by Chris Fabry
“You’re asking me? From what you say, I don’t think we’re safe anywhere, but you won’t go with me to the police.”
“No police.”
“Right. I seem to remember you saying that a time or two.” He told her where he had parked. “How do you think that fellow in the Escalade found out where you were?”
She shrugged.
“It could have been dumb luck that he showed up at Walmart and before that found us out in the sticks. But for him to be heading toward Win’s place is wrong. I think he was tracking us.”
“Maybe your truck had something on it.”
He scratched his face, covered with three or four days’ worth of beard. The shower felt inviting, but he didn’t have a change of clothes.
“He was driving around with a computer, I know that. Wish I’d have thought to take it. But what’s to keep somebody else from doing the same thing?”
She stood and threw the wet towel on the bathroom floor and got another one.
“You don’t have some computer chip planted somewhere in you, do you?” he said.
“Computer chip?”
“You know, those things they put just under the skin of a dog or a cow so they can track it if it runs off or gets eaten by a coyote?”
She shook her head.
“You ever felt any weird bumps? Maybe on your back?”
“Are you asking me to undress?”
“No, I’m not asking that at all.”
She smiled. There was someone she looked like when she smiled, an actress or a singer. Dimples showing in both cheeks. “Are you blushing, J. D.? You are. You’re blushing.”
“Forget I asked. I’m just trying to figure out how he found us.”
She turned her back to him and pulled the hem of her T-shirt up, moving her hair to one side. “Take a look. Do you see bumps that may be computer chips?”
“Put that down; I believe you. I don’t need to see.”
“Look at my back.” She sounded like she meant it. “Stand up.”
She had a tone in her voice that came from privilege, like she’d had practice ordering people around. He got up and moved toward her. She was about five-seven, so he didn’t exactly tower over her. In the dim light there were traces of water from her hair on her skin. Her hair smelled like the cheap hotel shampoo, and he bet she had to use all of it just to get up some lather. It had been a long time since he had been this close to a woman, and the sight excited and pained him.
“It was a dumb idea. How would the guy get a chip in you, anyway?”
She let the shirt fall and turned, running her hands over her arms. “It’s not a dumb idea. The people in our town were frightened that children might go missing. It was a story I heard as a girl.”
“So your mom or dad could have implanted something when you were a kid.” He looked at her legs as she ran her hands along the backs of her arms and her elbows.
A car door slammed outside and J. D. pushed past her to the door. In the distorted view through the peephole, a man in a St. Louis hat got out of an exhausted Ford Taurus wagon. Luggage strapped to the carrier on top and bike wheels sticking out on the back and rust all around. A woman in the passenger seat yelled at the kids behind her as the man stretched and scratched himself.
“Is it him?” Maria said.
J. D. opened the curtain slightly to get a better look at the Illinois license plate on the front of the car. “Is he a Cardinals fan with three kids?”
“What is a Cardinals fan?”
“It’s not him. Or if it is, he’s got a good disguise. What’s Muerte look like?”
She was checking her legs now, still looking for the chip. “Dark hair, a mustache, and that thing down on the chin . . .”
“A goatee?”
“Yes. Always shaved. He uses lots of cologne. He hates to get dirty. Always washing his hands. Stocky build, like a block of ice. Square shoulders. About your height. Maybe a little shorter. And there’s a scar—” She gasped and touched something on the bottom of her calf. “Feel this.”
He ran a finger over the smooth skin and noticed a tattoo near her ankle. A stallion’s head, its mane flowing. “Feels like a chigger bite. Maybe he’s tracking chiggers.”
The mention of the word chigger made her scratch.
“I don’t think you’re going to find anything.”
Maria went into the bathroom and closed the door. J. D. took a deep breath. Something was stirring, something old, and he knew he had to keep his head or things could go downhill fast.
Maria returned and sat on her bed.
“Didn’t find it?”
She shook her head.
“Maybe it was just luck that he found us,” he said. “Or that guy in the Escalade followed us and I didn’t notice him in the rearview. Do you know his name?”
“No. Just that he works for Muerte across the border.”
“Wonder if he had kids?” He said it absently, not expecting an answer. “Wonder if they had something on him to make him do that kind of thing or if he was just plain mean.”
“How old are you?” she said. It came out of the blue, like a leaf fluttering toward the ground in the fall.
“You want to know my shoe size, too? I’m an eleven. And I’m thirty.”
“Do you want to know how old I am?” she said.
“My mother taught me never to ask a woman’s age. But my guess is you have to be at least eighteen.”
She rolled her eyes and frowned. “I’m twenty-five. I get that a lot.” She told him the year she was born, like that would prove it in a court of law, and he studied the high cheekbones and slender nose, the burnished, impeccable skin. Even in the muted light of the room, she glowed like an angel.
“I believe you,” he said. “I didn’t mean you looked like a kid, just not twenty-five.”
“Now tell me about your wedding ring,” she said. “Are you married?”
“I told you I used to be. But I’m not now.”
“You’re divorced? I want to know. I am curious about you, John David.”
“Don’t call me that. It’s J. D.”
“If we are to trust each other, I have a right to know. You said you would answer my questions. Why do you wear a ring if you are not married?”
“It’s not a crime to wear a ring when you’re not married. You wear a ring and you’re not married, right?”
“I wear it on my little finger, and it’s not a wedding band.” She thought a moment and dipped her head, her dark hair veiling her face. “Maybe you think she will come back to you. You wear the ring in the hope of what might be in the future.”
“Maybe I wear it so people won’t ask me questions. Ever think of that?” He said it with an edge he didn’t expect. “I’ve just never taken it off, that’s all.”
She lifted both hands in surrender and walked toward the bathroom. “No more questions then.”
But he wasn’t through. “Since we’re on a roll here with all the trust that’s oozing from you, why don’t you tell me about that bracelet you were wearing? The one around your wrist when I found you.” It seemed like a year since the morning.
“Bracelet?”
“The handcuff. What was the other end hooked to?”
She turned and cocked her head slightly. “It was something I wore that I didn’t want to take off.”
He heard something outside and rose to check it. The wind had kicked up, blowing dust and mesquite beans and trash around the parking lot. The thin door moved. The lock was flimsy and the weather stripping had worn from the edge so that sunlight shone through and hot air blew inside.
“It was a satchel, a leather case,” she said with remorse as if she regretted their argument. As if she wanted to thank him but couldn’t. “The other handcuff was hooked to the handle. It was long and heavy.”
“What was in it? What were you bringing across the border?”
“I don’t know.”
“That makes no sense. How could you not know? Who
gave it to you? How’d you get through customs? You have to know what was in there.”
“I have an idea, but I can’t say for sure. It was locked and I didn’t have the combination. But I knew it was important. He wouldn’t have sent me with it if it wasn’t.”
“Okay, and who is he?”
She looked at him, then at the floor. “Muerte. He was part of it. He suggested it, in a way.”
“So you know him personally. What is he, some guy you dated? You worked for?”
She frowned. “He is not my boyfriend.”
“Is he the one who handcuffed you?”
“No, I did that myself.”
The story wasn’t making sense. “So you came through the border handcuffed to a satchel and they let you waltz through?”
“I did not put the handcuffs on until after we made it across the border.”
“We?”
“Yes, there was a driver.”
“But the Border Patrol didn’t check it? The dogs didn’t go wild?”
“The driver I was with had a contact at the crossing.”
“Maria, this is pretty confusing.”
“It is not that difficult to get through the border when you know the right people.”
He imagined a handshake and a subtle exchange of cash, but that seemed unlikely. Too many cameras. Was she making this up?
“So where’d you get the handcuffs? Or is that just part of your accessories where you’re from?”
She had a far-off look now. “The driver. I took them from him.”
He let the information sift through his mind. Everything about her said she was telling the truth.
The phone rang. It was an old ringer, one that clanged and rattled. Maria was startled but J. D. got another feeling.
10
MUERTE DROVE TOWARD TUCSON, pulling off the interstate twice to view the location of the tracking device. He used his phone instead of a laptop. When the signal became stationary, he proceeded toward his hotel, a historic inn located near the university. The news media had made the nearby medical center a focal point a year earlier when a congresswoman had been shot. Most of the victims had been brought here after the gunman opened fire.
He continued past his hotel to see the hospital. He wanted to get a view of what it looked like without the world’s attention. He smiled as he passed a grassy area where flowers and teddy bears and scribbled messages had once been displayed. The world would again mourn at this spot in three days.
He checked in to his room, which was immaculately clean. He watched the locator as he called in an order at the four-star restaurant downstairs with the room phone, then left the room after noting that the girl’s location hadn’t changed.
The tables in the main dining area were crisp and clean, and at this hour the room was nearly empty. He asked to be seated near the fireplace, where he could see the entire dining area. His seared breast of chicken with prosciutto tomato relish came almost immediately, garnished with garlic mashed potatoes and early squash harvested from local farms. Tonight, to celebrate the first stage of his plan, he would have the Mediterranean seafood paella for dinner, along with a bottle of cabernet sauvignon from a Napa Valley winery and perhaps, if his work went particularly well, a crème brûlée to top off the meal. He did not allow himself haphazard sweets. They made him soft and he needed to be in control of every movement. This was his one indulgence, a dessert tied to the memory of his first assignment for Sanchez.
The hacienda sat on a hill overlooking the valley. The father had been a local constable, and Muerte knew when the family ate dinner together at the hacienda. Muerte was to send a message to anyone who would stand against Sanchez. Alone, disguised as a deliveryman, he had taken out the security guards at the front of the residence with two perfectly placed shots. He had to use three more bullets than he wanted on dogs prowling the residence, and things got messy in the kitchen when the cook, a burly man with arms like tree trunks, tried to block his entrance to the dining room. All were silent deaths, the men and animals collapsing in heaps where they stood, except for this man. His massive body fell against the doorway and into the room.
The man at the head of the table had jumped up in horror and protested, though Muerte could see resignation in his eyes. After the head of the household, Muerte took care of his wife and three children, who looked at him with mouths agape, frozen in their seats. Sanchez had not been happy with the killing of the wife and children, and looking back, Muerte conceded that he should have left at least one living witness who could have described the horror, could have warned others not to try to stand up against the cartel. But it had been his first job. He had learned from his mistakes.
With blood on the tablecloth, he waited for any movement in the rest of the house or grounds, then retreated through the kitchen, spotting several individual servings of dessert for the family. He picked up a spoon and tasted the concoction, something he had never had growing up in Mexico City. He ate an entire serving and took the next with him, along with a silver spoon with the family crest. He had saved it as a memento as one might save a baby picture.
I should keep something from the girl when this day is over, he thought now.
When he had completed his meal, he went back to his room. He had set the temperature to sixty-two and now the air was crisp the way he liked it. He hated being hot as he slept. He used the restroom, washed his face, and dried it, studying himself in the mirror. A little stubble had begun to appear on his cheeks and he used his razor to clean the spots.
When he neared the hotel on the east side of town where the locator showed the girl to be, Muerte slowed and looked for the truck he had seen earlier. It was not in the parking lot or on the street near the building. Had they figured out the tracking device and left it in the room? He checked to see if the device had moved in the past hour, but the sensor wasn’t precise enough to reveal minor movements. He parked across the street and waited, evened his breathing. Stay in control. Do not panic.
A Taurus station wagon pulled in and a man in a red hat got out and stretched. The passenger-side door flew open and a child stuck his head out and vomited. Muerte turned away, then noticed slight movement in the window near the Taurus. He noted the room number and watched the family get their luggage and enter the dilapidated hotel. Then he made a U-turn in front of the office, looking in at the aged desk clerk and deciding he would not engage the man. Better to simply proceed and complete his job.
His job. That sounded good to him. Not taking orders from Sanchez any longer, but making decisions himself.
He pulled to the curb on the street, a few steps from the parking lot and perhaps ten yards from the door of room 12. He would have liked a weapon with a little less firepower, but his main concern wasn’t to avoid detection; it was to take care of the problem. If the noise of the gunfire drew spectators, he would simply eliminate them.
He strode confidently toward the door, holding the TEC-9 close to his body. No hesitation, no stopping to listen at the door or any other movement that would give them time to react. He planted his left foot on the concrete walkway and thrust his right boot firmly near the doorknob. The kick splintered the sun-scorched wood like balsa and the door flew open, the sunlight revealing squalor. There was no one on the beds.
Muerte pulled the trigger and sent a spray of bullets into the bathroom wall and tile and plaster fell. He listened closely for any sound.
Nothing.
He stepped to the bathroom and pushed open the door with the gun muzzle. Beside the sink were bloody bandages. Steam on the mirror. Open shampoo and conditioner bottles on the shelf. Missing tiles in the wall and plaster on the floor. An open window at the back of the room—small but big enough for an adult to crawl through. He cursed and looked out on the alley behind the hotel. He hadn’t checked for the truck there.
When he exited the room, one of the children from the Taurus stood in the doorway of the next room, staring at Muerte. The child was pulled back inside and
the door closed. He heard the distant sound of a siren.
He hurried to his car, looking back for the desk worker, who wasn’t in sight. Probably on the floor praying. Muerte checked the tracking device and cursed again, banging the steering wheel. It had changed positions. They were somewhere east of him moving quickly south. But the siren was coming behind him. He gunned the engine and pulled away.
11
J. D. DROVE AS FAST as he dared in the residential area. He had never been in this part of town and was flying blind down narrow streets with sun-faded cars hugging the curbs.
As soon as the phone had rung in the hotel room, he knew. Something in his gut, some inner intuition, had told him they shouldn’t stop, but he’d pushed that down and let his desire to rest win. The allure of a shower and someplace cool had been too enticing and now he kicked himself for the indulgence.
The desk worker on the other end of the line had mentioned a car across the street and a man wearing sunglasses watching the hotel.
“What’s he look like?” J. D. said.
“Can’t see too good,” the man wheezed. “Looks Mexican.”
J. D. almost dropped the phone. He wanted to run, but the fellow was chatty.
“Hang on, looks like he’s pulling out. Yeah, he’s leaving—no, he’s turning around and coming back.” The man cursed. “He’s pulling in the turnaround. He’s right out front.” The man had moved and his breathing was shorter now. “Definitely Mexican.”
J. D. had enough of the play-by-play. He hung up and grabbed the Uzi from the bed and rustled the handgun from the nightstand. “Your friend’s outside,” he said to Maria. Her eyes flashed with deep fear.
He shoved open the bathroom window and Maria climbed up on the sill. He pushed on her backside to help her through. Such a light woman. Nothing to her, really. Her T-shirt caught on the metal windowsill, ripping as she quickly turned and dropped to the asphalt. He was right behind her, and then they ran through the alley toward the Suburban.
Like a fighter would pull his arm toward a wound, they’d stayed close to the buildings. When he heard the muted spit of gunfire, he stopped and turned. She grabbed his arm and pulled him across the street in a dead run. She was thin, but there was strength to her. And not just muscles. Inner strength. He could sense it, and it both encouraged and frightened him. What had it taken for her to get to this place? And what would it take for her to overcome what was following her? What would it take for both of them?
