Time on the Wire

by Jay Giles

The police captain had assured him he personally would put a bullet behind the ear of any intruder and feed the remains to the coyotes.

  CHAPTER 94

  Marike’s flight landed in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico at 5:15 p.m. local time. She collected her bags, breezed through customs, hailed a cab, had it take her to the Buenaventura Hotel and Beach Club.

  She registered, followed the bellman to an upper-floor room with a view of the ocean. He placed her bags on the bed, accepted his tip, smiled appreciatively, left.

  Marike surveyed her room, found it adequate. She’d requested a chilled bottle of champagne be waiting for her. She found it, pulled the bottle up by the neck, examined the label. Local. She popped the cork, poured a taste into a cheap flute, founded it to be quite dry, flavorful. She filled her glass, set about the task of unpacking.

  Tomorrow, she would set about the task of tracking.

  • • •

  Hanna and Miles landed in Puerto Vallarta at 8:20 that evening. They made their way to the baggage area where Miles collected his duffel, Hanna’s suitcase. For the walk to customs, he slung the duffel’s shoulder strap over his neck, let the duffle ride comfortably against his right hip, pulled Hanna’s suitcase along with his left hand.

  Hanna showed her badge to the customs officer and they passed right through.

  In twenty minutes, their cab deposited them at the Fiesta Americana where Hanna had booked two rooms.

  Miles gaze took in the elaborate open air lobby with a tall cathedral ceiling, elaborate carved wood detailing, tile floors, tropical plants. He wasn’t used to such luxury. Usually, he camped or stayed in hostels. “Impressive,” he said to Hanna while they waited in line to check in.

  “The travel department recommended it,” Hanna said over her shoulder.

  The couple in front of her finished. Hanna and Miles stepped up to the counter. Hanna took charge, putting the rooms on a FBI credit card. The desk clerk, Maria, a young dark-haired, dark-eyed girl wearing a dark-blue suit, handed each of them a keycard, gave them directions to the elevators.

  After they’d dropped off things in their rooms, Miles and Hanna met for dinner at the Fiesta Americana’s open-air restaurant.

  “So what’s our plan of attack?” Miles asked after they were settled at one of the tables overlooking the pool area.

  “Professional courtesy says the first thing we do is let the police know we’re here trying to locate Albrecht. They may help.”

  “Think so?”

  “Hope so. That’s usually how it works when we contact the local authorities. Of course, that’s back in the states. I have no idea how the Mexican authorities will respond.”

  “Then what?” Miles asked as their waiter, in white shirt, black pants, pattered cummerbund, and large sombrero, arrived, handed them oversize menus. “For you, from the bar?” He asked and adjusted the napkin draped over his forearm.

  “Just water for me,” Hanna said.

  “Dos Equis.”

  “Coming right up,” he assured them.

  Hanna leaned forward. “Remember that photo of Albrecht I had downloaded?”

  “Sort of,” Miles said over the top of his menu.

  “We start showing it to hotel staff, restaurant people. Albrecht has been here a month. Somebody has to recognize his photo, give us something to go on. Then it’s putting in the time, doing the investigative work to track him down.”

  Their waiter returned, served Hanna’s water, Miles’ beer.

  Miles took a sip. “So let’s say we find Albrecht. How does that work? Do you arrest him? Do you turn him over to the Mexican police?”

  “We don’t want to arrest Albrecht right away,” she explained. “We’ll put him under surveillance, wait and see if Silber shows up.

  My biggest concern is that she’s already been here, that we may be too late.”

  “Too late for what?”

  “Too late to find Albrecht alive.”

  CHAPTER 95

  Marike, dressed in a black halter top, white Capri pants, beige strappy sandals, had breakfast at the hotel’s open-air restaurant overlooking the beach. Still concerned about her weight, she had half a grapefruit, juice, half a plain bagel, single cup of coffee. She signed the bill to her room, had the concierge in the lobby call a taxi to take her to the address for PV Sailboat Charter.

  It turned out to be a small white clapboard building adjacent to the Marina. Marike climbed the three steps to the front porch, where faded pictures of sailboats were tacked to the walls, entered the open front door.

  Inside, behind a wooden counter in the rear of the room, a well-groomed young Mexican in a white golf shirt bearing a gold PV Sailboat Charter logo, greeted her in Spanish.

  She took Albrecht’s cancelled check and a crisp, new hundred-dollar bill from her purse, placed them on the counter, said in English: “It’s urgent I find this man as soon as possible.” She tapped the bill with a well-manicured fingernail, “Locating him may be difficult. This is for your trouble.”

  The gaze of the man, identified by his name tag as Miguel, shifted from Marike to the bill, back to Marike. “You are most generous, señorita.” The smile on his lips offset the distrust in his eyes. “I am afraid I don’t know enough to earn your money. The man you seek turned in his boat several days ago. I have no idea where he is now.”

  Marike took a second hundred-dollar bill from her purse, placed it on top of the first one. “Can you help me find him? I’ll pay you three hundred dollars more if you can help me locate him.”

  The man’s brow furrowed. “Why is it you wish to find this man?”

  “I have come all the way from Germany,” Marike said without hesitation, “to plead with him to reconcile with his son. They have not spoken because of me, I have come to make it right.”

  The man’s eyes were skeptical, but he didn’t challenge her. He took the two-hundred dollars, put it in his pant’s pocket. “Come back in one hour. I make no promises, but I may have something for you.”

  Marike thanked him, took Albrecht’s cancelled check, put it back in her purse, left. She strolled to a small outdoor café half-a-block down, picked a table that gave her a view of PV Sailboat Charters, ordered a bottle of sparkling water, prepared to pass the time.

  Marike wasn’t so naive she thought young Miguel would sell out a good customer for five hundred dollars. The smarter play would be to contact Albrecht, say someone was asking for him, see what it would be worth to him to send that person in the wrong direction.

  His response, an hour later when she returned to the office, didn’t disappoint. “Señorita, I have made a number of phone calls,” he told her, eying the three-hundred dollars she had placed on the counter in front of him, “and I have information for you. I have talked with people who know Señor Albrecht and they tell me he has gone to Cancun.”

  “Cancun? Why would he go to Cancun?”

  He forced a smile. “The sailing, I’m sure.”

  “Did you recommend a charter company there to him?”

  “Me, señorita? No, I did not.”

  Marika was sure he was lying.

  CHAPTER 96

  That same morning, Hanna and Miles met in the hotel’s lobby, took a cab to the police station in downtown Puerto Vallarta for a meeting with Chief Arturo Soto.

  On the ride over, Hanna said, “I had two voicemails from the Bureau. One good, one not so good.”

  Miles looked over at her. “Let’s hear the not so good.”

  Hanna sank a little lower in the cab’s back seat. “Agent Casper is on his way to join us.”

  “That doesn’t sound so bad.”

  Hanna shot him a look, eyes flashed anger. “That means he’s been sent to take charge of the case. It’s not fair, Miles. I’ve done all the work. You watch, he’ll take all the credit.”

  “I don’t—”

  “The Bureau has done this to me before,” she said angrily.” I get treated like the girl, the men do the important stuff.”

&
nbsp; Miles smiled. “Well, we’ll just have to make sure you wrap all this up before Casper has a chance to get his manly fingerprints on it.”

  He seemed so confident, it took away a little of Hanna’s anger.

  “What’s the good news?” He asked.

  “Amy, my admin, says they’re not furious I brought you.”

  “Really?”

  “I justified it saying you were the only one who could identify both Silber and Albrecht.”

  Miles smile grew. “Oh, and I thought it was because of my boyish charm.”

  Hanna elbowed him in the ribs. “Stop it. We have work to do.”

  “Ouch,” Miles said. “You hit hard—for a girl.”

  The banter stopped as the cab pulled up in front of the police station. Miles paid the cabbie, he and Hanna entered the station, were taken to Chief Soto’s office.

  Soto was a short, blocky man. He wore beige police uniform, had a deep-brown complexion, thinning black hair, bushy black moustache, ready smile. His office was small, cluttered, hot.

  He stood to greet them, listened to the officer who had led them to his office say something in Spanish, nodded. “Please, make yourselves comfortable,” he said in English. He gazed at Hanna, “I am told you are with the American FBI.”

  Hanna took out her badge, showed it to him. He nodded. She put it back. “Mr. Marin and I are looking for a German national we believe vacationed here for the past month.” She took the photo from her purse, placed it in front of Soto. “His name is Dieter Albrecht. We’d like to ask him a few questions.”

  Soto pursed his lips, looked at the photo. “What crime has this man committed that makes the American FBI interested in him?”

  “He’s a suspect in a kidnapping and murder. Does your department have any knowledge of Mr. Albrecht?”

  Soto made a face, shook his head. “I am not aware that he has come to our attention for any reason. But if, as you say, he has been here a month, we can find him.” He nodded, indicating the photo. “It would help if I could distribute copies of this photo to my men.”

  “By all means,” Hanna assured him.

  He picked up a pencil, found a piece of paper. “Give me your hotel and room number, I will call you when I have information.”

  Miles told him the name and number. Soto wrote them down, put the paper with the photo.

  “When do you think we might hear from you?” Hanna asked.

  “I am confident by tomorrow afternoon we will have located your Mr. Albrecht.” He stood, indicating the meeting was over. “I will call, you have my word on that. Until then, enjoy your stay in Puerto Vallarta,” he said and gave each of them his best Chamber of Commerce smile.

  When they were in the cab, riding back to the hotel, Miles asked, “What do you think? Was that what you expected?”

  “To be honest, I didn’t expect him to be that helpful.”

  Miles had been impressed by Soto’s willingness to help, his confidence he could locate Albrecht, quickly. “Who knows, a big part of his job might be searching for missing vacationers, wayward spouses. Maybe this is no big deal for him.”

  “He didn’t act like it was.” She shook her head. “But there’s a big difference between finding a missing vacationer and someone who’s stolen $50-million. If I’d been in his shoes, I wouldn’t have committed to locating Albrecht by tomorrow. He may have been grandstanding, trying to impress us.”

  The cab pulled up to the entrance of the Fiesta, Miles paid the driver. The two of them got out, walked into the hotel’s open-air lobby. “So what do we do now?” Miles asked.

  Hanna debated. Instinctively, she wanted to start right in, go hotel to hotel with Albrecht’s picture. Her hesitation was that it would be a time-intensive, inefficient search. Soto, on the other hand, had the resources and contacts to cast a wide net. Even if he didn’t turn-up Albrecht, if he could narrow their search to a specific area or focused direction, it would be worth the wait.

  She watched a young couple in swimsuits walk down the path to the beach. Beyond them, the white sand and turquoise water looked so inviting. “You brought trunks didn’t you?”

  “Sure,” Miles said, a little surprised. He gazed over at her, smiled. “That doesn’t sound like you’re thinking work.”

  “Depending on what Chief Soto has for us tomorrow, we’ll be putting in some long hours. This may be our only chance to enjoy ourselves.”

  Miles didn’t need any encouraging. “The beach looks awfully tempting.”

  “That’s what I was thinking,” Hanna agreed.

  They headed to their rooms, changed into swimsuits, went out to the beach, strolled down the sand at the water’s edge. Every now and then, a wave would run in, splash around their feet.

  “This is the life,” Hanna said, wiggling her toes in the sand.

  That made Miles laugh. “You live in Florida. You could do this every day if you wanted.”

  Hanna’s gaze took in people from different cultures, sounds of Mexican music, brightly colored buildings, mountains jutting up beyond the strip of hotels. “This has a whole different feel. It’s more vibrant, more exciting.”

  Miles watched a parachute rider ascend into the sky. “There’s something about getting away from the everyday world that makes you feel more alive.”

  “That sounds like the adventurer in you.”

  Miles laughed. “I guess it is,” he said, taking Hanna’s hand. “This is an adventure, too, you know. Us.”

  Hanna glanced over at him. Saw the dazzling smile, the kind eyes, looked past the tattoos and scars.

  “Who knows where this adventure will take us,” he said as they strolled hand-in-hand down the beach.

  Us. Hanna liked the sound of that, of their adventure, unaware that in just 24 short hours their adventure was about to take a horrible turn.

  CHAPTER 97

  The phone call had rattled Albrecht. As he replaced the receiver on the cradle, his hands trembled. He walked to the bar, poured himself a stiff Scotch, downed a big swallow.

  He found Monique in the family room watching television. “Who was on the phone?” She asked breezily. Phone calls were still a rarity for them.

  “It was your policeman.”

  Alarmed, Monique sat up on the sofa, used the remote to switch off the TV. “Ruis?”

  “Yes.”

  “What did he say?” She asked in a high, frightened voice.

  Albrecht swallowed more Scotch, paced back and forth. “His cousin, the policeman in Puerto Vallarta, called him, said two FBI agents were looking for me.”

  Monique’s hand flew to her mouth. “Oh, no.” She jumped up from the sofa, followed Albrecht around the room.

  “Ruis has a plan. He says he and his cousin can get rid of these FBI agents.”

  Albrecht added disgustedly. “For money.”

  “How much?” Monique asked, her eyes wide.

  “A hundred thousand dollars for each of them.”

  “What did you say? That’s a lot of money for telling them they don’t know where you are.”

  “You misunderstand me. The money is to kill them.”

  “Oh,” Monique said, meekly.

  “What could I tell him? It had to be yes, otherwise they would betray us.”

  Monique stopped pacing, put her hands on her hips. Her face had regained its determined cast. “So the precautions we put in place are working. We pay Ruis to make the problem go away.”

  Albrecht shook his head. “The problem won’t go away. If these agents disappear, they’ll send more agents to find them.”

  Her gaze found Albrecht’s, she gave him a shrewd smile. “Not if it looks like they died in an accident and the accident is authenticated by an official police accident report.”

  CHAPTER 98

  Miguel watched horrified as Marike took the knife from her purse. He was in his car’s passenger seat, his hands bound behind his back with wire. A frantic glance out the car windows told him, even if he screamed for help, no o
ne would hear him. He began sobbing. “Don’t hurt me, please don’t hurt me.”

  Marike brandished the knife in front of his face. “You lied to me once.” She ran the serrated edge of the knife lightly along the front of his throat. The cut began to bleed, turning the collar of his white golf shirt red. “Lie to me again, and I’ll slice your throat to the bone.”

  Tears streamed down his cheeks.

  “Which way to Albrecht’s?” Marike demanded.

  “Take the highway,” Miguel said between sobs, “to Nuevo Vallarta.”

  Marike put the car in gear, followed the signs to Nuevo Vallarta, a newer area, north of Puerto Vallarta.

  “There. That is his house,” Miguel said some forty minutes later.

  Marike pulled off the road, cast a quick look at a large yellow stucco villa, took the knife from her lap. “You’re sure,” she said and sliced the edge of Miguel’s ear.

  He screamed in pain.

  She cut him again.

  “Yes, yes. I am sure. That is his house. Don’t hurt me any more.”

  Marike saw a bearded man walk by a window. “That’s not Albrecht,” she said angrily.

  Miguel cowered against the car door, anticipating being cut again. “It’s him,” he said quickly. “He lost weight, grew a beard. It’s him. I swear.”

  Marike watched the window, waited for the man to walk past again. Instead, she saw a blond woman. “Who’s that?”

  “I don’t know.”

  The man walked by the window, again. Now that Marike knew how Albrecht had altered his appearance, she could tell it was him. She watched as he and the blond woman, engaged in heated discussion, appeared and disappeared at the window.

  She wondered what it was about. Could it be about her? Could they know she was here?

  No use worrying about that now Marike thought as she drove away from Albrecht’s house, dropped Miguel off.

  Off a cliff.

  She watched his body tumble in the air, smash on the rocks below. Satisfied it would be quite some time before the body was discovered, she drove back to her hotel, stopped in the lobby bar to have a drink, think about how to handle Albrecht and the woman.