Strong Enough to Die: A Caitlin Strong Novel

by Jon Land

  “He matches the description provided by both the federalés and Larrito from the warehouse. Our associates in America tried to deal with him. They failed.”

  “Perhaps they tried to be subtle.”

  “No,” the man standing before the desk said. “They hired someone known for quite the opposite.”

  “Who?”

  “Colonel Guillermo Paz of the Venezuelan secret police.”

  “Dirección de los Servicios de Inteligencia y Prevención. Paz has done much work for us as well, impressively and thoroughly. Another true warrior descended from the same Indians as our ancestors. You’re telling me he was unable to kill this man Masters?”

  “A Texas Ranger intervened.”

  “A Texas Ranger? After all these years . . . I lost many relatives to their guns over the years in the border wars. The beginning of Mexico’s end as a proud nation. Perhaps changing all that begins here, eh?” Garza nodded slowly, to himself. “I think I will call our American associates, offer our services to handle this matter from this point on, so they can go about the things they are better suited for.”

  Garza reached for his phone and worked a number programmed into his speed dial.

  “Buenos días, Señor Delladonne. . . .”

  PART EIGHT

  Rangers continued to add to their legend during the 1950s. When inmates in the Rusk State Hospital for the Criminally Insane rioted and took hostages, Ranger Captain R. A. “Bob” Crowder and the leader of the mob had a conversation and the inmates surrendered.

  —Mike Cox, with updates from the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum Staff, “A Brief History of the Texas Rangers”

  73

  BAHRAIN, THE PRESENT

  “So what business exactly do the Texas Rangers have in Bahrain, Ms. Strong?”

  “Well, Mr. Smith,” Caitlin started. “I’m sorry, was it Jones?”

  “No, it’s Smith,” said the man behind the desk on the American Consulate’s second floor. “It was Jones yesterday.”

  The man smirked. He was tall and broad with a close-cropped military haircut and carried himself with a confidence bred from the kind of combat experience that stripped all fear. He reminded Caitlin of a milder version of Cort Wesley Masters without the edge or careless certainty. He wore a suit that was tight in his shoulders and chest but swam loosely closer to his narrow waist.

  “You knew I was coming.”

  “Your office notified the ambassador as a matter of protocol. He thought the reason for your visit might be more in my neck of the woods.”

  “He thought?”

  “It was a mutual decision.”

  “So you ask me about my business, but you already know why I’m here.”

  “I like to hear things firsthand. That way I can smile politely and send you on your way.”

  Caitlin had landed at Bahrain International Airport on the island of Al Muharraq barely an hour before. Stepping outside the terminal, she was assaulted by the heat. Every bit as oppressive as the Texas summer, the sun seeming to ride the tops of the office buildings forming the Manama skyline across the water beyond. The long flight had left her stiff and stuck to her clothes. A shower was what she really longed for, but there were more pressing concerns to take care of first.

  Caitlin had taken a taxi across the causeway into Manama, reaching the city’s diplomatic section minutes later. The pale, limestone American Consulate was nestled among similar buildings on the block, each enclosed by a gated fence that looked more decorative than protective. There were no Marine guards patrolling the meager grounds or standing their post at the entrance. Caitlin simply rang the buzzer alongside the front door, announced herself into a speaker, and heard a buzz followed by the door clicking open.

  At the reception desk, she asked to see the ambassador but was taken to the office of Mr. Smith instead.

  “You can understand my problem, I’m sure,” he resumed.

  “Actually, I can’t.”

  “Bahrain’s an ally, Ranger. We can’t have accusations of torture being levied against the government.”

  “I never said it was the government.”

  Smith, Jones, or whoever, tightened his brow. “Am I missing something here?”

  “An American, a resident of Texas, was tortured in this country. Just not, we believe, by any officials of Bahrain.”

  “Then I’m not really sure how I’m supposed to help you.”

  “You could show me around. If you’re too busy, I’ll just take the tour myself.”

  “And, what, look for buildings with signs reading Torture Is Us?”

  Caitlin gazed about Smith’s sparse office. “Wouldn’t happen to have one lying around here now, would you?”

  “That’s not funny, Ranger.”

  “Do I look like I’m laughing?”

  “Long way to come to tell a bad joke.”

  “The man who was tortured was my husband, Mr. Smith. How’s that for a punch line?”

  Smith settled back in his chair, going quiet. He gazed across the desk, sizing Caitlin up. “Hope you’re not expecting to make an arrest here.”

  “Nope. I’m just looking for the place where it happened.”

  “Why?”

  “Got my reasons.”

  Smith shifted his chair to face her head-on, making his shoulders look even broader. “You need to make them my reasons too, if you want my help.”

  “You speaking for the United States government, Mr. Smith?”

  “The relevant part of it for your purposes anyway.”

  “CIA?”

  Smith shrugged her comment off. “Put any three letters together, you’re bound to get something relevant, Ranger.”

  “What am I supposed to call you?”

  “Huh?”

  “You called me Ranger. How am I supposed to address you? I’m thinking maybe ‘Agent.’ ”

  “Mister will do.”

  Caitlin cocked her head slightly to the side. “No first name?”

  “Not today. We aren’t gonna know each other long enough to dispense with the formality.”

  “Know what?” Caitlin asked, feigning disappointment as she rose. “I get the point. Think I’ll just take my problem over to Bahrain’s interior ministry, see what they can do for me.”

  Smith sneered. “Nobody official will talk to you without a consulate official present.”

  “Don’t be so sure of that. I can be pretty persuasive.”

  “You don’t even speak the language.”

  “Do you?”

  “Enough to know how to lie.”

  “You lying now, Mr. Smith?”

  “I’m speaking English.”

  Caitlin leaned forward and laid her hands on the edge of the desk. “Two choices—that’s what you’ve got from where I’m standing. Either you help me out and I’m gone from your hair in less than a day. Or you don’t help me and watch me make a mess of things for you with your friends in the local government.”

  If Smith was riled, he didn’t show it. “Come on, a nice girl like you . . .”

  Caitlin spun the stiff wooden chair set before his desk around and straddled the seat. “Let me tell you a story. My dad was a Ranger too. One night he walked into a Laredo bar in search of information about who beat up a woman pretty bad. Knocked four of her teeth out, broke a couple ribs and an arm. She got away before he could rape her, and my dad came calling to see what the regulars inside could tell him. You know much about Texas, Mr. Smith?”

  “Not particularly, no.”

  “Well, suffice it to say Texans have a way of keeping to themselves and protecting their own. So my dad walks into this bar that’s not much more than a beer joint with a tackle shop in the front to a chorus of stares that could melt ice. He tries to handle things in a polite and friendly manner—diplomatic to use a term you’re more accustomed to.” Caitlin tightened her gaze and her tone. “But when that didn’t work he set the building on fire and got the information he needed from customers being
treated for smoke inhalation. Perpetrator’s truck was blocked in by a fire engine and my dad arrested him behind the wheel.”

  Smith’s eyes narrowed on her. “You threatening to burn down the consulate, Ranger Strong?”

  “Only metaphorically.”

  Smith’s eyes blinked more rapidly, weighing his options it looked like. “Tell you what, I’ll give you the rest of today. Whatever you find, or don’t find, you’re on a plane out of here first thing tomorrow.”

  “Sounds fair enough.”

  Smith pursed his lips, then curled his upper one over the lower. “Just empty your pockets first.”

  Caitlin rose and reached in with both hands. “I left my gun back in Texas.”

  “Not a gun I’m worried about,” Smith told her, “so much as matches.”

  74

  TERRELL HILLS, THE PRESENT

  “I thought we were finished,” Jimmy Farro said, after opening his front door to find Cort Wesley standing there.

  “We will be soon, podner. Just give me a few minutes of your time.”

  “Do I have a choice?”

  Cort Wesley’s answer was to brush past him inside. “Got any iced tea?”

  “In the fridge.”

  “I’ll pour you a glass too. We can drink them downstairs in your office.”

  Farro followed him into the kitchen, nerves in a jumble. “I’m trying to stay out of this kind of st-st-st-stuff.”

  “There you go with the stuttering again, Jimbo.”

  “I haven’t stuttered in five years.”

  “Leads me believe you don’t make me for the changed man I’ve become,” Cort Wesley said, pulling a pitcher of iced tea from the refrigerator. “Just wanna ask you a couple questions, podner. Be on my way again ’fore you know it.”

  “What k-k-k-kind of questions?”

  Cort Wesley found the glasses and laid two of them on the counter. “Tell you downstairs. You take sugar with your tea, Jimbo?”

  “I need to find manufacturing plants in Mexico,” he told Jimmy Farro when they were amid his array of computers.

  “You check the yellow pages?”

  “Do they make computers down there these days?”

  “Lenovo just opened a new plant. Take advantage of all that cheap labor.”

  “I’m not looking for Lenovo or anything else you can find in the yellow pages. I’m looking for places people would want to keep on the quiet.”

  “So what do you w-w-w-want from me?”

  “Tell me how to find them, podner.”

  “I’m not psychic, Cort Wesley.”

  “No, but you’re smart. Come on, you wanted to find a place that was manufacturing or assembling computer chips, what would you look for?”

  “Air exchangers,” Farro said with little hesitation.

  “Huh?”

  “Chips have to be produced in a clean environment, virtually sterile. You see videos, the workers are always wearing masks and latex gloves.”

  Cort Wesley looked as if he had never seen those videos.

  “But the biggest problem is dust, so chip assembly lines require these massive exchangers that basically clean the air to two parts per million on a continuous basis.”

  “I find who bought these air exchangers, I find who’s making chips.”

  “Maybe. Yeah. We d-d-d-done now?”

  Cort Wesley switched on the computer he was standing next to. “We will be, soon as you tell me who purchased these damn things down there.”

  It took two hours for Farro to generate the list Cort Wesley had come for. Since there were only a few manufacturers cranking out the kind of air exchangers required for chip assembly, he explained it was a relatively simple matter to hack their internal billing records to see where those exchangers had been shipped.

  “There’s more than I thought here, Cort Wesley,” Farro told him. “Any way we can narrow the search a bit?”

  “Go back to 2003 or so.”

  “The Cerberus chip,” Farro realized.

  “On the money as always, Jimbo.”

  Farro’s fingers glided effortlessly across the keyboard. “Got three addresses for you,” he reported. “No way to tell whether they’re legit or if the plants are st-st-st-still in operation.”

  “Just print them out for me, podner. Then I’ll be out of your hair.”

  75

  BAHRAIN, THE PRESENT

  “This is the place where the local authorities found him,” Caitlin told Smith, standing amid a sea of tourists at the Bab Al Bahrain marketplace.

  She could hear the sizzling of food roasting over open flames, the scents of garlic and lemon heavy in the air. There were tables set both outside in the sun and beneath the shade of a canopied veranda where several diners stood as opposed to exposing themselves to the intense heat. Caitlin imagined Peter standing here, starving and emaciated, felt the familiar flush of anger that continued to fuel her.

  “According to the report,” she continued, snapping off shots of the place with her disposable camera, “he proceeded here from City Gardens.”

  “Heading east then,” Smith surmised.

  “Important since his dazed state likely means he traveled in a straight line.”

  “From the west,” Smith said, looking back that way.

  “Yes.”

  “Lots of places to the west.”

  “But the condition of Peter’s feet and light sandals indicate he didn’t walk that far, maybe a mile, mile and a half or so.”

  Smith followed her gaze. “So we’re looking for a site generally within that distance from here.”

  “Pretty narrow grid. An office or apartment building.”

  “Not an office building,” Smith told her. “Office buildings have cleaning staffs. With apartments people keep to themselves.”

  “You’ve thought this out pretty well.”

  “I’ve got a good imagination.”

  “What kind of man tortures another?”

  “Why don’t you tell me?”

  The knowing, sententious look in Smith’s eyes told Caitlin as much as his words. “Guess you’ve done your research.”

  “I read your file, the kind nobody knows exists.”

  “I’m not proud of lots of things I’ve done.”

  “We all do what we have to, Ranger. Difference here is you weren’t under orders at the time.”

  “There a point to that?”

  “You enjoy the process?”

  “Not in the least.”

  “Tell yourself that long enough and maybe you’ll start buying it.”

  “I never did it again.”

  “Maybe if you had, you wouldn’t have needed a gun. So crass, Ranger. You should’ve given me a call, asked for a few pointers.”

  The casualness of his remark chilled her. “So those mules could’ve ended up with their brains scrambled like Peter.”

  “Instead they limp for the rest of their lives.”

  “You sound like you’re judging me.”

  “You think finding the men who tortured your husband will absolve you of your own indiscretions.”

  “Analyzing me now,” Caitlin said, shaking her head slowly.

  “Lessons of experience, Ranger. Take it for what it’s worth.”

  Caitlin clung to the shadows as best she could, the whole city like sitting inside a sauna, the heat building a throb in her head on top of the fact that Smith’s attitude made her fear she might knock his pearly teeth out the next time he flashed his sardonic grin. Finally, she just pulled the disposable camera from her pocket again and fired off more shots of the souq.

  “I saw pictures taken at the British Embassy where he was brought originally,” she said, once she had emptied half the roll. “He had patches of sunburn on his face, like in a grid.”

  “Say they left him by the sun during the hottest times of the day.”

  “Something you’ve done, Smith?”

  Smith’s expression didn’t even flicker. “Just say. Temperatur
e variances are a staple of benign interrogation.”

  Caitlin eyed him with disgust. “That term, benign interrogation, you’re kidding, right?”

  “You’re not the only one looking for a way to sleep at night, Ranger.”

  “I sleep just fine, thank you, Smith.”

  “Knowing you did what you had to.”

  “That’s right.”

  “You think it’s any different for people like me?”

  “It should be.”

  “Not what I asked you.”

  “It’s the question I’m answering all the same, Smith. Don’t try equating what I did in Juárez with what you’ve done just about everywhere else.”

  “Intelligence gathering, Ranger. It’s the same thing.”

  “No, it’s not.”

  “What’s the difference?”

  “I don’t do it for a living, Smith.”

  “Really? Could’ve fooled me.”

  Caitlin looked at him in silence.

  “Clock’s running, Ranger.”

  “I’d like us to check those buildings. Apartments, you said.”

  “Tell you what, we’ll go back to the consulate and I’ll set the computers to work on narrowing the list down a bit. See what we can see.”

  “So long as you find me that building, Smith.”

  “If nothing else, it’ll give us a chance to get better acquainted.”

  “Swap stories about inflicting pain.”

  “There’s a thought.”

  “I can’t wait,” Caitlin told him.

  76

  MEXICO, THE PRESENT

  The three addresses Jimmy Farro had come up with were all located in the Mexican state of Coahuila de Zaragoza, the first location in the violent border town of Nuevo Laredo. Once again, Cort Wesley had driven, only this time Caitlin Strong had insisted he use her SUV. He was grateful since, unlike Pablo Asuna’s now abandoned Ford, the air-conditioning worked and, even more important, the interior smelled of her. Not a sharp scent, just something soft like lilacs and some kind of talcum powder. It made the drive south from San Antonio that much more pleasurable.