“Ahh,” Valdez finally said, again stroking the enormous mound of hair on top of his lip.
“Something got your attention. Who are you thinking is behind this?”
“Not sure.”
“I thought you had this ah-ha moment.”
His forehead crumpled. I tapped my head, disgusted at myself for being stupid enough to confuse my Dominican partners with another Americanism.
“A thought came to your mind. What was it?”
“I have general theories, but nothing solid.”
My shoulders slumped a bit, and I leaned back in my chair and crossed my arms, frustration beginning to move its way up my esophagus. The canister of chalky Tums that usually saved me about now was tucked away in my car’s glove compartment, two thousand miles away.
“But I do have a contact. An ex-con. Just got out of prison about a year ago.”
“You know him well? He’s a friend?” I asked, sitting up.
“I know him very well. I put him in prison.”
Bolt had been chugging down his second can of Coke. He choked, then sprayed us with a layer of sticky soda.
“Nice, Bolt. Nice. Can I get some water over here please?” I asked a nearby waitress.
“Dos aguas por favor,” Valdez said, holding up two fingers.
She brought the waters, which we used to wipe the goo off our arms and faces.
“Sorry,” Bolt said. “But Tito Jackson said that he’s friends with a guy he put in prison. How can we expect the person to help us?”
I gave Bolt one of those looks. “He’s not a member of the Jackson Five.”
Valdez shook his head, trying to ignore Bolt. “I arrested Alejandro twice in one week for selling bags of cocaine on a street corner. He cursed me when I told him he was going to prison. A month later, he sent me a letter at the police department, thanking me for saving his life. He admitted he was hooked on cocaine, and even with a wife and daughter, he could do nothing more than sell drugs every night to those more desperate than him.”
“Makes you feel good, huh?”
“The pay has never been good, especially in a poor country. But, yes, reading his letter made me think I had made a small difference in at least one person’s life.” Valdez sipped his Coke. “Alejandro was small time, but he was connected.”
“We need to meet him.”
Valdez puffed out his cheeks. “Might be a tough conversation. His sentence was reduced because he turned state’s evidence. He probably wants to keep a low profile. He doesn’t want to be seen talking to a cop. Even an ex-cop,” he said, placing a hand on his chest, his stretched T-shirt flapping like a wind-blown flag.
“He’s our best chance, our only chance right now, at getting a lead, or at least another connection to someone who might know. It might take four or five connections. Who knows? We need to talk this guy, now.”
Valdez had just tapped his phone. “Hold on.” He rose from his chair and stepped outside. We watched through murky windows as he paced on the sidewalk, initially smiling and laughing, then his face turned serious. Finally, a head nod.
The metal frame door scraped the bottom plate as Valdez walked back to our corner table near the window.
“Just as I thought. Alejandro wants nothing to do with talking about his life of crime. It’s ancient history,” he said.
“Dammit. Give me the phone. Let me talk to him,” I said.
Valdez chuckled. “Listening to the two of you speak would be like watching an American sitcom. You wouldn’t understand what he was saying. But—”
“Where does he live?”
“Damn, you’re aggressive.”
“Esteban might already be dead. We don’t have time to fuck around.” I glanced at Bolt. “Sorry…again.”
“Mr. Booker, I was trying to get to a point.” Valdez lurched his chair forward a couple of inches. “I played the guilt paper. I reminded him how I helped turn his life around. He was still hesitant to meet with us. But then his daughter spoke in the background, and I asked what he would do if someone took her from him and his wife.”
Bolt held up a fist. “Give me some skin, Tito!”
The unlikely pair bumped fists.
Two hours later, we crossed a street with a single light at the corner, bugs flocking around the yellow color as if it were their last food source. Beyond a bent chain-link fence, we turned into a small playground on the side of an elementary school. It was so dark from the sidewalk, I couldn’t see the school’s facade.
“He’s supposed to meet us at the swing set,” Valdez said, his head on a swivel.
Clouds had rolled in, eliminating even a soft glow from the nighttime sky.
“Crap!” I said in a loud whisper. My shin had just caromed off the bottom of a slide.
Something moved just ahead, and I put my arms in front of me.
“Alejandro?” Valdez asked, each of us shuffling forward as if we were crossing a minefield.
Three more steps, and my hand reached out, catching a swaying empty swing, Bolt a step behind. As we turned toward each other, I moved a hand toward my chest. I needed the comfort of my security blanket, my Sig Sauer.
“He was here,” Bolt said. “Did he get scared and decide not to meet?”
Two hands at his waist, Valdez didn’t respond while he scanned the area.
“Any chance he’s been lured back to the crime life, and he just set us up?” I hunkered down to a couple of feet off the ground, trying to see movement.
Motion at ten o’clock. Pivoting left, I caught fluttering wings lifting a small bird off the top of a jungle gym. The small bird veered toward three other birds about the same size. They fell into formation and glided away.
Bolt shuffled two steps in front of me. Reaching ahead, I took his elbow and guided him back behind me. I spoke in a quiet whisper. “You’re my eyes behind me. Nudge me if you see anything at all.”
“Got it, Mr. Booker.”
“Valdez, you packing?”
“I forgot my pistol again. I had no idea we’d be in danger. In the future, if you’re around, I will always need my sidearm.”
Edging beyond the swing set, the three of us paced our steps in unison. Objects came into focus, but they were inanimate—a lone car tire resting on its side with weeds poking through the donut hole, a rusted jungle gym, a roundabout with a single tennis shoe on top.
“Did you hear that, Mr. Booker?”
My breath caught in my throat. “Hear what, Bolt?”
A hand grabbed a fistful of my T-shirt.
“Valdez, hold on.”
The three of us looked frozen like mimes in Klyde Warren Park back home.
“There it is again,” Bolt whispered.
Hearing must get worse with age. I couldn’t hear a damn thing, not even a distant car.
Suddenly, a dog barked.
“I heard that,” I said.
“Could be someone running from the school,” Valdez said.
“Or to the school,” I added.
Taking in two more breaths, I waited for another audible or visual signal. Still dead as a ghost town. But I had a feeling someone was watching us, waiting for the right moment “Time to call the cops?” I asked Valdez.
Just then I heard a zipper, then shoes dragging a pebble against concrete. Flipping my body left, I was in a fighting position, knowing neither my fists nor my chest could stop a bullet. Even a knife, if used effectively, could take me down. A second away from taking an offensive tactic, I heard three words.
“Yo soy Alejandro.”
Still driven by a chugging pulse rate, I spotted a squatty guy emerge from the shadows near a school doorway.
“¿Manuel? Usted nos ha asustado, hombre. Usted es el único?”
“All alone,” Alejandro said, his English choppy but understandable.
Despite jungle-forest weather conditions, Alejandro wore a dark hoodie, zipped in front, his face barely visible through a tiny hole.
He was scared.
&
nbsp; Valdez engaged him in a quick conversation, mostly in Spanish, playing the interpreter when necessary.
“Have you convinced him I’m not with American DEA or any other law enforcement agency?”
Valdez chuckled, resting a hand on the shorter man. “He was skeptical at first. He’s a hard one to convince. Right, mi amigo?”
“Sí.” Alejandro shuffled his feet, moving his head left and right.
Paranoid must be this guy’s middle name.
“Why’s he so jittery?”
More discussion in Spanish.
“The whole city is on edge,” Bolt said as Valdez opened his jaw.
Valdez put a hand over Bolt’s face, essentially claiming possession of Alejandro as his contact, his responsibility. “If anyone spots Alejandro talking to anyone who’s not a close friend or relative, word will get back to his old associates. They’ll assume he’s a snitch. Then, it would only be a matter of time before they send someone to hurt him, or his family, or both.”
I didn’t want us to have an unexpected visit from any of his former thug buddies any more than he did.
“Let’s not waste time then,” I said, rolling my arm as if I just started a play clock.
Valdez nodded and turned back to Alejandro, who stared at his lips.
“Necesitamos una lista de personas que tendrían las bolas para secuestrar al hijo de Juan Ortiz.”
Alejandro wiped his face, and I could still see a sheen of sweat. He reached a hand into his hoodie pocket, and I jerked my hand outward, my body dropping lower.
“Maldita sea, este tipo es un paranoico,” Alejandro said, pulling a pack of cigarettes from his pocket. He chuckled and flicked his wrist toward Valdez.
“He thinks you are—”
“Paranoid. I got that part,” I said, blowing out a breath.
The hooded ex-con flicked his lighter, illuminating our area for the first time since we arrived. I noticed two broken windows just to my right.
“Is this school shut down?”
“Sadly, public schools here face a difficult task. They try to educate our youth, to break the cycle of crime and poverty. But many who live in poverty end up stealing equipment and supplies, or even copper wire, from the very school that could teach them the skills to be productive in our society without breaking the law,” Valdez explained.
“That’s tough,” I said, realizing how lucky my Samantha was with her school back in Dallas.
“That is why schools like the one Britney, er…Ana Sofia…whatever her name, teaches at are so important. It’s funded by scholarships, private donations. People don’t look at it as a government handout that they can pillage.”
For many citizens, Ana Sofia was viewed as a savior of sorts. It was impossible to picture the Britney I knew filling the role of caretaker to hundreds of kids. While Ana Sofia was essentially the same person, my mind had witnessed her in that environment. I couldn’t figure out the logic behind my thoughts, or what drove them exactly. Aside from the identity shell game, I still couldn’t fathom how she was bankrolling this endeavor.
“Hey, tipo.” Alejandro had turned his back to us, his head bobbing up and down as he spoke on his cell phone.
I ticked my head toward Alejandro, asking Valdez who he was calling.
“A guy he knows. Supposedly does contract work for people with money. If this kidnapping really happened, his buddy will know. He guaranteed it.”
A couple of minutes elapsed. He pivoted around to face us while using his shoe to snuff out his first cigarette. The second one was already in set-up mode.
Alejandro muttered something.
“He asked if he heard anything about Esteban’s disappearance,” Bolt said, whispering at my shoulder.
“And?” I asked.
“Él sabe,” Alejandro said, looking right at me.
“What does he know?”
“Esteban was kidnapped,” he said, blowing a plume of smoke into my face.
“Does he know who did it, or where they have Esteban?” Valdez jumped in.
Alejandro shrugged, shaking his head. “No comprendo.”
Bolt leaned in, using a hand to speak as if he was a politician. “Tito está preguntando si su compañero sabe quien secuestró a Esteban y donde lo escondieron.”
“He called me Tito again,” Valdez said with a dry tone.
“Ahh.” Alejandro inhaled another nicotine shot, then released two donut-hole breaths of smoke. “Esta es una gran mierda de tiempo.”
Valdez shifted his eyes to me, then back to Alejandro. “Usted no va a estar implicado en esta búsqueda. Nunca vamos a mencionar su nombre, ahora, o despues que encontramos a las personas que hicieron esto.”
Bolt cupped his hand against his mouth and translated. “He’s telling him we must never share his name with anyone.”
I nodded, as all eyes looked at me. “Bueno. I agree.”
Alejandro began shuffling his feet, as if he’d taken some type of hyper pill or was trying to mimic a boxer.
“No sé hombre. Si te doy este nombre, yo podría estar muerto antes de que salga el sol.”
“He’s worried that if he tells us anything, somehow they’ll get to him and kill him before the sun rises in the morning.”
Scratching the back of my head, I couldn’t think of anything to say to ease his fears. My contacts at the Dallas county DA’s office or at DPD or the FBI or any other American agency were about as worthless as a single peso in the Dominican Republic.
“Does he want money? Dinero?”
The shuffling ceased and white teeth glowed in the middle of his dark hoodie.
“Did I just speak his language?” I asked.
“I think you did.”
“Todo el mundo tiene necesidades monetarias. Quiero que mis hijas vayan a la universidad,” Alejandro said.
“He wants his girls to go to college,” I said.
“Are you going to pay for college for his two daughters?” Bolt asked.
“Hold on.” This time I stepped away and made a call.
The other line picked up on my third ring, but no one spoke. “Hello?” I said.
It sounded as if the phone was brushing against clothing. “Hold on,” the woman whispered.
I heard a door shut.
“Hi, Booker,” Britney said without a Spanish accent.
I still couldn’t wrap my mind around her dual lives.
“I have—”
“Do you remember the times we’d have phone sex?” she asked with a quiet giggle.
I fought back a suppressed image, chiding myself for even going there. “Now’s not the time.”
“Oh, that’s not why you called? I was hoping we could relive old times. I’m wearing—”
“Britney, stop.” And this is the woman who told me she loved her fiancé? I shouldn’t have been surprised.
“You don’t want to play?” Another giggle, this one filled with a mocking dose of disrespect.
“I have information about Esteban.”
She didn’t respond for a good five seconds. “Where is he?” Her voice was subdued, but serious.
“I’ve made a contact with someone who I’m hoping will tell us, but I need a favor from you to make this guy comfortable with the arrangement.”
Britney listened intently, then she offered just what I needed to seal the deal with Alejandro. Thankfully, she managed to avoid further conversation about sex and phones and old times.
Through Valdez, I explained the offer to Alejandro: if he would reveal all the information about Esteban’s kidnapping, his girls would have the opportunity to finish the rest of their schooling at La Academia de Aprendizaje free of charge.
Alejandro crossed himself, then shook my hand nonstop for a minute. “Muchas gracias, Señor Booker. Usted ha levantado un gran peso de mis hombros.”
“I think you have an amigo for life,” Bolt said.
<><><>
My stomach first felt the absence of gravity for a split-second. That was quickly
followed by a thunderous bounce off the bottom of a pothole large enough to swallow the Mini Cooper. I felt the thud collapse my spine just before I rebounded upward and banged my head off the Mini’s roof. Another blow to my vertebrae, but from the opposite end.
On reflex, I tossed out an expletive or two as I tried to brace my arms against the window on one side and a flimsy box of glasses on the other.
Reaching for my sore neck and back, I stopped halfway when I heard the noise. It sounded like a rubber propeller flapping against the wheel well. My sarcastic side wondered if the pothole had carved a hole into the bottom of the tin can.
“Pedazo de mierda carreteras.” Banging his steering wheel, Manuel cursed the roads, which were probably used more by horses than horsepower.
Manuel tapped the brakes, and the noise mercifully ceased. Throwing the door open, I toppled out of the car, spilling onto my hands and knees.
“I know the road like back of my foot, but not the damn potholes. Mother fucker!”
Kneeling down at the left wheel well, Manuel shined his cell phone flashlight on the damage. The tire was gutted, ripped to shreds.
“You got a spare?” I asked, turning back to the tree-covered mountain, wondering how far we had yet to go on our four-wheeled journey.
Without answering, Manuel pulled out the spare, tossed the tools on the red clay.
“Seems like I had to change a tire every month when I was younger. We’ll knock this out in ten minutes, maybe less.”
Eight minutes later, we stood next to the car, staring at a half-empty spare. But that wasn’t the worst of it.
“I can’t believe a pothole dented the rim. We’re screwed,” Manuel said.
“That’s what happens when you drive a tin can.”
He shrugged his shoulders, then tossed the tools back in the car.
“This is going to cost me a boatload of money.”
“Don’t worry. I’ll make sure my client pays you back.”
“Really? Do you think they’d spring for a full set of new tires, shocks and struts, and a new suspension? This road is a bitch,” he said, running his fingers through his thick mane.
He made me chuckle. “I’ll see what I can do.”
Over the next couples of minutes, Manuel attempted to use a map app and his memory of the narrow path to provide me enough guidance to reach my destination on foot.
BOOKER Box Set #2 (A Private Investigator Thriller Series of Crime and Suspense): Volumes 4-6 Page 31