Meltdown

by Chuck Holton

  The major’s sly smile answered the question before he dropped the bombshell. “Believe it or not, we’re headed back to Panama.”

  20

  THE CELL PHONE warbling on the dashboard brought Edgar out of a dream about the beautiful sangre de toro birds that chirped outside his rented villa in Cartagena. He blinked and then squinted against the bright sun outside, then remembered where he was—the last place he wanted to be. He couldn’t understand why anyone would voluntarily take up residence in the sun-seared desert that was Las Vegas.

  The text message that had just arrived was exactly what he’d been waiting for: directions to his meeting with the men he was now regretting having hired. He pried open his phone and read the message.

  “Chevron. Alamo. Two hours.”

  Edgar grimaced, wondering what the message meant.

  Ten minutes later, after consulting a telephone book borrowed from a convenience-store clerk, he had his answer. Alamo was a tiny village ensconced in the rugged no man’s land seventy miles north of Las Vegas. He surmised that the gang members had gone there to hide until the flames of their recent handiwork had died down in the city.

  Did they not realize the dangers they were exposing him to? Did they care? The city was in an uproar after the casino bombing-tourism had dropped to almost nothing overnight, and the police force was working double shifts to track down the culprits. And those were precisely the men he had to meet with.

  The final instructions he’d received might have sounded simple—recover the remaining product and destroy it. But he knew MS-13 well—they were just the type of thugs who would find a way to make it his fault, and demand more money for it.

  Nevertheless, he had to find a way to retrieve the remaining ITEB. Instead of launching the final “rain of fire” attack with the product he had left, the gringo had inexplicably instructed him to simply destroy it.

  Edgar knew what the ITEB was worth—he himself had distilled it and sold it to the gringo. Though now that they had actually met, Edgar had to wonder what line of work the man was in to afford the ridiculous price he had paid. So far, however, Edgar had seen only half of the money. Something now told him he should have taken that portion and forgotten the rest, but his greed had gotten the better of him. If he survived to collect his pay, he would be able to really disappear in style.

  He kissed the three rings on his left hand—El Padre, El Hijo, El Espíritu Santo—-as he pulled the Expedition onto Highway 93 toward Alamo. He had an hour’s drive to think of the best way to handle MS-13.

  By the time he had driven across the desolate desert separating Las Vegas from Alamo, he had formulated a good plan. So many years in business had taught him the art of diplomacy—and where that failed, he wasn’t averse to outright flattery. Yes, make the gangsters think they had done a great job, that they had earned their pay well even though they had failed to carry out the other objectives they were given. All that mattered was completing the job and escaping from this miserable country.

  Alamo seemed larger than he expected as he pulled into town. Perhaps that was because the highway looked out from the side of one mountain range with nothing to block the view as far as the next range of scraggly peaks, with the entire town visible in between. Edgar was not used to such vastness.

  He had scarcely rolled to a stop at the gas station when a young, jeans-clad punk emerged from the store wearing dark sunglasses and a red bandanna on his head. His emotionless face wore a wisp of a goatee. His skinny arms were adorned with various tattoos, and he walked with a ridiculous swagger that was doubtlessly intended to make him look tough, but in reality gave him the appearance of someone who had lost one shoe.

  The kid approached his window. “You looking for Cholo?”

  “Sí.”

  “I’m s’posed to take you to him, yo.”

  Edgar pursed his lips. He didn’t like this at all, but there wasn’t much choice. He had to get to Cholo. He looked back at the punk. “Get in.”

  With the young gangster slouched in the passenger seat and giving directions with monosyllabic grunts, Edgar drove back south about five miles out of town. There, the kid indicated the entrance to what looked like a farm situated among old cottonwood trees that stood beside a small stream. A cluster of dilapidated buildings was visible from the road.

  Edgar looked at the punk. “This is it?”

  “You got it, abuelo.”

  Edgar wanted to backhand the kid. “I’m not your grandfather.”

  He drove the SUV down the bumpy dirt driveway. When they reached the shade of the trees, he spied Cholo’s blood-red Imperial parked inside a wooden machine shed. The gangbanger was leaning against the open trunk, muscled arms crossed over what might have been the same white tank top he’d been wearing the last time they’d met.

  Edgar stepped from the vehicle and conjured up his best politician’s smile. “There you are, Cholo.” He walked toward the leader, who hadn’t moved and simply stared at him through dark sunglasses. “You did well, my friend.” Edgar lied on both counts. “I have come to settle our business.” On that, he was telling the truth.

  Cholo acted as if he hadn’t heard. Instead he reached into the trunk of the car and produced a bottle of ITEB, holding it up to the light. “Hey, ese, where did these bottles come from?”

  Edgar stopped in his tracks, surprised by the question. Drops of sweat formed on his brow. “Where?” he answered. Should I say? Does it matter now? Probably not, he decided. “They came from Panama.”

  Cholo raised his chin a notch. “You got any more?”

  “No, I…” Edgar didn’t like where this was going. “I just came to give you what I owe you. But I need to get the remaining bottles back from you.”

  For a moment, nobody said anything. Tension hung like the oppressive humidity in Cartagena before a rainstorm. At last Edgar knew for sure that bringing MS-13 into this had been a very, very big mistake.

  Cholo shook his head, almost in slow motion. “No, I think we would rather keep it, you know? We can find good uses for it.” He turned and placed the bottle back into the padded crate Edgar had given him.

  Anger burned hot in Edgar’s face. How can I make him understand? He took a step toward the thug. “Listen, you have—” He stopped midsentence when he realized he was now talking into the barrel of a large automatic handgun.

  Edgar felt the blood drain from his face. He put his hands up in surrender and began backing toward the SUV. “Listen, Cholo, we can work a deal. Let me pay you and see what I can—”

  At first, the explosion in Cholo’s fist seemed to have nothing to do with the white-hot sledgehammer that struck Edgar in the abdomen. He clutched his gut and fell backward onto the dusty ground. He looked around for someone who would help him but saw only the impassive faces of the other gang members. The young punk who had led him there stood off to one side, desperately trying to maintain his tough exterior after watching what was probably his first murder.

  It was not supposed to end like this.

  Edgar looked down at the spreading stain around his midsection. He could feel every slowly fading beat of his heart as his lifeblood leaked through the three rings on his left hand. The searing pain made it impossible to breathe. He looked up and saw that Cholo now had the pistol in his waistband and was barking out orders in Spanish to his men.

  This is what it is like to die.

  But then the anger returned. Nobody crossed Edgar Oswardo Lerida, or Gustavo Soto for that matter. In his former life, when he’d been known as Oswardo, nobody would have dared do such a thing.

  He could feel weakness entering his limbs as the blood continued to pump onto the ground. Blackness slithered around the edges of his vision. But his anger burned hotter by the second. He would teach them.

  With great effort, he reached a bloody hand into his pocket and found the small plastic keychain he’d never gotten a chance to use back in Panama. It had remained with him ever since as a subtle reminder of his former lif
e. The tiny transmitter in it had been designed to work over a distance of several hundred yards, but he knew he didn’t need that much range now. The receivers for this device were embedded in the car tire valve-stem covers he had packed with only a gram of plastic explosive each. He’d dropped those innocuous objects into the box he’d given to Cholo. Each contained the explosive power of barely more than a child’s firecracker, but just one was enough to cause a “car accident” by making a tire “blow out” on a dangerous curve. But also just powerful enough to shatter a glass bottle.

  Edgar Oswardo Lerida raised a trembling, bloody hand and with great effort kissed each of the three rings he wore. El Padre, El Hijo, El Espíritu Santo. Soon he would know if any of the three existed, though he suddenly wished not to know. But if he was destined for hell, at least he would not be making the trip alone.

  With the last of his energy he pointed the plastic keychain at Cholo’s car. Then he closed his eyes and pushed the button.

  The taste of revenge was incredibly sweet for the instant before it was swallowed by fire.

  Nagar Singh shuffled past the six-foot birdcage and stopped to peer at the magnificent scarlet macaw inside. The bird eyed him warily, shifting its weight from one foot to the other.

  “Hello, Nancy,” Singh said. “Hungry?” His eyes twinkled at the resplendent creature. Its variegated plumage displayed such bright yellows, blues, reds, and greens that he often wondered if it had flown through a rainbow.

  Squawk! The bird’s answer made him smile. Nancy was always hungry.

  The bird had become his friend in the week since he started his new job, as much as a bird and a man could be friends, anyway. They had a lot in common, Nancy and he. They were both more or less confined, though the bird had not chosen its cage.

  Singh actually enjoyed the idea of living in this beautiful home, a new life in a peaceful and tranquil place. His new job had taken him to a remote mountainous region, far away from the smog, crime, and traffic of city life. Here, the air was clean and cool all year, and the verdant flora that stretched away from the large ranch house where he worked was always in bloom, as if stuck in perpetual springtime.

  No more would he have to contend with the constant stream of picky and pampered hotel guests who hurried through their vacations at a frantic pace and expected him to move even faster. When his new employer had approached him about moving here, Singh had been all too content to leave his old job to younger men. Here he would spend the rest of his useful life simply keeping this magnificent house in order, a job made easier by the fact that there were so few visitors.

  It was like heaven on earth, except that he was still a servant. He didn’t mind that part, though. It gave him purpose.

  Singh stole a glance at the helicopter that was parked even now across the lawn from the glass sliding door that framed a volcano in the distance. The flying machine looked like a fishbowl with a few skinny palm fronds attached to the top. When his employer had arrived, it had buzzed in like an annoyed dragonfly and scattered leaves and grass in all directions. A fearful sight.

  He shook his head. “No, thank you, Nancy. I’m happy to leave the flying to you.”

  The bird shrieked again, but this time it began pacing back and forth on its perch, as if looking for a place to hide.

  “What is it, girl?”

  Squawk! Squawk! Squawk! The macaw was frantic now, jumping from side to side and flapping its wings.

  Then Singh heard it: a sound like low, rolling thunder in the distance. He slid open the glass door and cocked an ear to the sky. The rumbling increased. Now it was an angry throbbing that echoed from one mountain peak to another across the secluded valley. Nancy was trying to fly through the bars of her cage.

  It wasn’t until he saw the black monsters appear over the top of the house that he recognized the very different sound of military helicopters. And suddenly a ride on the dragonfly didn’t seem so bad.

  Sweeney’s stomach jumped into his throat as the Huey helicopter plunged through a break between two heavily forested mountains. He gripped the seat and held on, his jaw set, gripping the silenced Heckler and Koch MP5 submachine gun in his right hand.

  In the briefing they’d been given on the flight from Frankfurt to Panama, he’d learned that an Israeli had been apprehended while trying to leave the country from Washington Dulles airport. An alert rental car agent had been cleaning up the man’s rental car when he’d noticed that the saved route data in the on-board GPS showed the car had been in the vicinity of both ITEB explosions east of the Mississippi. He’d reported it to the authorities, who had picked up the man in the terminal. A search of his briefcase had yielded a cellular phone.

  Apparently one of the incoming calls on the Israeli’s phone had originated from a remote Panamanian ranch high up in the mountains near the Costa Rican border. Somewhere just ahead and below him right now. Someone in Langley felt it was significant enough to send in Task Force Valor.

  Sweeney thought it was a long shot, but if the men responsible for the mayhem unfolding at home happened to be here, he planned to make them pay.

  By what he could discern from the grim looks on the teammates seated around him, he might have to wait in line.

  John Cooper, who was wearing an extra headset to listen to the pilots, looked up at him and held out a finger. “One minute!”

  The chopper banked hard around a steep ridgeline, and then Sweeney saw it. A sprawling ranch house surrounded by manicured lawns, nestled in the bottom of the valley next to a crystal-clear mountain stream. Three other helicopters were already on the ground, and Panamanian commandos could be seen swarming across the grounds.

  Sweeney’s jaw clenched tighter. They should have let us go in first. Sure, it was their country, and he grudgingly understood why Panama’s president wanted his own guys making the capture and arrest. But that didn’t mean he had to like it.

  Mary, who was sitting across from him, reached over and punched him on the arm, her eyes unreadable behind mirrored goggles. She had a headset similar to John’s. She shouted over the thrup-thrup-thrup of the Huey’s rotors. “They’ve got three guys in custody!”

  Sweeney gave her a thumbs-up. “Let’s hope there aren’t thirty more waiting in the jungle!” His grip tightened on the MP5 submachine gun as the helicopter dropped into the clearing behind the ranch house and flared for landing.

  The second its skids met earth, Sweeney followed Rip, Frank Baldwin, John, and Phoenix out the far side door. As he did, he caught sight of the major’s aircraft above them coming in for landing.

  The five ran for the back of the house, weapons at the ready but still on Safe. Four Panamanian Frontera police officers dressed in olive-drab fatigues and black Kevlar vests waved them over to a large glass double door.

  They burst into a spacious parlor filled with more of the olive-suited Panamanian special police. In the center of the room, however, Sweeney spotted a set of leather couches arranged around a square glass table. On the couch, facing away from the door, sat three men with their hands held atop their heads by gun-toting policemen.

  Sweeney watched as John began working his way around in front of the suspects—and then stopped suddenly. John’s grim expression melted into one of disbelief. His mouth dropped open, and the color drained from his face. “Oh God, it can’t be!”

  Sweeney moved to his side, then gaped at the figure seated in the middle of the couch.

  It was Michael Lafontaine.

  To Lafontaine’s left sat a slim young man with darker skin and wide blue eyes that had terror and confusion in them. To Lafontaine’s right was an old man in a white turban.

  Lafontaine’s face bore a resolute frown, but his granite eyes showed none of the intensity that he was known for. Now they showed only sadness. “I’m sorry, John. I’m sorry you had to come here and see this.”

  Mary stepped forward. “John, do you know this man?”

  But John was still speechless.

  Rip answered f
or him. “This is Michael Lafontaine—he’s John’s godfather.”

  Mary’s eyebrows shot up. “The one that is supposed to be dead?”

  “That one, yeah.”

  John’s face turned red. “You are responsible for this? You’re the reason we’ve had to trek all over the planet tracking down this explosive?”

  Lafontaine shook his head. “No, John. I didn’t make the stuff. Actually, when I heard about your mission in Lebanon, I promised your father I would do whatever it took to help you. I started by getting in touch with some of my old contacts in this part of the world.” He sighed, his eyes riveted on the floor. “That’s where this all began for me.”

  Sweeney was confused. “Wait up. How were you trying to help, exactly? By the looks of what’s happening in the States right now, your aid hasn’t amounted to much that I would call helpful.”

  Lafontaine looked grim. “The arms dealer who was distilling ITEB was already shipping it all over. I contacted him and offered to buy the entire stockpile as long as he guaranteed he would take the entire remaining product off the market.”

  “Have you read the news lately?” Sweeney spat. “ITEB is blowing up everywhere!”

  A fire ignited behind Lafontaine’s expression. “And what effect is it having? Think about it, John. Finally, Americans are realizing how fragile their beloved economy is. They are realizing that Homeland Security is a farce. And the politicians—the same politicians that couldn’t seem to get anything accomplished even when I was pumping hundreds of thousands into their reelection coffers—are now passing resolutions faster than any Congress since the Second World War.”

  Mary was incredulous. “You planned all this?”

  Lafontaine turned his eyes away. “I did what had to be done. What no one else was willing to do.”

  “Even faking your own death?” Mary said.

  He looked back at her. “Of course. The idea came from a book, actually. One I read long ago, where all of the difference-makers in society disappear and leave a corrupt culture to face the consequences of its own corruption.”