by Ty Patterson
‘We can leave once we’ve done that?’ Roger asked him.
Fernandez nodded. ‘Yup. No call to hold you guys. If it was me, I would have pinned a fricking medal or two on your chests.’
‘Speaking of medals,’ he continued, ‘you don’t have any shortage of those, do you? I made some calls when we first got your message. Got your sheets sent to me… you guys come recommended from so many places, so high, that my poor old head goes dizzy just thinking of those heights.’
Bwana shrugged. ‘All those medals, they’re a past life. We just got lucky in those days.’
‘Not so past, so I’ve been told.’ Fernandez looked at him shrewdly. ‘I’ve also been told not to ask you guys too many questions about what you do now.’
‘Why? We just fish now, sir.’ Roger laughed and stood up to leave, Bwana following suit.
‘One last point.’ Fernandez halted them as the trio was heading to the door.
‘This bust is so big that in no way can it be contained. The media will be all over it, and truth to say, we like our fifteen minutes. It makes the jobs of all these guys worthwhile and makes them feel recognized.’ He waved broadly, meaning Gonzalez and the Border Patrol.
‘Question to you – we can spin this to take all the credit, or we can share credit with you. If we share credit with you, your names will be public. The danger with that is that 5Clubs might hunt you down. They have a reputation for being ruthless and for meting out punishment… and seeing that you have wiped out a good amount of them and caused them a serious loss, they might want to treat you extra special.’
Roger grinned wide as he pointed at Bwana. ‘Heck, mention our names. We’re not shy. Besides, he’s getting fat and lazy with all that fishing and sleeping. Time we had some excitement in our lives.’
‘Are you sure? If they come after you, it’ll be open season. They’re known for it. There was this guy in Nogales who was suspected of being our snitch. He wasn’t – we take care of our snitches and hide them well – but the rumor mill and the media somehow made this guy to be a snitch who fed us juice on 5Clubs and other gangs.
‘This story broke out one evening. The next day, the guy was found dead at home, hanging from a ceiling fan. On closer inspection, his head was pinned to the fan with a stake. Driven through him when he was alive. Around him lay his family, all butchered, three generations of it.’
Fernandez paused. ‘So, think about it. It could mean war if you guys are mentioned as being responsible for this bust and killing all those bandits.’
Bwana replied quietly, ‘War is our business, sir.’
Chapter 16
Roger and Bwana followed Fernandez and Gonzalez outside the Border Patrol Office on Swan Road – a swarm of news vans and reporters awaited them. They spent the next hour answering the reporters and then made their escape with Gonzalez to the chopper awaiting them. They were accompanied by six more Border Patrol agents. To get the bodies back, thought Roger.
‘I’d rather face twenty hostiles barehanded than go through that again,’ grumbled Bwana as he belted himself in the chopper.
‘What, and lose the chance to be known all across the country as the baddest man not to be crossed?’ Roger grinned at him. Bwana gave him the finger and leaned forward to guide Gonzalez and the pilot, not that any directions were required, since they had coordinates to all the locations.
The chopper settled down at the same place that it had picked them up from, outside the canyon – that was the closest the chopper could get. Forty-five minutes later, as the sun was casting long shadows in the stillness of the canyon, they reached the bodies. What was left of them.
A few vultures lazily flew away as they approached, and Bwana shooed away the last coyote. Gonzalez went over the seven bodies again and discovered nothing – Roger and Bwana had handed over all that they had collected from the bodies. Gonzalez produced a camera and took several photographs of the bodies and the 5Clubs markings on all of them. He took a few other photographs of the surroundings and then beckoned to his agents. They’d brought large black body bags with them and in a short while had all the bodies wrapped. The six agents paired up and carried the bodies back to the chopper.
‘Might be quicker if we helped,’ Bwana murmured.
‘Not his fault. Blame his folks. They brought him up to never be idle, not even for a few seconds,’ Roger sighed, addressing the air, and followed Bwana.
An hour later, the bodies were stacked in the chopper, and Bwana led the way to the remaining bodies a hundred yards away. There was a risk that the gang would send more bandits to check on the missing, and Bwana and Roger were alert, but they were the only ones moving in the ravine. Other than the shadows.
Gonzalez approached the fallen women first and circled around them, his camera working rapidly. He knelt in silence next to one of the bodies, the woman who had been felled by the bandit’s rifle, and noted her deformed head. His face was grim when he arose, and looking over at Roger and Bwana, he uttered a silent thank you.
Roger didn’t know if that was for helping the agents or for taking care of the bandits. It didn’t matter. He pointed silently to the coyote lying in the distance, his chest punctured by Bwana’s knife.
Once Gonzalez had snapped away to fill his memory card, they placed all the bodies in the chopper, taking more care with the victims.
Roger turned to the Border Patrol agent once they were done. ‘We can hoof it from here to our camping ground and recover our gear.’
‘And how’ll you get back?’
‘The way we usually do. Hoofing it and hitching rides whenever we can,’ drawled Bwana.
Gonzalez shook his head. ‘The least we can do is help you recover your gear and get you back to Tucson.’
‘It’s about three miles away from here–’
‘That’s nothing. We’ve walked longer and in harsher conditions, and sometimes under bandit fire.’ Gonzalez laughed and signaled to his men to follow them.
Bwana shrugged and led the way. The canyon was now throwing longer shadows as the sun began its daily descent. They moved with care, not disturbing the silence of the surroundings, keeping a sharp lookout for other bandits or any seek-and-destroy mission by 5Clubs. But other than the towering walls looking down at their insignificant forms, and the occasional wildlife, they encountered no one.
Probably realized discretion is the better part, thought Bwana, of the rest of the gang.
They found their camp near Pena Blanca Lake, in the thicket, undisturbed except for their pots and pans in disarray.
‘Birds and wildlife,’ surmised Roger and set about packing them up.
They always travelled light – just their camping gear and their weapons – and within half an hour, they had turned back to the trail to the chopper.
Ninety minutes later, in Tucson, they helped offload the bodies into anonymous vans. ‘The media is still buzzing, and we don’t want those assholes to follow our vehicles and hence these.’ Gonzalez nodded at the vehicles when he saw Bwana’s raised eyebrows.
‘Dez wants to meet you and wrap things up,’ he continued as he led Bwana and Roger to his Dodge Charger and eased into it with a satisfied grunt. Roger spotted a sticker across the wheel: ‘We Do it For God and Country – And for the A/C too,’ and on cue, Gonzalez turned up the cooling.
‘Thanks for the help, guys,’ Fernandez greeted them when they went to his office. ‘Hopefully we’ll be able to identify the bodies and start working back to how the women got abducted. It should be easier to identify the bandits if they’re from this side of the border. Chances are they’ll have a record. Gonzo, why don’t you do the honors?’
Gonzalez removed the memory disc from his camera and plugged it into a computer that was connected to a projector. He narrated the trail and their activities as he brought all the pictures up on a bare section of the wall.
Fernandez leaned back in his chair once Gonzalez had finished. ‘Gotta cover that section of the canyon more.’
> ‘We’ve done as much as we can, Dez. That section of the country is laid out so that only two legs can cover it, and we don’t have the manpower to patrol it more often. Which is why those coyotes use it,’ said Gonzalez as he let off frustrated steam and raised his hands heavenwards.
Roger and Bwana silently watched the byplay and then turned to each other with a why’re we still here look.
Fernandez noticed the byplay, and his lips twitched. ‘Yup, I would be getting itchy feet too if I were in your place. Like I said, you guys are well connected, and someone wants to talk to you. Apparently you guys have turned off your phones or they’ve run out of juice, and hence my office is the only place to make contact with you.’
Bwana and Roger simultaneously reached into their shirt pockets and dug out their phones.
Roger was first off the mark. ‘Ran out of battery. You know who called?’
The phone rang, stilling Fernandez’s reply. He lifted it, grunted in it, and handed it over to Roger.
‘Get your butts over here,’ came Broker’s baritone. ‘I swear, the moment I leave your side, you guys end up in trouble.’
Roger grinned broadly. ‘Aye, aye, sir. As soon as we book our flight.’
‘If you head over to the JetBlue desk, you’ll find a couple of tickets for you and that worthless friend of yours.’
Roger looked over at Bwana and mouthed, He called you worthless.
‘Forgive him, My Lord. He knows not what he does. Or says,’ mumbled Bwana.
Fernandez started drumming his desk loudly, which was the cue for Roger to hang up and stand up.
‘We’ll be on our way now. Thank you for helping us recover the gear.’
Fernandez waved his thanks away and walked with them outside the office, where Gonzalez revved up the Charger to drop them off at the airport.
Gonzalez clapped his hand on Roger’s shoulder. ‘Watch your backs, guys. 5Clubs are not to be taken lightly, and chances are, they’ll be seeking to get even.’
Bwana looked sideways at him with a face granite could be sharpened on. ‘We’re counting on that.’
Chapter 17
A whole night and half a day later, they knocked on the door of Broker’s large apartment overlooking Columbus Avenue in Manhattan. Broker greeted them with a, ‘Took you long enough to get here.’
‘We would’ve been here sooner if you’d got your fingers out and invented time travel,’ snarled Bwana and headed to the shower.
‘Has he always been this cheerful and sunny?’ Broker asked Roger, staring at Bwana’s broad back.
‘Ignore him. He hasn’t killed any badasses in twenty-four hours. You know how cranky he gets. So what’s cooking? Why did you get us here?’
Broker held his palm up for patience. ‘All in good time. Bear and Chloe are in town too and should be here shortly. All will be revealed then. Now how about filling up those skinny frames of yours?’ He laughed as Roger’s stomach growled loudly on cue.
Broker regarded himself as a mean cook and never passed up an opportunity to treat his friends to his culinary offerings. He was a good cook, but they would rather have their nails pulled out with pliers than acknowledge that.
Broker led the way to his kitchen, where he had several chicken breasts and legs baking, coated with a mix of bread crumbs, lemon zest and thyme. He laid out cutlery on the dining table and, when Bwana walked in from his shower, bowed elaborately and gestured to their seats. Bear and Chloe came in from their walk just as Roger and Bwana were seating themselves. Hugs, fist bumps, and a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc later, Chloe turned to Roger and Bwana.
‘So, guys, have you started getting calls from Hollywood? The channels have been reporting you as the modern-day version of S.H.I.E.L.D.’
Bwana shrugged embarrassedly. ‘Chloe, don’t believe all that shit they report. We just happened to be in the right place at the right time.’
‘Or the wrong place at the wrong time, for those assholes,’ chimed in Roger and then chuckled as he noticed Broker’s slack-jawed expression. ‘Yup, Bwana did blush then. You don’t get to witness that sight often.’ He ducked as Bwana swung a punch.
Turning back to Broker, he turned serious. ‘I presume that’s why you got us here? To deal with whatever this gang, 5Clubs, might throw at us?’
Broker swirled the wine in his glass and took a deep swallow. ‘That’s one part of it. The other part started a while back when the National Security Advisor requested a meeting with me.’
Roger choked on his food and, once his coughing fit had passed, exclaimed, ‘You mean General Klouse?’
‘None other.’ Broker passed the bottle around, leant back and narrated his story.
A couple of hours and a second bottle later, Bear frowned. ‘So we have this gang, 5Clubs, giving Roger and Bwana a gentle workout, and over here on the East Coast, they just might have cultivated a mole in the FBI. But if all the intelligence and computer shit at your disposal isn’t able to find that mole, how exactly are we going to help?’
Broker leaned back in his chair, the light catching his shaggy hair, Surfer Dude with a halo.
‘You know, Robert Hanssen was caught because the FBI went about trying to buy informants who knew his identity? They couldn’t identify him as the mole through all their conventional investigation.’
‘So we’re going to buy this mole’s identity? Shit, that’ll require truckloads of the stuff. I know you’re rolling in it, but do you really want to go down that route?’ Bear was incredulous.
‘Nope, I thought we would take a simpler approach.’ Broker paused theatrically and sipped his wine slowly.
Chloe rolled her eyes. ‘Out with it, Sherlock.’
Broker chuckled. ‘Why, we’ll just ask them politely.’
The pregnant silence lasted a few minutes, and then Bear guffawed as it hit him. Coming off his frame, it sounded like rolling thunder.
Broker looked searchingly at Roger and Bwana, who weren’t displaying any particular reaction.
‘You guys okay with this? This could get nasty, for a very long time. In fact’ – he turned to Chloe – ‘are you both on board with this? Me, I don’t have anything to lose, but you guys have each other, and Roger and Broker have been partners for far longer than all of us have been working together for Clare.’
Another silence fell in the room, and this time Bwana broke it with a growl. ‘I haven’t known you to ask before, Broker, what gives?’
‘I think I’ve become wiser ever since we lost Zeb and hence asking you guys to jump into this fully knowing that taking on 5Clubs will be a war, not a battle, and a war that we cannot win. We will never put out any gang. At the most, we’ll put a dent in their operations.’
He passed the bottle around. ‘And know this. It’s perfectly okay to back out of this. There’ll be other assignments – hell, there’ll be a lot – which we will work on together.’
Chloe looked at him in disbelief. ‘I can’t believe this is the same Broker. We have always worked together, have never backed out of any assignment, never refused an assignment, however dangerous, whatever the threat… even if it meant we lose one of ours. So what the fuck has changed now?’
She slammed her palm on the table so hard the bottles jumped.
Broker smiled. ‘Cool down, Chloe. I’m asking, because we lost Zeb and we never lost anyone before. I’m also asking because this is the first time we have assembled after Zeb, and I wanted to get a feel for your thinking on this assignment.’
Chloe snarled at him, her petite frame quivering with anger. ‘Nothing’s changed, Broker. We were a team, we are a team, and we’ll always be a team. If Zeb’s loss means anything, it’s that we never fight alone. We are the best elite black-ops team in the world, which is why Clare employs us. We are fucking proud of that.’
Bear mumbled in his glass, ‘Remind me never to piss her off,’ and winced as Chloe slugged him in the shoulder.
Bwana cracked a wide grin. ‘You’re getting old, Broker. That’s w
hat this is all about. You can’t handle the stress of working with us on an assignment anymore. Stress-related fear happens to many in the field. There’s nothing to be ashamed of. You were a good operative once; you can be proud of that. Why don’t you tend to your machines here and let us do all the heavy lifting?’
Broker gave him the finger. ‘I’ll stop to smell the roses and dawdle next time your sorry ass needs rescuing. All right, guys, it looks like your stupidity levels haven’t diminished, so let’s get serious. Clare doesn’t have anything for us and knows we’ll be helping Isakson on this.’
Roger pinched his nose as if to ward off a stench and said nasally, ‘Keep that pile of shit away from me, will ya, Broker? Else I just might have a go at him.’
‘You’ll be joining a long line, believe me, but let’s put aside what we feel for him for the time being. If there IS a mole in the FBI, and all signs do point to there being one, then let’s uncover the bastard and stamp him out.’
He went to his study and returned with a sheaf of papers and laid out the six photographs in front of them.
‘Agon Scheafer is the chief badass, the guy who put together 5Clubs. Scumbag was some hotshot commander in the Kosovo Liberation Army, but with a penchant for torturing women, raping them, raping kids too, driving stakes through people… that kinda shit. He became too hot for the KLA to handle, and just as they were going to put a bullet in him, he fled to our shores, adopted a new identity, and started this gang.’
He looked down at the dark eyes staring back from the photograph. ‘He makes Holt look like Snow White.’
Chloe placed her hand over Broker’s, bringing him back to the present, back from Zeb. ‘Doesn’t matter how ruthless he is. We’ll get him to hand over the mole.’
Bwana raised his glass in a silent toast. ‘Who’re the other fuckers?’
Broker laid out the images in a row and pointed to each one of them. ‘Jose Cruz, heads the Brooklyn arm; Martin Kelleher, Queens; Jorge Sancada, Bronx; Dieter Hamm, Manhattan and New Jersey; Pancho Morales, Staten Island. Agon looks after the activities on the West Coast himself. He’s got some hood on the ground, who’s chief hood there, but he’s not a chapter head. Scheafer is based somewhere in New York, but never stays in the same place for more than a couple of nights… the usual shit these guys follow just to stay invisible.’