by Jez Morrow
Martin should never, ever need to say that word.
What the hell is wrong with me?
* * * * *
Larry Hunter came in to work smug and swaggering. He gathered his department together and announced before Ann Jefferson, Moo Park and Martin Winter, “Checked your story, Winter. You weren’t in any prison in Guatemala. I checked all of them. There is no record of you.” Triumphantly, Hunter let fall a stack of supporting documents onto the conference room table.
Even Ann Jefferson looked a little embarrassed by this pronouncement.
Martin said, “Do you want to explain it to him, Annie, or should I?”
Ann Jefferson touched her hand to her head as if it suddenly ached. She spoke, pained, “Go ahead, Martin.”
Martin went ahead, “Hunter, how can you be so intentionally dumb?”
“Excuse me?”
“I was not arrested by the Guatemalan authorities,” Martin told Hunter. “I was kidnapped by Colombian drug runners. Now, to the best of my knowledge, the Guatemalan government does not lease out prison space to foreign drug lords. I was confined in a private, sub-legal, drug-built, drug-run hellhole in the jungle that exists outside of Guatemalan law and keeps no records whatsoever. Questions?”
After a long embarrassed silence, Moo Park asked, “Did anyone order donuts for this meeting?”
* * * * *
Martin confided in Jack the nature of the case under investigation without giving him any details or specific data.
“Those men kidnapped me because they thought I knew the name of the traitor who is extorting money from them—the man or woman they call El Gusano. As long as they thought I knew his identity, they kept me alive, because they want to know who El Gusano is so they can kill him. And El Gusano needs to know how much I know so he or she can kill all my contacts. I told you I was dangerous to know, Jack.”
“The Gulf was dangerous,” Jack countered, unfazed.
Martin continued, “The traitor calls himself the Snake. But the Colombians call him El Gusano.”
“Is gusano Spanish for snake?”
“No, it’s Spanish for worm. I don’t know if El Gusano knows that or if he knows how much his paymasters despise him. I heard them talking about him from my cell. It wasn’t really a cell. It was a dirt hole with bars.
“The cartel pays millions of dollars to El Gusano. They don’t know who he is, because the payments go to a numbered account in the Caymans. My captors talked like they’re making him bend down to pick pennies out of the dirt. They laugh at him. To them, the payout is just an annoying little business expense to keep the vermin from biting their ankles.”
“A million dollars is pennies?” Jack said.
“Millions, Jack. You have to pronounce the s. Millions.”
“Hell, Hanssen sold out for pennies on the dollar.”
Hanssen was the Bureau’s most infamous traitor to date.
“Hanssen is a sorry little dick,” said Martin. “And that just makes El Gusano a higher-priced whore. Actually I should say that El Gusano is the pimp. The real whore is in Congress. There is a congressman who is getting a billion dollars to clear the path for drugs coming into this country. You just can’t imagine the size of these operations.”
“I guess I can’t,” said Jack, aghast. He asked carefully, not wanting to seek more than Martin could give him, “Can I ask which congressman?”
“Don’t know. We only even know about the congressman from the drug lords complaining about the ‘import tax’ they have to pay to Uncle.
“You gotta know I uncovered this whole can of worms backward. I found evidence that someone in U.S. law enforcement was on the track of a congressman’s dirty dealings but instead of placing the congressman under arrest, this law enforcement officer started skimming a piece of the action.”
“El Gusano,” said Jack.
Martin nodded. “That’s what they call him.”
“Millions of dollars?” Jack pronounced the s this time. “That’s a hell of a number to call skim.”
“There are a hell of a lot of drugs moving across our border. And a lot of people who want El Gusano dead. Including me. In fact, when I find out who it is, I will be tempted to let my ‘friends’ in Guatemala know so they can do something cruel and unusual to him rather than just have our guys arrest him. Jack, you look like you want to ask me something sensitive. I may not answer but you can ask.”
“I was wondering who put you on the case.” That person would be Jack’s first suspect.
“I was the one who found the evidence of the existence of El Gusano, so I brought it to the executive assistant director. Cobb put me on it but it was already my case. It would only be questionable if he gave it to someone else.”
So much for that lead.
Martin hesitated, as if considering how much to reveal.
He decided to continue, “At first, I thought our law enforcement breach had to be in the DEA. Now I think someone just wanted me to look in that direction. The real traitor is much, much closer to home.”
Jack felt a dread chill lift the hairs behind his neck. “How close?”
“I’ve known for some time that it’s someone in the FBI. And now I know—” He stopped as if afraid to say it aloud. He started over. “And now I know it’s someone in my own department.”
“Martin! My God.”
“That is what makes my return so volatile. El Gusano needs to discredit me before I identify him.”
Jack was horrified. “Martin, I’m going to repeat an offer I made to you a while ago—can I rip someone’s throat out for you?”
Martin gave a sad smile. “I appreciate the offer.”
“Well, if it’s someone in your department, who do you think?”
“None of them!” Martin threw up his hands. “They all piss me off but I just don’t see any of them doing this. If you just weigh the evidence, I would suspect me before anyone else. Then you in second place.”
“I’m not in your department.”
“Oh, but I’m your patsy, according to Moo Park.”
“Try a different tack,” Jack suggested. “Who looks least suspicious?”
Martin shook his head. “Moo Park pretends to be my buddy. But he hasn’t done anything for me to back that up.
“Larry Hunter is a bumbling dick. Maybe his mistakes are all an act but I just don’t see him having the attention to detail to pull off a scheme this perfectly put together.
“Ann Jefferson is on the offensive. I guess that’s how I would play it if I were a traitorous sack of shit. But this is all speculation based on vapor, and I’m not like them. I don’t make conclusions without something like a fact to prop it up.”
“I’m here for you, Martin. If there’s anything you want me to do.”
“I need to pretend I’m getting close,” said Martin. “I need to force El Gusano to make a move.”
“Watch your ass, Martin.”
“You too, Jack.”
Jack assured him, “You don’t have to tell me to watch your ass.”
* * * * *
The blank spots in Martin’s memory began to fill in.
“The bad news is it’s nothing useful,” Martin told Jack in the evening over coffee. “I thought I was going to have this big revelation that was going to crack the case and solve everything. What I remember are things I can’t tell anyone.”
“Anything you can tell me?” Jack asked.
“Yeah. Let’s walk.”
They got their coats and ventured out into the cold.
Christmas lights were already going up here and there along the street.
Martin held Jack’s arm as they walked.
“Ann Jefferson keeps badgering me to explain how I got away.” Martin glanced up at the moon. “I remember my escape.”
There were two kinds of shooters in the world—those who practiced on a firing range and those who hunted.
In eluding men with guns, you had better luck against the range shooter
. Range shooters were not accustomed to dealing with moving targets. Angling off was an art that did not come naturally to most people. A moving target required the shooter to aim ahead of it.
Duck or pheasant hunters had practice angling off but they were also accustomed to their prey being airborne and moving in a straight line, not zigging and dodging.
When you’ve got a backwoods rabbit hunter gunning for you, you’re pretty well screwed.
“From my dirt hole, I could hear some of these clowns shooting skeet to pass the time,” Martin said. “They had a lot of time on their hands. They got pretty good at it. I could hear the skeet breaking apart.”
Then the day came when Martin’s captors were mortally tired of him, tired of the jungle, tired of shooting skeet.
They dragged him out of his underground den, shoved him into an open field and told him to run, Bambi, run.
All his nerves sparked and quavered. Martin presented his back to the shooters. He held his arms out to his sides and walked slowly into the field.
He was not a fun target. They jeered. He was boring them.
He tried to keep his hands from shaking. His back tingled. His knees threatened to buckle under him. Any moment he would feel the shot.
He heard the gun crack. His body went rigid. A bullet ripped the air over his head. He heard the passing bullet zing.
His tormentors shouted, “Move!”
He had walked into the thigh-high grass by now. He heard a gun cock, a muttered curse. The next shot would be for the kill.
Martin dropped into the grass.
He became a wolf, shimmied out of his clothes like a snake leaving its old skin and slinked low to the ground through the tall grass.
Behind him, bullets ripped into his abandoned clothing.
The men came running toward his clothes to collect their kill.
Martin changed direction and broke into an all-out run toward the jungle.
The men found Martin’s clothes, empty. They stomped on them, as if making sure no one was really in them, which made no sense but Martin never could make sense of the actions of men who peddled poison. The men cast about on the ground.
They found the direction of the disturbed grasses. One spied a movement, pointed and yelled, “Coyote!”
Martin’s head ducked on reflex at the gun crack. The bullet stabbed the ground near him, spraying up dirt, spattering Martin’s silver fur. Sounds of cursing reached him from a quickly increasing distance as Martin ran.
“Forget the damned coyote!” someone snarled. “Get the FBI man!”
The “coyote” melted into the jungle.
Martin heard their singsong voices behind him diminishing in the distance, urging him to come out and play.
They claimed they were only just playing. They told him he would die in the jungle.
Had he been just a man, he probably would have died out there, which was why the FBI had trouble believing that Martin escaped without help.
Martin could not tell the full truth to the FBI. He didn’t even try to tell them that his captors had mistaken him for a coyote.
“And I remember what they did to me while I was in captivity,” Martin said, his voice a faint rasp. “Lots of things. Nothing I really want to tell anyone.”
He leaned his head against Jack’s arm as they walked, the navy wool of Jack’s coat rough against his cheek. He knew there was a strange look on his face. His eyes were wide and glassy, his gaze inward.
Tasted metal. Gagging. Could not breathe. Choking. The light fading. Thought he was dead.
Martin abruptly pulled out of the memory like a fighter jet out of a fatal dive. He gasped. He could breathe.
His fists were clenched on Jack’s coat sleeve.
Even to his own ears, his voice sounded distant and hollow. “They jammed a loaded gun in my mouth…”
Chapter Ten
Jack picked up Martin after work to take him shopping for a new car. Martin found a couple possibilities but walked away to see what kind of offers the dealers would call him with later.
On the way home, a news item on the radio caught Martin’s attention.
There had been a shooting at a Metro stop. Martin only caught part of the story, so he turned on the television at eleven o’clock to get some details on the local news.
A quick camera shot showed a slender figure in a dark green trench coat sprawled in a pool of blood on the eastbound platform of the Metro. The face was young, early twenties, male, clean-shaven. His hair was dark blond.
Martin stared, shaking. It was like looking at his own dead body.
The time of the shooting was 5:50 p.m.
The place was Martin’s Metro stop.
That had been Martin’s train.
If Jack had not picked him up after work, Martin would have got off that train at the same time as this young man.
The reporter said there was no apparent motive. She gave the victim’s name and his age, which was two years younger than Martin. The victim had been an office worker with no criminal record. The killing seemed utterly senseless and random.
A photo of the victim’s face, taken while still living, showed only the most superficial resemblance to Martin. But taken together with the green trench coat—which was identical—his height, his slenderness, the place and the time, it was enough for a stranger taking aim through a telescopic sight to make a mistake.
Martin turned off the TV. He sat very still, staring at the blank screen. “Jack, am I being paranoid?”
Jack looked grim. “No.”
Martin flipped open his cell phone.
Cobb’s voice, very low, sounded surprised and not happy to hear from him. “Martin! What is this? Are you still at work?”
“No, sir.”
“Just what time zone do you think you’re in?” Cobb scolded in a low rasp.
Martin told Executive Assistant Director Cobb what he had seen on the news.
“And the police were there?” Cobb nearly whispered. “So what makes a local shooting a Federal case?”
“The vic was built like me, his hair is like mine, he was wearing my coat, he was on my train and he got shot at my stop!”
“You were there?”
“No. I saw it on the news. I was supposed to be there. I didn’t take the train today. I just walked over my own grave. That was supposed to be me.”
“What do you want, Martin?” Cobb said, low.
A chill whispered up Martin’s neck. “Sir, you don’t sound like you can talk freely.”
Cobb hissed, “I am on babysitting duty! I’m trying not to wake up my granddaughter. Hold on. I’m going to another room.”
Martin shut his eyes. He hoped he was not crying wolf. It was closing on midnight, and Martin was calling the man at his home while he was watching a grandbaby.
“Okay,” said Cobb, returning to the phone.
“Sir, I want us to take jurisdiction of the case. I know it looks like a police matter but I think it was supposed to have been an attack on a Federal agent. Me.”
“Yes,” said Cobb, not arguing.
Martin blinked, taken up short. “You believe me?”
“I told you, you have earned your paranoia, Martin.”
Martin felt his body relax. Everything was going to be okay. The matter was in competent hands now. He told Cobb, “And I don’t want Ann Jefferson, Larry Hunter or Moo Park on it.”
“Very well. But Martin, since you think you were the intended victim, you aren’t getting this case either,” Cobb warned. “As soon as we get off the phone, I will call the police and inform them that the FBI is taking jurisdiction. Did you get the precinct or the name of the detective in charge?”
“No, sir. It wasn’t on the news.”
“I’ll find it.”
“Don’t tell the others—”
“Martin, I am not a rookie.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And, Martin, don’t come in to work tomorrow. I would like to see what kind of react
ions your absence might cause.”
“Yes, sir. And maybe you could show the picture of the victim to the three blind mice and see who squeaks,” Martin suggested.
“Where will you be tomorrow?”
“I don’t know,” said Martin. He hadn’t thought that far ahead. “Somewhere different. Call my cell phone. I can tell you I definitely won’t be at the Metro and I won’t be at Jack’s place.”
Martin could hear the thin voice of a little baby crying in the background.
Cobb’s crumbly voice mumbled, “I am too old for this.”
* * * * *
Jack and Martin left the townhouse and went to Jack’s cabin—the last place Martin ever wanted to lead his enemies. The place was their sanctuary.
“You’re safe here,” said Jack.
“How can you be sure?” Martin asked.
This was Jack’s ground.
“If they come for you here,” said Jack, “I will kill them.”
* * * * *
A text message appeared on Martin’s cell phone. It was from Ann Jefferson, summoning Martin to headquarters at 9:00 p.m., well after normal work hours.
Jack’s head lifted suddenly, his face guarded. A lock of dark hair fell across his serious brow but he did not move it away from his eyes. He did not move at all, like a wild creature at the sound of a snapping twig. “That’s a blatant trap,” said Jack. His open collar allowed a glimpse of his pulse leaping at the base of his throat. “You won’t be able to take your gun inside the building.”
After hours, Martin would need to sign in, walk through a metal detector and get buzzed through the inner doors. Keycards did not work after hours.
“Don’t go,” said Jack. The words came out like an order.
But Martin was already un-tucking his gun from his belt at his back. He set the heavy metal piece on Jack’s breakfast table, a dangerous calm about him.
“It’s a blatant trap,” said Martin, determined, a steel resolve fixed underneath his fragility. “I have to go.”
He was nobody’s prey. A wolf was a predator.
