Fields of Wrath (Luis Chavez Book 1)

by Mark Wheaton

  “Yes. I should’ve known better. It’s not the first time we’ve been approached by fraudsters looking to disrupt deals, but it’s still embarrassing that I gave it credence over not only your word but that of my own due-diligence team. For that I apologize.”

  Glenn shrugged as if Donald had done little more than lose a borrowed pen.

  “They’re getting good, these ‘fraudsters,’ to use your word,” Glenn said. “They used to have a reason: a disgruntled employee, a competitor. Now you’ve got folks just doing it to see if they can get away with it.”

  “Well, forgive me all the same,” Donald stressed. “How about we extend the terms another year to make it up to you?”

  Glenn laughed.

  “So we can’t renegotiate once we’ve surpassed our performance milestones for another twelve months? That is a definite no. Nice one, though.”

  “Can’t fault a guy for trying,” Donald said, palms up. “At least let me buy you breakfast.”

  “That I can agree to,” Glenn said, though he hadn’t seen a bill in this place for years.

  Their cell phones rang in unison.

  “We’re popular,” Glenn announced, fishing his cell from his pocket. “Hello?”

  “Where are you?” came a worried voice.

  It was Jack Iskander, senior partner at Baringer & Iskander, who had been one of the Marshaks’ primary counsels for thirty years.

  “Jack! You’ll be happy to hear I’m sitting with Donald right now concluding our business—”

  “You’re in Santa Barbara?” Jack interrupted.

  “I am,” Glenn replied, seething that it had not been acknowledged that he had earned a victory Jack and his team should’ve delivered. “But maybe you didn’t hear me. I’m with Donald Roenningke, from Crown Foods.”

  Glenn glanced over to catch Donald’s reaction to his show of bombast, only to see that he looked furious.

  “Donald?”

  “Fuck you, Glenn,” Donald said as he rose and walked toward the door.

  “What the hell . . . ? Jack, Donald just stormed out of here.”

  “He probably got the same news I did. Something big is going down. There are warrants being served at all of your office locations, warehouses, and accounting firms. They’ve even come here.”

  Warrants? Against my company?

  “What on earth for? What are the charges?” Glenn roared, ignoring the sidelong glances of his fellow diners.

  “We don’t know.”

  “Don’t they have to say on the warrant?”

  “They’re vague. They do cite an unimpeachable informant, but they seem to be casting a wide net in hopes of shaking new witnesses and evidence out of the tree.”

  “Bullshit!” Glenn spat, slapping his hand on the table. “Who’s behind this? Is this the same people who tried to screw up the Crown deal? Or is some jumped-up politician who couldn’t get his name in the paper trying to use mine?”

  Glenn’s teeth were clenched so tight his jaw popped.

  “We have to get out in front of this,” Jack said, trying on a calming tone. “You need to start thinking of ways to deflect this from your personal portfolio.”

  Glenn went still. Nothing about containment? Nothing about riding it out? Was his lawyer actually talking exit strategy already?

  “Are you serious?”

  “I’ve never seen anything like this,” Jack admitted. “People are already lining up on the sidelines to watch. No one thinks the DA would make such a move without something to back it up.”

  Where there’s smoke there’s fire, Glenn thought.

  “But none of it’s true,” Glenn offered.

  “You’ve been around long enough to know that doesn’t matter. I’ve been putting calls in to judges we’ve known for years. They’re not calling back. Apparently Crown got a stack of witness testimonials and stills purporting to show undocumented workers in your fields and warehouses—that was the shot across the bow. What it looks like the DA’s got is the broadside, financials purporting to show that this was some kind of widespread and carefully organized effort with players on both sides of the border.”

  “Are you . . . ?” Glenn stammered. “That’s insane! I marched with Cesar Chavez! I signed the first deal with his United Farm Workers in this state!”

  “Look, we’ve been tipped that the DA is giving a press conference in forty-five minutes. We’ll know more then. I need you to get down here as quickly as you can.”

  Even as his pulse returned to normal, Glenn still couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

  “I’m on my way,” he said wearily. “One question: Where’s Jason?”

  No one in the Blocks knew what to do when the INS vans pulled up. The trucks hadn’t come for them that morning, so the residents were already on edge. As the vans idled out front, everyone gathered their things and waited, but the agents didn’t emerge. Instead, they eyed the apartments, talked into their phones, talked amongst themselves, and made more calls.

  Odilia watched all this from her window. She refused to let herself be hopeful. Deportation took time, but maybe this was the first step.

  An hour after they arrived, two men got out of the first van.

  This is it, Odilia thought.

  Then they just lit cigarettes, stared at the makeshift apartments, as if having no idea a thousand people were looking back at them, and laughed about something. When the smokes were done, they got back in their air-conditioned vehicles.

  Military vehicles arrived about fifteen minutes later, two dozen trucks with a handful of national guardsmen in each. They pulled up in front of the apartments, and a man in an officer’s uniform hopped out to consult with the INS agents. After a ten-minute back and forth, the officer gave a lazy wave to his men, and they poured out of their vehicles and lined up to be directed by the INS agents.

  In another unit, someone screamed as if believing a massacre was imminent. Behind her, Odilia heard crying and hushed voices. Another woman, an apparent veteran of such events, told the women what phrases to use in order to get moved to the safer, more responsive medical wing of the facilities they’d be taken to. Things like “sudden and acute” and “sharp pain.”

  “But they keep track of who comes in more than once,” she admonished. “So use them sparingly.”

  Someone passed the window and knocked on the door.

  “Are you able to open this door?” came a voice speaking American-accented Spanish.

  “It’s locked from the outside,” Odilia replied. “What’s going on?”

  “This is not a raid. We have been informed of your status and been in contact with the government of Mexico as to your treatment here in the States. We’re here to get you out of this situation.”

  It wasn’t the best-rehearsed speech Odilia had ever heard, but it said all the right things. She couldn’t imagine how this had happened, until a realization spread over her.

  The priest. It was the priest.

  Tears swelled into her eyes. He’d done it. Somehow he’d done it.

  The door handle and bolt were unlocked, but it took the INS agents a few tries to remove the jamb. When it was finally down, the door swung wide. The agent stared in at the twelve women for a moment before waving over a female guardsman, a Latina with Carrizales on her name tape. She eyed the women with undisguised horror.

  “How many of you are there in here?” she asked.

  “Twelve,” Odilia replied. “There are five or six women’s units, but I’m not sure which are which.”

  “Can you provide information about the fields where you worked?”

  “We didn’t work in the fields.”

  A look of tragic understanding passed between the agent and Odilia.

  “We’ll get you some help. Don’t worry.”

  “Thank you.”

&n
bsp; “Don’t mention it,” Carrizales said. “I’m only sorry we weren’t here earlier.”

  XXIX

  Michael rode the rush all morning long. He’d never felt anything like it. The victories piling up at his feet were almost too much. Every phone call, every text, every e-mail was a new document found or connection made. They found building contracts related to the Blocks, leases for the unmarked warehouses, and even customs information relating to cargo containers brought in through the Port of Long Beach.

  If they’d had to go in blind, it would have taken months if not years to get a foothold. But thanks to Luis, it took hours. All the more shocking was the key evidence that had gotten the ball rolling. Not the murder weapon, not the location of the fields, not even where Luis believed Maria and possibly others were buried. No, it was the registration of the truck that provided the financial road map once they gained access to the Marshak Corporation’s financials. It was a company truck, but not one that belonged to the Marshaks. Not directly anyway. Rather, it was owned by a holding company with a single officer, Jason Marshak. The holding company received substantial financial transfers from the Marshak Corporation, money that inevitably disappeared, albeit on dates a clever Treasury liaison linked to various construction projects relating to the Blocks. These payments went back ten years. Once this was uncovered, the rest unraveled neatly.

  Never let it be said criminals were smart.

  Of everything he’d recovered himself, Michael’s saddest discovery from the files at the main campus related to the laundering of the workers through Santiago’s farm and five other alleged landowners’ farms. “Alleged” because even as the Marshaks went through the motions of transferring ownership to these trusted former field hands, there were any number of clauses that would allow them to yank it back out from under them. They couldn’t sell it to a third party, they couldn’t grow anything that the Marshaks couldn’t sell, and they couldn’t add on to the parcel. For all intents and purposes the laborers and, to a lesser degree, the landowners were indeed slaves, but by the letter of the law, it was perfectly legal.

  What quickly became clear was that few in the company actually knew about the conspiracy. The overseers, whose pay was handled by the same shell company that owned the truck Zarate drove, were free to hire who they wanted. No one at the Marshak company would know they were on the payroll. The irony was if more people—specifically, more accountants or lawyers—had known about the illegal side of the business, Michael’s job might’ve been more difficult. Without much effort, they could’ve covered their tracks more efficiently.

  Guess Marshak didn’t trust his own lawyers not to rat him out, Michael thought. Maybe there’s hope for the human race after all.

  And in the mix of all of this, he kept waiting for the other shoe to drop. For the blackmailer with the photos of him and Annie to forward that story to the Los Angeles Times, to his superior, or even to Helen. But it never came. He knew he wasn’t so lucky that the whole thing would vanish. He was now hoping the blackmailer, realizing how stacked the deck was against him, might be holding on to the pictures to use as leverage in a potential plea down the line.

  That Michael could handle.

  The phone rang. It was Rebenold for the tenth time that hour alone.

  “You’re about to hear from the state highway patrol. They found remains.”

  “Zarate?”

  “Yes, but even more after they searched the area with metal detectors. They believe the first one they pulled out of the ground is Maria Higuera. There are more coming.”

  Though he’d assumed this would be the case, it still hit Michael like a hammer blow. She’d been in front of him only days before. He’d been the one who’d sent her up there. Now, like Annie and Santiago, she was dead.

  And he would reap the benefits.

  “When the press gets word of the recovered remains, this becomes something else entirely,” Rebenold cautioned Michael. “As it involves foreign nationals and a major American corporation, it’ll be front-page news around the world. We have to be extremely sensitive.”

  “Of course.”

  He got off the phone and sat back in his chair. He’d taken over one of the Marshak conference rooms, which was now an obstacle course of boxes and files. A steady stream of assistants and clerks navigated their way over to him, but he asked that everyone set up elsewhere. He didn’t want the background noise.

  But now the silence was almost too much.

  His cell rang. Rebenold again.

  “Turn on the news,” she said.

  Michael looked for a remote for the television on the wall and couldn’t find one. He opened his laptop and went to the website for the local ABC affiliate. There was a press conference going on, but he couldn’t tell where. It was in front of a courthouse, but it wasn’t LA, and the man identified as a police chief was no one he recognized.

  “What is this?” Michael asked.

  “Henry Marshak just turned himself in for the murders of Annie Whittaker, Santiago Higuera, and Maria Higuera.”

  Oh, today is just going to be full of surprises, isn’t it? Michael thought.

  The roundup of the Marshak field workers was unprecedented in scale. INS had been told to expect large numbers, but they thought this meant a couple hundred people. When they discovered it was clearly many more than this, they called in members of the Air National Guard to help.

  If this had been a typical scenario, a clusterfuck would have been inevitable. Getting local government agencies to allocate hard-won resources for something previously unbudgeted for was difficult to impossible. But in the face of what appeared to be a grotesque violation of human rights directly under their noses, a rare moment of unity coalesced.

  Trucks were mobilized; local businesses contributed emergency supplies, from food to toiletries to clothing; and hangars at Santa Ynez Airport were repurposed to house the workers. Cots were laid out and fans arranged at the doors to deal with the stifling heat. Temporary barricades kept the workers corralled and far off the runways.

  Though there were far more men than women—Odilia guessed it was about one hundred to one—no one had to be told that the women needed to be housed separately. Few had any doubt what the women had gone through was far worse than the men. The male workers were treated as victims, too, but law enforcement determined the men had been allowed to use the women as unpaid prostitutes. Once they realized that, they couldn’t help regarding them as criminals. Several of the male workers had actually looked away in shame when their female counterparts were brought from their apartments. This was the first time many of them had seen the women in the daylight.

  There was a prevailing sense of uncertainty among the workers. No one knew how long they would be in custody. Some feared they’d be jailed, despite the agents’ assurances. Virtually all believed they’d seen the last of the Blocks, though they hadn’t been privy to the inner workings of the Marshak clan the way Odilia had. She’d seen how the laws of the land didn’t apply to them.

  Santiago told her they’d be heroes, that everyone who’d been wronged by this evil family would rally to them. That they’d start a new life together and raise a family. That he would care for her forever.

  And, of course, he told her how different he was from Jason Marshak.

  But just like all the others, he’d picked her out because she was pretty. After he’d had his way with her a few times, he decided he would save her. When she was in the metal shack on La Calavera, memories of Santiago kept returning to her no matter how much she’d vowed to never think of him again. She hoped, now that she was away from the Blocks, that all of this pain would finally be allowed to fade.

  When they arrived at the hangar, each woman was given two towels, a blanket, two bottles of water, and three military MREs. They were told to pick a cot, shower if they wanted to, and that hot meals would be arriving soon.


  As others took cots closest to the temporary showers or food lines, Odilia selected a cot closest to the back doors. Hot as it was, she knew they wouldn’t close them at night, and she wanted to sleep as close to the stars as she could.

  Glenn was halfway to Los Angeles when he learned his brother had confessed to triple murder. It was Jack who let him know, the lawyer sounding now a decade older than he had an hour before.

  “This is the last day you need something like this thrown onto the fire,” he said with a sigh, “but I can’t imagine any day that news like this would be welcome. Additionally, I’m sorry to ask you over the phone, but I need to know how you want me to proceed.”

  Glenn searched his mind for an answer but found none. He wondered if this was what it felt like to have a stroke. He had never felt less in control in his life, as if he was hurtling down a ski slope, unable to turn or arrest his progress. There’d be a crash soon. What scared him most was not knowing the extent of the damage. It was sure to be a permanent injury, but maybe he’d still be able to walk away with some of his dignity intact.

  “Did he call you?” Glenn asked.

  “He did, but only to say he’d only talk to you.”

  “Oh for Christ’s sake.”

  “I agree. I think that would be a terrible idea.”

  Glenn hung up and told the driver to turn around. His eyes flitted around the back of the SUV, as if the answer were waiting there to be found. He wondered if Henry had heard about the raids and suffered some kind of mental break. He needed to be hospitalized, not arraigned. He reached for his phone to inform Jack of this assessment but then paused.

  Is there a solution here? he wondered. Could they just dump all this at Henry’s feet and call it a day?

  He pondered this for the rest of the drive. If there was some kind of crime uncovered within the company, the coincidence of his brother turning himself in for murders—plural—he obviously didn’t commit just might spin things in the right direction. Henry had been plagued by guilt and this was the result, full stop.