by James Lepore
“Can I get you something?” said Maria, who had remained standing. “Beer, coffee, a drink?”
“I’ll take a beer,” said Dunn.
“Nothing,” said Jay.
“Is Shaw dead?” Dunn asked. The house was too quiet, the night too still and hot, Angelo and Maria too stricken-looking for there to be anything but bad news.
“No. He’s okay,” Angelo answered. “I just got back from the hospital. He was in surgery, but his wife said it wasn’t critical. His shoulder’s torn up.”
“Where’s Miss Perez?” Jay asked.
“She’s not here,” Angelo replied, staring at Maria, who had returned from the kitchen with Frank’s bottle of Corona, and was standing in the doorway, holding it.
“She ran,” Maria said, stepping forward and placing the beer on the table in front of Frank.
“Fuck,” said Jay.
“What happened?” Frank asked, pulling the Corona to him, and lifting it to take a long drink.
“She had a gun. Libby came with the papers—a passport, a driver’s license, and credit cards. When she left, Isabel pointed the gun at me. I had already given her the money, twenty-five hundred dollars. She called a cab. When it came, she left. I’m sorry.”
“Where was she going?” Jay asked.
“We think Mexico,” said Angelo.
“What name was on the passport and license?”
“Isabel Sanchez-Hill of Miami,” Maria replied.
“And the credit cards?” asked Frank.
“I don’t know. Fictitious names. Libby applies for them, gets them, and sells them. These had fifteen hundred dollar cash advance limits. She was very proud of her work.”
“Why Mexico?” Jay asked.
“She said she had documents there, and tapes,” Angelo answered, “that would incriminate the Mexican attorney general in the drug trade. She thinks she could bargain them for her life. Those two shooters tonight killed your buddy and were at the restaurant to kill her. They must have recognized you from your picture in the paper in Jersey, which was Agent Markey’s idea—using you as a decoy to draw them out. He was planning on doing the same thing here—planting your picture and naming your hotel in the Herald. That’s what Gary Shaw came by to tell me.”
“Where in Mexico?” Jay asked.
“We don’t know,” Maria answered.
“No idea?”
“No.”
“Is she Mexican?”
“Yes. She said she was born there, an orphan.”
“Where was she living?”
“Above the restaurant. There’s a small apartment.”
“Have you looked through it?” Jay asked.
“No. I was waiting for Angelo. He just got back. Jay, I’m very sorry. She said she would talk to you, tell you how your friend died, before she ran. It was such a small request, I believed her.”
“It’s okay, Maria,” said Jay. “A talk is nothing. I would not have settled for a talk.”
Dunn stayed with Maria while Angelo drove Jay to El Pulpo. When they got there, there were two couples having a late dinner in the dining room. Sam was playing dominoes with Victor Ponce at the bar. Angelo joined them, first pointing Jay to the back stairway near the kitchen that led to the apartment.
It was not an apartment, Jay found, but rather one room, with a sloped ceiling and a window facing the parking lot. Under one eave was a single bed, neatly made, with a brown jute rug on the floor next to it. Under the opposite eave was a four drawer dresser, with a lamp on top that came on when Jay flipped the switch by the door. There was a small table under the window with a second lamp on it that he also switched on. The hardwood floor was worn bare, and there was nothing on the walls. Outside Jay could hear the clank of garbage cans in the alley behind the kitchen and, faintly, the traffic on Calle Ocho, always busy on a Friday night. Next to the bed was a small closet that was empty, its door standing open.
Isabel Perez’s scent was in the room, the aroma of her perfumes, soap, and lotions lingering in the hot night air, as if she had showered, dressed, and gone out only moments ago. Two small jars of face cream and a bottle of cologne stood on a flimsy plastic tray—something swiped from a cheap hotel—next to the lamp on the otherwise naked dresser top. Except for these there was no trace of Isabel in the room, nothing in the dresser drawers, nothing under the rug or the bed, nothing in the bedding, which Jay tore apart. Nothing, except her scent. He flicked off the table lamp, and then, before leaving, picked up the bottle of cologne, twisted off its top, and brought it to his nostrils, the smell, sweet and clean, reminding him sharply of Danny: Danny had smelled this scent, been close to this woman.
He fumbled with the bottle’s tiny plastic cap as he tried to replace it, and it fell to the floor and rolled under the dresser. When he bent down to retrieve it, he saw what he thought was a small box in the shadow at the back of the old chest of drawers. This turned out to be a packet of letters in yellowed envelopes bound by a faded red ribbon. On top was a cheap scapular medal—a green line image of the Virgin Mary on a square piece of white cloth tucked into a clear plastic protective cover. He extracted the first letter from its envelope. It was written in a chaste and unadorned script, like the vows taken by its author:My dearest Isabelita,
As you know, we are not allowed to have money or possessions, but even if we were, the Blessed Mother would be the best gift I could give you. May she be with you always as you enter your new life. Please keep in touch with me. I fear I will be lonely without you, and though I must bear all suffering for Christ, sometimes it is difficult, and your serenity and beauty of heart have brought much joy to my life.
With great affection and hope for your future, I am, your friend,
Josefina de los Angeles, O.P.
August 25, 1991
At the top of the faded, yellowing letter was the name and address of the Convent of Santa Maria in Polanco, Mexico City.
Jay reached for the switch near the door and turned off the light, and as he did, the room now pitch-dark, he felt the muzzle of a gun at the side of his head, and a woman’s voice said, “I came back for that.”
Jay gathered himself, smelling again the same scent he had just sniffed from the bottle on the dresser, gauging the position of Isabel in the room, and the distance between them, the outline of her body beginning to take shape in the darkness only a foot or two away, slightly behind him and to his left.
“You must be Miss Perez. Isabelita.”
Silence.
“You steal from your friends, then you return for this,” said Jay, snapping open the letter in his left hand, and simultaneously ducking and swinging with his right fist, aiming for Isabel’s midsection and hitting her squarely—and very hard—directly in the stomach. As she grunted and bent swiftly forward in reaction to the blow, Jay grabbed her gun arm and twisted it, bringing her to the floor on her stomach, the gun clattering away. Holding her arm twisted behind her, his knee pressed to the small of her back, Jay caught his breath, and again paused to get his bearings. Accustomed now to the darkness, the light from a streetlamp spilling softly in through the window, he spotted the gun on the floor near the bed, and was able to reach it with his free hand.
“Let me up,” said Isabel. “I can do you no harm.” She was winded, her words coming in swift spurts between deep breaths.
“Where’s your passport?”
“In my purse. I dropped it when you struck me.”
Jay saw the purse near the door.
“Dan spoke of you,” Isabel said.
“Was that before or after he was tortured? Or during?”
“I was not a part of that.”
“And you don’t steal from your friends,” Jay said, his breathing returning to normal, but unable to keep the anger from his voice. “And betray them.”
“I can help you get your revenge. I know that is what you want. Please let me up. My arm hurts, and I am sick.”
“How?”
Before Isabel could ans
wer, the door swung open and the dresser lamp went on. Angelo was standing in the doorway holding his gun straight out before him.
“Fuck,” he said, taking in the scene.
Jay released Isabel, and got to his feet.
“I see you found our friend,” said Angelo.
“She found me.”
“I’ll call the police.”
“No, don’t,” Jay said. “Leave me alone with her for a second, then we’ll decide.”
“Whose gun is that?”
“Hers.”
Isabel had rolled over and, rubbing her right arm—the one that Jay had twisted behind her and jammed almost up to her neck—dragged herself to the bed, where she sat on the floor, her head against the mattress. She was wearing black jeans and espadrilles, and a white blouse, which had gotten dirty and had come out of her pants while Jay was scraping her on the floor. She worked to tuck it back in now, clutching the neckline, where the three top buttons had been torn off.
“Take her purse, Ange,” Jay said. “The passport’s in it, and the money, too, probably. I won’t be long—a few minutes.”
“I’ll be in the bar,” said Angelo. “Don’t be long. The police were here talking to Sam. They said they’d be back to talk to the staff.” He picked the purse up off of the floor and left.
Jay sat on the floor across from Isabel, his back against the dresser, the gun, a lightweight revolver, in his right hand, which he rested on his drawn-up knees.
“Tell me how you can help me,” he said.
“The man I work for, Herman Santaria, is looking for me, to kill me I am sure,” Isabel replied. “If I call him, and tell him where I am, he will send his two killers—the ones who killed your friend—to kill me. You can be waiting for them. I will do that for you, but I must be in a position where I can flee immediately upon making the call. Also, I have hard proof that Santaria, his brother Lazaro, and a man named Rafael de Leon—the top aide to the president—have been in the drug and money laundering business for many years. They have committed murders, and worse. I have been thinking that it would be difficult for me to simply hand this proof to the American authorities. Who would believe me, a . . .”
“A what?”
“A nobody. A thief,” Isabel answered, running a hand over her short thatch of jet black hair. “If you come with me to Mexico, I will give you the evidence. You can read it—you are a lawyer—and ask me questions about my dealings with Santaria and Bryce Powers. You can bring it back and give it to your FBI, or do what you think best with it. From there also I will call Herman. He is the one who ordered your friend’s death. He will be happy to hear that I am in Mexico. The Feria brothers—his killers, his panthers he calls them—can kill me with impunity there.”
“Where in Mexico?”
“Puerto Angel, a poor town on the southern coast. I put the evidence in a house there that I used to visit as a child.”
“What kind of evidence?”
“Tapes of telephone conversations, and documents, many documents.”
“Where did you get them?”
“From Bryce Powers.”
“You were partners in crime.”
“Yes.”
“And lovers?”
“Yes.”
“How much did you take?”
“Several million, but I don’t have it. Bryce took care of the money.”
“Why bother with the documents? Why not just run?”
Isabel’s perfectly sculpted nostrils had been flaring while she was gasping for air, but now her face was composed, its natural high color, a creamy olive, returning as she recovered from the shock of Jay’s blow to her gut. She had folded one half of her broken blouse over the other, leaving it at that, resting her hands on the floor at her sides. She held his gaze as he waited for her to answer, and then said, “I want revenge, like you.”
“For what?”
“That is my business.”
“Why should I trust you?”
“You shouldn’t. I am a bad person. I have lied all my life. But I am your only chance to avenge your friend, who I know you loved. Otherwise why would you be sitting here, talking to me?”
“What happened to Danny?”
“If we go to Mexico, it will be a long journey. I will tell you as we go—what I know, and what I assume to be true. You can carry all of the money, and once we go through customs, you can also have my passport. I am tired of running. It is like a slow death, to always be running and hiding. I need to stop dying. You are my only chance.”
38.
4:00 PM, December 18, 2004, Merida, Mexico
The used car salesman looked at the papers a long time, pretending careful scrutiny, but concerned, Isabel knew, only with getting the highest price possible for the Jeep Wrangler she was interested in. Or getting her into bed. Probably both. Isabel Sanchez-Hill, US citizen, resident of Miami. A tourist, in the country for thirty days. The salesman, a paunchy, middle-aged hustler, saw enough tourists, she was sure, to know that she did not look like one. She was dressed simply, in jeans and silver leather sandals, and a simple blouse. But her grooming was impeccable—clean eyebrows, light lipstick, her fingernails shiny drops of crimson—and her bearing was what it always was, proud, unconsciously superior. Neither could she hide her perfect diction, the unaccented speech of the high-class Castilian, instilled in her by Sister Josefina from birth.
“Would you like to take it for a ride, senorita?”
“No,” Isabel replied. “That’s not necessary.”
“Do you know how to handle a stick shift? I will be happy to give you a quick lesson. Perhaps we can stop for a cool drink.”
“You’re very kind, senor, but I am pressed for time. I will pay the full price if you can have the paperwork done in ten minutes, no more. Will you take American dollars?”
“Of course, senorita. Please follow me.”
Isabel smiled to herself as she drove out of the used car lot. The fat salesman had stuck to his price—two thousand dollars—his lust for money asserting itself once he realized his lust for her was going nowhere. If she had had the time, she could have gotten the car for much less, possibly for nothing, but she was meeting Jay Cassio at the bus terminal in downtown Merida in an hour, maybe two, depending on the bus schedule from Cancun, and she wanted to be there on time so that they could begin their long journey—she calculated it to be seven hundred miles—at once. She stopped at a grocery and a bank, and then, map in hand, made her way through the handsome Yucatán capital until she found the terminal on Calle 69, not far from the Plaza Mayor, the shaded, parklike square that was, by a myriad of names, the heart of all of Mexico’s colonial cities.
Inside the station, Isabel found a seat as far away from the milling travelers and scampering children as she could get and still be able to see the glass doors that led to the departure /arrival area. She had slept fitfully on the morning flight from Miami to Merida, and been too busy to think since she landed. Now, sitting on a plastic bench, waiting for Cassio, oblivious to the noise and sweltering heat of the station, the events of the night before organized themselves in her mind: the photo and rapidly concluded discussion in Libby Morales’s basement printshop; threatening Maria with the gun; fleeing; returning to El Pulpo; the agreement reached with Cassio; the look on Angelo’s face when they told him they were leaving immediately for Mexico; Cassio promising to repay the twenty-five hundred dollars, and Morales’s fees, when he returned; her apology—without tears—to Maria when they returned to pick up Cassio’s passport; the redness of the face of the Irish detective; the drive to the airport; the sleepless waiting; the exhausting plane ride.
They had agreed that separate flights would be safer, that they should not be seen together until they were away from airports and cities. Isabel was free to run when she landed in Merida. She had her fake papers and twenty-two hundred dollars, but Angelo had watched her board her flight, and watched the plane take off, and one call from him, or Cassio, to any number of pe
ople—Agent Markey, the police in Merida, the Mexican Justice Department—and she would be quickly caught, and probably killed. She had lived her life in bondage, her one attempt to escape, with Bryce Powers, ending in disaster. And now once again she was shackled, to Cassio, but what choice did she have? An American prison? She had thought him a fool when Maria first mentioned Del Colliano’s lawyer friend, but she was wrong. The look in his eyes as he sat on the floor across from her in her room above El Pulpo was a familiar one. It was the look, a mixture of despair and hatred, that she remembered seeing in her own eyes when she looked in the mirror on a couple of very bad days in the last thirteen years. Days she could have easily killed had she the means.
If Cassio didn’t kill the Feria brothers, he would die as a man. Bryce’s papers would then not be delivered, but Isabel’s desire for revenge grew smaller as her chance for freedom grew larger. She would draw out the Ferias for the handsome, angry lawyer, and be long gone when they arrived. Whatever happened, Isabel would be unshackled, out of bondage, free, for the first time in her life, and she would then do everything in her power to keep it that way.
Spotting Cassio coming through the terminal’s glass doors, a battered canvas knapsack slung over one shoulder, dark sunglasses hiding his strikingly beautiful gray eyes, Isabel rose to greet him. Watching him as he walked toward her, not yet noticing her, her heart constricted, for, despite his week’s growth of beard and his obvious travel weariness, he was indeed very handsome, as proud and graceful and as sure of himself as a top athlete or a great matador, and Isabel wondered what it would be like to hold him in her arms, to choose him freely as her lover. He saw her, and she put these thoughts aside. In twenty-four hours she would be on her way to Guatemala, and he would be returning to Miami, or dead.