The Matador's Crown

by Alex Archer

  “Even more reason I would not employ him to do my dirty work.”

  “No, you do it yourself. It was you in Diego’s hotel room that night, wasn’t it?”

  He lunged, and Annja jumped back. Backing toward the window, with a quick glance she saw the latch was secured with a hook. She tapped the tip of her sword up under the latch, and the curved mechanism slid smoothly out of the lock.

  “Did you go through Russell Jones to get the crown? In London? You know he’s dead.”

  “Never heard the name.”

  “And the man killed on the beach a month ago using the same method Diego Montera was murdered?”

  “You are tossing out accusations like flowers into the ring. I crush them beneath my heel.” He made an abrupt stomp of his foot, like a flamenco dancer ending the dance with flair, then sliced the blade at her.

  Annja leaped onto the bed to lure him to the opposite side of the room. She jumped to the floor and met him with a clash of steel against steel. She didn’t swing hard, because she didn’t want to injure him. Out the corner of her eye she spied a small silver effigy of Baal on the hearth over the fieldstone fireplace. Another gift?

  “Do you kill everyone who touches your things?” she countered. They matched each other, circling with blades pointed toward each other. “Did Diego Montera touch the votive crown when he delivered it to you?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I never met the guitarist.”

  “How did you know he was a guitarist?”

  “The news stations reported it.”

  “I thought you didn’t pay attention to the media during the season. And why didn’t you take the Baal statue?”

  “The bronze bull?”

  He abruptly shut up. As far as she was concerned, he’d just confessed.

  Annja dashed to the unlatched window. “I will see justice is served. Those crowns don’t belong you.”

  Sliding a leg through the window, she jumped out the first-floor window, landed on her feet in a patch of fuchsia begonias and burst into a run toward the gates that were open out onto the main street.

  She heard Manuel call to someone in her wake not to follow her, to let her go. Great. But the fact remained, he’d killed Diego.

  Now, if she could get an audience with the police without getting arrested.

  * * *

  CÉSAR SOTO SLAPPED his cell phone shut. He kicked the leg of his desk, upsetting a manila file that scattered the papers inside it to the floor.

  “If she talks to anyone, I may never be able to pin down the dirty cop.”

  And he was this close. All he needed was proof that the alibi during the warehouse fire was false. There had been no prints at the dig site where Klosky had been murdered, but he suspected the gun used was still at large.

  He picked up the phone and sorted through the contacts he rarely used. Top of the list was A. He hit Dial and then cursed Bravo for his indiscretion.

  21

  Annja hopped off the bus a few streets away from the hotel. It was close to midnight and the humid night air was filled with the sounds of dance, laughter and shouting. An American heavy-metal tune hammered out of a boom box at the corner of the intersection and a group of teenagers were krumping. Yet right alongside the modern dance moves, girls in flamenco skirts performed earth-punishing golpes while their graceful arms swept the air in rhythm. The mixture of the two dance styles brought Annja to a standstill to watch.

  She recognized the zapateados in the dance, the rapid, percussive footwork a Mexican influence. The male partner worked his rapper moves, insinuating the street style into the traditional dance, while the female hipified the Spanish dance with an attitude that would have knocked over any gangsta rapper. A cardboard box had been set out and the appreciative audience was tossing in euros.

  After her escape from the matador’s blade, Annja needed to clear her head and take stock. She sat on the curved lip of a public fountain. The cool spray misted her shoulders and back of her neck.

  “That man certainly does not like it when people touch his stuff,” she muttered.

  Touching her upper thigh below her hip, she felt the sting of the injury she’d gotten from the bull. It had cut through her khakis but hadn’t gone too deeply beyond the epidermis, which explained the sting. The deeper the cut, the less it ultimately hurt. A dab of alcohol would fix it up fine.

  Did Manuel’s compulsion go so far as to make him track back the previous handlers of the crown to further clear it of the negative energies he claimed it took on with touch? Russell Jones in London had had his hands on it, according to his secretary.

  El Bravo had been booked solid at the corrida, and during the summer most matadors slept and fought; they had little time to do anything else.

  Ava had said Cristo wanted Bravo’s favor.

  The details of the murder and motives were being gathered by Soto’s team, and they would track the culprit. She made a mental note to give Jones’s name to Soto in case it may aid the murder investigation.

  But would that lead them to the party who had bought and sold the votive crown to El Bravo? That person had to have placed it in Diego’s hands for delivery. She teased the idea of a dirty cop who may have looted Crockett’s site also having access to the crown. If it had originated in London, it had to have been a special order, not another artifact a looter happened upon and was trying to get rid of quickly.

  The rapper/flamenco group moved up the street, seeking a new audience to scatter coins in the box they’d set out before the spray-painted sign Nouveau Flamenco—We’re Hungry.

  Annja headed back to the hotel. The door to her room stood open an inch.

  You’ve got to be kidding me. Apparently, there was not a single hotel in this city she could stay without attracting bad news.

  She approached cautiously, and in a moment of instinct, hand held down at her side, she willed the sword into her grip. The leather-wrapped hilt filled her curled palm. The plain but strong blade stretched out along the wall. Sliding the blade tip along the door, she pried it open with a flick of her wrist.

  A female silhouette stood in front of the patio window sheers, her back to Annja. A twist of dark hair was secured at the back of her head. No ponytail today. Red ruffles edged her sleeves at the elbows. Black leather pants replaced her usual festive skirt. Fitted black leather biker boots sported buckles from knee to ankle. At her side, she wielded a long blade, not so long as

  Annja’s, but close in size to the estoque the matador used.

  Annja pulled the door shut, making sure the lock clicked.

  Ava turned around and smiled a tight grin. She dragged the tip of her blade down the thigh of her snug leather pants. “I was hoping you’d have your sword. That’ll make this a fair fight.”

  “Really? You want to give your mark a fighting chance?”

  She shrugged minutely.

  “Why me?”

  “You’ve been asking a lot of questions. That one was plain stupid. Do you really expect an answer?”

  No. She knew why her. Someone in this city had it out for her. Probably more than a someone. Manuel Bravo and César Soto were tops on that list. Ava was inextricably tied to both. But how often did assassins allow their marks to fight in their defense?

  No sense in arguing the point. Annja raised the battle sword before her, clasping it in both hands. “El Bravo just tried to kill me, but since he failed, my first guess is he sent you to clean up what he couldn’t accomplish.”

  “I do nothing to please that man.”

  “Then I got nothing.”

  “You’ll never have the answers you want,” Ava said. “And yet, you already have the answers you need. Don’t you?”

  “Manuel Bravo—”

  “The matador will pay for his crime.”

  “Killing Diego Montera?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Do you have proof?” Annja asked. “It could have been any matador.”

  Ava stepped a few
paces forward, wielding the blade as if ready to stab. Her hair was styled back with a dark curl spilling down her forehead. The top half of her looked ready to dance; the bottom half was forged to kick ass.

  She spun the blade with her fingers, catching it smartly and on aim with Annja’s heart. Her switchblade smirk crimped. “Promise I’ll make it easy on you.”

  “Is that so? You going to sever my aorta by coming in over my head?”

  “Wasn’t me. But you know that already.” Ava stepped toward her, feinting to the left. Annja stepped right, expecting the double cross, and was rewarded with a clang of blade to sword.

  “You’ll never match me with that little blade,” she said, ducking under the attack and running through it to place herself before the patio doors so they could stand off in the largest open space in the room.

  Ava spun, viciously slashing the blade.

  Thrusting with a fencing move, Annja worked Ava back toward the door. She suspected if they got too loud the neighbors might become suspicious. Then again, the city was alive and vibrant. Nobody was in their hotel room right now. Below the window, the flamenco group beat the ground with their rapid footwork and the tunes blared.

  The dancer moved with agile grace, dashing to the left. She jumped, slashing her blade randomly, and Annja stumbled backward, losing her balance. She landed on the floor on her side and rolled to her knees.

  “I don’t get it,” Annja said, rising and coming en garde.

  Ava sneered and flicked a loose strand of hair from her face.

  “Manuel is the only one crazed enough to want to get rid of me, so I assume he sent you. But I thought you and he stood on opposite sides?”

  “You’ve guessed this one wrong, Creed. I do not work for the matador.”

  “I think you do, and you just don’t know it.”

  The suggestion gave Ava pause. She was thinking about it, but without dropping her guard. Annja had no intention of killing her; she wanted to incapacitate the crazy chick with the blade and then call the police—

  “Wait.” She dodged Ava’s blade. “Don’t tell me you’re working for César Soto?”

  No change in the assassin’s expression. Intent on killing her, Ava grunted as she stabbed. Annja blocked the move with the edge of her sword. While she did have the advantage of a longer blade, and a longer reach, she had the disadvantage that the blade was heavy and her best swings were performed with both hands.

  “Soto sent you after me,” she decided. “Because I was getting too deep. Into what?”

  The only conclusion she’d come close to making was that Manuel Bravo could have possibly murdered Diego for the votive crown. And if Soto was protecting Bravo, then he’d have reason to get her out of the picture. He’d already escorted her from the city once.

  “So it’s César Soto behind the antiquities ring, and you’re his muscle.”

  Ava smirked. “I never for one moment thought you were stupid, even though I suspect that was a wild guess. A wrong guess. Soto isn’t involved in illegal antiquities trade.”

  “You know that for certain?”

  “The man you’re looking for is right under your thumb. And then there is the woman.”

  They shuffled through the open patio door. Annja slammed the heel of her palm against Ava’s chest as her opponent’s back hit the iron railing. Ava’s hand, gripping the blade, swayed out above her head.

  Annja dropped her sword into the otherwhere and used both hands to clutch the woman by the shoulders. Below, a few onlookers noticed the commotion above. She flung Ava away from the railing and shoved her back inside the room.

  Before Ava could turn to face her, she’d called the sword back to her grip, stalking inside after her.

  “A woman? Other than you?” she asked.

  “She works closely with the man at the museum. I couldn’t believe César didn’t know it. I was the one who suggested he look into her background.”

  “Are you and César dating? To be close enough to share these conversations?”

  Blood drooled down her chin as Ava snarled and pushed herself up, collapsing with a yelp. It looked as if her arm was hurt, maybe broken. Annja kicked the blade out of her hand. It clattered across the tiled floor, the blade wedging under the bathroom door.

  Spearing the tip of her battle sword against Ava’s throat, Annja slammed down her groping free hand with the sole of her boot.

  “Do it!” Ava cried.

  “And spoil your dancing career?” Annja stepped back.

  “If you don’t end this,” Ava hissed, “the matador dies at tomorrow’s corrida.”

  Much as Annja didn’t condone murder for murder’s sake, she felt an empty disinterest regarding whether or not the matador lived or died. He needed to pay for

  Diego’s death. Yet she could get to the authorities before Ava could limp out after him. That is, if she could locate an authority not in collusion with Bravo and Ava Vital.

  “He’s killed too many,” Ava said. “He has to be stopped.”

  “Are you talking about animals or humans?”

  “He believes he is some kind of god who has the power over life and death.”

  That was all Annja needed to hear regarding who had killed Diego. “Who is the woman associated with the stolen artifacts?”

  “On the police force. César already knows about her. He wants you out of the way so he can catch her. That’s why I’m here. Keeping you out of the way.”

  “I think you’d better stick with dancing and leave the assassination gigs to the professionals. It’s been swell,” Annja said. Bending, she delivered a fist to Ava’s jaw, slamming her skull backward, her head hitting the wall as she collapsed. Annja released her sword into the otherwhere.

  Annja collected the dancer’s weapon, and not sure what to do with it, but not wanting to leave it in Ava’s hands, she tested the bend of the blade. It gave. It was too short to break over her knee, so, gripping the blade tip and the hilt, she wedged it into the bed frame and succeeded in breaking off the hilt.

  She grabbed her backpack and shoved the laptop inside, then swung it over her arm. She walked out of the room, leaving behind the failed assassin.

  The police didn’t want her sticking her nose into their business? Fine. But they needn’t send an assassin after her. Soto could have asked nicely.

  Annja smirked. Okay, so her habit of following things through to the end tended to put her in situations she would be wise to avoid.

  She’d be seeing James Harlow in the morning.

  * * *

  CÉSAR SOTO SAT DOWN before Hannibal Drake, hastily introduced himself and apologized for the early hour. He judged from the man’s calm demeanor he’d been in this kind of situation before and would know exactly how much he could say and was willing to say.

  Fine by him. He only needed the man to identify one person. He opened a manila file and sorted through three photos, wondering why he’d even pulled two of them. Ava had suggested a name that had startled him, yet when he’d run the background check, he’d been shocked that things on her history hadn’t shown up during her application to the force. Like a stint at the University of Madrid on an archaeological team.

  He turned the photo around and slid it across the table toward Drake. “Have you seen this person before, Señor Drake?”

  The man gave it a meager glance and nodded. “Yes.”

  “In the vicinity of the warehouse located directly across from your business office on the Campo del Sur?”

  Another nod. “Yes.”

  “Have you spoken directly to the person in this picture?”

  “I don’t recall if I have or have not.”

  He did recall, and he had, César guessed. But it didn’t matter. He’d only needed positive identification.

  “I understand.”

  “Am I being charged today? I wasn’t given opportunity to call my lawyer.”

  The suspicion that Hannibal Drake had received items from the person in the picture was
just that: a suspicion. Soto had seen the man’s name many times in cases involving illegal antiquities trade. He knew Drake bought and sold artifacts, but had no proof the items were stolen or obtained legally. And he hadn’t enough man-hours on the force to research and get such proof.

  He was no fool. Of course the man was dirty.

  “No, you are not being charged with a crime today, Señor Drake. You are free to go. I thank you for your cooperation.”

  Hannibal nodded and stood to shake César’s hand. The man had a good, firm handshake. Trying too hard, actually.

  César wiped his hand across his thigh as the man left the interrogation room.

  22

  Back at the hostel she’d originally been staying at, Annja was pleased to find it had cleared out, except for an elderly British couple who, after they’d introduced themselves, offered to share their tea. She politely refused, claiming exhaustion from touring the city.

  Yesterday had been a long day. Being almost run down in the morning, then the fire at the warehouse, followed by a swim in the ocean. Manuel Bravo had tried to kill her, and then Ava Vital.

  “That woman is a tough one to figure.”

  Opening her laptop, Annja ran a search for Ava Vital. The first time she’d found her she had only been snooping about the Gato Negra.

  On a hunch, she typed in César Soto’s name, and the search line that featured thumbnails of larger photos flashed a familiar face. It was a professional portrait of Soto showing him in full police gear and a bio listing his eight years of service. No mention of his failed shot at the corrida circuit. Nor were there any links associating him with Ava Vital.

  Ava had alluded the two of them were close enough for her to learn information Annja suspected only officers on the force should have.

  She typed in Manuel Bravo’s name and kept Ava’s name in the search. Bravo’s darkly handsome face appeared in a row of thumbnails. She scanned the pictures. Most featured him in the corrida in a classic bullfighter’s pose or caping the bull in a flurry of magenta and yellow. Only a few were of him in casual wear, signing autographs, and one looked like a snapshot taken in his villa, probably for a lifestyle magazine, as he posed out on the patio under the paper lanterns with a cigar and Scotch.