by Bella Juarez
“Did you forget where you were? Hell, I swear we’ve passed that same little tree over there twice.”
“The whole place is full of little trees, and they all look alike. Are you scared?” Dan asked without looking up.
“I ain’t from here. No telling what you have planned. Man, do I hear dueling banjos?” Shaq said, looking around.
“Are you horny already? I don’t want your ugly ass, but I have friends I can’t speak for,” Dan said, looking for his landmarks again.
The mesquite trees that littered the Sonoran desert landscape were like weeds. He recalled how the Jensen ranch hands would burn off the thick brush every rainy season. The brushy, thorny trees were out of control. He knew that Davey kept it that way on purpose in order to discourage migrating illegals from navigating this part of the ranch. He stood up in the Jeep and looked around. The landscape had changed, and some of the boulders that served as landmarks for him were now covered by the thick brush.
“Oh, man, please don’t tell me we’re lost,” Shaq said as he stood and looked behind them.
Dan scanned the horizon and managed to find one of his landmarks barely visible in the thick brush.
“Over there! It’s over there.”
They drove a short distance and stopped short of the mesa. Shaq stepped out of the vehicle and looked around.
“I don’t see shit, man. Are you sure?”
“Follow me. It’s probably grown over by now,” Dan said as he checked his weapon.
Having a weapon in the desert wouldn’t be unusual. There were dangerous animals and smugglers in the area. He scoured the land for a few minutes and finally spotted it, an opening in the ground covered by a chain-link fence. Desert vines had managed to intertwine themselves in the links of metal, hiding the entrance even more than usual. Reaching for the fence, he heard the ominous rattle before he’d had a chance to grab the metal links. Standing perfectly still, he peered inside the opening of the cave and saw the huge diamondback rattlesnake.
“Fuck.” Dan moved back slowly.
“That son of a bitch has to be at least six feet,” Shaq said with a shiver. “I don’t think we need to go inside right now.”
“That’s not funny.” Dan backed off even farther. “Well, that’s the entrance,” he said, taking a deep breath to calm his racing heart.
Shaq took a look around the entrance and kicked the dirt around. After a little digging outside the entrance to the mine, they found the old metal tracks that led inside.
“The entrance needs to be reinforced, and the snakes need to find a new home. Where did you say this thing went?” Shaq asked.
“It goes down about a hundred and fifty feet and then heads south into Mexico. From what I can remember from Mr. J, the company never took the silver out on this side of the border because of export taxes. This had been an alternate entrance or exit in case of a cave-in. Over there,” Dan said, pointing to some troughs, “used to be a building that the mining company used for an overnight housing area. Mr. J tore it down because the narco-traffickers started using it for a drop point. There’s a water source, and there used to be live power over there, too.”
“How far into Mexico does it go?” Shaq asked.
“Mr. J told me and Davey it was about ten miles. He helped design the extension of the mine into the United States. That’s why the company bought this land. From what I read of the original documents, they had an agreement with the State Department that they’d keep their workers contained and documented.”
“I wonder what the Mexican side looks like.”
“There used to be a huge facility in Mexico; that’s why I wanted to use it. It would’ve been the perfect cover. I remember taking a trip with Davey and Mr. J when I was a kid. When we were there, they were shutting it down. Mr. J went to pick up some paperwork.”
“We need to get a look at that facility.”
“We ain’t doing it like we planned now. It’s due south as the crow flies. I remember, we went through the Naco border crossing, and Mr. J made it a point to tell us that we could’ve driven straight through from Bisbee. Instead, we had to go out of our way thirty miles to get to the plant.”
They explored the area for a while longer then called the Marines and CBP that were laid up watching the place. When they met up with the teams, Dan saw Davey talking with one of the Marines.
“Glad to hear everything’s going okay with you and Eliza.”
“She’s good, thanks. I’m glad to see that you’re doing better.”
“Danny!” Davey exclaimed as he approached. “Jim, have you met Danny—er— Lieutenant Dan Gamez? Danny, Major Jim Williams, Marine Recon,” Davey said, making the introductions.
“Major,” Dan said, shaking hands.
“Nah, man, just Jim, lieutenant.”
Dan laughed. “Just Dan, Jim. This is Shaq Harman.”
The two large men shook hands. Jim was African American, stood a little over six feet, and had the build of a linebacker. Jim filled them in on what had been going on since he’d taken over watching the tunnel. They’d been ordered to stay low and not engage anyone who came and went on the land, including illegal traffic. Jim joked about how the CBP agents were itching to take down the human traffic as it slipped by. He didn’t allow them to engage but did allow them to radio that there had been traffic giving other CBP agents on patrol in the general vicinity the opportunity to intercept and take down anything illicit. Much to their credit, the CBP agents managed to stay focused and help the Marines keep the tunnel secure. From the looks of the brush on the fence, it didn’t seem as if anyone had moved it in some time.
Even though they were on his land and his best friend, Dan didn’t like the idea of Davey having knowledge of what was going on and where the laid-up teams were at any given time. Afterward, Dan took him aside.
“Hey, man, I appreciate your help on all of this, but you can’t be around here.”
Davey smiled. “Op-Sec?”
“Yeah, operational security. I can’t have you around here knowing what’s going on and where these guys are located.”
“Danny, I’m Recon, remember? Take me back to the hunting shack, something happened while you were gone, and we need to talk.”
As they started down the dusty trail back to the shack, it looked as if Davey was struggling with where to start.
“What’s going on?”
“You know I left on a medical, diagnosed with severe PTSD. My commander tried everything he could to get me to stay, but I left because I’d been responsible for getting my squad killed. All five men. I was the only survivor. I pushed to leave. I couldn’t face the men in my unit, and I couldn’t ask them to trust me after that.”
This had been the first time Davey had opened up about what had happened to him. By his hesitation and hedging, it couldn’t be easy to say some of the things he just did out loud. Dan understood the responsibility of having people’s lives in your hands and then losing them despite your best efforts. Even though things happened in war that a leader couldn’t avoid, it didn’t make living with it easy.
“Shit happens, man. You can’t lay something like that all on yourself, unless you pulled the trigger.”
“I may as well have. I didn’t listen to the intel. I had a gut feeling and went with it. I’ve never been so wrong in all of my life, and it cost five damn good Marines their lives. The inquest cleared me, but I’ve had a hard time living with it.”
That was bad. Davey had made a fatal mistake and probably without the guidance Dan thankfully had so much of with his leadership. Captain O’Malley and Commander Corbin as well as their enlisted counterparts, Master Chiefs McGuire and Jones were very hands-on and huge about preaching the mistakes they’d made that had been just as fatal as Davey described. They’d let younger SEALs like Dan and Shaq plan missions all day long without any input and then promptly tear them apart and make them start over, this time with guidance and advice on how to do it correctly. That method drove Dan
and his dive buddy insane at times, but now, listening to Davey, he understood the value of it. The nitpicking had lessened over time because it had become second nature to pick themselves apart before they went to their leadership. They’d learned to be thorough and have answers for every possible scenario.
Davey looked troubled, so Dan changed the subject. “You said, ‘I’m Recon’; you mean you were Recon.”
“Before Jim and his group set up shop here, my old commander called me and asked me to meet him at Fort Huachuca. He asked me to come back in.”
“Seriously? How’s that possible if they put you out on a medical?”
“Danny, you know Black Ops can do whatever the hell they want. My commander got a psych board to reevaluate me. I can’t go back full time, but he got them to let me back in part time. I’m now a Marine reservist assigned to 5th Marine Division, 5th Reconnaissance Battalion out of San Antonio, Texas. I’m doing all the electronics surveillance and comm from the hunting shack.”
“Jesus! We need to secure that area.”
“It’s secure. Watch your step when you get there, and don’t open the door without letting me know you’re coming inside.”
“Who the hell’s your commander, and how did he pull those kinds of strings?”
“Lieutenant Colonel Reese Thompson, and how he does his magic, is classified for Recon eyes only.”
“I know that, dude. I worked with him out at Dam Neck, right after I got back from Germany.”
“You were at Dam Neck? The Dev Group?”
“Yeah. Right before we got a home at Randolph, we were at Dam Neck.”
“Jesus, Danny, that’s an elite group. You must be damn good at what you do.”
“I am.”
After dropping Davey off at the hunting shack and ensuring that the mission he’d assumed responsibility for was secure, Dan and Shaq returned to their base of operations at Fort Huachuca. Badass had managed to procure an entire building for them. The long building housed private offices and a couple of conference rooms. It was perfect for the division of labor between the SEALs, Recon, and their new partners from the CBP, ATF, DEA, and FBI. Dan and Shaq found Badass looking over some maps. Rio, Van, and Alan were in the adjacent offices going over some files.
“Did you find it?” Badass asked.
“Yes, we did. It’ll need a lot of work in order to make it operational,” Shaq said.
“We still need to find out who owns the property on the other side of the border and why they’re letting the cartel use it,” Dan said.
“Let’s get on it, lieutenant. We’ve got to get moving.”
Quietly slipping past Rio and her men as they worked in one of the conference rooms, he went back to his office. It was awkward at times having her in his workspace. She went about her business never seeking him out unless they actually needed to interact. Logging in on his computer, he got to work looking for the people who owned the buildings in Mexico. It took him a couple of hours to trace the transfer of the deed from a previous Old Bisbee ranching family to Hidalgo Mining Group and then to Arroyo Investments in 1994. It was the year Dan recalled accompanying Davey and Mr. Jensen into Mexico.
Arroyo Investments? Dan quickly researched the investment group to find it was privately held. He went through the records filed with the Arizona Secretary of State and found the company wasn’t listed in the state. It took him a while to figure out that Arroyo Investments was a limited liability corporation from Delaware. The company was managed by a law firm out of Tucson. His blood ran cold when he saw the list of principal officers for the board of directors of the company. David Jensen, treasurer; Vivien Jensen, secretary; and Rio Jensen, president. Dan sat back staring at his screen. Why hadn’t she told him? They were getting married; why wouldn’t she want him to know about this part of her life? The more he thought about it the angrier he got. He stood and walked into Badass’s office.
“I told you from the beginning this wouldn’t work,” Dan said as he flopped into a chair.
“What the hell are you complaining about now?” Badass didn’t look up from his laptop.
“The ranch belongs to Arroyo Investments, LLC, out of Delaware. The law firm of Rocha, McNeil, and Partners manages the investment company.”
That tidbit caught Badass’s attention. “What? Why are you looking into the ranch? We know people at the ranch. I need to know who owns the property on the other side of the border.”
“I think you’d better ask the Jensen family about the ranch because they don’t own the ranch. And the investment company that owns the ranch owns those buildings in Mexico.”
“Are you serious?” Gavin asked. Dan nodded. “Did you know about this?”
“If I did, I wouldn’t have spent the last couple of hours jacking off in the other room,” Dan said.
“Rio! Get in here!” Gavin yelled from his seat.
“What’s wrong?” Rio asked, popping her head around the corner.
“Why does Arroyo Investments own your family’s ranch?”
“Arroyo Investments is my dad’s estate. It kept his properties here and in Mexico together for tax purposes. My brother, my cousin, and I are all on the board of directors to keep it in the family. Why?”
“What kind of property did he have in Mexico?” Gavin asked.
“A few acres of old dilapidated buildings about twenty miles due south of the ranch. It was the business end of the old silver mine that came out in Mexico.”
“Is there a reason you didn’t disclose this information before?” Gavin asked.
“You never told me you needed to know. I can go home and get the papers, if you want.”
“I guess we have our answer, lieutenant. Thank you, Rio. Now get back to finding out who owns that airstrip for me.”
What the hell? On top of that, Badass infuriated him. He’d glazed over this piece of information as if it were a weather report, important but not necessarily critical.
“Badass, can you please tell me why this is no big deal to you? And why she didn’t know about what we’re doing?”
“Dan, you have your part of the op. She has hers. She didn’t have a problem disclosing what we’d already found out. I don’t need her wasting time running home to get papers we already have. Now that we know those buildings are in friendly hands, that’s one less thing we have to worry about, right?”
“Friendly hands? The cartel is driving in and out of there like it’s a fucking truck stop! My team has to get in there, remember?”
“Let me ask you something. Do you think she knows the cartel is using those buildings? I haven’t disclosed your part of this op to the federal agencies I have here because they don’t have a need to know.”
Dan didn’t answer. He didn’t seriously believe she’d done anything wrong, but it irritated him that she’d never told him about the extent of her family’s holdings, and she’d just treated him like a fly on the wall. “What the hell’s she doing, anyway?”
Badass didn’t even glance up from the papers on his desk. “Like I said, she’s got her part of this op; you have yours. Go focus on your part.”
Back the fuck up… Even though Gavin was the senior SEAL, Dan was the mission commander and had to report to Rock on a daily basis. As uncomfortable as this would be, Dan had no option but to put Badass in his place.
“You didn’t answer me. What the hell are they doing? I’m the mission commander here. I have a need to know because I’ll be the one putting my ass as well as those of my men in the line of fire.”
Gavin glanced up and his eyes narrowed.
“All right, lieutenant. They’re working on shutting down Bakri and Montenegro within the US. Colonel Caesar Valdez, a former Mexican FES commander is running Montenegro’s private army. We trained him at Coronado, so he fucking knows what he’s doing. Part of what they’re op involves cutting off a private airport that belongs to a Montenegro puppet company. We’re trying to close it down so you don’t get your ass in a sling and get out flank
ed from this side of the border. Do you want to start making all the decisions on this end, too?”
Dan looked at this situation in an entirely different light. No one had told him a SEAL trained commander had been running the private force that he had to out maneuver, and they certainly hadn’t told him about a private airport that housed god knows what kind of aircraft and surveillance radar at the cartel’s disposal.
“Stand down, Badass. What you’ve just told me is vital information I didn’t have. That news will influence how I determine insertion into theater when my team goes in. So yeah, I needed to know, and going forward you need to at least tell me what’s happening. I want a briefing every Friday afternoon on their side of this op, understood?”
“Understood, lieutenant.”
Dan stalked back to his office and checked his e-mail. He didn’t like pulling rank on Badass, but he hadn’t regretted what he’d done either. There could be more information he needed to know about the holdings of Montenegro in this country that would affect his mission planning. He thought about Rio for a moment, it stung him a little to know she seemed to ignore him and not even acknowledge that he was standing in the room. Why was she snubbing him? Then he recalled a previous conversation when she’d asked him what were his expectations at work. He’d told her to act like she didn’t know him. I’ll be damned. She’s doing a pretty good job of it.
He spotted an e-mail from his counterpart at the Army Corps of Engineers. They’d finished studying the plat of the tunnel system for the mines and had determined that there was a tunnel that ran the length of the mine from the Jensen ranch to the buildings in Mexico. In fact, it was the main line where all the tunnels split.
The major with the Corps of Engineers determined that it would be somewhat sound. They could have the tunnel system ready to go in fifteen days, but they’d need help with manpower to complete the project within the time frame specified. Dan took the information back to Badass, and they decided they needed to reach out to the Air Force’s RED HORSE civil engineering command or the Navy’s SEABEES for the additional manpower. They developed a plan and sent it to Rock who promptly sent it back with his concerns. It took several more hours to put together a plan that Rock would approve. When Dan finally looked up it was almost five thirty. He’d been working over twelve hours.