“Well, that was helpful.” Hope took a pull on her bottle of Corona. “Do you think he’ll tell someone?”
“Yeah,” Jeff said. “Word travels fast in a place like this.”
And it did. In less than ten minutes, a rough-looking Mexican man with a scar on his face approached the table.
“I hear that you are looking for Jaime Adams,” the man said in Spanish.
“Sí, we’re looking for him,” Hope replied.
“I can help you,” he was now speaking to Hope. “Come with me.”
Catrina and Jeff exchanged glances, then Jeff nodded.
“Okay, let’s see what he’s up to.” Catrina rose from her chair.
The three followed Scarface through a door into the back room.
Two other narcos waited for them there.
“Put your arms out to your sides, por favor,” the leader said. He produced an ugly looking semi-automatic pistol.
The two other narcos stepped forward and started patting them down. They removed the Glocks from Catrina and Jeff’s belts.
“Nice guns.” The leader hefted a pistol in each hand. “You know, you could get into a lot of trouble, carrying guns in Mejico.” He laughed. “My cousin, he is a lieutenant on the Policia Municipal. If I told him about this, you would be in big trouble.”
“I don’t think that’s the worst of our problems,” Catrina said.
“I hear you are looking for Jaime Adams, sí?” The man leaned against the old desk.
“Sí, we are looking for Adams,” Catrina said. “Do you know where he is?”
“I know where he is, but it won’t help you.” He scratched at his nose with the barrel of the pistol. “El Lobo, he doesn’t want anyone bothering Señor Adams. He likes to keep him where he is.”
“We thought that El Lobo might like to make a deal with us. We could pay for Señor Adams release.”
The man laughed. “Release? You think he’s a prisoner? He is with El Lobo because he wants to be. He doesn’t want to go back to Los Estados Unidos.”
“Who said anything about him going back?” Catrina shifted her weight on her feet. “We just want to talk to him. We’re working for his wife.”
“You want to talk to him? You expect me to believe this? His wife, she wants him back so she can get out of jail. El Lobo, he wants her in jail. It suits his purposes. Sending Jaime home would mess up his plans.”
Catrina looked at Jeff. He shook his head.
“Well, I guess we’re done here then.”
“No, señora, we are not done.” Scarface got up from the chair. “Bring them,” he said to his henchmen.
“Wait.” Hope stepped forward. “There’s no need to get nasty.” She began unbuttoning her blouse.
Scarface smiled and stared.
Hope reached inside her blouse, and pulled out a small automatic pistol. She pushed it into Scarface’s face. “Tell them to stand back.”
“It is very cute, your little gun,” Scarface said. “But I think it is not so effective.”
“You want to find out? You make one move and I’ll splatter your brains all over the wall.”
She moved behind Scarface and grabbed the back of his collar. “Now, let’s go for a walk.”
“Just a minute,” Catrina said. “Our guns.”
“Oh yeah.” Hope pushed the barrel of her little pistol behind Scarface’s ear. “Return our guns.”
“Give them their guns,” Scarface ordered his men.
They handed back the Glocks.
“Okay, let’s go.” Hope shoved Scarface towards the door.
Catrina and Jeff backed out of the room with their guns at the ready.
They cautiously worked their way through the dining room and out into the street. At Catrina’s Explorer, they climbed in and Hope shoved Scarface away. Catrina roared down the street.
“What in the hell was that?” Jeff asked.
“Oh, just a little Beretta PX4.” Hope handed the gun to Jeff. “Papa got it for me. He said it was the perfect ladies’ purse gun, small and compact, but with the stopping power of a nine millimeter Storm.”
“Shit, this thing is kinda cute.” Jeff handed her back her pistol.
“Where did you hide that thing?” Catrina asked.
Hope beamed. “In my bra. Actually, I have a Flashbang bra holster, the safest place for a woman to carry a concealed weapon. It holds the gun between your breasts. Of course, you have to have breasts to carry it off. If you’re flat chested, you’ll have a bulge in your blouse, but I’m pretty safe. I’ve got enough to hide it. If you get patted down, men will almost never feel up your boobs.”
Catrina turned a corner and accelerated. “You continue to amaze me, kiddo. First the knife, now the gun. What other aces do you have up your sleeve that you haven’t shown us yet?”
Hope tucked the gun back into its holster and buttoned up her blouse. “That’s about it. Wait a minute. I haven’t shown you my purse.” Hope held up her tan Coronado Hollister bag. “It has a hidden compartment. You couldn’t find it if you didn’t know it was there. See?”
She pulled the seam on the front of the bag open and reached in, pulling out six stainless steel throwing knives.
“After I saw Selma Hayek in El Mariachi I had to learn how to throw those knives. She was so cool.”
“You’re a walking armory,” Jeff said from the back seat.
“When you grow up in the barrio, you have to learn to take care of yourself. I carry deposits to the bank every day. Papa thought that I should have some protection.”
****
Juarez, Mexico
“Señor Ruiz, my name is Maria Fernandez and I need your help.” Hope held her breath. How would Ruiz react?
Would he be willing to talk to her, to meet her, or would he sense danger and go into hiding again?
There was a brief pause.
“Sí, señorita, how can I help you?” His voice sounded very far away, like he was inside a tunnel.
“I’m a reporter for the Los Angeles Times,” Hope said into her cell phone. “I’m working on a story on the sex trade in Mexico. My sources tell me that you might be able to help me. I want to meet some of the women doing this work.”
“What you’re asking is dangerous, Señorita Fernandez. You would be putting yourself at risk, you would be putting me at risk.”
That was good news. He wasn’t hanging up on her. Now she just needed to lure him to a meeting.
“I’m willing to pay. I have a budget from the paper for the story.”
“I see. How much are you willing to pay?”
Hope smiled. “How about five hundred dollars?”
“Señorita, you humiliate me. Five hundred dollars? Your paper, the Los Angeles Times, It is a big paper, no? It must have big budgets. What you are asking for is risky. To put myself at risk like that I need adequate, how you say . . . Oh! Compensation. Yes, I need adequate compensation?”
“And what would be adequate?” Hope asked.
“Five thousand US dollars.”
Hope didn’t want to seem too easy, but she wanted the meeting. “Okay, I’m pretty sure I can get my editor to approve that. Where can we meet?”
“Meet me at Central Camionera, the bus station at nine o’clock. You know it?”
“No.”
“It is on Teófilo Borunda where it meets Oscar Fernandez. Bring your money and come alone.” He hung up before Hope had a chance to respond.
“He wants me to meet him at the bus station tonight, alone.” She put her phone back in her purse.
“You’re not going anywhere alone,” Ted said.
Ted sat on his bed, Catrina and Jeff were at the high-backed wooden chairs around the table in Ted and Chris’s room.
“No, but I’ll find him, meet with him, then you can come in.”
“I’m coming too,” Chris said. “We’re not letting you out of our sight.”
“We’ll all go.” Catrina got up. “I have something in my room that can he
lp.” She stepped out of the door.
“I don’t like the idea of you meeting him by yourself,” Chris said. “It’s too dangerous. What if he has a gun or something?”
“That’s where you big brave men will come in. You’re going to have to protect me, make sure nothing happens.”
Catrina stepped back through the door. “Here, put one of these in your purse.” She tossed a small yellow and black radio to Hope. “They have wireless microphones and headsets. We’ll hide a mic in your bra, that way we can listen in.”
****
Mexico City
The small patch of light worked its way across the floor. From the tiny window high in the wall, a shaft of light provided Guillermo all the illumination he had all day. It was his only way to measure the march of time. And time moved by so slowly.
He lost track of how many days he had been a captive. Was it a week? Maybe more. First in the barn at the rancho, then here in a concrete block room.
The window, which was too high and too small for him to crawl out anyway, had wrought iron bars over it.
The only access to the room was through a heavy oak door. The door had big, black wrought iron hinges and was studded with iron disks. It looked like it was built to keep out an army.
There was no furniture in the room. Guillermo slept on the floor, when he could sleep. Mostly he lay in the darkness lost in a sea of helplessness.
Once a day two armed men brought him a plate of beans and rice. A couple of times a day they took him down the corridor to the bathroom. He had a five-gallon plastic bucket in the room, but he tried very hard not to use it. He hated the stench.
He could tell it was afternoon by the angle of the light coming into the room.
Why hadn’t Papa come for him? Or Ted? Surely Papa would pay any ransom. He half expected to see his hero-brother come smashing through the door with cartridge bandoliers across his chest, wielding some kind of big machine gun, ala Rambo.
But where was he? Guillermo had worshiped the ground his big brother walked on for all of his life. He knew he could never match up to the trail Ted left behind him.
Ted had cut a wide swath through high school, what with his football prowess, social skills and hard work. He wasn’t the top student in his class, but no one worked harder for their grades.
Guillermo knew he could never match up to his brother, so he didn’t bother to try. He skated through school. He stayed in and graduated because it was so important to Papa, but he didn’t really like it.
He liked cars. When he got out, he was going to drive his Mustang back home, maybe go to trade school and open his own shop. Tio Ernesto owned a garage. He’d hung around there a lot helping with small jobs. Maybe he could work with Tio Ernesto when he got out of school.
Time moved by so slowly. How long had it been since the sun had moved?
He used his belt buckle to scratch marks on the floor. He could get a general sense of time by watching the sun’s rays move from scratch to scratch. It seemed like a year since it moved from the last mark.
He heard voices out in the hall. He looked at his makeshift sundial. It wasn’t time for his food yet. They wouldn’t be taking him to the bathroom.
He heard a key click in the lock on the door. He jumped to his feet, fist balled. The door swung inward. The little Frenchman stepped through the door, followed by two men with pistols in their hands.
“Bon jour, Monsieur Higuera,” Yves said. “I need something from you.”
“Yeah, what?”
“A little reminder for your brother.” While Yves talked, the two men spread out on either side of Guillermo.
“You, my young friend, are the cheese in my trap. I know your brother well. He will come for you. And when he does, I will be ready.”
“When he does, you better watch your ass. You’re going to be real sorry you ever mixed it up with him.”
Yves laughed. “I think it will be him who is sorry. He has so much to pay for.” Yves reached in his pocket and produced a switch-blade. “I will set the trap at Teotihuacán. You know Teotihuacán?”
Guillermo shook his head.
“It is the only pre-Colombian city still standing in Mexico. It was abandoned when the Spaniards got here, so they didn’t bother tearing it down. All of the other great cities, the Spaniards razed and used the stones to build their cathedrals and public buildings.
“But you don’t care about all of that. All you need to know is that the ancient priests sacrificed their victims on the platform at the front of the Temple of the Sun. That’s where you and I will wait for your brother.”
“He’ll never walk into your trap. He’s too smart.”
Yves stifled a small chuckle. “Your brother won’t be able to resist. He and his big blond friend will come and I will be waiting for them.
“I’ll capture them and make them watch. I want them to suffer for what they have done. I will cut your heart out with a stone knife and eat it while it is still beating. They will have to watch, then I will cut Chris’s heart out and make Ted watch. I want him to see the two of you die before it is his turn. I want him to know what’s going to happen to him.”
Yves pushed the button on the switch-blade. The shiny blade clicked open. “But first, I have to lure him to my trap. What better way that to send him a little present?”
The two men grabbed Guillermo’s arms. Guillermo struggled, but couldn’t break free.
“Yves grabbed Guillermo’s hair and pulled him close. “We’re going to send him a reminder that I have you.” He flicked the knife by Guillermo’s head.
Guillermo cried out. Blood spurted from his head.
Yves stooped and picked up Guillermo’s ear off of the floor.
“Yes,” Yves said. “I think this is just what we need.”
Chapter 25
Juarez, Mexico
The bus station, el central camionera, was a dusty, dirty building with a large parking lot. Expensive looking Mercedes motor coaches parked next to run down former school buses. People from every stripe of life sat on the benches or wandered the large open space in the building.
Hope knew what Ruiz looked like. She walked through the crowd, eyes peeled, but saw no sign of him. Of course, he had been more than an hour late for their last meeting.
“¿Chicles, señorita?” a young boy asked, he was trying to sell Hope chewing gum. He couldn’t have been more than eight or nine years old.
“No gracias, chico,” Hope replied.
“The man said you should come with me,” he said in Spanish.
Ruiz must have sent the boy.
“Bueno,” Hope said. “Let’s go.”
The boy took off through the crowd of people at breakneck speed. It was all Hope could do to keep up. Finally, the boy exited the bus station through a side door and Hope followed.
The bright sunshine assaulted her eyes. She flipped her sunglasses down from on top of her head.
“Buenas dias, Señorita Fernandez,” Ruiz said. He leaned against the midnight blue Cadillac. “You are ready for your research?”
“Uh, yes,” Hope stammered. Now that she was face to face with him, she wasn’t so sure this was such a good idea.
Ruiz looked like a cruel man, with narrow features. A fresh scar on his face twisted the thin line of his mouth into a perpetual sneer.
“Get in the car.” Ruiz opened the door. “We’re going to meet your sex workers.”
Hope said a silent Hail Mary before sliding into the white leather seat.
****
“Got her,” Ted said into the microphone. “She’s getting into Ruiz’ car. An old dark blue Cadillac.”
Catrina fired up the Explorer and pulled out after the Cadillac.
Since she and Jeff both had experience tailing cars as police officers, they decided to drive. Chris and Jeff were in the rented jeep two blocks over. They would parallel Ruiz’s route, then take over when he turned so that Ruiz didn’t spot his tail.
Ruiz drove like he
didn’t have a care in the world. He gave no indication that he made the burgundy Explorer.
“He’s turning right, towards you,” Catrina said into her microphone.
“Roger that, I’ve got him.” She heard Jeff’s voice through her headset.
“We’ll let Jeff have him for a few blocks, then we’ll pick him up again,” she said to Ted.
“You just be careful, lady. That’s my sister he’s got with him.”
The paved streets turned into dirt roads, the store fronts and businesses turned into tar paper shacks. Ruiz was definitely taking Hope to a bad part of town.
Catrina and Jeff traded off tailing Ruiz two more times before he came to a stop in front of an empty lot. The lot was piled with trash, old tires and the detritus of a tired civilization.
The doors opened and Ruiz and Hope got out.
****
“I think it’s time you told me where you’re taking me.” Hope clung tightly to her purse.
“We need a quiet place where we can talk. Where no one will interrupt us and no one will report seeing us.”
Hope looked around her. Everywhere she looked, she saw hopelessness. Old, worn plywood shacks snaked around the dirt streets, the roadside littered with paper and trash. The few people in view shuffled aimlessly about, paying no attention to the big blue car.
“I know you,” Ruiz said. “You were with the detective lady. Now you tell me you’re a reporter? How stupid do you think I am?”
Hope looked up the street for the Jeep or the Explorer. She saw neither.
“I am a reporter. I was riding with them because they could help me with my story. I’ve followed their leads as far as they’ll take me. Now I need new sources.”
Ruiz leaned against his car and folded his arms. “I think you are looking for something else, no? You don’t care about sex workers.”
“No, I do. This is going to be a big story.”
“You don’t look like a reporter to me. You are too young for such an important assignment. You are much too beautiful to be working for a living.” Ruiz produced a switchblade from his back pocket. “I think you need to tell me the truth.”
The Mexican Connection: Ted Higuera Series Book 3 Page 19
