“He on his way here?” Memo said.
Refugio nodded.
Rayan said, “When?”
Refugio shook his head. “No lo se.”
Memo said, “How many men with him?”
“Tres hombres.”
•••
Nora felt sick, nauseous, opened her eyes. She was on a stained mattress in a small dingy room. She heard music and smelled vomit, saw traces of it on her blouse and on the bed. She tried to piece together the events of the night: remembered arriving at the club with Raylan, Memo, and Big Country, remembered sitting at a table with Rindo, Thunderbird, and a Mexican bandit, and remembered being carried out of the club and through the kitchen. Her memory was hazy after that, no recollection of coming to this place, wherever it was, no recollection of anything except the two men who came in the room earlier as the sun was rising. They stood next to the bed talking in Spanish.
“She’s still out, man. How much they give her?”
“I don’t know. But he wants her to be awake when we do it.”
They walked out and Nora, still feeling the effects of the drug, closed her eyes and fell asleep.
•••
Now sometime later, awake and more alert, she had a dry cough and a pain in her chest and wondered if these symptoms were related to what they had put in her margarita. She tried to sit up and felt dizzy, swung her legs over the side of the bed, and pushed herself up, searched the room for a weapon, something to defend herself. There was a toolbox in the corner. She opened it, picked up a screwdriver, sat on the floor, leaning against the wall, and waited.
Nora was dozing off when she heard voices, heard a key in the lock. The door opened. A man came in the room and stood next to the bed. It was Raylan. “Oh my God, I don’t believe it.” He turned and moved to her, picked her up and put his arms around her.
“I prayed you’d come and here you are.”
”How do you feel?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t have to worry. It’s over.”
Raylan carried Nora to Memo’s car, sat her in the rear seat, and held her.
•••
At Rindo’s house, Raylan took Big Country aside. “Listen, I need you to take Nora to El Centro, get her to a doctor.”
“You’re not coming with us?” Big Country gave him a questioning look. “You can’t stay here. Let Memo take Rindo into custody, hold him till we work this out.”
“I trust the little guy, he’s been great, but as you said, the country’s corrupt and Rindo’s got money.” Raylan paused. “Will you call your contact in Mexico City, find out what’s going on?”
“They’re trying to get clearance from the Mexican Government.”
“You don’t have something positive by tomorrow, I’m gonna do it my way.”
“The hell’s that mean?” Big Country said. “Let me refresh your memory, you take Rindo out of Mexico against his will, we’re gonna have to give him back. That happens, we’re never gonna see him again. Take it easy, will you? I think it’s all gonna work out.”
Raylan walked out to the car and got in next to Nora. “You need a doctor. Big Country’s gonna get you to the hospital in El Centro.”
“What about you?”
“I’m gonna finish up here, come see you.”
“You better. Just do it fast, will you?”
•••
Big Country phoned Raylan an hour and a half later. “Nora’s at the El Centro Medical Center. They’ve got her on IVs, trying to flush out her system. She’s hanging in there. Doc thinks they gave her ketamine, some kind of anesthetic, says she’ll be fine. No word on the Jose Rindo case yet. You’re gonna have to be patient.”
“What do you suggest I do with him, sit around, watch TV: Judge Judy and Maury in Spanish? Wait for Jeopardy and Family Feud to come on?”
“Find out what his interests are,” Big Country said. “Start there.”
“That’s what I’ll do. Thanks for the tip.”
“I don’t know what to tell you. I can come back, give you a hand if you want.”
“I’ll take care of it.”
“Where’s Rindo?”
“Cuffed to his bed frame.”
“That’s your signature move, huh?”
“You got something that works, why fool around?”
•••
On the way back from the border, Memo stopped at Eduordo Meza’s house. There were Mexicali police cars, and an ambulance parked in front. Memo got out of his car, approaching the front door as a gurney carrying a body bag was rolled outside.
“What happened here?” Memo said to one of the cops.
“A man was murdered.”
“Do you know his name?”
“Eduordo Meza.”
“Do you know who did it? Do you have a suspect?”
“A neighbor heard gunshots, saw the killer come out of the house.”
“Do you have a description of him?”
“We have a photograph—taken with a phone.” The cop took his own phone out, pressed a couple keys, and angled the screen toward Memo. It was a grainy, out-of-focus shot of a man.
“Who is he?”
“An American.”
•••
“Listen, there is a problem,” Memo said, walking in Rindo’s kitchen. “Police found Eduordo Meza dead in his home, executed in the bedroom where we find him this morning. Is all over the radio. They have a photo of the killer and he look like you. They have a witness, saw you at the house. I think is time to go, leave Mexico. I can no longer protect you.”
Early evening, Raylan was watching Memo chop tomatoes and onions and sear chicken in a skillet, making tacos, when he heard a knock on the front door. He glanced at Memo and they went into the bedroom. Rindo was on the bed, hands cuffed behind his back, ankle cuffed to the metal bed frame, duct tape over his mouth. Memo stayed with him while Raylan went to the front of the house, looked out a window, and saw a Mexicali police car, a marked unit parked on the street. There was another knock. Raylan looked through the peephole at two policemen.
Now the cops were moving across the front of the house, trying to see in the windows, moving around the side to the veranda, faces up against the glass panes, one of them shaking the handles of the French doors. Raylan watched them all the way around the house and back to their car. He saw Memo come up behind him. “Why would the Mexicali police come here?”
“No one has heard from Rindo for many hours. They look for him, or maybe you. Or maybe they are not the police. They have the car, they have the uniform,” he said, “but this is Mexico.”
“We should move him, get him out of here. I’m taking Rindo back to El Centro tomorrow.”
“How you going to do that?”
Raylan told him his plan. “What do you think?”
Memo nodded and smiled.
•••
Three in the morning, Raylan followed Memo to his house and pulled in the garage. No sign of the police. They brought Rindo inside and cuffed him to the bed frame in the room where Raylan had slept the night before. He went into the other room and stretched out on the couch but was too revved up to sleep. He stared at the ceiling, thinking about trying to bring Rindo across the border. It was a long shot, but it was the only one he had.
In the morning, Memo woke Rindo and gave him a piece of bread and a glass of orange juice with two sleeping pills crushed in it. Twenty minutes later, they carried him, barely conscious, to the garage and lifted him in the trunk.
“I don’t know how to thank you,” Raylan said. “You’ve risked a lot to help us.”
“Is my job. Good luck, my friend. I hope we meet again.”
Memo opened the garage door with a remote and drove out heading south to the outskirts of the city.
&nb
sp; Raylan, in the Lexus, went next, heading north to the border. He’d gone a couple blocks when he saw a police car in the rearview mirror. He, made a couple turns, and now he was in the barrio. He looked again and there were two police cars behind him. Raylan punched the accelerator, speeding down a narrow street lined with parked cars on one side, hearing the sharp chirp of sirens.
From the neighborhood street, he turned right onto a city boulevard. Out of nowhere, a police car hit him broadside. The impact stunned Raylan and sent the Lexus bouncing over the curb onto a sidewalk, taking out several cafe tables, people scrambling to get out of the way. Raylan cut the wheel hard left and was back on the boulevard. He could see the border ahead, a sign that read:
Linea Internacional
Calexico/USA
Now a round blew out the rear window and punched a hole in the windshield. He could see a Mexicali cop leaning out the front passenger window with a pistol in his hand. Raylan turned left, driving along the seventeen-foot-high fence that separated Mexico and the US, and saw three Mexicali police cars, lights flashing, behind him maybe forty yards, and then he was braking hard, caught in the slow snarl of traffic waiting to cross the border.
Beggars washing car windows for spare change, and vendors selling tacos and Cokes, moved through the gridlock. In the side mirrors he saw four Mexicali police, guns drawn, coming up fast behind him. Raylan opened the door, got out, crouching, looking back at the cops, and now ran for the border. He heard shouts behind him and pistols discharge but kept going, seeing a US border agent watching what was happening, the man reaching down, raising an AR-15, aiming first at him until he said, “DUSM Raylan Givens,” and showed his star.
“Better get over here quick.”
Raylan ran, crossed the line. The border agent, a man about his age, aimed his long rifle at the Mexicali police, standing four abreast, pistols drawn, twenty feet from the United States border.
One of the Mexicali cops said, “This man is our prisoner, he is wanted for murder.”
“This man is a United States citizen inside the US. You have no authorization, no jurisdiction.”
The Mexicali police continued to hold their ground until three more armed US border agents appeared.
“This is the last time I’m gonna tell you,” the old pro said, “lower your weapons and back away.”
Now the Mexican police holstered their guns and dispersed.
“You couldn’t have cut it any closer,” the border agent said. “Welcome home, Deputy Marshal Givens.”
Raylan would have some explaining to do. And the Mexican government might try to extradite him, but there was no way he was going back to Mexico anytime soon.
Thirty-Seven
Wiggy had just taken a load of wets up to Anaheim when he got the call from Lori, saying Pedro, a coyote she knew, was offering them three grand to come down, pick up a wet in Mexicali, and take him to a house in El Centro. It was a two-and-a-half-hour job max, and he’d make as much as he usually did in a month or more.
Wiggy didn’t exactly like bringing wets across the border. Too many things could go haywire, and he’d be the one holding the bag of shit. But if there was ever a time to take a risk, this was it.
His gaze held on the green sign ahead:
International Border
Mexicali
Minutes later he was in line waiting to cross into Mexico. When it was his turn, a sleepy-eyed dude smoking a cigarette, tie at half-mast, glanced at Wiggy and waved him through. Getting in was a piece of cake. It was getting out that was tough.
Every time he came here, Wiggy was surprised how big it was compared to Calexico, which was a nothing border town on the US side. Mexicali had like a million people and went on forever.
Wiggy met Pedro and a skinny Mex with a big gun holstered on his hip in a dusty lot outside the city. The dude he was transporting, face under a baseball cap, was unconscious. Pedro said, “The man is okay, be awake when you get to El Centro.” Pedro gave him an address. “Someone meet you.”
•••
Now approaching the border on the return trip, Wiggy tapped on the sheet metal behind his seat. “Dude, can you hear me?” he said to the wet in the hidden compartment. “Be all chill, don’t say anything till I tell you, okay?”
Wiggy handed the border guard his driver’s license.
The man stared at it and stared at him. “Mr. Dentinger, what was the purpose of your visit in Mexico today?”
“I came down to have something to eat.”
“Something to eat? We don’t have food you like here in the US?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Yes, sir, we do, or yes, sir, we don’t?”
“We do.”
“What are you transporting in the van?”
“Nothing, sir.”
“Are you transporting illegal drugs?”
“No, sir.”
“Are you transporting illegal Mexican aliens?”
“No, sir.”
“You expect me to believe you came all the way to Mexicali for the food?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Do I look gullible to you, son?”
“No, sir.” Wiggy snapped one of the rubber bands on his wrist.
“What do you have on your arm?”
“Rubber bands.”
“I can see that, why?”
“I don’t know, sir.”
“You don’t know.” The guard stared at him for a couple seconds and shook his head. “Are the rear doors unlocked?”
“Yes, sir.”
The guard walked to the back, opened it, looked in at the empty cargo area, and closed it up. Now he walked around the van with some kind of a pole with a mirror on the end of it so he could see the undercarriage.
Wiggy thought he’d be on his way when the man came back to the side window.
“Pull over there,” he said, pointing to a parking area.
“Is there a problem, sir?”
“Pull over and step out of the van, Mr. Dentinger.”
Wiggy’s heart started pin-balling again. He tried to kick-start his brain, trying to remember if there was something in the van they could bust him for: a few meth crystals, a roach, a pipe with a little weed still in the bowl. Was he forgetting something? Wiggy checked the ashtray. It was clean. Checked the aftermarket console between the seats. Nothing there either. What about the glove box? No idea. Why hadn’t he thought about this earlier? Cause he was a dumbass. Wiggy could feel sweat on his face and sweat running from his armpits down his bare sides under the tank top.
He got out and the guard said, “Turn, face the vehicle, place your hands on the top of the door.” Now the guard patted him down. “Son, when you leave here, I’d suggest you find a shower. Smells like something crawled in you and died.”
•••
Wiggy found 506 Smoketree Drive and pulled in the driveway. “Hey, you okay?” he yelled to the wet in the compartment. Jesus, he hoped the guy wasn’t dead. He hadn’t been there five minutes when the SUV pulled in. He knew why it looked familiar when the cowboy and the big marshal got out. Talk about bad luck.
“We’re here to take him off your hands.”
The cowboy said it like he knew Wiggy had the dude. He was trying to think of what to say. His first impulse was to bullshit the two lawmen and decided that didn’t have a chance in hell of working. So he didn’t say anything, opened the back of the van, lifted the floor, and there was the wet.
The big marshal pulled the dude—who looked dazed—out of the hidden compartment and cuffed him. Without the cap, Wiggy recognized him. This wet he’d just brought over was the dude they’d asked him about when they’d come to the Slabs, the dude with the gun he’d given a ride to. That’s what this was about.
Wiggy said, “What about me?”
The cowboy said,
“What about you?”
“What’re you gonna do?”
“What do you want us to do?”
“Nothing. Let me go.”
“Okay.”
Wiggy couldn’t believe it. What was going on? “You serious?”
The marshals left him standing on the driveway in total disbelief.
Thirty-Eight
Rindo, sitting next to Raylan in the rear seat of Big Country’s G-ride, tried to bribe them on the way to jail, and when that didn’t work, he threatened them.
“Man, the fuck you think you’re doing? Kidnap a Mexican citizen, take me across the border against my will.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Raylan said. “We didn’t bring you across the border, and US Border Patrol has nothing that proves you entered the country at all. So that leads us to believe you’ve been here all along. Let me remind you, Jose, you’re an escaped convict, a fugitive with several warrants against you. We had you under surveillance in El Centro—that’s in the United States of America, last time I looked—and arrested you at Five Oh Six Smoketree Drive.”
“Motherfuckers think you can hold me this time?”
“We’re sure gonna try,” Raylan said.
•••
He walked through the doors of the El Centro Medical Center, saw Nora in the waiting area, and couldn’t get to her quick enough. She saw him too, got up, and ran across the lobby, fell into his arms, and held on, the two of them embracing in the middle of the hall as people walked around them.
“How do you feel?”
“Better now.”
Nora was still pale but starting to get some color back. Raylan took her out to the car he’d borrowed from the El Centro motor pool. They got in and he leaned over and kissed her, and she kissed him back.
They held onto each other until Nora said, “I know Rindo’s in custody. Tell me what happened.”
“It got a little hairy there at the end. Local police accusing me of murdering one of Rindo’s men.” He told her about the showdown at the border.
“They thought you had him in the trunk?”
“That was the idea.”
“And you used the kid from the Slabs? I don’t believe it.”
Raylan Goes to Detroit Page 23
