by David Nees
“It’s not worth it.”
“Well I’m going to have to bring in at least one weapon. I’m not going unarmed, so, in for a dime, in for a dollar.”
“Ditch the rifles at least but keep the 9mm if you have to have a weapon.” It’s much less conspicuous.”
“Yes ma’am.”
“I just don’t want you to get caught this late in the game.”
“Are you always so nervous about your agents?”
Jane changed the subject. “We have a car picking up Rodrigo and his sister and niece. They’ll be covered by diplomatic passports so they’ll breeze through the checkpoint. We’re bringing him in at Laredo.”
“Thank you…I mean that.”
“You’re welcome. Things are certainly stirred up, but that is what we aimed for. Congratulations on a job well done.”
“Thanks.”
“You mentioned an incredible story earlier. Can you tell me about it?”
“Later, when I’m back in the U.S. We’ll talk in person. It’s complicated but just know that there are others out there who are aware of you and what we’re doing together. Don’t worry, they’re on our side…sort of.”
“You’re being very mysterious.”
“That’s because it’s all a bit of a mystery. I’m going to hang up now. I’ll contact you when I’m in the States.”
Dan shut the phone off. He felt a mix of emotions. There was sadness at leaving María. He hoped she would find the will to make her own way. There was anticipation at seeing Jane again. That feeling was more real to Dan than the mix of feelings swirling around in his mind about María. She was more of a dream, a fantasy, and the children created an element of unfulfilled hope surrounding the fantasy. Since Rita’s death along with their unborn child he had become a sucker for children. Frustrated desires for fatherhood. Jane was more real. She was in his life; she was full of opinion and action; she was not fearful. He found himself projecting some of Rita’s qualities onto Jane and was pleased to find they seemed to fit. He drove until noon when his eyes started closing and his head started to nod. He stopped in Matehuala at a rundown hotel and rented a room. He was asleep almost as soon as his head hit the pillow.
Jane met with Henry outside their offices.
“Did you alert Roger about the bugs?”
“I told him. He’s not happy. He wants to see the list as soon as Fred is done whittling it down.”
“What can he do?”
“He has connections. If we determine who it is, he’ll work through his superior to shut the action down.”
“What if his superior is in on it?”
“Doubtful from what you said about the technology. Someone high up would use the company’s resources.”
“I just hope we can nail this down before Dan gets back. He doesn’t need this. It will only make him paranoid and not trust us.” Henry nodded. Jane continued, “That trust is vital to his well-being in the field. I’ve seen how things can go sour when the asset stops trusting his connections.”
“So have I. Where is Dan now?”
“Driving north. He’s going to cross illegally. Once in the U.S. he should be okay.”
“Will he come in? Come to DC?”
Jane shrugged. “Not sure. It may depend on what we have to tell him.”
“Tell Fred to get me that list.”
It was dark when Dan awoke. He washed his face and body as best he could from the bathroom sink; there was no shower. Next he checked his wounded leg. It was swollen from the activity and the driving but it didn’t look infected. Pulling out a shirt from his pack, one that was less dirty than the one he was wearing; he got dressed and went out on the street. The night was warm and full of smells. The mix of aromas from the street vendors competed with the fragrance of the night blooming flowers that filled the air with their perfume. He stretched and walked along the streets of the town, taking deep draughts of air into his lungs. Clearing out the crap. Finally his appetite kicked in; he hadn’t eaten for a day. He stopped at a particularly good smelling stall and ordered what looked good. The chicken burrito came with a corn side dish. Dan ate ravenously and then stopped in at a cantina and bought a beer. He sat in the corner and drank the beer, letting his body relax. He remained alert to the street, watching everyone walk by and noticing who came into the bar.
But evening was mellow. The people seemed to be happy to be out relaxing after the day’s work was done. He didn’t get any sense of danger or threat. Everyone was just enjoying the pleasant evening when the fierce heat of the day had departed and the air was filled with exotic smells and a sense of anticipation, of wonder. It was a simple town with a priceless ambience. We try to recreate this in our fake downtowns up north only to end up with a pale copy. People might think they’re having an experience, but they are missing the real thing. You don’t find it in a developer’s imagination but in a small Mexican town, dusty and hot in the day and magically transformed at night.
I hope I haven’t unleashed too much blood on them. Deep inside he was afraid that there would be much blood spilled and many civilians would be caught in the deadly violence. Still how do they put up with so much corruption? Can the people ever rise up and demand more from their officials? Dan shook his head. The reformers were so few and so easily eliminated. It took great courage to be a crusading reporter in Mexico—to print the truth. Have I helped your cause? He didn’t know the answer. He did know that he had disrupted the cartels, which meant disrupting, at least for a while, the drugs flowing into the U.S.
Would all his jobs seem so fleeting in their effect? He needed to strike at the key players among the terrorists. And they needed to be aware there was someone out there gunning for them. They needed to feel fear. They will go to ground. That is how I’ll slow them down, have them go silent, afraid to stick their heads up for fear of me—some unknown assassin—Ángel de la Muerte.
Dan finished his beer and stepped back into the street. He heard a sharp screech and looked up. There on the edge of the low roof perched a large black bird, a raven. Dan stopped and looked carefully at the bird. From the streetlights he could see one red eye and one black eye. He smiled and started for the hotel.
I wonder if that’s Jane’s vision, to strike fear as well as to assassinate? I wonder if that is what Tlayolotl wants of me. His mind went over the all he had experienced here in Mexico. Yes, the world was much more complex than he had imagined. It was not so neat and tidy and there was a larger drama going on; one in which he had a part to play.
Early the next morning Dan departed Matehuala. Along the way to the border he stopped at a remote spot in the desert and pulled off the highway. He was reluctant, but he knew he had to leave his long guns behind. He took his weapon bag and walked out into the desert. He dropped the bag behind a large boulder. Inside were the Barrett MRAD and the M4 with their suppressors, magazines, and unspent ammunition. He stared at the bag. Such a waste. Forget it. It’s a tool and you probably won’t use them again. The right tool for the job, and all jobs are different. But what if someone finds the bag? He shook his head and turned around; he couldn’t worry about that. He walked back to the pickup.
By noon he was in Nuevo Laredo. He cruised along the riverfront, looking for a good place to cross. He wanted to be able to quickly blend in to the pedestrian traffic on the Laredo side. It was an unsatisfactory search. He didn’t have enough intel to make a good choice and this was not the time to screw up.
As he drove around his mind kept going back to the mission: the assassination, blowing up the trucks, and the killings at the mansion. He had killed close to eighty people in the course of three weeks. He didn’t feel remorse. He guessed most people would; but most people would not do what he did. These were all bad men, bent on destroying lives for their enrichment. It was true some of them became gang members due to their poverty and lack of opportunity, but Dan figured that was their choice. The terrorists, he had no further thoughts about; they needed to die before they could g
et into the U.S. and kill innocent people.
Maybe it was the carnage that would be unleashed on the civilians here in Mexico that bothered him. The cartels going to war with one another was the goal of this mission and that would lead to collateral damage. Dan felt twinges of remorse for that, but it wasn’t a reason to not act. He had done what was necessary to protect his country and would continue to do so. His encounter with Tlayolotl showed him he had a mission, an appointed task, and Jane, without knowing about the larger struggle, had correctly recruited him to the work. For now, this was going to be his future.
After an hour and a half, Dan stopped a scruffy looking teenage kid walking along one of the streets.
“Do you know where the best place is to cross the river?”
The boy looked at him warily. The man’s Spanish was good but not native. “You’re not Mexican. Just drive over the bridge.”
Dan shook his head and smiled at the kid. “I can’t.”
“The river is deep. You need a raft or you have to swim.”
“I can swim, but I need some plastic bags to keep my gear dry.”
“This is strange. You’re a gringo and you want to sneak into your own country? Are you trying to get me into trouble?”
“No, no. I need some advice.” Dan leaned out the window of the truck. You help me and there is a reward for you.”
“What help? You can swim anywhere.”
“I want to go across where I can get into Laredo the quickest.”
“I can show you a park down by the river. I hear many try to go from there, but it is watched. I would not try there.”
“Get in. Take me to a store where I can get some plastic bags and then show me where I can get across.”
The boy hesitated.
“It will be worth your time.”
The boy lifted his shirt to reveal a knife in his belt. “You try anything funny, I’ll stab you.”
Dan almost laughed. “Don’t worry. No funny business,” he said with a smile.
They weren’t dry bags, but by using multiple layers along with duct tape Dan figured he had a pretty good chance to protect his gear.
“I would cross outside of town,” the boy said.
They drove north, out of the city. The houses gave out to the desert. A few miles out of town they came to a ‘T’ junction with a few houses, a cantina, and a gas station. To the right of the road were footpaths leading down to the river’s edge. Dan pulled over and parked where the boy directed him.
“You go down to the edge, in the thickets. You wait until dark and then you can swim. If you swim well you won’t drown. Who knows if you run into patrols on the other side? All I know is that they patrol the river banks but not as much here as in town.”
“You’ve been a big help. I want to give you something. Reach into the glove box.”
The boy opened the box. “Only papers in here.”
“Hand them to me.”
In the stack was the registration to the truck. There was a place on the back where the owner could assign it to a purchaser.
“You know how to drive?”
The boy nodded. He had driven his uncle’s car a couple of times. Dan signed the owner’s name on the transfer section.
“I’m signing this pickup over to you. You can do with it what you want. Register it if you’re old enough, or sell it if you want. It’s yours.” He handed the boy the papers.
The boy’s mouth opened in surprise. He had hoped for maybe fifty U.S. dollars for what would be an afternoon’s work by the time he got back to town, but a pickup? It must be worth a thousand dollars. He looked at the papers.
“This is not you,” he said pointing to the owner’s name.
“Yes, but I signed for him. And he is not coming back to claim the truck.”
Dan grinned and grabbed his gear, now limited to his backpack and the plastic bags, and got out.
“It is yours now. Drive carefully,” he said as he turned to head to the water. He would wait in the thickets until late that night. With his Night Vision Goggles he could even his odds, seeing the patrols as easily as they could see him. The swim would be no problem. He had done harder ones in sniper training. He’d just wait for a break in the patrols, they couldn’t be non-stop, and then he’d swim across. After that he’d stand an even chance of avoiding the border agents, moving as slowly and quietly as needed in order to reach the city. It might take all night and he might have to hole up for the day, but Dan felt confident in his skill at avoiding detection.
“Gracias,” the boy finally managed to say as he slid over into the driver’s seat.
The old man sat in the front of the cantina, under the porch. He came here every day. He would nurse a beer for hours and often fall asleep. He watched the traffic going by and wondered where they were headed. He knew many of the people who came to the bar at lunch time. They would always say hello. Sometimes one of them would buy him a beer. After school he watched the kids playing in the empty lot next door. They played football in the dirt yard with more energy than the old man could remember. The coyotes, the people smugglers, would come in the evening and drop off people. They led them down to the river. Often they would leave them alone by the water with flimsy rubber rafts and depart. They had collected their money and didn’t want to risk crossing over and getting arrested. The people had to fend for themselves, sometimes with disastrous results. The old man didn’t witness these things, he usually left before dark. But he’d heard of them.
He guessed he had seen most everything there was to see in his life. Nothing surprised him anymore. He had lived through the waxing and waning of drug violence many times. He had navigated corruption all his life, playing his hand carefully to avoid getting caught in it. Now he was old, the world ignored him, and the world showed him few surprises.
But today was different. He saw three things he had never seen before and he began to wonder again at how the world could surprise even someone as old as him.
The pickup pulled off just beyond the cantina, on the other side of the street closest to the river. A man and boy were in the truck. The old man watched. The man wrote something on some paper and handed it to the boy. Then he got out with a bag. He looked like a gringo. The boy slid over into the driver’s seat and started the truck. The old man realized the driver had given the boy the truck and he was headed to the river. But why would a gringo give away something so valuable to a boy? And why would a gringo need to sneak into his own country?
The next thing the old man noticed was a large raven that perched on the rail of the fence next to the cantina. The bird looked at the old man. He saw that it had one red eye and one black eye. He had never seen that before.
When the gringo walked off, headed to the thickets by the river, the raven let out a screech that startled the old man. It flew into the air and circled higher and higher. Then it flew over the man as he approached the thickets. The gringo stopped and looked up at the bird for a long time, the bird circling above him, the man staring up. The gringo then waved and disappeared into the thickets. The raven let out another screech and turned, flapping its wings to fly into the desert.
The old man marveled: a gringo giving a pickup to a poor Mexican boy, a raven with one red eye and one black eye that seemed to know the gringo and then flew into the barren desert, away from easy food found near the city. This had been a special day. He had seen three wonders. He got up. He would walk home early and tell his old woman what he had seen.
The End
Afterword
The Shaman is the second book of a new thriller series featuring Dan Stone. Look for subsequent novels with Dan Stone and Jane Tanner off on other missions.
If you enjoyed this story, please consider writing a review on Amazon. Reviews do not have to be lengthy and are extremely helpful; they provide “social proof” of a book’s value and help the reader take a chance on it. I very much appreciate your support.
Other novels published by David Nees:
/> After the Fall: Jason’s Tale
After the Fall: Catherine’s Tale, Part 1
After the Fall: Catherine’s Tale, Part 2
Payback: Book One in the Assassin Series
For information about upcoming novels, please visit my website at http://www.davidnees.com or go on Facebook to find my page, fb.me/neesauthor. Also you can sign up for my reader list to get new information. No spam; I never sell my list and you can opt out at any time.
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