Edge of Battle aow-2

by Dale Brown

  But it turned out that Felix Díaz was a good choice for the post, because he appeared to have no burning vendetta against any person or political party and didn’t seem to have any sort of resentment against a woman being his superior. His extreme wealth, and his family’s long-standing policy of siding with whoever was in power or soon to be in power, left him with few strong enemies. He had personal political aspirations, of course—it was no secret that he wanted to be president of Mexico, a position that no others in his family had ever attained. But, typically, politicians in Mexico tried to exploit the least little bit of power they attained, and at least as far as Maravilloso’s trained eye could see, Felix Díaz was not acting like a typical Mexican politician.

  Even so, she was careful to be forever watchful for any signs of a power grab by this man or any other man close to her. No politician in Mexico could afford to be a nice guy, even nice guys like Felix Díaz. She had made a woman’s mistake by letting him take sexual liberties in this, her base of power—that made her vulnerable. If he ever exhibited any desire whatsoever to take advantage of that vulnerability, she would have to squash it immediately.

  Now it was time to challenge him, put him back on the defensive, before he had a chance to even pull up the fly on his pants: “How in hell do you know what the Americans will do, Felix?” she asked.

  “One of my agents intercepted a message sent from Washington for the American ambassador here in Mexico City,” Díaz said. “The message stated that effective immediately their Operation Rampart was suspended and all of their Cybernetic Infantry Devices were being withdrawn from the border.”

  “So? We already know they have replaced those robots with National Guard troops. They haven’t withdrawn—if anything, they have increased and reinforced their presence.”

  “Our informants in Washington tell us that the American President has summoned the commander of those National Guard forces to the White House, as well as the Secretary of Defense and the Attorney General, and that he is not happy at all,” Díaz said, wiping bright red lipstick from his neck and straightening his necktie. “The analysts say he will gradually pull forces back from the border so it will not look like a retreat. He does not want to be seen as backing down in the face of pressure from Mexico. But he will back down.”

  “Perhaps—until the next terrorist or smuggler decides to kill an American vigilante or Border Patrol agent,” Maravilloso said bitterly. She looked at him carefully. “You insist these attacks are not being done by Mexicans, Felix, but then you give me reports of yet another videotape being distributed by this ‘Comandante Veracruz’ character, inciting the Mexican people to commit even more atrocities. How sure are you that these attacks are not being perpetuated by him?”

  “I am not sure of much when it comes to Veracruz, Carmen.”

  Her stare intensified. “You seem to have very good, reliable contacts throughout the world, Felix,” Maravilloso said suspiciously, “but I find it very strange that you cannot tell me very much about Veracruz. Why is that, Felix?”

  “Because he is probably not Mexican,” Diaz replied. “All of our internal investigations have come up empty so far, and most foreign governments will not share information on anyone who might have had specialized military or guerrilla training.”

  “Well, what can you tell me about him?”

  “Just the basics. His name is Ernesto Fuerza, reported in a French newspaper interview a couple years ago but never independently verified. His nationality is unknown. He is in his late thirties or early forties, male, tall, and slender…”

  “I mean some real information about him, Felix,” she said irritably. “The whole world knows that trivia—I read all that last week in People magazine…”

  “Next to the article on you, I noticed, the one on ‘The New Faces of Mexico.’” She gave him a warning glare, and Díaz’s tone turned serious: “The uniform he often wears looks American, English, or Canadian, and the headdress he wears looks very Middle Eastern—very confusing to analysts. His Spanish is good, but it sounds more South American, perhaps Brazilian or Venezuelan, more sophisticated, more European. He obviously has some military training, judging by the way he speaks and the way he holds a weapon…”

  “How can you tell anything by how one holds a weapon?”

  “A trained man will never put his finger on a trigger unless he is ready to shoot—he will lay his finger on the side of the trigger guard,” Diaz said. “That is pounded into a soldier from the first moment he is given a gun.”

  “What else?”

  “Everything is guesswork and speculation—it can hardly even be called ‘analysis,’” Díaz admitted. “One thing is for certain: he is bound to slip up, try to cross the border once too often, or take a shot at the wrong target, and he will either be dead or captured. Revolutionaries do not have much of a shelf life these days, since the Americans started clamping down hard on anyone who might even remotely smell like a terrorist.” Díaz fell silent for a moment. Then, “Maybe we should not be trying to hunt this man down,” he said. “Maybe we should use him instead.”

  “Bad idea, Felix,” Maravilloso said. “He is certainly popular all around the world. But the magazine articles state he was—perhaps still is—a drug smuggler. Why would I want to be associated with such a man?”

  “I do not think it matters much,” the Minister of Internal Affairs said. “As long as he is truly committed to helping the Mexican people who choose to work in the United States, I think our cause would be greatly helped. A slight imperfection might enhance his character a bit.”

  “There is no way on earth we can find that out for sure without a face-to-face meeting.”

  “I can make it happen, Carmen.”

  “A meeting with the infamous Comandante Veracruz?” Her face turned from serious to thoughtful. “You are the one person in the world who could pull off such a meeting, my dear.” Maravilloso thought for a moment, then shook her head. “Collect more information on this man—hopefully even capture him so you can question him directly.”

  “Or kill him, if necessary, if he proves a threat to your administration’s plans to work with the Americans and solve this immigration dilemma,” Diaz said matter-of-factly.

  Maravilloso smiled, stepped over to Díaz, put her arms around him, and kissed his lips. “Why, Felix, you almost sound as if you really care about what happens to me,” she said.

  He kissed her again, grasping her shoulders seriously. “I admitted to you from the first day we met that I aspired to the presidency, Carmen,” he said. “We even would not talk about marriage for that very reason, although you know how much I love you and want to spend the rest of my life with you. But I am not your political rival, or just your lover. I am a member of your government, and I am a Mexican. Whether you believe it or not, I do care about what happens to our country—and yes, I care about this government too, if for no other reason than I will have less to clean up after assuming this office.”

  “Do not try to pretend that you care that much, Felix,” Maravilloso said. She pushed away from him and looked at him with great concern. “Why that stunt with the helicopter, Felix? You embarrassed me on worldwide television. You provoked a riot while I was talking to the President of the United States!”

  “Carmen, I was out there inspecting that base firsthand—I didn’t go out there to incite a riot or embarrass you,” Diaz said. “It just made me angry that our people were being herded around like that. I wanted to be sure they knew their government was there looking out for them.”

  “That is my job, Felix—yours is to inform me of developments like this Rampart One abomination and help me decide the best course of action,” Maravilloso said. “We need to keep avenues of dialogue open with the Americans, not shut them down. Do you understand, Felix?”

  “Of course, Madam President.”

  The phone on her desk rang. She kissed him again, then held his face between her hands. “What in hell am I going to do with you,
Felix Díaz?” she asked, then released him and went to her desk and picked up the phone. “I told you not to disturb me,” she said into the receiver. “I will kick you in the…what? He what? Bring it in here immediately!” She hung up the phone.

  “Fifteen minutes, on the dot,” Díaz said.

  “This is the real thing, Felix—another videotape by that Veracruz character, released to the press, with a detailed account of the incident in Arizona and calling for a worldwide insurgency against America to avenge the killings.”

  “The man might be a genius,” Díaz said. “Imagine the power one could have if she could sway every Hispanic man and woman in the United States, Carmen! Imagine the influence one could have if you could take one tenth of America’s entire workforce and not only order them not to show up for work, but to rise up against their employers! The American government would be forced to make a just deal for worker amnesty!”

  “This Fuerza guy is a complete unknown—worse than a loose cannon, he is a criminal with a popular following,” Maravilloso said. “How can you trust someone like that?”

  “I think it is worth a try,” Díaz said. “I might be able to use my special investigators, the Sombras, to find this man.”

  Maravilloso was silent for a long moment, then: “This is something I cannot support, Felix,” she said finally. “This Fuerza is too dangerous. He could turn on his handlers in an instant, like a wild animal trainer surrounded by lions.”

  “You and he, together—it would certainly be a very powerful combination.”

  She looked at him with a knowing smile. “Or it could be a disaster, and you would certainly benefit from that, would you not, Felix?” He did not reply. “You are not ready to give up your chance at the presidency of Mexico…for me,” she said. His smile dimmed, only for a moment, but she knew she had hit her target. She made a little show of acting disappointed, happy that she had uncovered a tiny bit of the man, the real man, before her; then, as her assistant came into the office after a very quiet knock, shrugged her shoulders. “Good day to you, Minister Díaz,” she said icily. “Please come again.” Her tense body language and hooded eyes told him the meeting was definitely over—perhaps for good—and he departed with a courteous bow and no words.

  Díaz paid courtesy visits on several government officials in the Palacio Nacional, shook hands with visitors, and made a brief statement in the press office about the worsening situation on the U.S.-Mexican border but said that he was confident that all could be resolved peacefully. Then he headed to his waiting car. The Ministry of Internal Affairs was located on the other side of the Federal District from the Palacio Nacional, south of the president’s residence on Constitution Avenue in the center of the Bosque de Chapultepec, so even with a police escort it would take a long time to make it back to his office.

  Although Díaz had ready access to a helicopter—he could even fly it himself, and had done so many times—he preferred the relative peace and quiet of his specially outfitted armored Mercedes S600 sedan and its wide array of secure voice, data, and video communications equipment, specially installed himself and tied into the government communications net only one way—he could access all government systems and networks, but they could not access his. With a police escort, he could get back to his office relatively quickly. He donned his lightweight headset and called back to his office and was immediately connected to José Elvarez, deputy minister of Internal Affairs, director of operations of the Political Police and of the Sombras, or Special Investigations Unit. “Report, José,” Díaz ordered.

  “Follow-up report regarding the visit by TALON One and Two and FBI Director DeLaine in San Diego, sir,” Elvarez said. The computer screen in the back of the sedan came to life. It showed a photograph, obviously taken from the ground at a street intersection, through the clear windshield of a dark government-looking armored Suburban. Four persons could clearly be seen in the photo, two men and two women, seated in the rear two forward-facing rows of the vehicle, plus a driver and woman sitting in the front passenger seat. “Subjects were photographed leaving the FBI field office yesterday. The second man has just been identified as Paul Purdy, one of the U.S. Border Patrol agents believed to have been killed near Blythe, California.”

  “Mi Díos,” Díaz breathed, studying the digital photo. Damn, a survivor, a witness—that could be a very significant development. “Where did they take him?”

  “They first went to Montgomery Airport, where DeLaine, her female bodyguard, and TALON Two were dropped off at her jet, and then the others went to a charity store in downtown San Diego,” Elvarez said. The Sombras had managed to plant tracking devices on most of the American official government vehicles, and although the bugs were usually discovered and deactivated within a few days, quite often they could still get a great amount of useful intelligence from them. “They purchased several bags of clothes.”

  “Clothes, eh? From a charity used-clothing store? Sounds like they are going undercover.”

  “After that, they went to a market and came out with several more bags of supplies, then got on Interstate 15 northbound. We lost GPS tracking a few minutes later and notified all of our southern California lookouts to watch for the vehicle.”

  “And did someone spot it?”

  “Yes, sir. It was observed arriving at the U.S. Border Patrol sector field office in Indio, California.”

  Interesting, Díaz thought—the heart of the Coachella Valley, with a very large concentration of illegal immigrants and smugglers nearby. “And then?”

  “After two hours, TALON One and Purdy were observed wearing civilian clothes and getting into an unmarked civilian-asset-seizure vehicle. We had this vehicle under both electronic and agent surveillance. The vehicle was heading south on Route 196. The agents we had following the vehicle terminated visual contact when they suspected Purdy was making some countersurveillance turns, so we lost visual contact, but we are still tracking it electronically.”

  “Interesting,” Díaz commented. “This Border Patrol agent, Purdy, seems quite resourceful. He may require some…diligencia especial.”

  “Understood, sir,” Elvarez said. “The vehicle made several stops along Route 196 and Highway 111 before stopping last night at a motel south of Niland. We have not made direct visual contact with the subjects in the past few hours but we now have their vehicle under both visual and electronic surveillance.”

  “I need round-the-clock direct visual contact on the subjects, José,” Díaz said. “Put your best men on this one. This Agent Purdy seems very well trained and experienced—unusual for a Border Patrol agent. He may be getting countersurveillance help from Richter and Vega, so tell your men to be extra careful, or they could be face-to-face with one of those robots.”

  “My best men in southern California are already on it, sir.”

  “Good. Now we need to find out what those three are up to.”

  “Unfortunately we do not have any listening devices in the FBI field office in San Diego,” Elvarez said. “We can monitor comings and goings but cannot reliably tap their phone or data transmissions without risking discovery. The same is true for all of the high-level American government offices in southern California.”

  “But we do have some good human intelligence…the consular office in San Diego,” Díaz said. “The consulate has excellent connections in the U.S. Attorney’s office. I think it’s time to send the consul back out there to see what he can find out. That will be all, José. Find those three Americans and try to determine why they are playing spymaster.” He terminated the secure phone call.

  A survivor of that attack near Blythe, Díaz thought ruefully—that could be real trouble. But even more trouble could develop with President Maravilloso’s request to meet with Ernesto Fuerza. Hopefully it was just an idle demand, soon to be forgotten once the political dangers became clear…

  …but with Carmen Maravilloso, anything could happen. He had to be ready to make Fuerza available to meet the president soo
n. It was a meeting he was certainly not looking forward to making happen.

  CHAPTER 7

  U.S. FEDERAL COURTHOUSE,

  LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA

  LATER THAT DAY

  “I’m very glad to see you, Señor Ochoa,” Annette Cass, the U.S. Attorney for the southern district of California, said. She had met the deputy consul general of the United Mexican States’ consulate in San Diego, Armando Ochoa, just outside the security screening station at the federal courthouse in Los Angeles. She waved at the security guards at the X-ray machine and metal detector and breezed past them before they could remind her to follow their security precautions. “I hope we can come to an agreement on settling the questions before us.”

  “As do I, Miss Cass,” Ochoa said. “My government and my office wish to see all of the unpleasantness we have experienced settled and forgotten as soon as possible.”

  Cass escorted the Mexican deputy consul to her office and had her assistant fetch him coffee. “As I said before, Mr. Ochoa, my office still has not resolved the jurisdictional questions related to border security and the treatment of detainees suspected of illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexico border,” Cass said. “With the recent attacks by the Consortium, Congress successfully passing a war resolution against them, and the perceived similarity between the recent attacks on the border and activities by the Consortium, the military has a pretty strong hand in this debate.”

  “I understand, Miss Cass,” Ochoa said. “I am confident this will soon be resolved so there will be no more hostilities between our countries.”

  “We’re all hoping for the same thing, sir.” Cass withdrew a folder from a drawer in her desk. “I have been authorized to offer you a settlement on your own claims against my government for your treatment, Mr. Ochoa: formal apologies from the Secretary of Defense, Brigadier General Lopez the man in charge of the military operation, and Major Jason Richter, who was the officer in charge at the scene at the time of the offense; a guarantee of full reimbursement for any medical bills you may incur for a period of five years from the date of the incident; and a lump sum cash award of twenty-five thousand dollars. All my government asks in return is a strict gag order on the terms of our settlement.”