by Dan Kelly
But one of the platoon leaders, Alfredo Garcia, is from Mexico and he’s familiar with a lot of the tricks smugglers use in his country. He’s convinced there’s a tunnel somewhere in the farmhouse and he’s determined to find it. “Manny, the only way Fuentes could have gotten away from us is through a hidden tunnel. There has to be an entrance to one somewhere in this house or on the surrounding property. Let us continue to look.”
Manny thinks it’s a waste of time, but the conviction in Alfredo’s voice persuades him to go along with the request. Three hours later Manny’s glad he listened to the platoon leader. Down in the basement, in the wine cellar, one of Alfredo’s men found the entrance to a tunnel under a movable wine rack. There’s a trap door with a hole in it that conceals the entrance to the tunnel. The hole is big enough for a rod with a small hook on one end to be inserted from inside the tunnel to pull the wine rack back over the trap door. The rod was found leaning against the wall of the tunnel.
The tunnel is big enough for a man six feet tall to walk upright and has a reinforced ceiling. When Manny checked it out, his first thought was to take a couple of men and follow the tunnel to see where it went. His second thought was “That could get you killed. I wouldn’t put it past this rodent to booby trap the damn thing to blow up anyone who tried to follow him.”
Out loud Manny says, “We need a bomb disposal unit to sweep that tunnel before any of us go in there to follow it to the end to see if we can pick up any kind of trail or clue as to where he is headed and what he’s using for transportation.”
Manny hears Pete trying to get his attention in his ear piece and says, “Pod Leader. Say again, Beach. Over.”
“Abby’s requesting a bomb disposal unit via Dave now. Hang tight. Over.”
Twenty minutes later a bomb disposal team of two men showed up at the farmhouse wearing nothing to help an observer to identify where they came from and using Manny’s code name, Pod Leader, to identify themselves as the people who were requested.
Amazingly, all the shooting and the parade of ambulances and trucks being used to haul away the dead and wounded has attracted little onlooker traffic. The normal truck traffic that uses the road that runs parallel to the front of the farm property seems oblivious to or unconcerned with what’s going on and since Abby instructed the ambulance services to keep their sirens off and radio communication to a minimum, no news media folks or looky-loos from the city have put in an appearance.
Aloncia has arranged with a private clinic in Bogota to take care of the wounded and Dave has made arrangements for around the clock guards to be posted outside each room where prisoners are assigned until it is medically safe to transport them to facilities where they can be properly interrogated. Dave has also arranged for the uninjured captives to be taken someplace else in Bogota to be interrogated and buses will be dispatched to transport them after the sun goes down.
After Manny advises Pete and Abby that the area has been cleared of all the dead and wounded and that the area has been secured, they head out to the farm to have a look at the prisoners who managed to survive the assault unscathed.
By the time they arrive at the farm, the rumor mill among the 94 prisoners is really cranking away. Everything from facing a firing squad to life in prison at hard labor is being spread around which was started and is being nurtured by some of the troops ordered by Manny to do so. When Pete and Abby walked into what was left of the tent, they saw on the faces of the prisoners a variety of emotions, fear, distrust, anger, hope of making some kind of deal, acquiescence as to their fate, but the most predominant was hate. Even though these people were tied up, immobilized, Pete and Abby were very cautious around them.
As they move amongst the prisoners a voice from behind them shouts, “You two! Enjoy this while you can because as sure as I’m sitting here you two are dead meat.”
Pete and Abby turn around to see who is talking and lo and behold it’s the CFO and golfer from San Juan, Puerto Rico, Zarita Barranco, and who’s sitting next to her but Hector Montoya. Hector’s not talking though. He’s just glowering up a storm. Abby walks over to Zarita, puts her foot on Zarita’s forehead and knocks her flat on her back. Looking down at Zarita Abby says, “Nothing’s certain in life, Zarita, not even sitting on your ass.”
The lady went ballistic and Abby said to Pete as they were walking back out of the tent into the house, “Well, I guess some things are certain. That certainly made my day.”
They went looking for Manny to see if the bomb removal guys had cleared the tunnel yet and found him talking to one of them. What’s up Manny? Is the tunnel safe to enter now?” The man he was talking to said, “That tunnel is a long one, senorita. We’ve cleared about a quarter mile of it so far, but still have more to go.”
“Okay. Stay at it. Manny, we’re going back to the villa. Keep us posted.”
“Will do, Abby. Once we’re given the all clear, I’ll take a couple of men and see where the tunnel goes, but these guys are long gone by now and I doubt if we’ll pick up any clues as to where he’s headed.”
“It still has to be checked out, Manny.”
“I know.”
Driving back to the villa Abby says, “The first thing I’ve got to do when we get back is call Julio Mendoza and bring him up to date. I think it’s time to turn him loose and let him do his thing and maybe in the process he’ll create more ill will among the remaining players in the Caribbean underworld, especially if we plant the idea in his head that this has all come about because of greed, dissatisfaction and traitorous behavior within the ranks of the major crime organizations.”
“What you’re really saying is we might have won this battle, but the war still wages on, so we have to keep the pressure on by continuing to spread inflammatory rumors with little basis in fact.”
“You’re learning, Brody, you’re definitely learning. Even though we’ve blown a tremendous hole in the major crime syndicates’ operations in the Caribbean today, not everyone in these organizations was present at the meeting. They’ll be a lot of in-fighting and back stabbing before new leadership assumes power. That will present an ideal situation for Sea Wasp to create more havoc with lies and half-truths.”
Pete said, “What you just said has me wondering about something. Why wasn’t Vicente Fuentes at this august gathering?”
“I can only make an educated guess, but the things we’ve been hearing indicate that he’s been grooming his son for the top slot for a while now and has been gradually turning the operation over to Juan and been slipping into retirement.”
“I wonder if the old man put Juan up to what he pulled today.”
“He might have, but Vicente is the cagiest of the cagey. I doubt if we’ll ever know the truth.”
When they got back to the villa, they learned something else that also took some edge off their victory. Damien Christensen had flown the coop. No one saw him leave as everyone was listening intently to what was going on at the farm. Abby had been planning to have Dave arrange for a 24/7 tail to be put on him to see where he might go and whom he might meet with when the mission was over, but now that wasn’t going to happen. “I screwed up, Pete. I should have had someone watching him when we were at the farm. I knew deep down in my bones that he was up to no good and would pull another disappearing act, but I didn’t think he’d split so soon.”
“Stop kicking yourself in the butt, Abby. You made a judgment call and things didn’t go your way. In the vernacular of the peasantry, shit happens. You’re human, you’re not omniscient.”
“Thanks for the kind words, Pete, but I blew it and won’t rest until I have him in my sights again.”
Pete nodded his understanding and smiling inwardly to himself he thought, “Damien, you have pissed off the wrong woman and are in for a heap of trouble.”
Chapter 40
- Bogota, Colombia-
It took the better part of a week to mop up after the assault. The return of the troops to their respective countries, the di
sposition of the bodies of the dead, the administering of proper medical attention to the wounded on both sides and the timing and location of prisoner interrogations as well as the selection of the interrogators was handled by Phil Desoto and his counterparts in the other countries that participated in the assault. The truck drivers who were held in the heavy equipment shed until the mission was a done deal were released and rewarded for their cooperation with an all-expenses paid for night on the town for both them and their spouses or dates.
The communications center in the villa was disassembled and Aloncia was hugged so much by her departing guests she could barely breathe. She’ll be looking for someone to sublet the storage facility and arrange for the rental payments to be forwarded to a bank account owned by Sea Wasp but held under a phony name. She will be reimbursed for the expenses she incurred to prepare for the mission.
Manny and his men returned to Miami by military transport, but Pete and Abby have been ordered to stay at the villa to follow up on what was found out about the tunnel. It took the bomb squad a couple of days to check out the entire tunnel, but it wasn’t until they reached the other end that they located a simple but very effective trip wire actuated bomb that contained enough explosives to blow any pursuers into the hereafter. They were able to disarm the bomb without incident and finally able to give Manny the all clear.
The tunnel turned out to be more than a half mile in length and ended in what looked like a large airplane hangar where mechanics maintain and repair all kinds of farming equipment. When the bomb squad arrived in the hangar no one was there, but when Manny and his men walked through the tunnel, they found a dozen or more people working on a variety of equipment who were more than a little surprised to see three men dressed in military gear and carrying rifles come up out of the floor in the corner of the hanger.
Manny explained to them what was going on and asked them if they knew about the tunnel and if they had seen anyone else come out of it recently. They got a bunch of noes, but Manny wasn’t buying their not having a clue act. He took their names and contact info and was told that the boss/owner hadn’t been in all week because he had to attend to a family emergency. They didn’t know when he would be back. This immediately aroused Manny’s suspicions. Manny is one of those guys who doesn’t take kindly to coincidences. He’s thinking that perhaps the boss helped Fuentes get away. He reported all of this to Dave Morrison and hence the orders to Pete and Abby to stay put and poke around for any clues as to where Fuentes might have gone.
By the end of the week, all the guests had left, the mopping up details had been attended to and the villa had reacquired its ambience of elegant serenity. Pete, Abby and Aloncia are now sitting out on the veranda trying to relax over some delicious margaritas and enjoy the beautiful sunset while at the same time discussing the possible options for determining the whereabouts of Fuentes and Christensen.
Abby said, “In my mind, one thing’s for sure. Wherever Fuentes is we’ll find Christensen also. Those two are peas in the same pod and nothing would give me greater pleasure than to shell them and drop them in the soup.”
Pete said, “It might produce some leads if I were to touch base again with my contacts here in Bogota and enlist their help in finding these two weasels. I could send pictures of the two and ask them to keep their ears and eyes open and get back to us ASAP if anything turns up.”
Aloncia said, “That might help if Fuentes and Christensen are still in Bogota or even Colombia for that matter, but these animals have lairs all over the Caribbean. They could be anywhere by now. It’s been almost a week since the assault on the farm. That’s enough time for them to go underground in a lot of places.”
Abby responded with, “I agree with you, Aloncia, but if they’ve stayed in Colombia somewhere we might get lucky and one of Pete’s friends could pick up something helpful.”
Nodding her head Aloncia said, “Well, it certainly wouldn’t hurt to give it a try, but I’m not holding my breath for a positive outcome.”
Pete asks Abby, “Have you made contact with Julio Mendoza yet? I know you tried earlier in the week, but he was out of the office and you had to leave a message.”
“Not yet, why?”
“I was thinking that he might be willing to use the paper to get the word out about our fugitives and maybe even offer a reward for any information that might lead to their apprehension.”
Abby said, “I believe that Julio is a courageous man and wants to do everything he can to clean up the Caribbean area, but he’s not stupid and certainly doesn’t have a death wish. Printing a story about events that have already transpired is something that will probably not lead to any serious unpleasantness for him, but taking an active role in the attempt to bring these guys to justice could get him killed. Hell, Pete, these animals kill judges, presidents and anyone else that gets in their way and he has no one to watch his back around the clock.”
“Okay, since Julio is not likely to opt for being a martyr, what else can we do to zero in on these guys?”
Aloncia throws out a couple of ideas that have some potential and after some discussion they quickly become plans of action. One involves a detailed search of the farmhouse. “Fuentes obviously had to have advance warning of the coming assault, probably by Christensen, because he was the only one who got away. I think that after he gave his welcoming speech, he headed straight for the tunnel entrance in the wine cellar. Even with advance warning he couldn’t have taken much with him that he didn’t want to fall into the hands of the authorities. One of our inside people always knew where he was until the assault and they didn’t see him taking repeated trips to the wine cellar carrying anything since they arrived. If the farmhouse has been used as a regional office of operations, there might be something there that we could use to find out where he went or at the very least to use to interfere with his operations.”
Pete said, “Despite what he might have not wanted to leave behind, right now Fuentes has to be thinking he’s one of the luckiest guys on the planet. He’s survived a massive military assault and a large percentage of his competition has literally bought the farm, if you’ll pardon the pun.
Abby said, “That’s smart thinking, Aloncia. There’s a good chance that we’ll find something useful there. What’s your other idea?”
“You might not like this scenario, but it might be worth a try if nothing else works. If we can’t find a way to go to the mountain, let’s find a way to entice the mountain to come to us. It’s my understanding that you have already gotten under the skin of a lot of these large cartel leaders and smaller gang bosses, so much so that a sizeable reward has been placed on your heads for your demise. Let’s exacerbate their skin condition by you two going public with pronouncements of your intention to make their lives miserable by having to concentrate on avoiding capture instead of attending to business. Also, if you constantly belittle them in public you’ll embarrass them to their friends, colleagues and competitors and this should drive them up the wall as well. If we keep the pressure on, we might be able to set up a situation which would provide sufficient temptation for them to come out of hiding and take a crack at putting you two in a hole in the ground.”
Pete reacted with, “You’re right, Aloncia, I don’t like that idea at all, but it might be all we have to fall back on if nothing turns up at the farmhouse that we can use to help us find him.”
Abby said, “It appears to me that what we’re going to wind up doing is launching an international man hunt which is going to require a lot of cooperation from a lot of people, many of whom are on Fuentes’s payroll. Turnabout is fair play, so I think placing a very attractive price on their heads, one large enough to dissuade their employees from their loyalty, would make it a lot more difficult for them to play hide and seek.”
Pete said, “This also might help to persuade them to have a go at Abby and me if they believed we were responsible for the reward being placed on their heads.”
Abby said, “I think it
’s time for a conference call between Phil, Dave and us to get their input on these ideas and their assistance if they approve. I can tell you now that Phil is not going to like putting us out in the open as bait for these rodents and may shoot it down without any opportunity for debate. One thing I’ve learned about Phil is he treats his people like they’re gold and doesn’t like to put them at what he considers unnecessary risk and hardly ever puts his decisions up for discussion.”
