“That old guy you were talking to?”
“That old guy was a Navy SEAL back in the day. Maybe he can’t run the surf the way he used to, but I’m guessing he knows how to knock the life out of these dickheads.”
“I was thinking we could double-team one of those tossers, grab his rifle, and take the fight to them.”
“Please don’t do that,” Zach said. “Too much risk of shit going badly. What I’d like for you to do is see if you can pick up more recruits.”
“You’re talking dangerous shite if they decide to curry favor with the lads in the uniforms.”
“Do what you think is right, then,” Zach said. “Trust your gut. Don’t do anything that doesn’t feel right.”
An angry voice called from Will’s side of the pool. “You! You two! No talking!” It was one of the soldiers.
Zach smiled and gave a little wave. “Let’s not either of us do something rogue,” he said as he rolled to his side and paddled away. “When the time comes, we’ll do something coordinated.”
* * *
“You’ll want to stash that rifle and vest,” Jonathan said. They’d assembled on the mulchy ground where they were largely obscured by foliage and vegetation. “If they catch you with that, you’ll find yourself in the middle of a gunfight for sure.”
“That means I won’t have any protection at all.” If there’d been enthusiasm for this mission in the beginning, it seemed to be dwindling.
“If they see you with a weapon, they’ll shoot without asking any questions,” Gail said. “That can’t end well for you.”
“How about if I stash something in the trees nearby? So if I need to run, I can get to it and shoot. At least I’ll have something if I need it.”
“Sure,” Jonathan said. It wasn’t worth the argument. In his own experience, there’d never been a time when he cursed life because he had a gun, but there’d been plenty of curses when he didn’t have one. The fact that he wasn’t sure the kid even knew how to shoot was another troubling factor. But that was for later. If it made him feel better, what the hell?
Jonathan moved to the next part of the plan. “Slinger, please give him your phone and dial in my number.” As Gail complied with the request, Jonathan said, “Keep the phone with you, and keep it on vibrate.”
“I’ll just mute it,” Tyler said.
“No,” Jonathan said. “Vibrate. If we need you for something, I want to be able to get through to you. Trust me, I’m not going to be calling to chat.”
“Only three people in the word know the number, anyway,” Gail said as she handed the phone over. “It’s a burner phone. I never travel with the real thing.”
“Too many secrets on it, right?” Tyler guessed.
“Something like that,” Jonathan said. “How confident are you about your final approach into the back side of the resort?”
“Pretty,” he said. He motioned for the tourist map and Jonathan gave it to him. “We’re way the hell over here on this side of the island.”
“There are kill teams out looking for us,” Gail reminded.
“We’ll provide escort for as long as we can,” Jonathan said. He pointed a finger at Tyler. “And you, young man, need to keep me in the loop. What you see, when you’re moving, and when you’re coming back out.”
“Okay, I will,” Tyler replied. “If we can work our way down to the golf course”—he pointed to a spot well inland from the northwest coast of the island—“I just need to cross the parking lot, and then I’ll be back in the trees and shrubs. I figure I can stay near the empty bungalows, cross behind them, and then drop into the service path, over here behind the pool.”
Jonathan sucked in a loud noseful of air. “That’s what, three or four hundred yards between the golf course and the pool area?”
“That’s a lot of exposure, Scorpion,” Gail said.
“Yes, it is,” he agreed.
“That’s why I want to have a gun.”
“No.” Gail and Jonathan said it together.
Jonathan explained, “One way or another, it will be a bad day if you get caught. But if you’re empty-handed, you’ll have a chance to talk your way out.”
“Isn’t it better to have a chance to shoot my way out?”
“They can take you out from five hundred yards,” Jonathan said. “Not all gunfights are like the movies. In fact, none of them are.”
“Why don’t you go with him?” Jaime asked.
“Same reasons,” Jonathan said. “Us getting killed will do nothing to help anyone.”
“But Ty getting killed will?”
“I don’t put my weapons down for anyone,” Jonathan said. There was a threatening rumble to his voice.
“I get it, Jaime,” Tyler said. “I really do. The trick is to not get caught, and if I do get caught, the trick is talk like hell.”
“I’m going to go with you,” Jaime said.
Jonathan recoiled from the words. “Whoa. Come again?”
“I can’t let you go alone. I taught you all the back ways that you know, but you don’t know all the ones I know.”
Tyler looked startled.
Jaime bobbled his head as he hedged. “There are utility tunnels,” he said. “They go pretty much everywhere.”
“Tunnels?” Tyler said. “And in all this time you never told me?”
“Hey, a guy’s got to have secrets, you know?” Jaime sold it with a smile.
Jonathan found himself fully engaged. “When you say ‘they go pretty much everywhere,’ what does that mean?”
“It means that tunnels bring steam, electricity, and cable TV to every place on the resort,” Jaime explained. “We stay pretty much at thirty degrees year-round, but some nights will dip into the low twenties. I remember one whole week where it never got above twenty-two.”
Jonathan understood that he was speaking of centigrade. He translated on the fly to hear swings from the nineties to the low seventies on the Fahrenheit scale. “Are these tunnels big enough to enter?”
Jaime nodded. “I don’t like going down there, but I will if I have to.”
“Wait,” Gail said. “How can there be tunnels to every bungalow? Hidden basements?”
Jonathan’s mind swam at the opportunities. If they could directly access each of the bungalows—
Jaime dialed back a little. “Okay, no. I see what you’re getting at. You can’t get to every bungalow, but you can get close. There are central stacks, one for every cluster of bungalows. The final plumbing connections branch off from the stacks and run under the walkways to the bungalows themselves. If something breaks between the stack and a bungalow, all we have to do is dig up the path to fix it. But the main lines run through the tunnels.”
“Can we get into the Plantation House from a tunnel?” Tyler asked. “It has a below-grade loading dock. Wait, is that what that locked room is for?”
Jaime explained, “There’s a creepy-looking locked room that Ty has been begging to see.”
“You said you didn’t know what was in there.”
“It was better than telling you and then living with your whining when I wouldn’t take you there.” He turned back to Jonathan. “That is the only access to the tunnels through a door.”
Jonathan felt himself deflate. “Well, shit. Under the circumstances, it’s asking a lot to break into the basement of the Plantation House.”
“You don’t have to,” Jaime said. “You can get into the tunnels through the stacks.”
“I don’t know about utility tunnels,” Gail said. “What are these stacks you keep talking about?”
“They look like garden houses,” Jaime said.
She scowled, then got it. “The little gnome houses in the flower beds?” Each of the bungalow clusters featured a unique, bright-colored little cottage in the central garden with statues of big-eared, smiling gnomes involved with various gardening endeavors.
Jaime chuckled at the phrase. “Yes, the gnome houses.”
“Isn’t th
ere a concern about children or animals getting in there?” Jonathan asked.
“Animals get in all the time,” Jaime said. “But there are heavy grates at the bottom of every stack—gnome house—and those are locked.”
“Please tell me you have the keys with you,” Gail said.
“They’re back in the shanty.”
Jonathan stood. “Then let’s get back to the shanty,” he said. As he walked, the others followed. “Okay, listen, guys. I need to make a phone call.”
* * *
“How come everything in Mexico looks alike?” Jesse Montgomery asked as he watched the sagging pastel buildings pass by.
He’d been expecting a snarky answer from his father, so he was surprised when Davey said, “That’s what generations of corruption and poverty do to a place. It doesn’t help when that place gets invaded every hundred years or so.”
This was Jesse’s second trip below America’s southern border in just a few months—for much the same purpose—and he couldn’t help but notice that there was a hopelessness to the poverty down here. He’d been to South Central Los Angeles, and he’d gotten lost in the slums of Chicago and D.C. and Memphis over the years, but as slummy as those slums were, at least the structures seemed sound, and the water was drinkable. Down here, he got the sense that everybody walked along the edge of death. There was a foreverness to the poverty here that depressed him.
And yet almost everyone he made eye contact with smiled.
“Be careful, kid. They all want something from you.” It was as if Davey had read his mind. “It’s the cool car and the white skin.” At the airport, Davey had sprung for a BMW rag top at the rental-car place. Jesse knew that the words that registered as racism were meant as a practical observation.
As so many racist comments were.
Jesse decided to change the subject. “I thought we were supposed to keep a low profile this time. You know, because of the last time.” On their last visit to Mexico—to the northern coast—they’d left a lot of dead people behind. That the dead were all part of a drug cartel actually made it worse because they were the people who ran the police departments.
“You’re gonna get an ulcer if you always worry about the little stuff,” Davey said, winking at him across the center console. “We haven’t done anything wrong, and as far as I know, nobody could possibly know that we were the ones who lit up that night. It’s a nice day. Enjoy the sunshine and shit-smelling humidity.”
Jesse laughed. The air did reek of shit, and not the herbal cow-and-horse variety. This shit smelled like humans or big dogs. Mixed with the stench of decaying fish that wafted from the marshland behind the sagging buildings. “We’re really not stealing anything on this trip, right?” Jesse asked.
“That’s the way I understand it,” Davey said. “I’ve got two hundred fifty large in my bag. That should buy us a pretty nice boat.”
Jesse wasn’t sure he’d heard correctly. He leaned forward and pivoted his head to the left to get Davey’s attention. “You’ve got a quarter of a million dollars in your bag?” Incredulity had spiked his voice higher and louder.
“That’s the very opposite of the low profile you were talking about,” Davey said through a laugh. “And it sounds like so much more when you use the M-word.”
“Where did you get that kind of cash?”
“Your inheritance fund.”
Whatever Davey saw in his son’s face made him laugh.
“I’m kidding,” he said. “The only way you’ll ever get that kind of money on your own is if you make it. Big Guy wired it to my account, and I cashed it out because I figured the banks down here would choke on it.”
“So, you’re just going to hand two hundred fifty thousand dollars to a stranger?”
“What are you so shocked about? It’s not like it’s going to a panhandler. We’re going to get a big-ass speedboat in return.”
“That’s what boats cost?”
“For something fast and durable, yeah. I’m hoping that the greenback nature of the transaction will get us a discount.”
“Where are you going to find the boat?”
“Mother Hen already found it for us,” Davey said. He pointed ahead and to the right. “That’s the marina, right there. We’re supposed to meet a guy named Esteban Gris.”
Jesse felt a little overwhelmed. “When did all this planning happen?”
“Before I called you,” Davey said. “And a little more while you were primping for the mirror.”
Davey piloted the rental through the open front gates and pulled to a stop in front of a construction trailer lookalike sporting a hand-painted sign that read, OFFICINA.
“I don’t speak a lot of Spanish,” Davey said, “but I’m guessing that says office.”
To Jesse’s eye, the place was less a marina than a boneyard. A few vessels bobbed at moorings, but the majority—powerboats, shrimp boats, and a couple of sailboats, along with three rusting ambulances and a school bus—sat on the ground. Wooden wedges constructed of what looked like scrap lumber kept the landlocked boats from keeling over.
“The beauty just never stops, does it?” Davey quipped.
Jesse opened his door first and stepped out. He could hear the sounds of people working, but none of them were visible to him. He waited for Davey’s lead, then followed him up the three creaky steps. He expected him to knock, but he just walked in. “Hola,” he said to the man behind the desk.
The guy looked to be in his late forties, with a thick middle and a bald head. “Good afternoon,” he said. “I speak English, so you don’t have to torture the Spanish language.” He closed the smut magazine he’d been reading and laid it in the middle of the other crap on his desk.
“I guess I need to get better at my pronunciation,” Davey said. “You know, since all you Mexicans are franchising out to Texas.”
Jesse’s stomach tensed. Clearly, Davey didn’t like this guy’s attitude. That said, it was entirely unclear how the trading of insults could do much to further the business of the day.
“You must be the gringos the lady called about. I am Esteban Gris. What kind of boat are you looking for?”
“What did the lady tell you?” Davey asked. There was a verbal chess game going on that Jesse didn’t understand. He knew to stay quiet, though.
“She said that you wanted something fast, and that you were going to pay cash. She wanted to know if I had a problem accepting cash.”
“Dare I ask what your answer was?” Davey had shifted to a fighter’s stance. It was a subtle thing, but Jesse had seen it before. He kept his arms crossed against his chest, but he bladed his body a couple of degrees and put his weight on both legs.
Esteban seemed to see the shift, too. After only a second or two, he broke out into a big laugh. “I told her that cash is always welcome here.” He stood. “Come, let me show you what I have in stock.”
Davey stepped out of the fat man’s way.
“Please,” Esteban said. “Lead the way.”
“Nope.” As an afterthought, he added, “After you.”
As Esteban crossed the threshold and was out of view, Davey leaned close to Jesse and said, “Watch his hands, and don’t let anyone get too close to you.” He straightened and then followed their host.
Jesse didn’t get it, but he knew better than to question it. When he was growing up, he hadn’t had a lot of opportunity to hang out with his old man, but now that Jesse was out of prison, and Davey was out of the Navy, they’d had some meaningful time together. Jesse had come to admire the guy’s ability to read people, and to respect his ability to bring a quick end to a mortal threat. If Davey sensed that something was out of place, the smart money said that there was something out of place.
“How much range do you need?” Esteban asked as they headed toward the boneyard.
“The most I can get for the money,” Davey said. “Count on a thousand-kilo load.”
Esteban whistled. “That is a lot of blow,” he said.
/> Jesus, he thinks we’re smuggling drugs. “Wait,” Jesse said. “We’re not—”
Davey silenced him mid-word with a glare.
“You are not what?” Esteban pressed.
“We’re not in the mood to chat,” Davey said. A second weaponized glare drove his point a few inches deeper.
“If you have ninety-five thousand dollars to spend, I have a cigarette boat for you. The boy can learn what it was like during the Miami Vice days.” Esteban laughed at his own joke.
Jesse had no idea what the man was talking about. And Davey didn’t seem to care. “Bigger than that,” he said. “More along the lines of a Sunseeker Camargue.”
Esteban turned and started walking backward. “So, you have real money,” he said, and he bounced his eyebrows, oozing sleaze. “I can make your day. I have that very boat, but she’s a few years old.”
“How many is a few?”
“About fifteen years.”
Davey stopped and planted his fists on his hips, drawing everyone else to a halt, as well. “About?”
“She is nineteen years old,” Esteban said with a smile. “I am a salesman, after all.”
“Does she float?”
“She floats and she runs—how do you gringos say it? She runs like a top.”
Jesse didn’t believe a word the guy said.
“I’ll take a look at it,” Davey said.
Esteban led them to a hard right and Jesse found himself in a canyon of boats, dozens of them, stacked three-high in some places. Most were pretty small, and a couple would qualify in Jesse’s mind as yachts. He saw wooden hulls and fiberglass hulls. Some of the powerboats were missing engines.
“Where do you get your inventory?” Davey asked.
“It’s all legal, I assure you,” Esteban said.
“That’s not even close to an answer.”
“Why does it matter to you?”
Davey said, “I like to know who I’m dealing with. Let me tell you what I believe to be the case. I think that when people with boats need money, you take their boats as collateral. Then when people like me come along looking for a boat, you sell them something that does not belong to you in the first place.”
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