Santa Fe Edge

by Stuart Woods

  “Okay.”

  “I love you, baby,” she said. “I’ll call as soon as I can.” She hung up and returned to the office, where Alvarez still snored away, and began searching the room for useful items. There was a cabinet containing guns, but it was securely locked and grilled with ironwork. There was also a substantial safe with an electronic keypad lock.

  She went to the desk and methodically searched the drawers, but the only thing of use to her was half a dozen of what appeared to be handcuff keys. She took one and put it into her mouth, under her tongue, then she looked at the sides and bottoms of the drawers, finally finding what she was looking for, taped to the bottom of a pull-out typewriter shelf. It was a piece of paper with a six-digit number written on it, and she did not doubt that it would open the safe. She also did not doubt that if she used the code now, it would cause electronic beeping that would waken the warden. She memorized the number.

  Alvarez stirred. She ran back to the sofa, sat on the floor beside him and pretended to be asleep.

  “Hey, you, girl,” Alvarez said, shaking her.

  Barbara raised her head. “Hey, you,” she said in a low voice.

  “You’re pretty good, you know?”

  “I know.”

  “Get dressed and get out. I’ll send for you again.”

  “I’d love to see you again,” she said. “When?”

  “You want some more, eh?”

  “Oh, yes,” she agreed.

  “Maybe tomorrow,” he said.

  “When does your wife return?” she asked.

  “What do you know about my wife?” he demanded.

  “Just that she’s away.”

  He looked at her for a moment. “Sunday,” he said.

  “Then we have tomorrow to play,” she said, standing up and slowly putting on her clothes.

  “Tomorrow, then,” he said.

  “Yes, Capitán,” she replied. “I will be ready.”

  He handcuffed her, then unlocked the office door and turned her over to the guard who waited outside.

  The guard marched her back down the dirty hallways and put her back in the small cell that she shared with five other women.

  “Have a good time?” one of the women asked suggestively.

  “Shut up, bitch,” Barbara replied, and lay down on her bunk. Tomorrow, she thought. Saturday at the latest.

  Later, she got up and motioned to the guard in the hallway.

  “Eh?” the woman said.

  “I can’t sleep,” Barbara said. “I need something to take.”

  “Sleep is expensive,” the woman replied.

  “Twenty dollars American for Ambien or two Valiums.”

  “Show me the money.”

  “When I see the medicine.”

  The woman went away and returned with two yellow pills. “Valium,” she said. “See the writing?”

  Ten milligrams, Barbara thought. Ideal. She retrieved the money from a capsule in her vagina and paid the woman. Now all she had to do was survive tomorrow.

  3

  It was nearly noon before the guard came for Barbara in her cell, and she had been getting nervous, thinking something had gone wrong. The guard finally opened the cell door, and she didn’t handcuff Barbara.

  The guard took her down the corridors, let her into Alvarez’s office and closed the office door behind her. Barbara locked it herself.

  This seemed to please Alvarez. “Would you like a drink?” he asked.

  “Sure,” she replied, walking toward his desk, where a bottle of tequila reposed, along with some glasses. “Let me get you one.” She was unbuttoning her blouse as she walked.

  “Good girl,” Alvarez said, unzipping his pants.

  Barbara fished the two Valium tablets from her bra and ground them between her thumb and forefinger into the glass as she poured the liquid. She turned and walked over to Alvarez while reaching behind her and unhooking her bra.

  “You’re not having one?” he asked.

  “Afterward,” she replied. “I enjoy it more if I’m sober.” She knelt between his legs and began toying with his penis. “Salud.”

  He tossed off the tequila, grabbed her hair and pulled her into his crotch.

  She took longer this time, hoping the drug would work quickly, playing with him, bringing him to the brink of orgasm, then backing off. After fifteen minutes or so he came loudly, then sagged sideways on the sofa, as he had done the previous day. She continued to stroke him until he fell asleep.

  Barbara walked back to the desk, took a swig from the tequila bottle, swished it around her mouth and spat it onto the floor, then went into the apartment, picked a dress from the closet and put it on. She took a scarf from a drawer to wear over her blond hair, then picked up the phone and dialed James Long’s cell number.

  “Hello?”

  “Where are you?”

  “Just driving down Camino Cerritos,” he said. “I was delayed by some roadwork.”

  “Can you be under the window in five minutes?” she asked.

  “Yes.”

  “See you then.” Barbara hung up and looked around the room for something else but didn’t find it. She walked back into the office and looked around. In a corner was a silver-trimmed Mexican saddle, with a cowboy’s rope tied to it. She took the rope and started back into the apartment, then stopped.

  She had nearly forgotten the safe. She knelt before it and pressed in the code she had found in the desk. There was a soft click, then she turned the handle and the door swung open. To her delight, the first thing she saw was two stacks of bills, one of dollars, the other of pesos. She took both. On a lower shelf, half a dozen pistols were arrayed. She chose a small Beretta semiautomatic and checked to be sure it was loaded.

  At the bottom of the safe she found a cloth bag and put the gun and the money into it and tied it around her neck. She walked back to where Alvarez slept, thought about putting a bullet into his brain, then decided against it. It would just make the authorities angrier and motivate their search for her.

  She went back into the apartment and into the bathroom, where she tied one end of the rope around the base of the sink, then she stood on the toilet, opened the window and, with one foot on the sink, raised herself and looked out. A car was just turning into the alley, with Jimmy at the wheel. Perfect.

  Barbara tossed the remainder of the rope out the window, then, pushing off the toilet tank, got her upper half out the window and looked down. The car was directly beneath her.

  Holding tightly to the rope, she allowed the rest of herself to fall out the window, breaking the fall with the rope. She landed in a sitting position on top of the car, then let herself to the ground. “Hi, there,” she said to Jimmy.

  “Hey, babe,” he replied, smiling.

  She got into the backseat. “Let’s get out of here,” she said, “but slowly. We have some time, I think.”

  Jimmy backed slowly down the alley and into the street, then put the car in drive and headed back the way he had come.

  Barbara kept her head down until they had cleared the town, then she crawled over the seat and into the front.

  “How long until Acapulco?” she asked.

  “A little over an hour.”

  “How long before the roadwork?”

  “Half that.”

  “Stop well before it, and I’ll get into the trunk. We don’t want the workers remembering a car with a woman in it.”

  “Good thinking,” he said. “How are you? Was it rough?”

  “At times, but nothing I couldn’t handle.”

  “What’s that around your neck?” he asked.

  “Ill-gotten gains,” she replied.

  Twenty minutes later Jimmy slowed the car. “I think the roadwork is just around the bend ahead.”

  They both got out of the car and checked for traffic. Barbara climbed in the trunk. “I’ll let you out when it’s safe,” Jimmy said, then closed it after her.

  He got in and drove away, while Barbara di
d her best to make herself comfortable. Shortly, the car stopped, then moved forward in little spurts, then they were finally past the work and at speed. Jimmy slowed and stopped again, then helped her out of the trunk.

  Barbara put on the head scarf and took Jimmy’s sunglasses from him and put them on. “There,” she said. “Did you get the hair dye?”

  “It’s in our suite,” he said. “Why don’t we go straight to the airport and get out of here?”

  “No,” she said. “They’ll shut that down as soon as I’m missed. Let’s go to the Princess. We’ll check on the airport tomorrow. I don’t care if we have to wait for a few days, until the heat is off.”

  “I don’t think the pilot will wait that long,” he said.

  “Call him when we get to the hotel and tell him tomorrow. Where’s my suitcase?”

  “In the suite,” he replied. “I had everything in it pressed.”

  “Good.” As they approached Acapulco, Barbara put her head in Jimmy’s lap. “Wake me when we’re there,” she said.

  Jimmy drove to the hotel, passing the main entrance, then stopping at a side door. He handed her a key card. “This will let you in through that door and into the suite. It’s number nine hundred, ninth floor, turn right out of the elevator. I’ll go park the car.”

  Barbara got out of the car and let herself into the hotel, then followed Jimmy’s directions to the suite. It was spacious and sunny, with a terrace overlooking the Pacific. She undressed, went into the bathroom and began applying the hair color. By the time Jimmy got upstairs, she was a redhead. She dried her hair, and when she came out of the bathroom, Jimmy was in bed, naked.

  “You deserve a reward,” she said, climbing in beside him.

  4

  When Alvarez awoke it was dark in his office. He stood up and groggily felt for the light switch along the wall above the sofa. Then he took a step and fell heavily on the floor. His trousers were around his ankles.

  He pulled them up and buckled his belt, then, holding on to the arm of the sofa, pulled himself to his feet and found the light switch. He was alone in the office. Panicked, he went to the safe and checked the door, but it was locked. Relieved, he sank into his office chair and poured himself a glass of tequila from the open bottle on the desk. Where the hell was the woman? Then he noticed that the door to his apartment was open. Was she in his bed? He’d kill her!

  He got up and staggered into the apartment, switching on an overhead light. She was not in the living room, so he went into the bedroom and turned on a bedside lamp. The bed was perfectly made. He tried the bathroom and was stunned to see a rope, one end tied to the sink pedestal, the other end hanging out the window above the toilet. He pulled it in and untied it from the sink, then returned to his office and placed the rope back on his prize saddle. Everything had to be in perfect order when his wife came home.

  But where was the woman? He unlocked his office door and stepped into the hallway. No one there. Thank God the guard was gone. He went back into his office and sat down at his desk. She had escaped, and he had to do something, but what? If he sounded the alarm, he would have to explain how she got out of his office. He would be fired out of hand the moment the story hit the papers and TV. What was even worse was that he would have to explain it to his wife.

  He looked at his clock on his desk: just after eight P.M. There was a knock on the office door. “Come in!” he called.

  The door opened and the guard stood there, looking around the room. “My shift is ending,” she said. “Do you want me to return the American woman to her cell?”

  Alvarez, borne on a cloud of tequila, improvised. “The American woman has been transferred,” he replied.

  “Transferred? Where?”

  “Who knows? I think the woman has connections in the government. They came, they had the proper papers, they took her away. Now go home and forget about it. If anybody asks about her you know nothing, except that she has been transferred. You don’t want to get caught in that particular flypaper.”

  “That is true,” the woman said, and closed the door.

  Transferred-that was it! Alvarez mopped his brow and poured himself another tequila. The woman was gone, and good riddance! He would stick to his story. There had been a telephone call from the Ministry of Justice. He was to bring the woman to his office, where she would be collected in due course. They had brought a transfer order, properly signed and stamped, and had taken her away. If anyone asked, he knew nothing further. He drank more tequila.

  BARBARA AND JIMMY WERE, at that moment, having a room-service dinner on the terrace of their suite, watching the moon rise over the Pacific. Barbara kept an eye on the TV, waiting for her picture to be displayed, but it didn’t happen. What was going on?

  “You still looking for yourself on TV?” Jimmy asked.

  “Yes, and I don’t understand it.”

  “Maybe the warden is still asleep.”

  “Possibly,” she said, “Or…”

  “Or what?”

  “Alvarez is now in a very difficult position,” Barbara said. “I’m gone, and there’s a rope hanging out his bathroom window. What does he do?”

  “Sound the alarm?”

  “I’ve been gone for hours,” she said. “The Valium had to put him down for quite a while, especially when mixed with the tequila.”

  “Yeah, that would do it, if he drank enough.”

  “He’s a lush. He drinks all the time.”

  “Then maybe he’s still out.”

  “It’s been more than eight hours,” she said. “When he wakes up and I’m gone, he’s going to have to figure out what to do, and from his point of view, the absolute worst thing he could do is raise an alarm for my recapture.”

  “Good point,” Jimmy said. “You’ve got that on your side.”

  “He’s in control inside the prison. If I’m gone he can cover it up, at least for a while, but if his superiors know I’m out, all hell will break loose.”

  “Granted.”

  “And then there’s his wife,” Barbara said, smiling. “Word is, he’s more frightened of her and her father than of his bosses. She comes home tomorrow morning. If he’s smart, and he is, in a kind of reptilian-brain way, he’ll cover it up.”

  “How about the money you stole from him?”

  “I’d bet anything she knows nothing about it. It’s graft-bribes he’s taken over time. There was sixty-one thousand dollars and about twenty in pesos.”

  “So, only you and Alvarez know about that.”

  “Right, but if they catch me, everyone will know. Jimmy, we have to get out of here tomorrow morning, first thing. Call your pilot.”

  Jimmy got out his cell phone. “Hello, Bart? Jim Long. I want to fly back to L.A. tomorrow morning.”

  “No,” Barbara said, tugging at his sleeve.

  “We have to stop somewhere on the way to L.A. What’s an out-of-the-way airport?”

  Jimmy shrugged. “How about Yuma?” he said to Barbara.

  “Perfect. Tell him to file for there, then he can drop me and take you back to Santa Monica.”

  Jimmy passed on the request and hung up. “Bart’s good with that,” he said.

  “How well do you know him?”

  “Very well. He’s worked on nearly all of my films as a stunt pilot, and ferrying around cast and crew. He can do just about anything, and I put money in his pocket all the time.”

  “Good, then he won’t ask too many questions about me.”

  “Don’t worry about it.”

  “Tell him I live in Yuma, and my husband doesn’t know I’ve been in Mexico.”

  “Okay.”

  “Does he fly to Mexico a lot?”

  “All the time.”

  “Good. You can give him Alvarez’s pesos.”

  The following morning they drove to the Acapulco Airport and onto the ramp, stopping next to the Beech Baron and depositing their luggage with Bart, who seemed to think nothing of taking on an unexpected passenger and dropping
her in Yuma.

  They took off and climbed to twelve thousand feet, and headed northeast. Barbara opened her suitcase and went through all her ID-credit cards, driver’s license and passport, all genuine, all in the name of Eleanor Keeler. Her last husband had been Walter Keeler, who had died in a car crash. She had been left a tightly controlled legacy and suspected Walter’s lawyer of having screwed her out of anything more. He had, no doubt, cut off payments when she had been convicted in Mexico, but she still had a fund of several hundred thousand dollars in a San Francisco bank. It would take some doing, but she would get her hands on that.

  The airplane landed at Yuma later in the day, and Barbara handed the pilot her passport. “For some reason, they didn’t give me an entry stamp when I crossed the border,” she said.

  “When did you cross?”

  “Three days ago. I flew private into Acapulco.”

  “It’ll probably be okay,” he said.

  She and Jimmy waited next to the airplane. She was nervous, and she looked for a way out of the airport. There was a midsized jet parked next to them with the engines running. Maybe she could hide in the toilet.

  Their pilot came walking across the tarmac with a uniformed customs official, scaring her half to death, but the official wanted only to inspect the airplane, which took no more than two minutes, then he left.

  “We’re cleared,” the pilot said, returning her passport. “It was no sweat about your entry stamp, and you’re stamped into the U.S. now.” He got her bag out of the airplane for her.

  She put an arm around Jimmy’s neck and kissed him. “I’ll be in touch, baby. You just go back to L.A. and live your life. You know nothing about me.”

  “Gotcha, kiddo,” he said, climbing back into the airplane.

  BARBARASPENT THE NIGHT in an airport motel, then, the following morning, rented a car and drove to Phoenix, ending up in Scottsdale at the Mondrian, a fashionable hotel full of beautiful people.

  She had a new life to invent now, and a long shopping list of a car, an untraceable cell phone, clothes and luggage. She started with a day at the hotel spa, including a recoloring and cut of her hair.