Rope on Fire (John Crane Series Book 1)

by Mark Parragh

  Crane started with a pair of black Fjallraven hiking pants. They were made of a microfiber fabric that was light enough to be comfortable while still providing UV protection. They also had plenty of pockets for the other things he was planning to buy. He modeled the pants for Melissa, who had him spin around for her before she gave him two thumbs up. He added a pair of Scarpa Kinesis boots and a couple T-shirts to the pile, and then they headed to the equipment section. There Crane bought a GPS receiver, a point-and-shoot camera, a compact multi-tool, a rucksack, and a few other things he thought he might need. Again, Josh’s credit card absorbed it all without a peep.

  They were loaded down with shopping bags when they left.

  “I totally would have bought you those boots, you know,” Crane said in a playful tone. “The leopard print ones. I saw you eying them.”

  She laughed and punched his bicep. “Oh God, can you see me wearing those things around my team? They’d lose all respect for me. It would be anarchy.”

  “So what? You want them. You know you want them.” He started to turn around. “It’s not too late! We can go get them. It’s the least Josh can do.”

  “If you’re feeling generous with Josh’s money, you can get me another gene sequencer,” she said with a grin.

  “Mom always said the way to a girl’s heart is through her lab equipment.”

  “You know it.”

  She flagged down a cab and told the driver to take them back to Condado.

  On the ride back, Crane felt an energy between them. He knew he’d been attracted to her from the moment he saw her on Josh’s yacht. He thought she had dropped her initial wariness. If, when they got back to the Vanderbilt, he asked her up to his suite, he thought she’d come.

  But no, he decided. It was too soon. More than that, he had work to do.

  The cab pulled up outside the Vanderbilt, and Melissa helped him unload his bags and carry them to the doors, where a bellman put them on a cart and took them upstairs for him.

  “What time do you want me to pick you up?” she asked as they stood beneath the overhang in front of the lobby doors.

  “Let me get some breakfast first,” said Crane. “Nine-thirty? When will that get us there?”

  “By eleven or so. Is that okay?”

  “That works,” he said. “Thank you for showing me around. Dinner was excellent.”

  “Any time,” she said softly. It felt like an invitation, and Crane was again tempted. But not now. Not yet. Part of him argued that he was working for Josh, not Melissa, but he knew better than that. He had no business getting involved with her while he was investigating the threat to her project.

  “Have a good night,” he said, and watched her walk back to the waiting taxi.

  Afterwards might be a different matter.

  Chapter 8

  A little after midnight, Police Sergeant Javier Acevedo sat in his cruiser in the parking lot of a dark strip mall outside San Juan and waited for the Little Russian.

  The Little Russian was, of course, far from little. The man was six and a half feet tall and built like a tank. He must have weighed three hundred pounds. And Acevedo knew he wasn’t really Russian, either. He was from one of those old eastern bloc countries; Acevedo didn’t bother to remember which one because he didn’t really care. Russia was close enough. His name was Zajic, or something like it. Again, Acevedo didn’t care. He only put up with him at all because he was paid well to do so.

  Acevedo turned his radio down until the dispatch chatter was barely audible through the whine of traffic on the highway in front of him. The pale dash lights cast his angular face in sharp relief.

  Acevedo took a long drag on his cigarette and wished he was home in bed with his wife.

  He was a simple man, an officer in the Puerto Rico Police, the state level police force. It wasn’t a bad job, but the pay wasn’t great, especially with the government going broke. There was a pay freeze for public employees, and the taxes kept getting higher all the time. All Acevedo wanted was enough money to buy a little plot of land at the western end of the island, somewhere outside Mayaguez maybe. A place with a nice house he could retire to. That and a boat for fishing. It wasn’t so much to ask.

  He’d assembled a group of officers with similar inclinations. They were assigned to the Carolina district, which meant their patrol area included Luis Muñoz International Airport. They had a simple enough system going. Drugs came in from partners in Colombia or Mexico. Acevedo and his men collected them and repartitioned the shipments into smaller packages. Those went to the airport and then out on direct flights to Spain or Germany, and eventually on to other partners in Southern and Eastern Europe. They were just middlemen. They passed the drugs up the chain and took their cut. It was simple.

  Then this bullshit.

  Acevedo had no idea what the Little Russian’s boss had against some science project in the middle of nowhere in El Yunque. He just knew he was sick of tramping around the forest in the dead of night, tripping over roots and getting soaked, all to tear up cardboard moth traps and smash test tubes. Yes, they were getting paid for it, but it was still bullshit. And he didn’t like the way Zajic’s boss assumed he and his men were there just to run whatever errands he came up with. He didn’t like that part at all.

  Headlights swept around the edge of the building and then the Little Russian’s black BMW appeared. Acevedo tossed his cigarette out the window, and it fell to the pavement like a tiny red comet.

  The BMW gave off thumping bass from some kind of fast, Slavic rap. Thankfully it cut out suddenly, in mid-beat. The Little Russian killed his headlights next. He turned in a wide arc across the parking lot’s orderly yellow stripes and pulled up opposite the cruiser so the driver’s side windows were only a couple feet apart.

  “Anything new?” the Little Russian said. His voice was deep and guttural, and his Spanish was horrible. It was like talking to a three-hundred-pound toddler who broke kneecaps if he didn’t get his treats on time.

  Acevedo shook his head. “We checked the forest again last night. They didn’t put anything out for us.”

  “The boss doesn’t like the woman went away for help. He lost his shit. Not good. The man they sent back. What do you know about him?”

  Acevedo shook his head. He’d put a tap on the center’s phone lines, but it was another waste of time. They just didn’t use the phone very much. The call from Florida was the only useful thing they’d gotten. “Just what I told you. She called yesterday. Said they’re sending someone back with her.”

  “They’re not here yet?”

  Acevedo shrugged. “Nobody’s seen them.”

  “The boss says no more fucking around. He wants them shut down for good.”

  Well, who the hell didn’t want that? Acevedo had enough on his plate without running around the rainforest doing favors for his clients. He didn’t even know what the hell Zajic’s boss had against these people. They were harmless. Acevedo needed this to be finished. They had a delivery on its way, the biggest one of the year. And he was pretty sure the Special Investigations Bureau had sniffed something in the air. If they kept this up, it would bring attention to him and his men.

  “How does he want to handle it?” he asked.

  “Shut them down for good,” the Little Russian repeated. “Go in tomorrow. In the daytime. Shoot the place up. Kill everybody. It’s easy. It’s done.”

  Jesus Christ. The last thing he needed was to turn this into a high-profile mass murder. “We’re not killing anybody,” Acevedo snapped. “That’s not what we agreed to.”

  The Little Russian snorted in disgust. “Bunch of pussies.”

  That couldn’t go unchallenged or the bastard would be pissing on him forever. “Hey, fuck you, jackoff! We need to keep it on the down low, you follow? We’ve got real business to think of. Business which this shit is not!”

  They locked eyes for a tense moment. Acevedo knew the Little Russian had a gun and a short temper. He let his fingertips quietl
y unsnap his holster, slowly edged his pistol free.

  Then the Little Russian laughed. It was not a happy sound.

  “I don’t get it either,” he said. “The boss is worked up, but he doesn’t tell me shit. Just ‘is it done? Is it done?’ He showed his right hand by scratching his head for a moment. “So get it done, yes? Whatever you have to do. Just get it done, and then we can get back to business. Business we understand, right?”

  Acevedo let out a breath he hadn’t quite realized he’d been holding. “Yeah, we’ll get it done. But we’re not killing people. Believe me, your boss doesn’t want that kind of heat.”

  “Okay, okay,” said the Little Russian. “Tomorrow. Tell me it’s done. Here.”

  He tossed a heavy envelope through Acevedo’s window. Then the BMW slid away into the night, erupting with bass once again and a voice snapping off clipped Russian phrases.

  Acevedo hefted the envelope of cash and then tucked it into a gym bag in the passenger seat. Christ, he’d be happy to see the last of that asshole.

  Chapter 9

  The next morning, Crane waited in front of the Vanderbilt, practicing his Spanish with the doorman. Just before nine thirty, Melissa rolled up in a battered Jeep Wrangler. She had taken a somewhat different approach to preparing for the rainforest, he realized as she jumped down out of the Jeep. Her boots were like his, though obviously well used. She wore tight shorts in green twill and a T-shirt with an open plaid shirt over it. The overall effect was…effective.

  “Damn,” Crane murmured.

  The doorman nodded in agreement.

  “Morning!” Melissa said cheerfully as she looked Crane over. “A little touristy, but you’ll do.”

  “We’ll have to get me scuffed up a bit,” Crane said. He tossed the rucksack into the back.

  “Yeah, that won’t be a problem where we’re going. Climb in.”

  Crane grabbed the Jeep’s roll cage and swung himself into the passenger seat.

  Melissa coaxed the engine back to life, and they were off. They took the main Highway 26 past the airport and then south out of San Juan until it turned into Highway 66 and led east toward El Yunque. The air was comfortable. A few high clouds scudded across the sky.

  “What kind of weather are we expecting?” Crane shouted over the wind rushing through the open Jeep.

  “It’ll be fine!” Melissa answered. “It warms up during the day. Might see some showers by late afternoon, but we should be done before then.”

  When they reached Canovanas, Melissa turned off the highway onto a much smaller road and headed south, away from the town.

  “Benitez is a few miles ahead,” said Melissa. “Then we get into the real back country!”

  Crane could tell this was not a prosperous area. The houses thinned out as they got farther from the highway, and those that were here were in poor repair, set well back from the road amid thick groves of trees. They passed a number of bars and little barbecue stands and then a large sign informing them they were entering the Caribbean National Forest. A few minutes later, they passed through a small village that Crane supposed must be Benitez. On its far edge, Melissa slowed and took a sharp left onto a narrow gravel road.

  Within a few hundred yards, they were surrounded by tropical greenery. There were palms with enormous trunks, lush ferns, a dozen types of trees Crane had never seen before. He could hear bird calls and another chorus of voices that Melissa identified as tree frog cries. “Coquis,” she said. “Thirteen different species of them. Only here. That’s why we need to catalog this place while it’s still here.”

  They rattled across almost two miles of the poorly maintained road, climbed a ridge, and descended the far side. Crane counted only three houses along the way.

  “We’re near the river,” Melissa said. “The Rio Cubuy. Runs south from the mountains. Then it turns west here and curves all the way around to the north until it hits the Canovanas. Fantastic place to collect samples. Used to be, anyway. We’re here!”

  They rounded a bend and passed through an open steel gate. A faded sign read “Kaplan Foundation–Caribbean Biodiversity Project. Benitez Research Facility.”

  Crane’s first impression was that someone had taken poured concrete slabs and dumped them here in a pile. The place was all tilted cement walls, ramps, and walkways. Crane could see the seams where the cement had been poured in pieces and irregular green stains of moss were taking hold. The rainforest had grown up among the walkways and ramps and threatened to absorb the building in its entirety.

  “This was supposed to be another visitors’ center for the park,” said Melissa. “Like the one up at El Portal. But they dropped that idea halfway through and never finished it. The foundation bought the place a few years ago. Cleaned it up. Put in new glass, power and data lines. It’s perfect for us. You get used to the architecture after a while.”

  She parked the Jeep next to a handful of other cars, and they got out.

  “Come on. I’ll introduce you to the team.”

  They went up a ramp to a cement walkway that crossed a shallow ravine. At the bottom, a stream threaded its way between tall trees that shot up past them. On the other side of the ravine, the walkway dumped them near a pair of large glass doors, set in a sweeping wall of glass panels. Melissa opened one and led Crane inside.

  “Welcome to my domain,” said Melissa. Then she let out a loud whistle and shouted, “Anybody home? We’ve got company!”

  “In here!” a woman shouted from somewhere. Her voice echoed off the cement until Crane had no idea where she was calling from. Melissa led the way down a dim corridor with bare cement walls. It appeared to run the length of the building to a glaring bright rectangle of light at the back. Crane imagined the original designers had meant for the place to be more brightly lit and decorated with displays about the local flora and fauna. All that was here was rust stains where rain had leaked through the roof and dripped down the cement.

  Eventually the corridor opened up into a two-story circular atrium with a skylight. Melissa led him down a flight of stairs to the atrium’s floor level, a large open space with rooms around the outer edge. Crane spotted power and data cables running along the walls, bundled up with zip ties so the researchers wouldn’t trip over them. The doorways looked indistinguishable to Crane, but Melissa led him through one.

  “This is our sequencing lab,” said Melissa. The room was cluttered with metal tables loaded down with instruments the purpose of which Crane could only guess. Stainless steel refrigerators lined one wall. Their humming competed with a boom box putting out old school R&B.

  Four young people stood in a ragged line, shuffling nervously as if they were about to be inspected.

  Melissa quickly introduced him. “Dorothea, our botanist. Lupe—insects mostly. Thom, our IT support. And our biochemist Sabelio. He handles the sequencing and DNA analysis.”

  Crane shook hands all around and left his own role vague. It was probably best if they remained uncertain about what he was really here to do. They shook his hand, smiled nervously, and seemed happy to get back to what they were doing. Crane guessed they thought he was a wealthy donor, or at least someone with power over their funding.

  Then Melissa showed him around the rest of the complex. It was a huge space for a half-dozen people, with long, empty corridors and large rooms devoted to classifying, preserving, and analyzing everything from insects and lizards to diatoms and microorganisms.

  “This is my part, right here,” said Melissa as she showed Crane into a chamber scattered with plastic boxes full of river mud. Some had irrigation systems with hoses that leaked water onto the cement floor. “I mean, I cover what needs to be covered, but my specialty is actinomycetes.”

  “Which are?”

  “Soil and freshwater bacteria. DNA slanted toward guanine and cytosine. Most of our antibiotics come from them. And they do a lot of good work decomposing compost and fixing nitrogen in the soil so crops can grow. “

  She was entirely
in her element here. Crane found her enthusiasm charming.

  “There’s a lot of debate about how to classify them,” she was saying, “which I hope to make even worse with the paper I’m working on. There’s something odd about the chemical profile of the soil here. If it’s what I think it is, then I’ll discover whole new species of the little guys and change science forever in my own small way.”

  “I’m sure you will,” said Crane.

  “If we can keep the project from falling apart,” she muttered, half to herself.

  “That’s what I’m here to help with, remember?” said Crane. “Maybe you should show me the sampling sites.”

  Melissa nodded. “Let’s go.”

  ###

  While Sosa cut the telephone line, Acevedo sat on the edge of the van’s deck, in the side doorway, and let the others gather around. There were five officers besides himself: Gavilan, Sosa up on the pole, Old Rodriguez, Acosta, and Fat Rodriguez. Like him, they all wore black tactical gear and boots. Surplus stuff, not actual police gear. Black ski masks bulged in their pants pockets. They were armed with seized Kalashnikov knockoffs from Vietnam or someplace. They were shit guns, but they looked scary and they made a loud noise.

  This road was the only way in or out of the facility, and Sosa was cutting its only phone connection. There were a couple houses between here and the center and their phones would be dead too, but Acevedo doubted they’d even notice. These hicks kept to themselves.

  “Okay,” he said. “They’re cut off. They’ll probably notice right away when their Internet goes down. But it’s too late to do anything. Besides, it’s down half the time. They don’t know we’re coming. We’re going to move fast. Roll in, take control. The van stops inside the gates and blocks the road.”

  “Rodriguez.” He gestured to Fat Rodriguez so they’d know which one he meant. “You stay with the van.”