Requiem for the Assassin (33 page)

His hand settled on the antique lever, and he drew a long breath, the pistol clutched with whitened fingers. He twisted the lever and threw the door wide, sweeping the inky room with the gun as he entered, searching for a target. The scrape sounded from the far side of the room again, and he lowered the weapon and flipped on the light switch. It was only the window, blown open by the wind. He must have forgotten to close it.

Ynez walked over, pushed the two hinged panels shut, and latched them in the middle. The antique bronze mechanism was dull from the years and loose in the slot. No wonder it hadn’t closed properly before. His eye caught a glint from the miniature model of the three towers of the Punta Conejo project on a table set up to showcase it – hundreds of rooms in each phase to be sold as timeshares.

The economics were staggering – for sixty million of earnest money and using reinvested profits to build each phase, he’d see over a billion, assuming he got the construction loans at a reasonable rate. With the current environment that was a given, because once the base was announced and the four-lane road was started, it was only a matter of time until a real airport went in and land values went through the roof.

His gaze drifted to his desk, where the files on Tovar and Bernardo lay, the latter chronicling the payments he’d made to the CISEN official as well as the blackmail material. That was strange. He could have sworn he’d filed them. Then again, he was of an age when the mind softened and memory wasn’t what it had once been. Perhaps he’d referenced them and forgotten. He glanced at the row of bottles of tequila on his bar, where he routinely had several nightcaps after dinner – maybe it was best to cut back to only two or three.

Ynez turned and moved back to the door and shut off the light, feeling sheepish with the heavy gun in his hand. He’d be glad when the escrow was closed and he could break ground on the project. His nerves were shot from the stress of making it all come together, more so on this deal than any he’d cobbled together.

But he’d done it. The rest was inevitable.

He smiled in the dark. He’d be hailed as a genius, as he had been in his heyday, when Baja was booming and Cabo had swelled from a tiny fishing hamlet into an international resort destination. With the navy harbor would come a private marina – he’d already made deals with those responsible for planning. The taxpayer would shell out to dredge twice as large an area as was needed for the base, build a longer breakwater, provide all the necessary services, and a few officers would be able to buy second homes in the hills. It was the way things had been done since he’d arrived on the planet. He chuckled to himself as he returned down the hall at the thought of his competitors’ expressions when the news of his coup broke. That alone was worth the risks he’d taken and the toll paid.

Because in this world, you were either hunter or prey.

And Ynez was too seasoned and too savvy to be prey. Not so his adversaries, who would be forced to watch as he built yet another fortune while they stood by, powerless to stop him.

If life got any better than that, he didn’t know how.

~ ~ ~

Mexico City, Mexico

At CISEN headquarters, Rodriguez eyed the monitor displaying
El Rey’
s video footage from Jacinto Ynez’s office a final time before turning the playback off. The assassin sat across from him, his countenance placid, seemingly unconcerned by the struggle visible on the older man’s face. Rodriguez stood and moved to the window – double-paned, bulletproof glass – and looked out at the city as the assassin waited patiently for a response.

Eventually Rodriguez turned to him. “Seems I owe you an apology.”

“Then you agree this is sufficient proof for me to get the antidote with no further delay?”

“Yes. Of course.”

“Because I’d happily go back to his house and skin him alive and capture the proceedings for you as he confesses. Just say the word.”

“That won’t be necessary. I think the files paint a clear enough picture.”

“You’re sure?”

“Quite.”

“What about Bernardo?”

Rodriguez’s jaw muscle clenched, and his eyes narrowed. “I’ll take care of it internally.”

“A lot of people are dead because of him.”

“I’m more than aware of that. I said I’d take care of it,” Rodriguez repeated, steel in his voice.

“Fine. When do I get my vial?”

“I’ll have someone search Tovar’s office. There’s no reason to suspect him any longer, given the contents of the dossiers. They obviously decided to execute him to end the trail to Bernardo – it would seem natural that you killed him, and then we’d be after you. Everyone neutralized, end of problem.”

“Then you don’t have it?”

“I know it was delivered. But where he put it after the subway shoot-out is unknown.” Rodriguez sat back down and leveled a frank gaze at him. “Don’t worry. You’ll get your antidote. If I have to, I’ll have the Americans send more.”

“If you don’t mind, I’ll wait here for your people to conduct the search. I’d really prefer having it in my hand when I leave today.”

Rodriguez inclined his head. “Fair enough.”

Half an hour later, nothing had been found. Rodriguez seemed uncomfortable having the country’s most lethal assassin’s eyes boring holes through him as he waited. When it became obvious that there was no antidote, Rodriguez made good on his promise and called his counterpart in the CIA. After twenty minutes of delays, he got the okay and hung up.

“There. I have to complete some paperwork, but it will arrive first thing tomorrow morning. I’ll have one of my people pick it up at the airport, and we’ll call you. If you like, we can drop it off at the lab of your choosing.”

“I’ll come by for it,”
El Rey
said, his tone skeptical.

“Suit yourself.” Rodriguez hesitated, and his tone grew formal. “On behalf of CISEN, I apologize for all this. I obviously had no way of knowing. In the future, I’ll be your contact. Nobody else.”

“I think after this, I’ve discharged my obligation. I more than kept my side of any bargain.”

Rodriguez looked off at a kit of pigeons flapping into the sky outside the window, and followed their flight as they veered south toward the cathedral. He seemed, for a split second, lost in his big office, and then he returned to the moment and turned to the assassin.

“We’ll take it day by day.”

Chapter 55

Guadalajara, Mexico

A jet streaked a white horsetail across the cobalt sky as the ranch hands finished their coffee in preparation for starting their morning. There was no shortage of work to be done on the grounds, and the men were used to beginning early and continuing until dark, as their ancestors had done for hundreds of years. Today would be fence mending on the eastern perimeter, replacing the degraded wood used for posts.

The foreman moved to the old Dodge pickup parked adjacent to the stand-alone four-car garage, and when he reached the vehicle, he paused, listening. His men straggled behind, but when they reached the truck, they could see the concerned expression on his face.

“What is it?” Tobias, his cousin, asked.

“Do you hear that?”

“What?”

“An engine. In the garage.” The foreman moved to the entry door and tried it. Locked. He fished in his pocket and extracted a fistful of keys on a worn ring and, after finding the one he wanted, inserted it in the lock and twisted.

The door swung outward, and a pall of exhaust fumes belched from inside. He leaned to the side, took a deep gulp of fresh air, and entered the building. The Land Rover was idling, its engine thrumming steadily, the Mercedes and Escalade silent next to it. He took a few tentative steps toward the SUV, his eyes burning from the fumes.

The Land Rover door was locked. The foreman moved to the toolbox in the corner and removed a hammer and, after a glance at the entry, ran back to the vehicle. The glass shattered on the first blow, and he jerked the door open.

The foreman and his cousin dragged Ynez onto the ground outside the garage, the developer’s gray face slack in the warm sun as they coughed, eyes watering. Ynez was cold to the touch, and after a few minutes of halfhearted CPR, the foreman looked up at the men and shook his head.

He stood and dusted off his pants, the sour expression in his eyes matching the scowl on his face.

“I’ll go tell the
señora
,” he said quietly and left the men standing in a circle around their longtime employer’s lifeless body, hats clutched in their hands, heads bowed.

~ ~ ~

Mexico City, Mexico

Cruz stood outside of headquarters, staring up at the image of the officer in assault garb that stretched to the roof far above, and smiled. It was good to be back in the land of the living, even if that meant a return to twelve-hour workdays. He’d had a conference call with the brass the evening before and explained his subterfuge in faking his death – he and Briones had invented a plausible scenario where it had been necessary as part of an undercover sting operation against the Los Zetas cartel, which required everyone believe Cruz was dead.

His superiors had been both relieved that he was alive and furious that they’d been duped. Cruz had offered his resignation, effective immediately, which had been summarily rejected. After some discussion, everyone agreed that Cruz was to be commended for his unorthodox approach and that he was to be reinstated with back pay, signaling the end to the matter. Mainly, he knew, because nobody else would be willing to take over the task force, risking his life on a daily basis, living on the run.

Cruz walked through the entryway, his uniform crisp, head held high, and paused to shake hands with the duty officers. When he emerged from the elevator at the task force level, he was greeted with a standing ovation from his staff and, after a few impromptu words, marched to his corner office, stopping every ten feet to shake hands and accept congratulations.

Briones was waiting nearby, and after Cruz’s receptionist released him from a teary embrace, he waved the younger man in.

“Good morning, Lieutenant.”

“Good morning to you as well, sir. Nice to have you back.”

“It’s nice to be back. I think,” Cruz said, taking in the overflowing stacks of paperwork on his desk and the conference table. “Bring me up to speed. What’s been going on during my little sabbatical?”

Briones took his customary seat. Cruz shifted two piles of documents from the tabletop to his desk and pulled up a chair opposite him. “The kidnapping ring was responsible for at least a dozen high-profile abductions, as part of Los Zetas’ expansion into that. We got a confession from one of the survivors, so there’s no doubt. Whether this will mark an end to the cartel’s efforts or not remains to be seen, but I wouldn’t bet on it.”

Cruz nodded. “Too much easy money to be made.”

“Exactly. And as they get squeezed on the drug trade, they’ll be more aggressive in their other endeavors. No, we haven’t seen the last of this, although the violence and abuse appears to have been the work of the cell leader, not a systemic tactic.”

“Isabel wasn’t…harmed?”

“No, thank God. And we have a very grateful senator in our debt. We saved him millions and got his daughter back – it doesn’t get much better than that.”

Briones updated him on the remainder of the open cases and then raised the topic he’d obviously been waiting to breach. “Did you see that the developer committed suicide?”

“Yes. It was on the news this morning. Sad, isn’t it?” Cruz said, his expression unreadable.

“You don’t think
El
…our friend had a hand in it, do you?”

“No way of knowing. But I can’t say as I’m heartbroken about his demise.” Cruz straightened his collar. “And it does save CISEN from considerable embarrassment. There’s no way he could have been prosecuted.”

“So really, just karma.”

“I suppose one could view it that way. Perhaps his guilty conscience got the better of him. I hear that can happen.”

Briones fell silent for a moment. “I saw that his chief financial officer broke his neck, too. Fell down a flight of stairs.”

“Yes, well, it’s a reminder to us all to watch our step.”

“Indeed.”

“What will happen with the
ejido
land? And the base?”

Cruz shrugged. “Beats me. But I was thinking that a senator with the right connections might be able to call into question the wisdom of spending a fortune on a base that Mexico really doesn’t need.”

“It would be his patriotic duty, I’d say.”

Cruz allowed himself a small smile. “We can only hope.”

That night, Dinah snuggled with Cruz on the sofa as Carla finished her special TV report about the new Tijuana archbishop, and Cruz smiled the same smile. He’d told Dinah most of the story, but left out living in the same house as Carla for the better part of a week. Dinah’s anger at his faking his death had gradually faded, and as she’d thawed, she’d seen the logic in keeping her in the dark.

“I couldn’t risk it,” he’d explained. “I couldn’t risk you.”

“You put me through hell.”

“I know. And I’ve never been sorrier about anything in my life. But it was to protect us both.” Cruz punched at the remote, muted the sound, and turned his face to hers. “How does an early bedtime sound to you?” he asked.

“Good.” She kissed him, and then her eyes drifted back to the program. “Did you follow that whole thing with Vega while you were dead, about the cartels being after her?”

“How could I miss it? It’s all that was on the tube.”

“She’s brave to have decided to go back to work in spite of the threat. Reminds me of how we’ve been living. Sword of Damocles hanging over our heads every day.”

“That’s not the kind of thing to be taken lightly,” Cruz agreed.

“I thought it was interesting, didn’t you? Her exposé on the archbishop? How do men like that get positions of power in the Church? Are they all pedophiles?” Carla had broken a story about the new archbishop’s child pornography collection, discovered by the police after an anonymous tip had alerted them to its presence on his computer.