by Ben Shapiro
Governor Davis wasn’t in the mood to pay.
He ordered an immediate full-scale investigation, and he put Ellen in charge. She knew that nobody had crossed the border after the Texas National Guard incursions. That meant that the cartel had agents on the American side of the border.
For years, there had been rumors of significant drug cartel inroads into the city. Not just the civilian infrastructure—the city government. Just a few months earlier, nine former law enforcement officers were convicted on federal drug charges. The attorney general had said, “This creeping corruption resembles third-world country practices that erode the social fabric of our communities.”
Drugs, money, corruption. The triangle couldn’t be broken. And so the cartels had honeycombed their way through the force, using people with access to the border to work across the border.
Ellen acted swiftly, placing National Guard troops in the local police centers, increasing security along the border. Within hours, the Border Patrol had caught two men attempting to flee into Mexico. After questioning, Ellen had them detained indefinitely pending further investigation into their activities the night of the hanging. And she redoubled deployments to the border to stop any further infiltrations and deter any attempts by collaborators to escape into Mexico.
All of it was good policy. None of it made for good pictures on front pages around the country. And Ellen was stunned by the magnitude of the coverage.
The media coverage exploded with a protest on the other side of the Rio Grande: nothing but women and children. As the sun came up, at least a hundred women stood, carrying toddlers and babies, waving their hands and screaming for the National Guard to let them cross. The National Guardsmen stood their ground. They didn’t point their weapons—Ellen and Davis had agreed there would be no such activity, for both moral and media reasons—but they looked threatening enough in their uniforms, young, strong, square-jawed. The cameras zoomed in on their impassive faces, contrasting them with the tear-stained faces of young children standing in the heat of the day.
It wasn’t hard to gather who had tipped off the cameras: one of the biggest magnates in Mexico owned several major media outlets in the United States. Ellen wasn’t surprised at the number of cameras showing up—obviously, this was a big story. Still, she resented the intrusion: there had been zero cameras for the murdered National Guardsman, but get a few dozen crying women on the border with their kids, and the media had a field day.
The cameras eventually found their way to Ellen for comment. “We will maintain the security of the people of Texas,” she said. “Our immigration services have not screened any of the people out there. We’re sure most of them are wonderful people who want to come here and work and build a life without taxpayer help, but we simply don’t know who they are, and without screening them, we’re not going to open our borders to anyone who wants to cross. We have the body of a National Guardsman hanging from a billboard that tells the story of what we get when we don’t check those who cross the border.”
The headlines hit almost immediately: “Texas Governor’s Top Aide Says Immigrant Women, Children Pose Security Threat.” Ellen could have slapped herself—she should have known better than to give them any material they could misuse. Then again, what material wouldn’t they have misused? She vowed to ignore any calls coming from a media number.
Still, the news from Texas remained tertiary. And that meant that the operation to clean out drug cartel operatives in Ciudad Juarez continued to operate on the quiet. The Mexican military knew enough to avoid a significant confrontation with the National Guard; there were still honest members among its ranks who wanted the area cleaned of cartel influence. Each day, small groups of National Guardsmen raided Ciudad Juarez, usually by motor vehicle convoys across the border. The cartel members had picked up on the nature of the offensive action and had inserted themselves into heavily civilian areas, cutting down on the ability of Texas forces to strike without facing the prospect of urban warfare. Now, more dangerous search and destroy missions had been authorized.
The American side of the border remained silent.
Until it wasn’t.
The first news of the massacre hit the airwaves three days after the Ciudad Juarez raids began. According to early reports, six people, women and children, had been found dead on the Mexican side of the border. They were protesters, and their bodies had been riddled with bullets. Over the course of the morning, the number increased: six, then twelve, then finally twenty-six people, all women and children, found shot to death on the banks of the Rio Grande. Everyone figured it for a drug cartel hit.
Then the footage came out.
Ellen saw it on the evening news, as the network anchor intoned, “What you are about to watch is very graphic. Younger viewers are advised not to watch.” She then cut to grainy, close-range video of a man in a National Guard uniform, from behind, walking up to a group of tents. “Get out of thar,” the National Guardsman said in a thick Texas accent. “Get out of thar, you little wetbacks.”
A few children, rubbing their eyes, came scurrying out of their tents, their mothers following. Seeing the barrel of a gun, they raised their hands. The screen went white with the fired shots: flash after flash, again and again. When the night vision calmed, the smoking bodies of two dozen innocents lay on the ground.
The screen cut back to the anchor. “Our sources on the ground tell us that this tape has not yet been verified,” she said. “No one has yet claimed credit for this horrific attack. Calls for comment to Ellen Hawthorne, chief of staff to Governor Bubba Davis, have gone unreturned.”
Ellen quickly took out her phone—and sure enough, there in her messages were two voice mails from a 212 area code. Son of a bitch, she thought.
Now the phone rang again.
“Ellen,” said Bubba, “get your ass back to Austin tonight.”
“I want some answers on this, Ellen,” Davis said, pacing back and forth, his thick body tense with energy. “I’ve got the president of the United States calling me every five minutes, and I’m putting him off for as long as I can.”
Ellen gripped her fists. “I didn’t ask for this, Bubba. I did it as a favor to you.”
“Some favor,” he said. “I’ve got two dozen dead kids and their mamas and a boy in a National Guard uniform responsible for all of it. A boy I kept here in Texas instead of sending him to New York like Prescott wanted me to do. Do we know who the little bastard was?”
“Yes,” she answered. “We do.” Before leaving for Austin, Ellen had spent the night questioning all of the command-level National Guard officers she could get her hands on. A consensus seemed to be emerging on the name and nature of the culprit. And it wasn’t pretty.
“His name,” she said, “seems to be James Eastin McLawrence. Buck sergeant.”
“Don’t they all have three names,” Davis muttered.
She passed him a photo of a young man in National Guard uniform. His eyes were open a shade too far, bright blue and off-putting. His mouth was slack. “McLawrence joined the Guard after dropping out of high school and getting his GED. Not a stellar candidate for higher rank. Barely at the bottom rung. He’s full active duty. His parents live over near Lubbock. No friends in the Guard, at least none that wanted to speak with us.”
“What set him off?”
“We don’t have any hard info on that yet, Governor. But there are at least a couple of rumors. One says that he had it out for illegal immigrants ever since his dad lost his job at a manufacturing plant that moved south of the border. Another says he was short on cash and paid by the cartels. The third says he’s just crazy. Simple as that.”
‘That doesn’t make things simple for me. Who’s the cameraman?”
“Your guess is as good as mine.”
Davis leaned back against his desk. “Ellen, I need you to go to New York.”
“Why New Yo
rk?”
“Prescott wants me there. And I don’t want to go. I can’t go. I’ve shown him up in front of the entire country, and now he wants me there to humiliate me in front of the entire country for this massacre. Hell, he could have a local DA down here draw up charges against me so that they’re frog-walking me when I get off the plane. It’s a setup.”
Ellen shook her head. “I still don’t understand.”
“They won’t touch you because of Brett.”
That actually drew a laugh from her.
“What’s so funny?” asked the governor.
“You just don’t know Prescott. He hates Brett. He’s always hated Brett.”
“But that doesn’t matter, Ellen. Your husband’s a national hero. You go to New York, the story isn’t gonna be some dead Mexicans south of the border. It’s going to be the reunification of the soldier and his wife. Prescott won’t see it coming. He’ll want me to negotiate with him, and instead, I’ll be giving him the V-J Day nurse picture. Your husband’s still got his admirers.”
Ellen had to admit that the idea appealed to her. She hadn’t seen Brett in nearly a year now; she’d missed him awfully. Every time they flashed his face across the television, her chest ached from missing him so much.
“And what do I say to Prescott?” she said.
“You tell that son of a bitch that we’re not going to back down off the border, not for him or anybody. And if he asks you about McLawrence, you tell him that we’re investigating. Turn down any federal offers for help. We don’t need the feds down here mucking up our operation.”
“That won’t be easy. Cross-border murder falls under federal jurisdiction.”
“He’s busy. He won’t mind. And it’ll allow him to save face, to put me up for public scourging. I’ll be the bad guy southern hick who won’t let the sweet-faced Yankee down here to fix things. That’s what the media’s looking for anyway, right?” He sighed.
“And what’s your endgame?” she said.
“Endgame? Darlin’, this thing here’s been going on since the Alamo. There’s no endgame. Just a game that won’t end any way except us holding our ground or cutting and running. But don’t worry—you just play him for time. We’ll find our Private McLawrence. And we’ll string him up by the balls. You say that to the cameras. How soon can you be ready to fly?”
Her heart beat heavily in her chest. Brett, she thought. Brett.
“I can be ready tonight.”
Her phone rang as she sat in the National Guard terminal, waiting for her flight to gas up. It wasn’t a number she recognized. It came up as a 212 area code; this time, she figured, she’d best pick up to at least hear what the media had prepared. At worst, she could give a “no comment.”
But when she picked up, it was Brett.
“Honey, don’t come to New York.” He sounded winded, hoarse.
“Brett, what’s going on?”
“I can’t say for certain yet. Just don’t come to New York. Something bad is going down.”
“How do you know that?”
“No time to explain…”
The line went dead.
Nashville, Tennessee
They camped outside the city. No fires. No lights.
They’d separated after Detroit, split up to avoid being followed. They set the rendezvous for Nashville three days later. Soledad recommended that they wend their way through several states to throw any would-be trackers off the scent. She took Ezekiel west, then south. Aiden took Ricky east, then doubled back through Kentucky.
Nearly all the men made it. A few apparently decided they’d had enough after Detroit, after seeing their faces on television, labeled white supremacists. They took off for the hills; Soledad told them to ditch all their electronic gear, to make for the northern border if they could.
The ones who were left looked like they’d been through a war.
Eddie was the worst. Fatso, as they all called him, had taken a tire iron to the gut, then gotten stomped at the center of the crowd. He’d been in and out of consciousness ever since, his fever spiking radically. Just before hitting camp, Ezekiel told Soledad, he’d started twitching, then gone quiet.
When Aiden and Ricky drove in, Soledad motioned them over. They put down their kickstands, turned off the hogs. Aiden’s eyes were shining. Ricky still looked stunned. Aiden strode over to Soledad and picked her up in a bear hug. She waited until he put her down, then gestured at Fatso.
Aiden knelt down beside him. “Do we have anybody who knows anything about medicine?”
She shook her head. “We need to get him to a hospital.”
“It leaves too much of a trail.”
“We don’t, he’ll die.”
Aiden stood up. “Doesn’t look like he has much of a chance anyway.”
Soledad felt anger well up in her. “Aiden, we did this your way. And Fatso knew what he was in for, or at least he thought he did. But we’re not leaving anybody out here to die. Your friend here seems very nice and all, but it wasn’t part of the plan to trade Fatso—Eddie—for him.”
Aiden scratched his stubble. “He knew the stakes, didn’t he?”
“Nobody really knows the stakes until their number hits. Come on, Aiden, I need your help.”
Aiden made no move for his motorcycle.
Soledad stared at him, uncomprehending. After all this way, she thought, he’s still a soldier, and I’m still the amateur. Then she shuddered. No, she thought again. I’m the one who makes the call.
“Colonel.”
Ezekiel stepped forward.
“Give me a hand with this man.” She leaned over the body, felt the heat emanating from the burning skin. She gripped him around the biceps, put her back into it—and moved him nowhere. Embarrassed, she gripped him tighter, pulled again. When she looked up, Ricky O’Sullivan stood next to her.
“I didn’t ask anybody to do this for me,” he said, eyes far off. “But no one is going to die because of me ever again.” He looked up at Aiden. “Get your ass in here and give us a hand, shithead.”
Aiden spat on the cold ground. Then he leaned in, wrapped his large hands around Fatso’s ankle. “I swear, Ramirez, this isn’t going to end well.”
She actually laughed. “Which part of running from the feds, then invading a heavily armed police station and grabbing the highest-profile cop in America sounded like it was going to end well?”
Suddenly, Ricky broke into a smile. A genuine smile. Soledad could see why Aiden liked him, felt so loyal to him. “She’s got you there, Aiden,” he said.
“Shut up,” Aiden grumbled, pulling Fatso toward the van.
They dropped Eddie off at the emergency room of a local clinic. Ezekiel stayed with him—as the only person without a national face in the group, he seemed like the safest bet. “Keep your electronics off,” he told them. “If you need to get in touch, find a pay phone along the highway.” He gave a handshake to Aiden, one to Ricky. “See you fellas on the flip side,” he said.
Then he wrapped Soledad in a bear hug. “I’ll meet you at the rendezvous. If I don’t show up in two days, I’m not coming. Just move on along.”
“Why don’t you come along now, Ezekiel?”
“Fatso here’ll need some looking after. He has a family. Just want to let them know where he is. Maybe they can come pick him up before anybody comes looking for him. Maybe.”
“Okay.”
She, Aiden, and Ricky turned to head for the exit. Then she turned back. “Ezekiel,” she said. “Thank you for everything.”
He smiled. “You bet, ma’am. It’s been an honor. See you in a couple days. You keep safe out there.” Then he reached into his backpack, came up with his maroon scarf. He handed it to her. “It’ll be cold. You’d best take this.”
She smiled, nodded, and wrapped it around her own neck. They headed f
or the door.
As soon as they left the room, he picked up a phone from the nurse’s station. He stared at it for a solid several seconds. Then he dialed a number.
“You let my girl go now,” he said. “That was the deal.”
“Okay, Colonel,” said the voice at the other end. “A deal’s a deal.”
The headlights from the hogs carved a three-pronged gash into the darkness. To one side of Soledad, Ricky rode; to the other, Aiden. The night was silent except for the rumbling of the engines. The murky smell of the trees washed over Soledad—for a second, she felt herself smiling. Smiling, truly, for the first time since the drought. She felt free. She was safe; she led a group of good men, men unwilling to bow to a system that hurt people callously, that condemned them to an unled life as the price of living in a civilized society. She knew they called her a barbarian in the press. With the humid air of the Tennessee forests surrounding her, she couldn’t care less. Somewhere, Emilio knew what she was doing, and why she was doing it. That’s all that mattered, that someone remembered.
She glanced over at Aiden, then Ricky. At least a few people remembered. It had cost lives, but at least some people would remember.
“Aiden, I’m sorry I dragged you into this,” she yelled at last.
“Sorry?” he grinned. “I’ve been waiting for this all my life. Something to fight for.”
She glanced over at Ricky. His mouth was set in a tight line, his gaze focused on the dark horizon. “Nothing left to fight for,” said Ricky. “You guys know what you’re up against?”
Soledad felt a churning in her stomach. “Yes, I think we do. After what happened at the ranch. After what happened to you.”
“They won’t let us go, you know,” Ricky said. “They say we killed Jim Crawford. They say we’re white supremacists.”
Soledad said, “Do I look like a white supremacist?”
