by Roger Weston
“We’re not on the list,” Ajax said. “I’m the next-door neighbor, Ajax Rosario. I just want to talk to Mr. Abascal about the property lines.”
“I’m sorry, sir. You’ll have to make an appointment.”
“Look, Abascal is a friend of my family,” Ajax said.
Irina thought friend was too strong a word. Abascal was a member of the pack, which meant he would turn on another member and devour them at the first sign of weakness. Abascal was a member of the Augean Command. He was one of the ones El Jefe had feared, causing her father-in-law to betray her five years ago.
“I have my instructions,” the guard said. “Leave me your card and I’ll give it to him.”
Contempt rose in Irina’s heart. How dare he turn away Ajax Rosario. What impudence! Very soon, she thought, such men will fall all over themselves to try to please her and Ajax. Soon everyone would treat them with respect and deference. Irina caged her emotions.
“I’m only in town for today,” Ajax said. “I’m leaving for over a year.”
“I’m sorry. I’ll explain that when I see him.”
They parked the Porsche over at Ajax’s stunning property. Irina was not tempted to go in the beautiful pink mansion.
Ajax said, “The fence in the back five hundred is just a brick wall. There’s no electrical wire. I’ll get the ladder out of the garage.”
Irina barely looked at the beautiful, sprawling pool with its statuesque fountains. When they walked by the serene lake, the color reflections of the trees on the surface hardly caught her notice. She had bigger concerns.
The brick wall was ten-feet high along the golf course, but that was easy to get past with a ladder. Ajax cursed when his silk shirt got smudged from dirt on the wall. Within minutes, Irina and Ajax were walking on Abascal’s golf course. Ajax’s $3,000 Christian Louboutin high-top sneakers felt good as he walked on the freshly-mowed grass. He and Irina walked four holes before they found the man. He had a long narrow face and dark, brooding eyes.
Irina waved to him. “Hello, Mr. Abascal. It’s Irina Rosario.”
“Who?” His jaw dropped open. “I don’t understand, I…” His eyes pondered her with a hint of fear.
“She’s with me,” Ajax said.
“I know that, but I recall some sad news from five years ago. I’m sure you can understand why ....”
“Mr. Abascal,” Irina said. “The Rosarios just learned over the past twenty-four hours that I didn’t die when the yacht exploded five years ago. They were just as surprised as you are.”
“Were they?”
Abascal’s bodyguards started in Irina’s direction, but he waved them back and said, “Just hold off a minute.”
The men in dark clothes backed away.
“I had to disappear for while, Mr. Abascal.” Irina pushed her strawberry-blond hair back over her shoulder.
“Disappeared? How did you get in here?”
“A ladder. We’re looking at the property lines.” Irina slightly adjusted her gold-threaded headband and then pointed vaguely over toward Ajax’s property.
“Property lines, I see.” Abascal’s face darkened. “And Ajax Rosario. Back from Thailand, are you?”
“Yes, family business.”
Abascal stared at Irina. “I’m sure. Of course, I’m glad you’re okay, Irina, but this is ... Why are you here?”
“It’s a long story,” she said. “I have some crucial business to talk with you, Mr. Abascal.”
“Business?”
“I’m in a very tough situation, a desperate situation.”
“Aren’t we all?”
“I need you to write a letter to the board of directors of Santiago Bank blaming Nicholas Rosario for massive losses at the bank.”
Abascal’s dark eyes brooded on her like a rabid dog. “What? Is this a joke? I think you’d better leave.” He pointed for the fence, and the bodyguards stepped forward.
“Not so fast, Mr. Abascal.” She raised her eyebrows, astounded that a Rosario could receive such treatment. “I think you’ll want to hear what I have to say.”
“I’ve heard enough.”
“You haven’t heard about Judge Joaquin yet. Don’t you want to hear about him?”
Abascal flinched. He shook his bodyguards away with his golfer’s cap. The men in dark clothes backed off and stood by trees.
“I don’t know who you’re talking about,” Abascal said.
“Oh, I think you do. After all, before I married Nick Rosario, I worked for Judge Joaquin. Did accounting work for him. I worked closely with him on some … unorthodox deals. Should I go on?”
“I think you should leave,” he said weakly.
Irina’s eyes brightened. She shook her head. “I don’t think so. You and I both know that Judge Joaquin is in prison now. He was convicted of 19 counts of income-tax evasion, bribery, conspiracy, fraud, and perjury. We also know that several of his conspirators are in jail. And of course, we both know that many of his crimes were never discovered because of his secret files. That would include your arrangement with him where Judge Joaquin accepted a lucrative stock offer in your insurance company in America. He netted over $900,000 on the deal. Judge Joaquin bought the stock at giveaway prices—and in exchange you got a series of favorable rulings for your racetracks—longer seasons, permission to expand into harness racing. Should I keep going?”
Abascal’s face was dark with rage. “What do you want?” His eyes were bulging out of his gaunt face.
Irina turned away and turned back. “Mainly I want to keep you out of prison because your political enemies are in power. They would salivate over the information like this. I don’t want that to happen. After all, we are neighbors.”
“I said, what do you want?” Veins were showing in his forehead.
“That would be blackmail. That’s not the kind of person I am.”
Abascal put his cap back on. “Let me put it differently then. Since we are neighbors, what if I help you out with your little problem? I’ll write that letter you were talking about. We’ll help each other out.”
“If you put it that way, I think we will be very good neighbors.”
“You want me to blame Nick Rosario for losses at the bank. What’s my connection? How would I know about such losses?”
“That’s easy. $750 thousand are about to disappear from one of your accounts.”
CHAPTER 31
As the Porsche raced down the highway, Irina had read the letter for the third time when Ajax’s cell phone rang. He answered it and listened. Someone else was doing all the talking. Then Ajax hung up. “When it rains, it pours.”
“What do you mean?” Irina asked. She adjusted her headband. Her fingers brushed her straight hair back behind her ears.
“Good fortune. That was my manhunter. He hasn’t found Jake Sands yet, but he will very soon. He just learned that Sands’ assistant was in Seville, Spain. Her return ticket to Seattle is for tomorrow. He says that she will help whether she wants to or not.”
“Call him back,” Irina said. “I need results sooner. The Jake Sands problem needs to be solved today.”
“Alright. He’ll come through.”
Irina nodded. “By now, my people will have drained $750 thousand from Abascal’s account.”
Ajax smiled. “That’s beautiful to my ears.”
“Now there’s just one more thing you have to do, and you will have to be very devious to pull it off.”
“What’s that?”
“Ruin your brother.”
CHAPTER 32
From his hotel penthouse, Ajax gazed out across Buenos Aires, a city of bitter memories.
Oh, betrayal! Bitter memories of pain and disgrace.
“Buenos Aires,” he mumbled, “What, you don’t welcome me home? We’ll see about that. We’ll see what happens…”
Ajax called his brother Nicholas. Ajax said he just wanted to talk about some business matters that he didn’t hear much about in Thailand. He activated a record
ing device. Then he asked a lot of questions about El Jefe, about his health, how much he was suffering, how involved he was in the bank.
“What are you going to do about El Jefe?”
“What do you mean?” Nick said.
“I mean to help him deal with his pain.”
“I leave that up to the doctors.”
“I’ve heard he’s in great shape. In fact, he’s still hunting.”
“That’s true, yes, he’s going hunting in Patagonia next month.”
“Will you ever go to Patagonia again?”
“Yes, I will go there, too. I will probably go next year.”
Then Ajax said they should bury the hatchet. He brought up old times and talked about their old hunting trips in Patagonia. Ajax asked, “What kind of gun was it you used to use?”
“The .30-.30.”
“Why that one?” Ajax already knew the answer.
“The .30-.30 Winchester is the best because of its larger, relatively slow-moving bullets. I figure those bigger bullets can bore right through the bramble of bushes and little branches and still take out my prey in heavy cover.”
Ajax had heard this logic a hundred times, but he dug for more. “Why not use a .243?”
“No, no, no. That’ll never work. The ammo is lighter and faster. The slug will blow up on contact with a branch. Even a little twig will deflect the bullet from its true course.”
Ajax said, “I never could hunt like you. I’ll try next year, but stalking is where I always blew it.”
“I tried to give you some advice, but you would never listen.”
“I’ll listen now. Tell me how you’ll stalk your prey this year.”
“Okay… I guess. It’s not complicated. When I spot him, he’s dead meat. It’s just a matter of time. First, I’ll map a stalking route, three prominent landmarks so I don’t misjudge the route. I won’t focus on sneaking up on him. That’s where you go wrong. I’ll stay focused on getting to the place where I’ll take the shot. That way I won’t be sneaking a peek when I’m crawling through the grass or rocks. Those peeks can alert your prey. Believe me, when I stalk a deer, I will kill him.”
“I guess when it comes time to make the kill, you’ll shoot him right in the belly.” Ajax knew this was going to set him off. He knew exactly the story Nick would tell.
“You should be denied a permit,” Nick said. “What’s the matter with you? What’s wrong with the water in Bangkok, anyway? Shoot ‘em in the belly? I’ll tell you exactly what I’ll do. I’ll work my way around front and put a bullet right between his eyes.”
“That’s a tough shot, isn’t it?”
“I’ve done it before, I’ll do it again.”
“What if you can’t get a clear shot between the eyes, then what? I’m not that good of a shot.”
Nick said, “You put a bullet right under his ear.”
Ajax kept up the interrogation even though he knew the answers: “What do you do with the entrails?”
“You bury ‘em,” Nick says.
“We gotta put the past behind us, brother. I want to remember the way it used to be between us, like when we used to go hunting.”
“That was a long time ago,” Nick said. “I know what you mean, though.”
“Hopefully, I’ll see you again before I leave town.”
***
With two bodyguards in the back seat of his limousine—his late-model limo, not his newly-acquired 1912 Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost Double Pullman limousine—Ajax drove into the parking lot of one of the big television stations. He dialed up his friend, who promptly came outside.
Ajax rolled down the tinted window. “Here’s the audio file,” he said. “See what you can do with it.”
CHAPTER 33
September 12
Jake suspected that he was being followed, so he wandered around busy streets and acted like a visiting businessman. Around 7am, he left his hotel and strolled for a couple of city blocks down Avenida Roque Sáenz Peña then stepped into a busy bakery. He stood back from the window but studied the sidewalks behind him. He saw a familiar face lingering under an awning across the street, half a block down. Two blocks earlier Jake had stepped into a coffee shop and seen the same thug at a distance. There was no doubt now in his Jake’s mind that he was being followed, so he would put on a show.
He went to tourist attractions and went down to the port a couple of times just to call his captain and be seen at the port, looking like he was conducting maritime business.
“How close are you?” Jake said.
The captain mumbled something then, “I’m thee hours out.”
“Great. I’ll call you later.”
Next, Jake called up Nick Rosario. “This is Jake Sands. My ship will be in town this afternoon. Do you want to meet me on the dock later to check out your collateral?”
“No, that’s not going to work. I’m very busy. I’ll send one of my people down there. You can be there if you want, but you don’t have to as long as someone on the crew will give him a tour.”
“Alright, I’ll let the captain know.”
Jake called him and let him know to expect a representative from Santiago Bank.
He was walking down a long stretch of waterfront when his phone rang. It turned out to be Ashley. “Is everything alright, Ashley?”
“I’m fine. Can you talk?”
“Sure, right now I’m walking past an 800-foot bulk carrier in the Rio de la Plata.”
“The curator has learned more about the Maravillas shipwreck of 1654.”
“I’ve been wondering about that, especially what that confession says.”
“I’m still waiting to hear from my linguist. Anyway, some doubts have been raised about the artifact.”
“What do you mean?”
“Several experts are now urging skepticism until further investigations can be conducted.”
“Really?”
“Yes, William T. Rutherford, the metals analyst from Jerusalem University, has changed his tune. Now he says that he is unconvinced in the authenticity. He says that the metal could have been taken from an ancient coffin and the messages could have been fabricated later. He also claims that the lead book lacks patina and corrosion. That alone is proof that that the Confession is a fraud, probably crafted in the 16th or 17th century.”
“A fraud?”
“It gets worse. The Israel Antiquities Authority now completely denies the Confession’s authenticity. They say there is no chance that the artifact is real and that it’s an attempt to discredit Jesus.”
“I can’t believe people have died over a fraudulent artifact.” Jake shook his head in disbelief.
“There’s more, Jake.”
“You’re kidding. Alright, go ahead.”
“During the Maravillas shipwreck, another passenger overheard Camilo Torres’ confession when he claimed to be the world’s greatest sinner. The sailor claimed Torres had a relic that would destroy the church and the faith of humanity.
“Camilo Torres who died on the Maravillas could say he was worst sinner in the world because he was the financier who commissioned the Christ Confession and then murdered the forger to keep his dirty secret. He had declared a personal war against God. He plotted to scandalize the church and destroy the faith of every man alive. Davila had enslaved or killed off two million Indians, but Torres had plotted to rob every man alive of his soul by destroying their faith. He believed that church would implode, depriving rulers of their one tool to pacify the masses. Society would give way to wars and widespread chaos. Torres would then finance those wars, piling up a fortune that would exceed even that of Pedrarias.”
Jake couldn’t believe what he was hearing, but Ashley wasn’t done.
She said, “In 1656, Torres was again returning to Europe after visiting his mining interests in the New World. He planned to arrive back in Barcelona in time to preside over the 126th annual meeting of the Augean Command. On this fateful trip, however, his ship, the Nuestra Senora
de las Maravillas, wrecked, and he was one of the unfortunate victims of the tragedy. He had the fake Christ Confession with him.”
“What a world we live in.”
“Yes, and before he drowned, Torres turned over the relic, the fake Christ Confession, to the priest.”
“Amazing.”
“The Confession has also been discredited by Brian Hastings from the UW chemistry department. He’s at Stanford University right now running further tests, but he doubts the authenticity. Now for the bad news... Are you ready?”
“More? I don’t think I can take any more.”
“You need to hear this. I’ve been playing phone tag with a highly-respected metals expert named Julian R. Cooper. He’s from Oxford and specializes in aging and authenticating ancient relics. He was studying close-up photos and talking with other experts. In fact, he was going to meet up with Brian Hastings yesterday at Stanford to look at the Confession in person and talk about Brian’s findings.”
“Good idea. Hasting is the chemist from UW, right?”
“Yes, but there’s a problem. I’ve now learned that Cooper was supposed to have lunch yesterday with Shirley Armstrong, an assistant professor at Stanford in the Department of Classics. She was planning to have lunch with Cooper to discuss a joint Oxford-Stanford excavations project in Sicily. Unfortunately, Cooper never showed up, nor did he show up for the meeting with Hastings or a cocktail party last night. Police checked his hotel room and found his luggage, but he never checked out. He just disappeared. He doesn’t respond to communications.”
“This doesn’t sound good.”
“No. I hope you don’t mind, but I contacted your stepfather Stuart. He’s helped us before so I thought maybe he could help us again.”
“Help us how?”
“Find Cooper. As it turns out, Cooper is not just an archaeologist. He’s also a CIA agent. Because he’d just come off of a dangerous mission, he has a micro-tracker implanted under his skin.”
“That’s good news. How soon will they have him back?”
“They won’t.”
“Why not?”
