Escape from Danger

by Linsey Lanier

  If only she’d taken it out and left while Ponce was reading his texts.

  She slipped into the car’s passenger seat while Simon tossed his bag into the back next to Torres and climbed inside.

  He started the car and eased it into the street. “Sorry we can’t take you back to your car, Torres. We’ll have to ride around for a while to make sure no one’s spotted us.”

  “Agreed,” Torres said. He sounded shaken.

  Simon turned down another one-way street while Janelle kept watch in the side mirror. “I don’t see anyone behind us.”

  Simon glanced at the rearview. “I don’t, either. Did you see what kind of vehicle any of them came in, Torres?”

  “No. They must have parked along the street facing the bar’s back entrance.”

  Simon made a few more turns and then headed for the roundabout and the monument of Garibaldi.

  Torres let out a long breath. “I cannot believe it.”

  Janelle turned around. “Maybe you can translate that conversation we heard tonight. Who is Fischer?”

  He shook his head in disbelief. “Ivan Fischer. A wealthy businessman. Grandson of a Nazi war criminal who came to Argentina after World War II.”

  “Oh my.”

  “His father denounced the elder Fischer’s activities and became a philanthropist. His son is a different story. He’s been on our radar for some time.”

  “It sounded like he’s the head of the operation,” she said.

  “Yes, it did.” Simon checked his mirror again. “And what about El Diamante?”

  “It’s a hotel and casino on the Avenida Del Libertador. It’s owned by Fischer,” Torres said. “The authorities have believed for some time Fischer has been using it as a front for illegal activities, but I did not think he was involved in something like this.”

  Janelle put a hand to her face. “It sounded like Fischer is having a party at his casino tomorrow night.”

  “And that he’s going to sell six boys to his guests,” Torres added.

  His face hard, Simon turned into the roundabout. “The guests who are into that sort of thing. He’ll have to do it in a way that the other guests are unaware.”

  Janelle thought about how that would play out. Then her stomach went tight again. “One of those boys could be Alejandro’s friend, Diego.”

  “Yes.” Torres grew quiet at the grim thought.

  After a moment, Simon turned out of the roundabout again and broke the silence. “El Puño,” he said. “It means ‘The Fist.’ Do you know him?”

  Torres shook his head. “I haven’t heard of him before tonight.” Still dazed by the conversation in the bar, he stared out the window.

  He was thinking about Diego and what to do next, Janelle realized. They had something of a confession on the recording that the bug had provided, but without connecting it to an actual crime, it wouldn’t be enough to put these men away. Not if the courts worked here like they did back home. And the boss of these men was well-connected. Plus, Ponce must have found that bug by now.

  She and Simon could be prosecuted for planting it.

  Torres straightened his shoulders. “We need to return to my home. I can give you more information there.”

  Simon turned down a narrow residential street. “Just what I was about to suggest.”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  They reached the bar in a few minutes, and found no one who looked like the three Castigadores roaming around the nearby streets. After dropping Torres off at his car, they drove back to his flat.

  Inside, it was dark and everyone was silent and asleep, which was just as well. Torres took their coats and led them back into his office where they once more settled into the guest chairs.

  Torres did some work on his computer and printed out photos of Ivan Fischer and the three men who had met in the bar. Two of them had a rap sheet. From what she could make out, they’d been arrested on drug charges a few times and let go.

  He had several pages on Fischer.

  Janelle studied the photo. High cheekbones. Thin blond hair combed in a wispy style. A polished look. Supremely confident to the point of haughty. Nastiness in his glassy blue eyes. A person would have to be both haughty and nasty to do what he did.

  Torres’s chair squeaked as he leaned back in it. “We found a body in the river last month. Thirty stab wounds. Horrible way to die. We know it was the work of Fischer’s men, but there’s not a shred of evidence to prove it or link him to the crime.”

  Fischer was a slippery fish.

  While she and Simon studied the photos of Ponce, Gomez, and Carrizo, Torres pulled several more papers off the printer and spread them out on his desk.

  “What’s this?” Simon asked, leaning forward to get a better view of them.

  “A layout of El Diamante.”

  Janelle blinked in shock. “The casino Fischer owns?”

  Torres nodded. “The center of the building has three floors, the wings on either side that make up the remainder of the structure have only two. We can surmise the boys will be taken somewhere here.” With a pen, he pointed to the diagram of the third floor.

  Janelle stared at the thin black lines on the white paper. Torres was indicating a circle with rooms jutting out around the perimeter of it.

  She tapped the middle of the circle. “There’s no inside wall?”

  Torres shook his head. “It’s open. The view goes straight down to the receiving area on the ground floor. The floors are connected by staircases. Rather elaborate ones.”

  Simon raised a brow. “You’ve been inside?”

  “A few times.”

  He didn’t ask why.

  Janelle studied the schematic of the building’s exterior, concentrating on the rear. “From what Gomez said tonight, they’ll take the boys through the back somewhere here, then put them into one of these rooms on the upper floor.

  “That’s how I understood it. There’s a service elevator here.” Torres tapped the layout again. “It leads from the outside straight to that room. It would be easy to park a truck in the lot and bring whatever they wanted to transport inside that way.”

  “Since we know that, wouldn’t the easiest plan be to catch them outside with the boys? Before they go inside?”

  Torres gave her a smile he might have given to his son. “I’m afraid, Señora Rodriguez, that would not give us the proof we need.”

  “Why not? It would be enough to convict the Castigadores for child trafficking. We’d catch them red handed.”

  He shook his head. “But we would not be able to convict Fischer. I would not even be able to arrest him.”

  “It’s his building.”

  “He would deny any knowledge of the activity. He would blame his operations manager or someone else. He would bribe anyone he could. An innocent person might go to prison.”

  She sat back in disgust. “And so how do we get enough evidence against Fischer?”

  Simon had that sly look in his eye again. “We get a recorded confession from him.”

  Chapter Thirty

  Janelle held her tongue until Simon opened the hotel room door and they stepped inside.

  Then she blurted out the angry words she’d been holding back. “Why on earth did you volunteer us for such a thing, Simon?”

  He stopped and turned around, looking insulted. “Because it’s the right thing to do.”

  The plan was crazy in her opinion. They were supposed to infiltrate the party. She was supposed to find the boys and get them out while Simon sweet talked Fischer and got him to admit what he was doing.

  Insane. Impossible. “Not if it doesn’t work.”

  “It’ll work.”

  “You can’t guarantee that.”

  “There will be back up.”

  Back up. After Simon had sketched out his idea, Torres had made a phone call to a friend in the police station near El Diamante. Her stomach had clenched into a knot as the inspector chatted away in Spanish, and she had tried to read Simon
’s face, since he could understand what was being said. When he hung up, Torres had announced his friend might be interested in helping with this case.

  “It didn’t sound like a firm commitment to me.”

  Simon didn’t answer. Instead he moved to the closet, put his bag away, and pulled out his laptop. He took it over to the desk, turned it on, and slipped the pen drive into it.

  She knew exactly what he was doing, and as she hurried over to peer over his shoulder at the screen, her anxiety only grew higher.

  Sure enough, he had brought up the spreadsheet from Kiev with the list of names. Holding her breath, she watched him type in “El Puño.”

  He pressed Search, and there it was.

  “Slava Zakhar,” she read aloud on an exhale. The man’s real name. Ukrainian. Then she dared to state the obvious. “He’s connected to Santana.”

  Simon’s reply was a low and dark growl. “Fischer’s whole operation is connected to Santana’s network.”

  Of course, it was. Somehow. It was mind boggling. “Don’t they know Santana’s gone?”

  “Hard to tell. But evidently the money trail is still in place.”

  “Money trail?” She had an idea what he was talking about, but she wanted to hear him say it.

  “The way it works in any large criminal enterprise. The low level workers bring the bulk of their earnings to a boss.”

  “In this case that would be Fischer.”

  “Right. He takes his cut and sends it up the chain.”

  “To Santana?”

  “Perhaps. But usually there are layers to cover the transfers. Several of them before you get to the top. That was part of what the Custodians were investigating.”

  “The top used to be Santana. But who is it now?”

  “Good question.” His voice sounded far away. He must be thinking of the shut down of the Custodians and everything that had happened since then.

  Putting her hand to her head, she paced a little, and thought of the conversation she’d heard in the back room tonight. “Gomez mentioned Fischer had people above him to pay.”

  Simon nodded. “That’s the money trail.”

  “That used to lead to Santana.”

  “And doesn’t any more. If we could find out who they are, if we could follow this money trail, maybe we’d find out who killed Cooley. And who sent the men in the helicopter.”

  The expression on Simon’s face told her he’d already worked all this out in his head.

  She sank down on the corner of the bed and put her head in her hands. How could they figure this out on their own? How could they pull off what they had to tomorrow night to save those boys?

  It seemed impossible. “If only I hadn’t screwed up tonight.”

  He turned to her with a sudden tenderness on his face that surprised her. “You didn’t screw up. I wouldn’t have been able to place that bug without you.”

  As good as it felt to hear that, it didn’t make up for her mistake. “I stayed in the air duct too long. I left the bug behind.”

  “You had to stay there. Ponce would have heard you if you had moved.”

  “But he saw me.”

  His face grew grim. “It’ll be alright.”

  He didn’t know that. He was just trying to be positive. But now this mission put even more at stake. She took off her snood and held it in her fingers, trying to think of another way. There was only one she could come up with. “We should go to the embassy and try to get Agent Knox’s help with this.”

  His head went back as if she’d slapped him. “I can’t risk going in there, Janey.”

  No. That wouldn’t be a smart move. “But I could. They don’t know me.”

  He rubbed his brow. “You can’t get in without credentials.”

  “Can’t you rig some up for me?”

  For a long moment he thought about the idea. Then he shook his head. “We can’t be sure we could get Knox on our side before the party tomorrow night.”

  She shot to her feet. “What if our plan doesn’t work, Simon? What if—the worst happens?” She couldn’t bear the thought of losing him. What if they failed completely?

  He rose and shocked her by taking her into his arms. Stroking her back to soothe her, he leaned his cheek against hers.

  And then he spoke softly in a voice that was low and intense. “If I die tomorrow and never prove myself innocent, never find out who killed Cooley, at least I know I saved some boys from a miserable life. Cooley would have wanted it that way.”

  His words took her breath. But she couldn’t disagree with him. She felt the same. It only made her feelings for him deeper.

  He kissed her cheek, then held her so he could face her. She watched the emotion in his deep blue eyes as he gazed into hers.

  Gently, he touched her hair. “We’ll get through tomorrow night. We’ll pull it off. Torres will contact Knox and we’ll have more evidence to give him along with the note from Tiziano. Knox will believe us. And then this nightmare will be over.”

  Oh, she hoped he was right.

  He took her hand in his and kissed it, not daring to go for her mouth. “And when it is, when we’re back home and safe, we’ll talk about the future.”

  “The future?”

  “Our future.”

  Despite all the terror in her heart, she couldn’t help melting at his words. He wanted a future with her? She could hardly believe it.

  But because he couldn’t give her any more than that, he released her and headed for the bathroom. “We need to get to sleep. It’s late and we need to be alert tomorrow.”

  An understatement.

  Suddenly she felt drained. She waited for Simon to finish, washed up and changed into her sweatpants and T-shirt.

  Plodding into the bedroom, she stared down at the beds. The one Alejandro had slept in last night. She’d never thought of herself as the maternal type, but she missed the boy. And the three of them had sort of felt like a family. For a little while.

  She turned to the bed she had slept in with Simon last night.

  When this was over, she thought. If they made it, there was so much to look forward to. A future. A life together. A safe and happy one. She would have to be satisfied with that promise for now.

  She lay down on the bed that was hers and fell instantly asleep.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  He stood in the aisle of the little store, oblivious to the packages of crackers and dried sausages on the shelves before him. He was listening to the conversation of the two men a few feet away from him, who were examining the soft drinks in the freezer.

  Two days ago with only a vague location, he had left Concepción, traveling alone in a jeep registered to a nonexistent identity. Since then, he had been to four little towns in the cursed Pampas region and not found his target.

  Perhaps he should not have left his pilot behind. But the young man could not find any more specific information. Besides, he was too green. He would have hampered his progress. Not that he was making any.

  Across the aisle, the taller man opened the freezer case. “Tiziano did not come to the bar last night.”

  His back went straight at the name.

  “He is celebrating his anniversary with his wife.” The shorter man chuckled as he selected a bottle of ginger ale.

  “Ah. She is much better company than we are.”

  The first man laughed along with his friend. “I am sure he had a good time.”

  “Out there on the ranch, anything can happen,” the shorter man teased.

  “He is a lucky man. I wish I had such a woman.” The taller man picked up a cola.

  It was risky, but he had to move now, or he’d lose this opportunity. He turned and took a step toward the taller man. “Excuse me, Señor. Did you say Tiziano has a ranch nearby?”

  The man closed the freezer door and turned to face him. “Why do you ask?”

  He took in the man’s thick black hair and mustache, his heavy cotton trousers, poncho, and beret, the band
ana around his neck. Unmistakably a gaucho. The shorter man was in similar garb.

  He smiled at both of them. “I am an old friend of Tiziano and have not seen him in years. I would like to stop by and say hello.”

  Unmoved, the man eyed him up and down.

  Hanging his head, he uttered as sad a sigh as he could muster. “Never mind. I’m being too presumptuous. Forgive me.”

  “No, Señor,” said the shorter man, turning to the taller one. “Tiziano would not like it if we sent away his friend.”

  They debated the point back and forth for a bit, but eventually gave him directions to the ranch.

  Half an hour later, he was in his jeep just a few kilometers away from the place. He slowed, parked the jeep among the weeds, and walked. When he was within sight of the ranch house, he hunkered down in the weeds and went the rest of the way in a tiger crouch, bent over, crawling through the endless field of tall dry grass, his back aching, the wind chafing his face, the bugs flying into his ears.

  It was miserable, but he pressed on. He was a soldier. And it was so much like the training drills he’d been through years ago, he found it exhilarating. So he told himself.

  It didn’t matter what he felt. What mattered was executing.

  This mission was of tantamount importance. He could not let that traitor, Simon Sloan, live. He would do anything he had to to obey the order he’d been given.

  Still, he wasn’t as young as he’d once been. He thought he was about to give out when he’d hit the mother lode.

  He’d found Tiziano and his wife in the barn, feeding their sheep and talking with each other. They thought they were alone. They thought they had complete privacy.

  They were wrong.

  He heard it all.

  Buenos Aires. And the name Rodriguez. And another name. Julian Knox. Agent Julian Knox.

  It was all the information he needed.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  The next day Janelle jumped out of the shower, wrapped a towel around herself, and poked her head out of the door.