by Mark Dawson
He parked next to the reception building and went inside. It was late and the night clerk was dozing in his chair. The sicario cleared his throat and then, when that didn’t work, he tapped the bell.
“Good evening,” he said when the clerk awoke with a start.
“Yeah?”
“I’d like to check in, please.”
“You got a reservation?”
“I have.”
He took out the printed sheet of paper that del Pozo had given him and laid it flat on the counter. The man squinted down at it.
“Burton,” the man said.
“That’s right,” he said pleasantly, taking out his fake passport and a credit card in the same name.
The clerk ran through the mundanities, running the credit card to cover any incidentals.
“We got breakfast in the restaurant between six and ten,” the man said, handing over a key card. “The pool’s open from eight. You got an ice machine outside the room. You need anything else?”
“That’s all,” the sicario said. “Thank you.”
He parked the car in an empty space next to a cheap-looking statue of a prancing horse and got out. He had been given room 14, a ground-level room accessed by a door that faced onto the parking lot. He went to the door, held the key card against the reader, waited for it to go green, then opened the door and went inside.
The room was not pleasant: a chequered bedspread featuring squares of brown and grey, a brownish carpet, cheap furniture that looked as if it was held together by glue, a white fridge that still had the manufacturer’s bright-yellow installation label affixed to the front. The bathroom was tiny, with just enough room for the toilet and a small bath with a shower attachment fitted to the taps. It was clean, though, and, more importantly, it was not the sort of place where one would attract attention. The sicario was satisfied with it.
He went back out to the car and popped the trunk. He took out his luggage and the rucksack, shut the lid, and transferred both items to the room. He shut the door, closed the curtains, and hefted the bag up onto the bed.
He started with the top pocket, unzipping it and noting that it had been packed to capacity. The mesh pockets included a pair of gloves, a bandana, a trauma kit and a pair of ballistic glasses. The main compartment of the bag included a BCM Recce AR-15, broken down into its constituent parts, a pistol belt with a holster containing a Ruger SR1911 .45 and extra magazines in the mag pouches. Finally, he saw a Condor plate carrier with the plates inserted, together with additional mags for the AR and the Ruger in the pouches.
He would check out the equipment later, but for now, he was happy.
He looked at his watch.
One thirty.
He would get started in the morning.
57
Milton drove south, out of Vegas, and back towards Jean. He saw a track that led into the scrub of the desert and followed it until he reached a depression that would partially obscure the Suburban from passing traffic. He texted Salazar to tell him where he was and got out of the vehicle. He knew that he would have to abandon the SUV; it was a miracle that he hadn’t already been pulled over, given the obvious damage that had been done to it during the shoot-out, and he would not have been able to provide a satisfactory answer that could explain the bloodbath in the back.
His prints would be all over the vehicle, of course, but at least he was able to do something about that. He went to the front and removed the license plate, then went to the back and removed that one, too. He lifted the door to access the load space and took out the jerry can that he had noticed earlier. He unscrewed the cap and took a sniff: gasoline. He poured the gas into the back seat, then went to the front and sloshed it over the seats there, too. He poured it out—into the footwells, over the dash, over the leather steering wheel, over the AR-15—until the can was empty. He took the manual out of the glove compartment, tore out a handful of pages, and used his lighter to set them on fire. He tossed the burning paper onto the gas-soaked driver’s seat and stepped back as the flames quickly spread and took hold.
Milton turned and trudged back to the road. He looked at his watch. It was a quarter past one. He found his thoughts drifting back to what had happened at the gas station. Should he have anticipated what Jessica had done? He was prepared to give himself a hard time about it, but, as he ran back over the events of the last day and a half again, he still wasn’t sure that he had missed any signs. She was an accomplished and convincing liar. His only mistake had been to assume that the money that Richard Russo had stolen was just the hundred and fifty thousand that he had found in the case and, even then, it was a reasonable mistake to make. That was a lot of money, even to a cartel; besides, Milton suspected, they would have reacted in the same way if the amount had been one-tenth of what had been there. The fact that Richard Russo had the temerity to steal from the Mexicans at all would have prompted the same response; how was Milton to know that the amount that he had taken was many multiples more?
He knew that was all true, but still he found that he blamed himself.
His phone buzzed. He took it out and saw that Salazar was calling.
“Where are you?”
“On the side of I-15,” Milton said. “About a mile south of Seven Hills.”
Milton saw headlights piercing the darkness ahead.
“That glow I can see to the southwest?” Salazar said.
“Yeah,” Milton replied. “That’s me.”
58
Milton got into Salazar’s car and rubbed his tired eyes as the detective swung the car around and set off back towards Vegas.
“How is he?” Milton asked him.
“They’re operating,” Salazar said.
“What are his chances?”
“They wouldn’t say. He’d already be dead if the bullet had hit anything important, so he got lucky there. On the other hand, he’s lost a lot of blood.”
“What a mess.”
“You got that right.”
Salazar had pouches under his eyes that suggested he could do with more sleep. His cheeks were heavy with stubble, and his skin looked sallow in the artificial glow of the dashboard lights. He was wearing jeans and a sports jacket.
“You want to tell me what in God’s name happened out there?”
“The woman that I was helping wasn’t who I thought she was.”
“That so? You never told me her name.”
“Jessica Russo. Her father is Richard and her brother is Mason. They’re all involved.”
“And this is to do with Delgado?”
“Looks like Richard ripped him off.”
“How much?”
“More than five million.”
Salazar gawped across the cabin of the car at him. “Seriously?”
Milton told him about the briefcase, the evidence that had been left on the thumb drive, and the Bitcoin.
“They do know who Delgado represents, right?”
“They do,” Milton said. “And they did it anyway. He has cancer—he might not care anymore.”
“But his kids?”
“They were all planning on leaving the country. Delgado got to Richard just before they did. And they’re resourceful—Jessica fooled me, and Mason is cunning. They make a good team. And, right now, they’ve got away with it.”
“You wanna tell me what happened?”
Milton went over the events in the desert. He explained how Jessica had led them all into a trap, and how Mason had closed it. He told him how Mason had been determined to shoot both him and Beau, and how Jessica had persuaded him against it. He described Mason’s compromise—shooting Beau in an effort to prevent their pursuit—and how Milton had taken Delgado’s vehicle and driven Beau back to the city.
Salazar shook his head with weary resignation. “So you’re telling me we’re gonna find dead Mexicans out in the desert?”
“Four of them,” Milton said. “Delgado and three others.”
“Shit,” Salazar said. “That’s
gonna generate some heat. Staff at the ER said Beau told them he’d been shot by a hitch-hiker.”
“We agreed that would be the best story,” Milton said.
“And you don’t want to be involved?”
“Not if we can help it.”
“And what’ll Beau say about him being out there after midnight?”
“He’ll say he was chasing a lead to a skipper out near Jean, but that it didn’t go anywhere. He was driving back to the city when he saw the woman. He pulled over; he got shot. He was picked up by another driver who was passing and he took him to the ER.”
“The Good Samaritan.”
Milton nodded.
“But he left him outside?”
“Because he didn’t want to be involved with the police. The story won’t stand up to too much scrutiny. It’d be helpful if you could move it in the right direction.”
“Keep you out of it, you mean?”
“Is that possible?”
“Yeah,” he said. “I can probably do that.”
“Thank you.”
“The fire back there—that was you torching your wheels?”
“Yes,” Milton said. “That was the car Delgado came to the meet in. I don’t want my forensics in it.”
Salazar gave a nod. “All right, then,” he said. “If that’s what you both want to say, that’s what we’ll go with. I’ll call my partner and get her to go take his statement as soon as he comes around. She’ll probably send a car out to the desert to have a look. Will they see anything?”
“Not until light,” Milton said. “And, even then, it’s round the back of the gas station. The bodies might not be visible from the road.”
“We’ll just have to play that by ear,” Salazar said. “I can’t tip her off—I can’t know that the bodies are there. If they get found, they get found. Odds are, though, the coyotes and the vultures will get to them first. We’ll deal with the scraps they leave behind.”
“There’s something else I’m going to need you to do,” Milton said. “I need you to see if you have anything on the Russos. We know that Richard was working with Delgado. Maybe there’s something on him. Mason was a Marine, but he got discharged. I wouldn’t mind knowing why. Anything would be helpful.”
“Why?”
“Because I want to find them,” he said.
“And then?”
“I haven’t decided yet.”
“I’ll ask.”
They raced past the sign that welcomed drivers to fabulous Las Vegas. Milton looked at it sourly. All he had wanted to do was enjoy a road trip, but, just like always, he had allowed himself to be dragged down into a mess. Regardless, he couldn’t walk away from it now. Beau had been shot. There would be a reckoning for that.
59
Salazar dropped Milton at the El Cortez and said that he would go back to the hospital to keep an eye on Beau.
The casino was busy as Milton passed through it to the elevators. He went up to his room, took a moment to listen out of an abundance of caution and then, satisfied that he could hear nothing that might suggest someone was inside, he opened the door and went in.
He had blood on his clothes. He undressed and showered, washing Beau’s blood from his skin, waiting until the water ran clear. He dressed in clean clothes, took the dirty ones and disposed of them in the trash. He moved quickly, confirming that Jessica had taken the data sticks that he had left behind. He collected the MacBook, double-checked that he hadn’t left anything behind, and then went back into the corridor and across to Jessica’s door. There was a paper room service menu that had been left on a tray on the floor next to the door. Milton took it, folded it in half and then in half again, and slid it into the gap between the door and the doorframe. He slid the paper down and applied pressure on the striker until the lock retracted.
He opened the door and went inside.
The room was empty. Jessica had abandoned her luggage in the back of her beached Tesla and had brought nothing with her. She had taken her phone with her to the gas station rendezvous and left nothing else behind, either.
Milton left the room and made his way back down to the casino and then into the lot outside. The Porsche was still in the same spot. He unlocked it and got inside, started the engine and reversed out of the space. He took out his phone, opened the map and tapped in his destination: the Mad Greek Café outside Baker, California. There was no traffic to contend with at this time of the morning, and the phone app reported that it would take Milton ninety minutes to get there.
That, though, was at lawful speeds.
Milton was going to drive a little faster this time.
60
Milton made excellent time, pushing the car up to a hundred on the quieter stretches of the interstate when he was confident that he wouldn’t attract the attention of the highway patrol. The Mad Greek was still open, catering to refugees fleeing their disappointments in Vegas. He pulled into the parking lot and saw that Jessica’s Tesla was still there. He had suspected that it would be—he doubted she could have had time to arrange for it to be collected in the chaos of the last two days—but it was still a relief to see it in the same spot.
Milton got out of the Porsche and went into the restaurant. He took a seat at the window where he was able to watch the car. The waitress came up to the table.
“What can I get you?”
“Coffee, please,” he said.
“What you having to eat?”
“I’ll have a cheeseburger.”
“You want fries with that?”
“Please.”
The restaurant was quiet. Milton watched as the waitress made her way back to the open kitchen and passed his order on to the chef. He thought back to his first visit here, looking over to the table where he had seen Jessica crying to herself. If he had known then what he knew now, he would have ignored her and made his way back to his GTO and continued on his drive to Vegas. He would still have his car, Beau would not have been shot, and he would not have found himself caught up in a conspiracy that he knew was going to prove difficult to unravel. He allowed himself a moment of wry introspection. Remembering his own fallibility was useful; grandiosity was a symptom of his alcoholism, and perhaps it was not such a bad thing for him to be reminded that he made mistakes.
The waitress returned with a pot of coffee and a mug.
“What you doing on the road tonight?” she asked him as she filled the mug.
“Driving to LA,” he said.
“Been gambling?”
“Luck wasn’t on my side.”
“I heard that before,” she said, smiling at him. “I’ll be back with your burger in a minute.”
61
Milton finished his meal, laid a twenty on the table to cover it, and nodded his thanks to the waitress as he made his way back to the Porsche. He climbed in, opened its glove compartment and took out the LifeHammer that he had seen earlier, a small tool with a double-sided carbon steel hammer head that was designed for breaking through car windows in the case of an emergency.
He stepped outside. A truck was just pulling out of the lot, but, apart from that, there was no one. The Tesla was a decent distance away from the windows of the restaurant; it was visible, but not so close that he would be easily seen, especially if he was careful. He approached, watching carefully for anyone who might have emerged from the parked trucks or the restaurant. He went around to the side that faced away from the restaurant and, with a sharp swing of the hammer, smashed the passenger-side window. The glass fractured around the point of impact and fell into the car. Milton wrapped his hand in the sleeve of his jacket, swept the remains of the glass out of the frame and reached inside to open the door.
He brushed the glass from the seat into the footwell and slid into the cabin. He opened the glovebox and took out the car’s documentation, flicking through it quickly before disregarding it. Nothing. There was a bottle of water in the cupholder and a half-finished Twinkie next to it, but nothing else of inter
est.
Milton slithered between the seats into the back. He unlatched the rear seat and lowered it so that he could look into the trunk. There was a medium-sized suitcase and a small leather shoulder bag. Milton took them both, swept the space with his phone’s flashlight to make sure that he hadn’t missed anything, and stepped outside. He took the luggage and made his way back to the Macan.
There was still no one else in the lot. Milton got back into his car, started the engine and drove out. He made his way north for two minutes before turning off the road and rolling to a stop in a run-off area.
Milton stepped out and went around to the trunk. He took out the suitcase and opened it, removing the contents one by one. There were several tops, underwear, a light jacket, a wrap, a pair of walking shoes and a pair of sneakers, several sundresses, sunglasses and a hat. There was a washbag with toiletries and anti-nausea medicine. Nothing useful. He felt around the lining of the suitcase in the event that something had been secreted inside it, but found nothing there, either.
He unzipped the shoulder bag and tipped it out. The contents looked as if they had been chosen to be taken on board during a flight. There was a clean T-shirt and underwear, an inhaler, a pair of wireless earbuds and a book: Tuscany for the Shameless Hedonist: Florence and Tuscany Travel Guide. He flipped through the pages. It was well thumbed, and several pages had been marked with loops of red ink. Milton skimmed the entries, seeing restaurant recommendations and beaches, all of them apparently in the vicinity of Siena. He flicked to the end and was rewarded with a folded piece of foolscap. He opened it and found a printed itinerary from a travel agency based in Los Angeles. Jessica had booked three tickets on Air Canada flight 585 from San Diego to Portland, connecting there onto Condor flight DE 291 to Frankfurt. The itinerary called for an overnight layover before picking up Lufthansa flight LH 238 to Leonardo da Vinci International Airport in Florence.
