I made a note to myself to ask for a copy of any purchase orders for items, like basic filters, that would at least denote someone tried, but one look at the dusty offices told another story. The health professionals claimed, as a result of gross negligence and downright greed on the part of the owners, workers were being exposed to high levels of toxic dust and acid mist.
Lighting the flame under an already volatile situation, a three-year wildcat strike, which shut down the mine, was deemed illegal by a court in Mexico City. Over seven hundred Mexican troops, with the assistance of the local, federal, and state police, arrived to quell the union uprising. Nevertheless, miners still blockaded the gates, a riot ensued, tear gas and pellets were fired, trucks burned, and some facilities on the other side of the mine were damaged by Molotov cocktails. About fifty miners were now holed up in key locations on site. What we had here was a true Mexican standoff.
And I thought this job was going to be boring. Gee, thanks, Wontrobski.
I checked the US news for reports of this situation. Mama would pitch a hissy if she flipped on the news and saw her daughter, once again, in the middle of a controversy, especially one that involved Molotov cocktails. And Jenks? I didn’t even want to think about what he’d say.
Maria, after whispering poisonous news in my ear, added, “Please let me know it you need anything,” and left the room.
My Net search garnered good news, not so good news, and extremely bad news.
Although the strike and escalating tensions were mentioned in some Arizona papers, it wasn’t important or catastrophic enough to catch the attention of big networks. They needed something bigger like, Hetta Coffey and Thousands Others Massacred by Mexican Police, details at five. So, in this case, no news was good news.
The Mexican press gave mention that one of their own had, several weeks before, written an article on the overall situation in Cananea. He reported that, exacerbating the loss of over two million dollars a day by the mine and a corresponding economic disaster in the area, drug activity and gang crime were on an alarming rise. Just weeks before two gangs clashed and dozens of drogistas were killed, but not before they kidnapped, tortured and murdered several ranchers and policemen. Again, the US news networks let it slide, probably because in Phoenix or just about any other city large in the US, this kind of story is daily fodder.
However, as I read the next article, I whispered, “Oh, boy,” to myself. Just yesterday, the reporter in the last article was murdered, along with his entire family. Shot in their home, execution-style. AP was on the story, it was flashing on the home page of most every Internet user in the world, and would, of course, be news at five. It was probably all over FOX and CNN already. Sigh.
Oh, yeah, my parents and Jenks were gonna be mighty riled when news of riots and murder in Cananea hit the American media. I didn’t think it would warrant more than a blip, certainly not a crawler, but the word, MEXICO, catches Mom’s attention now like PIZZA does mine.
They’d all demand I quit this job immediately. It would do no good arguing that Dad dragged his family all over the world, into some fairly unhealthy climates, both weather-wise and political, or that Jenks was now in Jihadist territory. Nope, they’d focus on the dangers of my situation, but I’ve never been a quitter.
Turning from the computer, I decided since I was probably going to be out of a job one way or another, I’d rack up some billabl
e time. I compiled a master equipment and operating spares list. Maria brought me a boxed lunch a little after noon. I thought this was great service until I realized the delivery meant we still couldn’t leave the premises. She did, however, assure me that by quitting time everything would be under control, and we could go home. I was not assured.
On the bright side, my lunch included the best carne asada burrito I’d had in a long time, served with—and this was totally foreign to any office I’d ever worked in—two ice cold beers. How could anyone be expected to quit a job with those perks?
I was happily munching away, proving once again that good food and booze can temporarily take my mind off anything, when a harried, but still handsome Señor Orozco strode in and caught me in mid-bite. He was flanked by two burly uniformed men, both sporting flattop haircuts and swarthy scowls. Arm patches indicated they were something federal. Now what?
“Miss Café, I must ask you to leave at once.”
“Gee, Señor Orozco, I’ve been bounced off better sites, but you haven’t even given me a chance to screw things up yet.”
His frown softened, then he grinned. “Ah, a joke. I am not dismissing you, it is that we simply cannot have you crossing the strike line again.”
I pointed to the files and drawings I was working on. “So, then, how do you expect me to do the job you hired me for?”
“You may take what you need home with you. Maria will help pack as many records as you can carry today, then these officers will escort you to the border. When you need more files, fax a list and we will bring them to you. And please, call me Juan.”
“As in Don Juan?” My flirt made them all smile, so I added, “In that case, Juan, you can drop the Miss and just call me Café. Can I get more of these burritos thrown in with those files you’ll send?”
“Café, I will deliver them personally, if that is what you wish.”
¡Carumba! Burritos and Don Juan?
A deal like that could turn a girl’s head.
Chapter 11
Just Deserts (Hetta Coffey Series (Book 4)) Page 6
