by Sam Hawken
‘Are you going to shoot me?’ Jack asked.
‘I could ask you the same question,’ Gonzalo said.
‘You forget: I know where you live. If I wanted you to be dead, you’d be dead.’
Gonzalo lowered his weapon. ‘Where is Fregoso?’
Jack jerked a thumb over his shoulder. ‘In the bedroom.’
He slipped past Jack and into the bedroom. Fregoso was facedown on the bed, his feet bound with torn sheets and his wrists zip-tied together so tightly that his hands were discolored. At first he thought Fregoso was unconscious, but the man turned his head and Gonzalo saw the blood and the fear. Fregoso’s mouth was stuffed with a sock.
Gonzalo returned to Jack. ‘What are you going to do with him?’ he asked.
‘I’m gonna leave him here until someone finds him.’
‘That could be a long time.’
‘Oh, well.’
Gonzalo’s hands were trembling again. He found another of the straight-backed chairs by the little table in the kitchen and brought it to sit by Jack. He lowered himself into it. Jack did not look at him. ‘What did you do to him?’ Gonzalo asked.
‘I did what I should have done from the start.’
‘He’s bleeding.’
‘Good.’
‘What are you doing, Jack? Do you realize what can happen to you if someone finds out you’ve done this? Life in our prisons is no place for a man like you. Who else knows you’re here?’
‘Nobody.’
‘Mierda,’ Gonzalo said. ‘And now you’ve brought me into it.’
‘He told me everything he knows,’ Jack said. ‘Don’t you want to hear it?’
Gonzalo hesitated. ‘Go ahead,’ he said.
‘It’s just like we knew already: Guadalupe pulled the girls over that night and arrested them. Maybe it didn’t go in the logbooks, but he took them back to the lock-up. Fregoso helped him do it.’
‘Why? Why did Guadalupe do it?’
‘Fregoso says Guadalupe was looking for a girl to pull over. A pretty one. He seemed real excited about it. When he got two, he was thrilled.’
‘What happened to them then?’
Jack frowned for the first time. ‘He doesn’t know. Guadalupe told him to quit his shift early and said he’d take off the rest.’
‘What rest?’
‘I said he doesn’t know,’ Jack said sharply. ‘And if he did know, he would have told me.’
‘You have to get out of here,’ Gonzalo said. ‘Out of Mexico.’
‘I’m not afraid of the police.’
‘The police are the least of your worries. Once Fregoso gets the chance, he’s going to tell Guadalupe everything that’s happened and then Guadalupe’s friends will be after you. What you’re doing isn’t just criminal, Jack, it’s suicidal. Look what they did to Sr Sigala and his son.’
Jack glared at Gonzalo. ‘Don’t bring them into this.’
‘They’ll kill you, Jack. They’ll kill you and there will be no one to look after the child you have left. Is that what you want?’
‘I want Guadalupe’s address. It’s up to you if you stick around to see what happens.’
‘This is insane!’
Jack erupted out of his seat, upsetting the chair. It fell on its back, legs up like a dead creature. ‘This whole goddamned country is insane! All your stakeouts and interrogations and I got the same information in half the time! It’s no wonder you can’t keep a police force together when you can’t even get corrupt cops for doing what they’ve done! They took Marina and Patricia to one of your own police stations! Don’t you get it?’
‘I can’t just let you torture Guadalupe,’ Gonzalo returned. ‘Maybe some other policeman could, but not me. I won’t tell you where to find him.’
‘You tell me what I want to know,’ Jack said, and his voice was flat again.
A tremor passed through Gonzalo. ‘Will you beat the information out of me next?’
‘I will if I have to.’
‘You’ve lost your mind.’
‘I want to find my girl!’
‘We both want to! Don’t you think I would give anything for you to have your stepdaughter back? Have you listened to nothing I’ve said?’
Jack raised his pistol and pointed it at Gonzalo’s face. A single quiver became a torrent of shakiness that crawled up Gonzalo’s back and into his limbs. His hand felt weak on his weapon when he stood and leveled it at Jack.
‘You’re going to tell me where Guadalupe is,’ Jack said.
‘You’re going to leave Mexico and let the authorities handle this.’
‘Goddamn it, Gonzalo, I’ll kill you.’
‘I believe you,’ Gonzalo said, and the barrel of his pistol wavered.
Gonzalo saw Jack’s finger move on the trigger and for a moment everything stopped. He pictured the bullet exploding from the barrel of the gun, the impact against flesh, the pain. He did not breathe.
Jack lowered his gun. ‘I’m not going to do it.’
It took all Gonzalo’s strength to keep hold of his weapon when he dropped his hand to his side. He took a shuddery breath that did not revitalize him. ‘Will you go, Jack?’
‘No. I’ll find him on my own.’
Jack put his pistol away and took a step toward the door. Gonzalo held up a hand that Jack could easily have knocked away, but it brought him up short and Gonzalo felt breathless all over again. ‘You can’t,’ he forced out.
‘There’s too much blood in this for me to stop now,’ Jack said.
‘If I don’t bring you to him, you’ll die trying to find him.’
‘The city’s not that big.’
‘It is for you.’
‘So you’ll help me?’
‘I don’t know if I can.’
‘It’s the only way to do this,’ Jack said.
Gonzalo put a foot up on his chair and holstered his weapon. He was aware of the sound of a passing heavy truck, the engine grinding, on the street below. In the bedroom, Fregoso had to be listening.
‘You’ll take me there?’ Jack asked.
Another breath. It came easier now and the room seemed to steady. ‘I’ll take you there,’ he said.
Jack nodded. ‘Now we have to deal with Fregoso.’
‘How?’
‘Do you think he can get loose of those ties?’
‘I don’t know. Maybe, given time.’
‘We’ll leave him. Once we’re done with Guadalupe we can call the army and they can cut him free.’
‘And what if he tells them everything, Jack?’
‘He doesn’t know me. I’m just some white guy from the States.’
‘He saw my face, Jack. He knows me. With that information it won’t take someone like Alvares long to figure out who it was asking questions about two missing girls. You should never have done this, Jack. The only solution is….’ Gonzalo let it trail off.
Jack drew his gun again. Gonzalo felt the blood seeping from his hands at the sight of it and his face went cold. ‘I’ll make it quick,’ Jack said.
Gonzalo could think of nothing else to say. Jack left for the bedroom.
Gonzalo rushed out the door of the apartment and pulled it shut behind him. He gripped the metal railing by the steps until the flesh of his palms burned. Though he was waiting for it, the muted report of the pistol made him flinch. ‘What have you done?’ Gonzalo whispered to himself. ‘What have you done?’
Jack reappeared. ‘Did you touch anything in there?’ he asked.
‘A chair.’
‘Wipe it down. They can have my fingerprints if they want them, but you should cover yourself.’
They went back inside together. The atmosphere inside the apartment seemed leaden and Gonzalo was very aware of the total stillness in the bedroom, as if he could sense life before and felt the absence of life acutely now. A part of him wanted to look and see for himself, but he had seen enough bodies already that one more would do him no good.
He used a handkerchief to ca
refully wipe down the chair he’d used, starting at the top and working all the way down to the floor where his fingers had never touched. Cleaning it seemed very important. When he was finished he swabbed the nervous perspiration from his palms and dragged an arm across his face.
They met on the ground floor near Fregoso’s car. No one else was parked there. The building seemed abandoned. Would anyone even notice the broken door, the body within?
‘I’ll follow you,’ Jack said. ‘All right?’
Gonzalo nodded numbly. ‘All right.’
SIX
JACK TRAILED GONZALO FOR THE BETTER part of twenty minutes before he began to think they were headed nowhere at all. Gonzalo made too many turns and at one point seemed to double back on himself. A quick phone call would straighten things out, but then Gonzalo resumed a normal course. He was trying to evade any other followers. Jack did not even know what to watch for. There were many eyes in Nuevo Laredo.
Gonzalo was slowing to park before Jack realized they were there and he passed the lead car before circling around the block to find a spot of his own. Neither man hurried to get out of their vehicle. Pedestrian traffic was heavier here than in Fregoso’s neighborhood and there was a lively bodega across the street where customers shopped for fresh fruits and vegetables in wooden stands out front. Jack could not hide here.
He waited until Gonzalo stepped out of his car and walked toward a plain-sided building with only one entrance on the street. Jack slipped out of the truck and came up slowly, watching carefully for any eye that might turn his way. They met at the door.
A tarnished metal plate was set into the wall beside a locked set of glass doors, one beyond the other. Little strips of white had names scribbled on them in faded ink and most of them were illegible. There was a mesh panel, badly dented, that covered a speaker. ‘Which one is Guadalupe?’ Jack asked.
‘This one, but he will never open the door for us. Let’s hope there is someone else home.’
Gonzalo pushed each button in turn, careful to avoid only Guadalupe’s. Most did not answer, but finally a woman’s voice rattled out of the speaker. ‘¿Quién es?’
‘We have a package for—’ Gonzalo examined the crabbed handwriting beside the button. ‘Sra Saravia. Is this she?’
‘Who is it from?’
‘There is no name, I’m sorry. The address is from Sonora.’
‘Sonora? I don’t… you had better come up so I can see.’
‘Gracias, señora.’
The door made an ugly buzzing sound and Jack heard the bolts pop. They went in together. The second door was unlocked and opened into a lobby that was surprisingly cool, light falling from a window on the second-floor landing to reveal rows of brass mailboxes marked with apartment numbers.
‘That woman needs to be safer,’ Gonzalo said. ‘We could be thieves, or worse.’
‘We are worse,’ Jack said.
‘Fourth floor.’
There was no elevator, so they took the central stairs, winding around the open center that let hot air rise to the very top and left the rest comfortable. Somewhere up above a fan rattled, venting the worst to the outside. Jack caught sounds through apartment doors as they climbed. A television. A muted conversation. This place was not deserted like Fregoso’s and they would have to be more careful. People like these would call for help if they heard a gunshot.
‘Here,’ Gonzalo said after they mounted the last stair.
The door was plain and brown and the number was a peeling sticker. There was no doorbell and, better yet, there was no peephole.
‘You knock,’ Jack said. He saw the nervous speckling of moisture on Gonzalo’s lip. ‘Get him to crack the door.’
He brought out the Browning and held it low to his side. He leaned against the wall beside the door and he watched Gonzalo carefully.
‘Knock.’
Gonzalo raised his hand, wavered a moment, and then struck knuckles to metal. The door sounded hollow and cheap. If they had to, they might be able to break it down, but that would give Guadalupe time to find a weapon, call for help, escape.
There was no noise from the other side of the door. Jack gripped the Browning more tightly. It was not possible to prepare for everything, but it occurred to him that the simplest thing might be the most likely: Eliseo Guadalupe might not even be home.
Gonzalo knocked a second time.
Silent seconds ticked over into a minute and Jack was aware that he was grinding his teeth. He opened his mouth to speak when there was the scrape of something against the other side of the door and Guadalupe called out, ‘Who’s out there?’
‘Hermano, soy yo,’ Gonzalo said in a rough voice that was not his own.
‘I don’t know you. What do you want?’
‘I got a message for you,’ Gonzalo said. ‘Come on, it’s important.’
‘I’ve got a gun I’ll stick right up your ass if you fuck with me,’ Guadalupe said through the door. ‘I’m a cop.’
‘Just open up.’
Jack held his breath as the locks clicked. He heard the sliding sound of a chain coming loose and then the door was opening. Guadalupe’s fingers appeared. Jack crashed into the door.
His full weight drove Guadalupe backward down a short hall. He crashed into a little table stacked with mail and the table fell to the floor. The man held a gun, a small revolver, in his right hand. Jack grabbed for his wrist and pressed forward with his Browning so that the barrel came up under Guadalupe’s ribcage and drove the wind from him.
Both men fell onto the couch in the apartment’s front room. Jack’s hand covered Guadalupe’s gun now, his fingers clamped down over the hammer to keep it from moving back. He drove a knee into Guadalupe’s balls again and again until Guadalupe doubled up underneath him, gasping for breath. A lamp fell from a side table.
Jack was vaguely aware of Gonzalo slamming the door to the apartment and coming up beside him. He felt Gonzalo clawing at the revolver, bending back Guadalupe’s thumb, yanking the weapon free.
Guadalupe thrashed, but Jack’s weight bore him down. Jack butted him in the face, grabbed him by the hair, and pulled his head back so that he could push the Browning into his eye. Just as abruptly as it started, the struggle was over. Guadalupe went limp.
‘Do you know me?’ Jack asked Guadalupe. ‘Do you recognize me?’
But Guadalupe was not looking at Jack. He rolled his uncovered eye toward Gonzalo. ‘You son of a bitch,’ he said. ‘You fucking bastard!’
‘Hey,’ Jack said, and he slapped Guadalupe in the head. ‘Pay attention to me.’
‘You fucked with the wrong person, pendejo! Go ahead and shoot me! Shoot me now!’
‘Not yet.’
Jack eased his body off Guadalupe’s and sat back into a chair that matched the couch. Guadalupe’s apartment was surprisingly large, tidy except for the shattered lamp on the floor and the scattered mail. The kitchen was separated from the front room by a counter where three barstools were set up. He had art on his walls and shelves full of books. His television was new.
Gonzalo stood over Guadalupe. ‘You shouldn’t open your door to people you don’t know.’
‘Go to hell! You’re out of your mind if you think you can do this!’
‘It’s done,’ Jack said. The Browning was still pointed at Guadalupe.
‘What now, Jack?’ Gonzalo asked.
‘We tie him up.’
‘Did you bring any rope, cabrón?’ Guadalupe said.
‘Anything will do,’ Jack said. ‘I’ve still got zip-ties.’
Gonzalo left them to search the kitchen. Jack rose from the chair. ‘Turn over on your stomach,’ he told Guadalupe.
‘You’re not going to kill me. You’re not going to kill a cop.’
‘I’m not going to tell you again.’
Guadalupe obeyed and Jack repeated what he had done to Fregoso. The plastic loops went around the wrists and then were cinched together. He did not make them so tight this time, though he did not car
e if Guadalupe’s hands rotted off. When he was finished, he helped Guadalupe back into a seated position on the couch, where the man sat rigidly.
Gonzalo reappeared. ‘This is all I could find,’ he said, and brandished a roll of blue duct tape.
‘Get his legs, then. He’s not going anywhere.’
Half the roll mummified Guadalupe’s legs together from ankle to knee. The man watched Gonzalo while he worked, his eyes boiling, but he could not keep from looking back to Jack and the gun.
‘I’ve been to see Fregoso,’ Jack told Guadalupe. ‘He told me everything.’
‘Then you don’t need anything from me.’
‘He told me everything he knew. Not everything you know.’
‘Vete a la chingada,’ Guadalupe said.
Jack moved from the chair and brought the pistol around hard against the side of Guadalupe’s head. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Gonzalo flinch.
‘We know about the girls. How you took them to the lock-up,’ Gonzalo cut in. ‘You’re not doing yourself any good.’
‘What do I care what you know? The minute you’re out of here I’m going to be on the phone and the two of you are dead! Dead! You won’t even make it back across the river. You’re dead men!’
Jack felt a terrible stillness. ‘You’re the one who’s going to die.’
Guadalupe saw something in Jack’s face that made him fall silent. He wriggled on the couch, but it was half-hearted. Every movement would make the zip-ties cut more tightly.
‘I want to know what you did with my girl,’ Jack told Guadalupe. ‘After you took her to the lock-up, what happened then? You sent Fregoso home. Why?’
‘Fregoso is an idiot,’ Guadalupe declared. ‘You’re an idiot.’
‘I’m the one with the gun.’
‘Fuck your gun!’
Jack snapped up from the chair with the pistol poised to strike again, but he did not. He looked to Gonzalo. ‘Turn on the TV. Turn it up. I’ll be right back.’
He went to the kitchen. In the third drawer he searched he found steak knives. They were cheap, with stamped plastic handles. He put the Browning away and took a knife, then he went back to Guadalupe.
‘What the hell are you going to do with that?’ Guadalupe asked.