“He got away,” Ezra said.
Hunt shouted a curse.
“Along with our only transportation,” Gwen pointed out.
“And our weapons,” Ezra added.
“You two did a real bang-up job,” Hunt said. “Remind me to put both of you in for commendations.”
They started to stumble out apologies.
“Cut me loose!”
Chapter Forty-Five
NOBLE PULLED INTO A FILLING STATION on a strip of barren highway running through cactus country. Alejandra went inside for snacks. Noble slotted the nozzle, set the handle and then redialed the unknown number. He had been too busy dealing with Hunt to follow up on his mystery friend earlier. Now, he leaned his hips against the car and listed to the dial tone. He was about to give up when Sam’s voice came on the line.
“Hi, Jake. Been a while.”
“Sam?”
“Surprise,” she said without inflection.
Noble felt the bottom drop out of his universe. It was like waking up from a deep nap and not knowing what day it is. Had he slept an hour? Or all day? He cleared his throat. “I’m going to need some context.”
“Matt Burke recruited me about six months ago,” she said, explaining her sudden disappearance. “I would have called sooner. I wanted to, but…”
“But you were instructed to sever all ties,” Noble finished for her. A sense of loss so profound it was a physical weight settled on his shoulders. He closed his eyes. His face pinched. He had lost Torres and now Sam.
“Please understand, Jake, I didn’t know,” she said to fill the silence. “They didn’t tell me until after I graduated the Farm. By then it was too late. I was already in.”
He buried the hurt in that cold dark place where he put all the other things he would never have in life. Love, marriage, kids, a regular job. It all went into the vault. He said, “You don’t have to explain.”
“I’m sorry, Jake. Really I am.”
“Don’t be,” he said. “Are you part of Hunt’s team in Mexico?”
“No,” she said. “I’m in D.C., between assignments. Is he alive?”
“He’s alive,” Noble told her. “How did you get onto his operation?”
There was a pause. “He and I have history.”
The pump clicked off, echoing the full stop in Noble’s brain. He tried to make sense of the statement. Sam and Hunt? The guy was a complete tool. What the hell did she see in him? He racked the nozzle and threaded the gas cap back on. “You and Hunt?”
“Not exactly,” she said.
“What’s that mean?”
“It’s complicated,” she said.
“Does he make you happy?” Noble asked.
“Sometimes,” she said.
“But not all the time?”
“When I’m with him, it’s like I’m the only girl in the world.”
“And when you’re not?” he asked.
There was another long pause. “He can be a bit much, I admit that, but he’s not a bad guy.”
“He tried to kill me,” Noble said.
“Is he okay?” she asked.
“He’s fine,” Noble told her. “I’m fine too, thanks for asking.”
She muttered an apology. “Did either of you try talking before knocking each other’s teeth out?”
“We talked some.” Noble said, thinking of car batteries and jumper cables. I should have fried him.
“And?” Sam asked.
“We didn’t see eye to eye.”
She gave an exasperated sigh. “Listen, Jake…”
Noble didn’t have the time or energy to hash out relationship problems. He changed subjects. “How much do you know about RIPTIDE?”
“I know Torres was gathering intel against the Los Zetas,” she said. “I know someone talked and it got him killed.”
“We’re on the same page so far.” Noble switched ears with the phone. “I’ve got a source that seems to think there’s a leak on your end.”
“Your source might be right,” Sam admitted. “Certain people here feel the same.”
“A mutual friend of ours?” Noble asked.
“He’s a big cuddly bear. And that’s all I’m saying. I’ve said too much already. I’m way out on a limb here.”
“That makes two of us,” Noble told her.
Alejandra came out of the gas station, dressed in a cheap tourist sweatshirt. She had the hood up to hide the bandages and a plastic bag in one hand.
“I gotta go,” Noble said.
“Before you do,” she said. “I really am sorry about the way things turned out.”
“Me too,” he said. “You’d better ditch that phone as soon as you can. They’ll be monitoring my calls.”
“I will,” she said, and then, “Jake?”
“Yeah?”
“Be careful.”
“I will.”
She hung up.
Alejandra looked at him over roof of the car. “Who was that?”
“A friend.”
“Someone you trust?”
“With my life,” he told her.
Ten minutes later they were back on the highway headed south towards Mexico City. Noble said, “Operating on the premise that Machado has an informant in the CIA, who else in his organization would know?”
“Blythe,” Alejandra said without pause.
Noble twirled his hand for her to continue.
“Machado’s accountant.” Alejandra said. “He’s got a thing for little boys. He did three years on child pornography charges in England. After that, he couldn’t land a job in the U.K.—no one wants to hire a pedophile—so he moved to Mexico.”
“Drug dealers aren’t too particular about the company they keep,” Noble commented.
Alejandra nodded. “A pervert like Blythe is custom made for the drug trade. Machado turns a blind eye to his sexual proclivities and offers protection from the law. Blythe provides creative accounting and tax shelters. The two are practically joined at the hip. Where Machado goes, Blythe follows.”
“They can’t be together all the time,” Noble said. “Where does Blythe get his boys?”
“The meetings are arranged through the internet, but Diaz—Torres,” she corrected herself, “tracked the source to an apartment in Zona Rosa. Once or twice a week, Blythe goes to a five-star hotel in the city. A courier drops off the boys.”
The idea left a sour taste in Noble’s mouth. Raping children plumbs the very depths of human depravity. People like that deserve a special place in hell, if it existed, and a very nasty death if it didn’t. Noble had a score to settle with Machado, he’d ice Blythe for free. He said, “Let’s go pay a visit to Blythe’s pimp.”
Chapter Forty-Six
IT WAS A LONG WALK back for Hunt and his team. They had spent the better part of the morning turning the villa inside out trying to find the missing car batteries. Wherever Noble hid them, he did a good job. By the time the sun reached its zenith, they abandoned the search and started the grueling march to the highway and eventually Mexico City.
Hunt spent the first half of the walk thinking of new and inventive ways to hurt Noble, but nothing he imagined was painful enough. Noble deserved to suffer. Pain fueled Hunt’s dark fantasies. He had been beat up, thrown off a balcony, and electrocuted by car battery. His joints ached. His head pounded, and it felt like someone had replaced his spine with broken glass. Every step hurt.
By the time they reached the highway, Hunt had walked off most of his rage and his thoughts turned to his strange talk with Noble. Hunt had been expecting a man on the edge, unhinged, someone driven by rage. Noble was in control. Worse, his questions nagged at Hunt. Shelving his deep-seated loathing of Noble, Hunt wrestled with questions and didn’t like the answers he came up with. There were too many pieces that didn’t fit.
Gwen had been walking with her thumb out for the better part of a mile when a beat up El Camino pulled over. The driver, a fat Mexican with a toothy grin, offered them a lift into town. The three agents
climbed into the bed and the driver took them all the way to the American embassy.
They grabbed lunch from the cafeteria and then rode the elevator to their cubby hole on the second floor. Ezra and Gwen dug into their food while Hunt put in a call to the Deputy Director.
“This is Clark S. Foster.”
“It’s Hunt.” He eased himself down on the ratty sofa with a sigh. Pain marched up his spine, but at least he was off his feet.
“Have you neutralized Noble?”
“We had a bit of a setback.”
“I’m listening.”
Hunt picked up a bottled water and pressed the cold plastic against his swollen eye. “We tracked him to a burned-out villa on the outskirts of town…”
“And?”
“He disarmed us and got away.”
“He disarmed all three of you?”
“Yes sir,” Hunt said.
There was silence on the other end.
Hunt cleared his throat and forged ahead. “About the missing agent, Torres. Noble made some allegations…”
Foster interrupted him. “His cover was blown. End of story. Your mission is Noble. Am I making myself clear?”
“Sir, Noble implied—”
“I don’t care what Noble said!” Foster’s voice distorted the tiny phone speaker. “He’s off the reservation. He needs to be stopped.”
Hunt kicked his shoes off and pinched the bridge of his nose. “I’ll need to rearm before I take another go at him, sir.”
Foster’s voice was a dangerous whisper. “Gregory, I want you to listen to me very carefully. Don’t come back to Virginia until Jake Noble is in a body bag. Is that clear?”
“Perfectly clear, sir. About our weaponry…”
The line went dead.
Four days ago, he would have turned summersaults at the order to kill Noble. Now, it didn’t sit too well. Hunt relaxed deeper into the sofa. His body begged him to stretch out and drift off to sleep, but he couldn’t afford to rest.
Ezra and Gwen watched him with identical expressions.
Gwen said, “Is it bad?”
“It isn’t good.” Hunt dialed Sam.
She picked up after three rings. “What can I do for you this time, Greg?”
“I need you to tell me everything you can about your friend, Noble.”
“This is a really bad time for me,” Sam said. “I’m not supposed to be talking to you, and I’m definitely not supposed to be talking about him.”
“Sam, it’s important.”
She sighed. “You’re asking me to put my head in the lion’s mouth, Greg.”
“I’ve just been ordered to retire him.” Hunt gave that time to sink in. “If you know anything that might affect that decision, now is the time to tell me.”
Chapter Forty-Seven
ZONA ROSA IS A GAY MECCA located smack in the heart of Mexico City. The whole place feels like one big Mardi Gras parade. Rainbow flags are everywhere. Same-sex couples stroll arm in arm. Lap dogs are a common accessory. The stink of sweat and liquor permeates the air and the sonorous beat of dance music pulses from every door and window. The brutal heat wave and carnival atmosphere were the perfect excuse for locals to shed clothes and inhibitions.
Noble and Alejandra walked through an outdoor market. Vendors sold everything from pirated movies and knock-off sneakers to sex toys and produce. While a merchant haggled over the cost of a handbag with a gaggle of young girls, Noble swiped a bright purple scarf from a rack. He turned his collar up, draped the scarf around his neck and turned to Alejandra for approval.
She chuckled. “All of your gay culture comes from Hollywood.”
“You’re not wrong,” Noble admitted.
She stopped him, untucked his shirt and then opened a few more buttons.
“Better,” she said, and they resumed their course.
Noble attracted the attention of several men. A transvestite in a corset and fishnets gave him a wink. He fended off advances with polite rejections.
Alejandra led the way to an apartment built over a club called Wild Stallions. Blythe’s pimp lived in number three. They entered a small foyer and mounted the stairs. Music from the club shook plaster from the walls. The deep rhythmic pounding would help mask the sound of a fight if it came to that. Noble reached behind him and put a hand on his pistol. He didn’t know what to expect at the top of the stairs. “Has he got security?”
“Don’t know.” Alejandra shook her head and brought out one of the Sigs they had collected from Hunt’s support crew. “I don’t know how much good I’ll be aiming with my left eye.”
“I’ll do most of the heavy lifting,” he told her.
The staircase ended at a small landing with a stout door painted green. There was a peephole set in the door and a brass knocker shaped like a pair of nuts.
Noble said, “You do the honors.”
Her lips pressed together. She rapped three times. The hollow booms echoed around the barren stairwell. There was movement on the other side of the door and then the tiny light at the center of the peephole winked out. Noble blew a kiss.
The door opened to the end of the security chain. A graying man with a neatly trimmed goatee appeared in the gap. His shirt was unbuttoned to reveal a thick mat of black curls. “The club is downstairs,” he said in a foppish lisp. “This is a private residence.”
Noble stepped back and crashed his foot into the door. The chain popped loose with a shriek of splintering wood. The door smacked the pimp in the face. His head snapped back. Blood burst from both nostrils and he went down on the floor in a heap.
Noble entered with his gun up. The apartment was garishly decorated in what passed for gay vogue. There was a leopard print rug on the floor and posters of Judy Garland from her Wizard of Oz days on the walls. In one corner was a chair in the shape of a giant, plastic hand.
Alejandra put her gun into the pimp’s cheek while Noble checked the rest of the apartment. Both kitchen and bedroom were empty. A Twister mat had been framed and hung over a platform bed. Crossword puzzle books were piled on the night stand. The whole place was impeccably clean. Some stereotypes hold up, Noble decided.
The pimp cringed at the steel pressing into his cheek. Blood oozed from his busted nose and dripped on the leopard print rug. “Please, don’t hurt me. I abhor violence. It makes me sick.”
“How do you feel about pimping out little boys?” Noble asked.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he said.
“I should let Alejandra dust you right now.”
“No!” he shrieked. “Wait. What do you want? You want money? There is fifty-thousand dollars in the copy of Alice in Wonderland.” He pointed a shaking finger at the bookshelf.
Noble pulled down the book and rifled the pages. He found fifty crisp one-thousand dollar bills in U.S. currency, which he folded and stuffed in his pocket. It would go to paying off his mother’s medical bills. He tossed the book on the floor. It landed with a flat smack.
“You supply Henry Blythe with little boys,” Noble said.
“I don’t know any Blythe. I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m an editor for an online zine.”
“Yeah? What’s your zine called?” Noble asked. “Pedo Monthly?”
“It’s called the Queer Guide to Latin America.”
“Selling boys is just your part-time gig?”
The pimp found his courage and said, “You know what you are? You’re a cisgender homophobe and a bully.”
“I’m a terrible dancer too,” Noble said. “How does it work? Does Blythe reach out to you, or do you contact him?”
The pimp insisted he didn’t know anything about prostitution. Alejandra pressed the gun deeper into his cheek, pinning him to the rug. Sweat collected on his brow. His eyes went from Noble to Alejandra and back again.
“Look at her face,” Noble said. “She look like somebody you want to piss off?”
Alejandra pulled the hood back to reveal blood stained b
andages and yellow bruises.
His chin trembled, but he needed more convincing.
Noble went to the kitchen and rummaged through drawers, making a lot of noise. Silverware jangled and dishes shattered on the floor. He found a wine bottle opener and carried it back to the living room.
The sight of the corkscrew had the desired effect.
“I’m just a middle man,” the pimp said between sobs. “The seller sends me pictures of his newest boys. When he has one that matches a client’s type, I arrange a meeting. Blythe wires the money and I contact the seller. I tell them where to take the merchandise.”
“Merchandise,” Noble said. “That’s all they are to you?”
“Look, I never did it myself. I like men. I just make the connections. That’s all. I forward the money into the seller’s account and keep ten percent.”
Noble waved the corkscrew under the pimp’s nose. “You’re going to contact Blythe and tell him you’ve got a boy for him.”
“He might not want to meet right away.”
“You better hope that’s not the case,” Noble said.
“If I arrange a meeting for tomorrow night, do you promise not to hurt me?”
“I promise to hurt you if you don’t,” Noble told him.
He swallowed hard, palmed blood away from his nose and nodded. “Okay, I’ll do it.”
Noble said, “What’s your name?”
“Hector Sanchez.”
“Time’s wasting, Hector.”
“I need my computer,” Hector said.
Alejandra took the gun out of his cheek. Noble grabbed his arm and yanked him to his feet. Hector let out a frightened squeak. Noble shoved him at the computer desk. “Get to work.”
Hector dropped into the chair and, after a sullen glance at Noble, opened a web browser. Noble watched every keystroke. He said, “If anyone shows up here to rescue you, I’ll kill them and then throw you out a window, understood?”
“You are so violent. You must be a meat eater,” Hector muttered. He sent the email. They waited several minutes for a reply. The laptop chimed. Hector said, “It’s done.”
“When?” Noble asked.
“Tomorrow night, just like you asked. The Hotel Plaza Suites at six.”
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