"You mean struggling to sh-stand with my cane. Running was two years ago. This is now. Old lady with cane."
"You're not old, my sweet," he told her. He touched her shoulder gently and she brushed up against him.
"I'm forties. Thash a short leap to fifty and that ish old."
"Nuts to that. You'll never age, Libby. You're a sprite, beautiful and ageless."
"You're shweet, Ansh."
"Come on now. Let's toss this in and get things zipped. We don't want to be late."
"Where are we going, exactly?"
He had been wondering how long he could avoid saying.
"Mexico. We have business in Mexico City."
"Ish it someone I know?"
"Oh, you know this person very well."
"Well?"
"I can't tell you. I'd have to kill you if I told you."
"Ansh! Come on!"
"Let's make it a surprise. You are going to be very happy. In fact, I predict tears of joy."
"Only seeing--"
"Never mind. Let's see if this thing will zip."
She flattened one edge of the suitcase, forcing her cane along the horizontal flap. It worked remarkably well and just like that, they were zipped.
"Excellent. Now let me grab a few things and we're off."
"Lesh eat first. Hungry."
"You go fish something out of the fridge. I'll grab some things and be right down."
"Okay."
She plunged the cane to the hardwood and bravely headed for the door.
"I'm not making you anything," she called back. "You'll eat on the plane."
"Fine, fine."
He quickly filled his overnighter with a few items and exchanged a used razor for new, and he was ready. His meds--good there. When you got to be fifty you started needing more than a small space on a shelf to hold your meds. Anymore his took up almost half of one shelf--and counting. Statin for cholesterol, antihistamine for allergies, blood-pressure--all fifties knew the drill.
12
Chapter 12
Juan Carlos Ordañez was sent by his father to put the squeeze on Hermano Sanchez. There was the matter of the suitcase of marijuana lost by Sanchez to the Drug Task Force in Flagstaff. The cartel wanted Sanchez to repay the value of the lost pot, $150,000.
To Juan Carlos' father, head of the Tijuana Cartel, it was a matter of principle that Sanchez pay up or be hurt. If he failed to enforce against a mule like Sanchez his business would quickly unravel. Drug smuggling would abruptly cease if the mules thought any less than their very lives was at stake when they were hauling the kingpin's drugs across the international boundaries. Sanchez would either pay up or--there was one other way. Sanchez had a daughter. Juan Carlos knew her name was Maria and that she was nine or ten. He would threaten to take her away. That would motivate the mule to get their money.
He pulled into Nogales driving a battered white Toyota Highlander. Among the other old cars along the street, it was invisible and that's the way the family wanted it. Ordañez parked one block from Canal Street, the infamous red light district of Nogales. At the corner of Canal Street and Dulcea Avenue he ducked inside El Camino, a whore house that was huge in the sex tourism business. El Camino's popularity was legendary because of the underage prostitutes available.
He found his contact, Efrain, who worked for Juan Carlos' father in the whore house. Efrain's job was to intercept men at the border and promote the strip and massage clubs along Canal Street. The clubs featured young—twelve- and even ten-years-old--hookers. It was into El Camino that Juan Carlos would place Maria if the $150,000 wasn't forthcoming in three days.
"Have you seen our man Sanchez?" Juan Carlos asked the employee over a Dos Equis beer. Dos Equis was brewed by Heineken--with whom the senior Ordañez also had a deal for distribution in Sonora, and the first sip was satisfying to the younger Ordañez, for it was good to keep business within the family. Even the beer in the saloons belonged to his father, and that made him very proud and made him feel very strong, even invincible.
"Yes, he is at home with his wife and kids."
"And Maria is still with him?"
"Last I know she was."
"Has he come in to talk about the money he owes?"
"He was here two nights ago. He said he was working on it."
"Sure he is. We are going to take his daughter. Tell him that."
"How long?"
"Three days. In three days I come for her."
"I will tell him."
"Good. Now who do you got for me tonight? I am looking for someone twelve."
"Girl or boy?"
"Either one."
"I have just the puta for you."
"Let's finish our beer and then I will go to my room in back. You don't let no one else use it?"
"Not since you said."
"I said. It's for me only."
"It's clean. No one else dares to go inside."
"Good. Now send me a chicken. Not too plump, not too skinny. In the middle."
"As you wish."
13
Chapter 13
Five minutes later, Ansel headed downstairs with his bag. She was in the kitchen; he smelled the onion soup heating. So he ducked into his office.
On his laptop he located a travel site and paid round-trip air fare to Mexico City. Return in three days. They would have the trust money back in hand by then and they could fly home.
Of course they would have to spend a day with David and listen to his pitch for his kids or whatever he was up to. Ansel would probably make a sizable gift. "Largesse Largent," his friends called him at the office. Because the firm's largesse was well-known to his partners and the several charities he considered deserving.
Thus, David had come by his proclivity for giving naturally; Ansel wondered that that maybe it was even genetic, for his own father’s obsessive tithing kept the family constantly poor as the proverbial church mice. His giving became Ansel's became David's. There were worse character traits, he didn't doubt, and they had done well in order to do well. David's own career had been astonishing to Ansel.
"Then we're ready?" she called. He envisioned her spooning soup to the good side.
"Just about," he called back. "One last item."
The money hadn't arrived. Two hundred thousand dollars. It would be no easy trick to smuggle that much cash out of the country. Failure to declare over ten thousand was a crime. A very serious crime, and he knew that, and he knew that he could be sent to prison for up to ten years and fined up to $500,000. Still, the money was a must, and no one could know about it. Not even Libby.
At just that moment the front gate buzzed.
Ansel checked the video and confirmed it was the courier, as he’d expected.
He buzzed him up the drive and hurried to the front door to intercept the delivery. There would be a valise and there would be a bank note to sign, and a receipt. And he would be ready.
He was at the front door, stretching out his signing hand so that the encounter was a quick one, when his cell phone chimed yet again.
Melinda calling. He already knew she was hopping mad because he had ducked out without first having the talk that she was demanding. His mistake. Big mistake. For all he knew her next call might be to Libby. He didn't think that would happen but with Melinda you never knew. After all, she was young and impulsive. The mother of three middle-schoolers and wife to Ramin Singh,
Melinda was all Indian grace, hallowed brown skin that always left him panting for more, large breasts that, despite filling three voracious newborn appetites over the years yet retained their newness, their pout, their upward tilt and gravity-defying protrusion.
Ansel hated to share with Ramin even though the husband held the deed. She knew better than to ever remind Ansel that she still was, at times, finding it necessary to satisfy her husband sexually. No matter than she was foresworn to Ansel and his love. She indulged Ramin as one might indulge a high school flame ten years down the road when, at the first reunion, he
copped a gratuitous feel. Old times went down hard, old feelings could be fanned, histories shifted and tilted as in tectonic plate hydraulics where one forgot one was now ten years older and no longer enfolded in the high school status equivalency of "engaged."
All he asked of her was that if there was to be a cop and feel that he didn't hear about it. If he didn't hear, it didn't exist.
Thus he survived the reality of her other life and wifely duty.
"Where the heck did you go?" she said when he accepted the call.
"I had to get away. It's impossible to explain right now."
"Does this have anything to do with Suzanne's death--wait, don't just answer and tell me 'no.' First remember that I love you and you can tell me anything and my lips are sealed. Having laid that foundation, did you bolting off have anything to do with Suzanne?"
"Yes and no. Yes because I didn't have time for the police. No because I had nothing to do with her death."
"You're sure about that?"
"Which?"
"The police part. You're too small to kill anyone."
"Well, thanks." Anything more would have required arguing he wasn't too small to kill someone. He yielded the point.
"What about talking to the cops? They want your number immediately."
"Listen, I can't talk just this minute, a courier just pulled up at my front door. I'll have to call you back."
"Brother, you've got ten minutes. Then I'm escalating."
"Escalating? What the hell does escalating mean?"
"Do I have to spell it out?"
"Yes, please."
"Ansel, you won't hear what I have to say. It won't wait. It involves our spouses. So if you won't hear me out you leave me no choice but to take it up with them."
"Don't go postal on me here, Mel. I'm not dodging you. Life implodes sometimes. I'm in the midst of a meltdown--"
"Do we need to call Dr. Starkey?"
"No, it's not like that."
"You're sure?"
"I'm certain. No, this is real life stuff that's happening. I want to bring you up to speed about it. You more than anyone. Let me answer the door. The bell's ringing. Then I'll lock myself in my office and call you back. I promise."
"Ten minutes, Ansel. I'm not kidding around."
"I know you're not. Ten minutes."
"Be safe."
"I will."
She had to add an admonition because she not only loved Ansel, she also knew him.
"And call Dr. Starkey if you need to."
"Please."
The front door buzzed a third time. It sounded angry and final. He quickly pulled it open before Libby came.
The driver held a zippered pouch that he held back as he pushed an electronic clipboard forward.
"Sign here," he said, which Ansel did, and he punched the face of the machine and said again, "sign here," which Ansel did. He appeared to study the signature, but then dropped the machine, which was tethered to him by a belt band. Then he handed Ansel the zippered pouch and tossed off a mock salute. "Enjoy," he laughed.
The door quickly shut behind him and Ansel headed for his office, making it inside and locking the door behind him before Libby noticed. Or so he thought.
No sooner had he unzipped the pouch and begun counting than she knocked.
"Busy, Lib," he called out. "Important and confidential law firm business."
"Jush open the damn door, Ansh!"
"Libby, come on! We both have our boundaries! That's important. And I'm not letting you in."
"Then I'm not going."
Great. She had him, and she knew she had him, because he wouldn’t leave her there without him. Great.
So he stuffed the banded money back inside the zipped bag.
She was just about to knock again when he jerked it open.
"What?"
She looked beyond him, determined to see what see what he was up to. He stood aside and swept his arm wide.
"As you can see, I have nothing to hide. I need to make a few firm calls. That's all I'm doing."
"Ansh," she laughed and brushed past. "When have I ever given up your shecrets? Heaven forbid I would do that!"
"Please. This is different. Give me some space here, Libby."
"Oh, pshaw," she said, using an expression her mother once used in his presence.
"So what do you need right now that can't wait until I make my calls?"
"Nothing. I'm jush being nosy. Thash what wives do. Were you on the phone with Melinda? Did I hear you whispering to her?"
"I was speaking to Melinda, yes, but it was business."
"You're shtill shtupping her, aren't you."
It wasn't a question and he didn't know where she got the expression. It came out of nowhere. They were Methodists. They didn't say "shtupping."
"You are. I can see it in your eyes."
He took her hand and led her outside his office, cane and all. She resisted, but not violently. She didn't have the strength to violently resist and had to lift-plop her cane in stutter-step to keep up.
"Now. You fix yourself a nice cup of coffee and give me ten minutes. That's all. No more, no less."
"'Kay."
"Thank you."
He closed the door and locked it. He got back to counting. At one-hundred-fifty-thousand he lost count and thought screw this and began forming a half-size human skeleton with the bills, which were banded in stacks of thousands.
How was he going to smuggle two-hundred of those? Tape was the obvious answer. He figured he could tape ten to each arm, twenty thousand. Twenty to each leg, which would be forty. The rest would have to encircle chest and abdomen. Plus he could throw another fifty in his travel bag and pray they didn't ask him to open it. In the inside pocket, the dirty-clothes sleeve. Fair enough.
Off came the suit coat, shirt; off came the T-shirt and down went the pants and off came the shoes. Wearing only his boxers, he began the tape job.
Ten minutes later he resembled the Michelin Man. His mid-section had gone from his svelte thirty-four to something resembling a fifty inch paunch. His chest looked, like it was protected by the same body armor police employ, and his arms--he could just barely bend his arms. And he'd made one huge mistake. Nothing fit. The pants wouldn't slide back on and the shirt sleeve wouldn't pass down over his swollen biceps and wouldn't button up the front anyway. Great.
As in other times of pure stymie in his life when he had run out of all good ideas, he was saved by serendipity. He heard the washing machine begin running water. And it was in the basement and he knew it was running water because it made the pipes pound in the walls of his office. Libby was running a load.
Without a second thought he dashed out of his office and raced upstairs two-at-a-time. Then he was locked in his bedroom.
Quickly he shrugged into his Bears sweatshirt, which dropped easily over his balloon arms and torso as it was an XXXL. And his fishing pants, huge as they were to allow comfort in the boat, passed with no small tugging and coaxing up his legs and around his waist. They snapped closed but only after he shifted fifty-thousand from waist height up a notch to kidney height. Sideways in the mirror he look distorted and bloated and strangely dressed for someone about to fly out of the states to a foreign country. Sweatshirt and fishing pants? Are you kidding me, he thought? Customs would have him face-down on the ground in a flash.
Just in time to confirm his insanity, Libby said from behind, "Why are you wearing that get-up? I thought we were flying?"
Evidently the lock failed.
"Don't know. Just wanted something comfortable."
"You don't look comfortable. You look swollen. What the hell you got on under there?"
Before he could stop her she pulled up his sweatshirt and visualized the first-level tape job, the kidney belt of fifty grand.
"Ansh, what the hell do we have here?"
"I know. This is part of my firm secret. It's for the law practice, I swear it."
"Cash money? Lawyers don't use cash
money. Try again."
"Okay. It's part of my surprise for you, but you caught me. Feel better? Do you feel better now that you ruined part of the surprise I have for you?"
Lawyers also attacked when run to the ground and mauled by lions.
"Really? I didn't mean to ruin my shurprise."
"Well just drop it. I can still make most of it a surprise for you."
"Well. I'm getting lots of money. I can't see anything wrong with that. When are we going?"
"Right now. I just have to call a cab. Now give me five minutes alone, please."
He was about to dial Melinda's number when he heard a voice over the front gate intercom. All he could make out was "FBI," followed by the sound of Libby hitting the gate unlock.
The FBI had officially arrived.
14
Chapter 14
Libby ushered them right inside, right into the living room, and then called upstairs. "FBI, Ansh! Come down, pleash!"
She tried to make it sing-song but failed. Her voice was plaintive and frightened. Which told the FBI they were on the right track. All this before hands had even been shaken and intros made.
"Coming!"
He took care coming down the stairs so as not to trip and spill two hundred thousand dollars out of his clothes.
The agents stood when he walked in. Both had been waiting on the couch, and both extended their badges over their wrists, like waiters offering the bottle.
The taller, black male went first. "Special Agent Freyer Smothers, FBI."
The shorter, thick male followed, "Special Agent Kip Honeycomb, FBI. You must be Mr. Largent."
"I am. Call me Ansel. Sit, please."
"Coffee?" Libby called in.
Both refused. Always with the business-first drama.
"How can I help?" Ansel asked, rubbing his hands together briskly in the universal ‘let's get to work’ sign language.
"We've asked around, down at the firm. You're the one trust account signatory we haven't spoken with yet," said Agent Smothers. He was very black with very Caucasian features. Ansel figured he hailed from one of the islands. Which meant he could read nothing into him. He would have to tread lightly with the guy.
The Mental Case (Thaddeus Murfee Legal Thriller Series Book 6) Page 6
