“That’s it?” the man in the back seat asked incredulously.
“These are the coordinates, sir. There are no street numbers around here. I assume that is the building. We won’t know until we’re closer. And there appears to be no way to drive any closer, so . . .”
“You expect me to—?”
“Pal, you want to know the truth?” the driver asked, his formerly subservient tone replaced by something just this side of a sneer. “I don’t give a rat’s ass about your little expectations. You know who I work for. My orders were, bring you to this joint, play chauffeur, keep anybody from hurting you. I did that. I can do that. The rest of this stuff—mister, you’re on your own. You want to stroll through that minefield over there, I’ll walk point. You want to bag the whole thing and go home, I’m just as okay with that. Don’t matter to me, you understand?”
“Couldn’t we call—?”
“This is what I was told, all right? Only place to find this guy is right here. Or at that Double X joint he owns, but word is he won’t do business there. So it’s got to be here. And it’s got to be now, the way it was set up.”
“Do you know this man?”
“Only by rep. Never met him.”
“Do you believe he could actually—?”
“Don’t know, don’t care.”
“Your superiors—”
“Sure. Whatever. I’m not in this. You want to walk or you want to ride?”
The immaculately dressed man let himself out of the back seat for an answer, tapping one toe impatiently as the chauffeur also got out and joined him.
“Did you set the alarm?”
“What the silly fuck for? You think anyone around here’s gonna call the cops? Look, the way I was told, you park in this spot—see, right across from that fire hydrant with the top knocked off it—you’re covered, long as you’re inside. And they’re expecting you. I figure they got us scoped already. These guys, they’re not car thieves, okay? Now come on. . . .”
The chauffeur walked ahead carefully, lips twisting in something close to a smile at the brief flashes of ankle-level light that exploded coldly every few steps—lighting the path and announcing a warning at the same time. The immaculately dressed man came behind him, finally silent.
The outside of the building had the number “71” scrawled in dried-blood red as its only identification. Good enough, the chauffeur thought to himself. A rusty metal door was standing slightly ajar. He pulled it toward himself and stepped inside. A long streamer of the same-color paint greeted him. A crudely drawn arrow at its end pointed the way. Down.
He descended the steps, chuckling at the dozen different ways he’d already spotted for an intruder who pulled the wrong move to die. The door at the bottom had the same “71” scrawled in the same-color paint. Past the door was a poolroom. At least, it looked like a poolroom—it was so murky that only the click of the ivory balls and an occasional muted movement gave any hint. The size of the room was impossible to determine.
An elderly man wearing a green eyeshade as old as he was swiveled in his wooden chair, pulling his eyes away from a small black-and-white TV set with rabbit-ear antennas wrapped in silver foil. He looked at the chauffeur, saying nothing.
“We’re here for Cross,” the chauffeur said.
“I ain’t the boss,” the old man said, cupping a hand around one ear.
“Sure, Pop.” The chauffeur snickered. “I get the joke. How long do I have to—?”
He stopped speaking because he felt a hand on his forearm. A gentle hand, but the chauffeur sensed it would be impossible to dislodge. He didn’t turn around.
“Count to five. Then turn around. Follow the biggest thing you see,” a high-pitched squeaky voice said quietly.
When the chauffeur turned around, he saw the shapeless bulk of the largest human he’d ever seen in his life moving off between the tables. “Let’s go,” he told the immaculately dressed man.
The huge man cleared a path with his presence, as though he were displacing the very air. When he came to a curtain composed of thousands of ball bearings strung like beads, he stepped to one side. “In there,” is all he said.
The chauffeur parted the curtain for his passenger, noting the weight—any one strand would snap bones as if they were dry twigs. As the chauffeur passed through, he felt the presence of the behemoth behind him, but there was no physical contact.
Inside, he saw a man behind a desk fashioned out of a door laid across a pair of sawhorses. The man was as unremarkable as a grain of rice. A human generic, a member of any crowd, invisible even in person. A pair of institutional-gray metal folding chairs was arranged on the other side of the desk.
“You’re Cross?” the immaculately dressed man asked the man behind the desk.
“Just sit down,” the chauffeur told him, embarrassed, taking a seat himself. “I’m carrying,” he told the man behind the desk.
“We know.”
The chauffeur nodded in acknowledgment. They knew he was armed. He knew he was surrounded. He’d disclosed his weapon only to keep things honest, that’s what he told himself. But he knew the truth—he wanted to distance himself from the immaculately dressed man. He was a professional, same as the man sitting across from them. And, somehow, it was important to him that the other man recognize it.
“My friends in the State Department . . .” the immaculately dressed man began.
“Told you I could get something done. Just tell me what it is,” the man behind the desk said softly.
“My daughter is a political prisoner,” the man said.
Cross regarded him in total stillness, waiting. It was almost fifteen seconds before the immaculately dressed man understood that this was not going to be a conversation—if he didn’t speak again, the meeting was over.
“She’s being held in Quitasol,” he said. “Maybe you read about it. The government claims she was working with the rebel faction, with some guerrilla outfit. But she was only there for some ecology thing. She never had a trial. Like that girl in Peru. Only these people are even worse. There’s no appellate process at all. The prison they have her in, she . . . won’t survive much longer. It’s high in the mountains. The food is foul. There’s no medical care. She . . .”
“What do you want?” the man behind the desk asked.
“Want? I want her out of there. I want her home. Where she belongs.”
“Uh, maybe you didn’t understand me. You came here. I’m not a therapist. Tell me what you want to buy.”
“He wants an extraction,” the chauffeur said, motioning the immaculately dressed man into silence before the arrogant fool said something that would end it all before they even got the offer out.
“From La Casa de Dolor?” Cross asked.
“Yes,” the chauffeur replied, unsurprised that Cross knew not only where the girl was being kept, but what the locals called it.
“Not a chance. Can’t be done.”
“You did it before,” the chauffeur said, wasting no time in playing the card his bosses had told him to hold back unless he really needed it. “Same country. A chopper made up to look like the Red Cross on one side and La Policía on the other. Dropped into the biggest drug-dealer gathering the DEA ever heard of. And took your man out.”
“That was on the ground, just the other side of the border,” Cross said, not bothering to deny anything he’d done in another country . . . one with no extradition treaty. “The prison is in the mountains. No way to get a chopper there without being spotted halfway up. And the camp we hit was right out in the open. This one’s behind high walls. You could blast it, maybe, but there’s no guarantee you wouldn’t take out the client at the same time.”
“We’re willing to take that chance,” the chauffeur said. “She’s not going to last much longer anyway.”
“You’re willing to take the chance? The last thing you talked about—it cost me two men.”
“High risk, high return,” the chauffeur said.
&nbs
p; “Your . . . friend here, he’s way-up connected, right?”
“Sure. But this can’t be a government thing. Hell, even the President called for her release; and our UN ambassador did, too. But Quitasol isn’t going for it. They saw what happened with the girl in Peru when the government wouldn’t release her. Nothing. Hell, Uncle’s not even willing to demand Pinochet’s extradition from England, for Christ’s sake. We got no muscle anymore,” he said, a deep trace of sadness in his voice.
“And even if the government was willing,” he continued, “we couldn’t do it the usual way—you know, foreign trade tariffs, Most Favored Nation status, rebuilding aid—with these guys. The only industry they got there is coke and gold. The coke market is drying up. Smack is back. So the Triangle’s back in business. That’s why Pol Pot had to go. And the gold they have, it’s not concentrated in one spot. On top of that, the government is highly unstable. The rebels hold big pieces of the country, and they could make their move anytime.”
“So why not throw them a little support? The government did that for the Kurds, they would have shredded Saddam a long time ago.”
“The old guard at the . . . agency isn’t real fond of the rebels. They’re way too leftist, if you get my drift. And they got no real leadership. Not pyramid-style, anyway. There’s nobody to talk to. Until the agency figures out who’s going to come out on top, they have to hedge. We need a presence there, in Central America. We’re going to lose our hold in the Canal Zone soon enough. Remember, this whole shaky mess is just the other side of Mexico. And Mexico, it’s got its own problems, especially in Chiapas.”
“But you tried anyway?” Cross asked mildly.
“Yeah, we did. And you know what’s funny? This guy,” the chauffeur said, jerking a thumb toward the immaculately dressed man, “he’s right. His daughter didn’t have jack to do with the rebels. She went down there with some other rich kids. You know, spend-a-semester-in-the-rain-forest thing? So the rebels, they don’t care what happens to her either. Fact is, near as I can tell, they’d kind of like it if she died there. Amnesty International already has her as a prisoner of conscience. It’d make it harder for us to associate ourselves with the guys in power.”
“So you want her out because . . . ?”
“Because I have friends in right places,” the immaculately dressed man interjected sharply. “Grateful friends. And all they’ve done is provide some . . . intelligence. I am expected to finance any rescue operation out of my own resources. And I am fully prepared to do so.”
“That’s nice,” Cross told him. “Good luck.”
“I am told,” the man said, his voice doing an isometric exercise against his impatience, “that you had the only private . . . force capable of handling such an operation.”
“We’re not a merc outfit,” Cross told him. “But there’s plenty of those out of work since Rhodesia disappeared and the Congo changed hands and the French pulled out of Algeria and the Portuguese out of Angola. . . . Well, you understand. Hell, for all I know, the Count still has his little air force you can rent.”
“I have spoken to . . . several such groups as you describe. It is clear to me, after consultation with my advisers, that I could spend money but would have no guarantee that the operation would ever be undertaken, much less successfully so.”
“And the difference between me and them is . . . what?”
“You live here,” the chauffeur said flatly. “Sorry, pal, but that’s the way it is. Uncle can’t reach out and touch the way it could years ago. The only outfits operating on U.S. soil are full of it. Bullshit idiots in camouflage suits. No way they could do anything like what we’re talking about. The ones that used to . . . work, they’re living elsewhere. Our orders are . . . Uh, look at it like this: We got to make you do it, okay? I don’t mean as a freebie or anything like that. This guy here”—indicating the immaculately dressed man with a curt nod—“he’s got the coin; that’s legit. But if you don’t take the deal, we have to take you down.”
“You mean . . . what?” Cross asked. “Those words, they’re like from a movie. They could mean anything. You saying you’re going to kill us, is that right? Murder us? All of us?”
The chauffeur threw up his hands, as if to defend himself against a blow. “Don’t be ridiculous. I gave you respect, why not give me some? I don’t know what I’m being recorded on now, but I’m not stupid enough to think I’m not. This place doesn’t look high-tech but . . . listen, I know what I’m dealing with, okay? You don’t want me to say in front of this guy”—another nod in the direction of the immaculately dressed man—“but I can show you whatever you want. You got something going here in Chicago, that’s all I’m saying. We know you don’t work out of the country anymore. All I’m saying is, we could make it kind of hard for you to work here, see what I’m saying?”
“Sure. And if I was running some kind of criminal enterprise, maybe that would be scary or something. But I think you got me confused with someone else.”
“No. No, we don’t. Look, don’t you have some place this guy”—another nod of the head—“can go while I talk to you alone for a minute?”
Cross nodded. A huge hand clamped down on the immaculately dressed man’s right shoulder. The tip of the hand’s forefinger was missing. Not a word was exchanged, but the man got up and left the room. The chauffeur didn’t take his eyes from Cross.
“You don’t want Uncle to owe you one?” he asked softly.
“He’s not my uncle,” Cross said.
“You must have thought so once. Your service record—”
“I went out on a Dishonorable.”
“That could be fixed. Easy enough. After all—”
“I don’t give a fuck. Gonna give me my medals back too, asshole? I went in because I thought it would be better than prison. It wasn’t.”
“Ah. All right, look: that guy, you think he’s got so much juice because of his cash? Fuck, the Chinese got more than him, and they pay. Got more politicians on their payroll than the whole tobacco industry. Reason he can call something like this in, he knows something. I don’t know what it is. And I know if he disappeared that wouldn’t be a tragedy, if you get what I’m saying. But the . . . agency doesn’t have what it takes to handle that stuff on the domestic side anymore.”
“Then you don’t have enough to hit us, either.”
“Nobody’s threatening to . . .” The chauffeur drew a deep breath. “Listen for a minute. This business with his daughter . . . I don’t understand these things. You got any kids?”
Cross stared through him.
“Yeah, sorry. Okay, look, here’s how it is. You got to do it. At least try to do it. And if it doesn’t work out, if the daughter doesn’t make it, that’s A-fucking-okay with us, you understand me now?”
“I don’t have the crew,” Cross replied.
“You got Ace, Rhino, Princess, Buddha, and Falcon for sure. And probably Tiger too.”
“You know so much, you know this much,” Cross said gently. “Ace never worked jungle in his life—he’s a city guy. Buddha, me, and Falcon are the only ones with the experience. And Falcon’s not with us.”
“He was with you on—”
“On some job, maybe,” Cross cut him off. “In another country. Once. But he’s not with us, understand? He’s not with the crew. He’s free-lance.”
“Uh, first of all, Rhino was on the ground when you made the last extraction from that same country. And Princess, you took him out of there . . . for whatever fucking reason we’ll never know, ’cause we do know he wasn’t part of the plan going in. And Falcon was there, on that job.”
“Princess wouldn’t know a rifle from a rock,” Cross said. “He’s useless. Tiger, I don’t even know where she is. She decides job by job, just like Fal, anyway. And I don’t have Luis or Maddox anymore. It’s too small a crew.”
“Money’s no—”
“We never take strangers,” Cross said, his voice dry ice. “Don’t even go there. And don�
��t waste my time telling me you know just the right boys.”
“She doesn’t have to come out, Cross. All we need is a big bang, something that’ll show on the radar, got me? Then you keep the money and Uncle owes you one, too.”
“I already told you—”
“Yeah. I believe you don’t know where Tiger is. Because we do. And I bet she’d be glad to go along on this one. She doesn’t get out much anymore.”
“That right?”
“Yeah. She killed a U.S. marshal while he was in performance of his duties. Only reason she didn’t get the death penalty was . . . it was a little murky, all right? Anyway, she’s got about another, oh, fifteen years inside. You take this deal, she goes with you.”
“What, on work release?”
“You do have a good sense of humor, huh? No, pal. She ‘escapes,’ all right? And nobody looks for her either.”
“Better she dies in prison,” Cross said.
“Damn, you’re a cold motherfucker. I thought—”
“Better she dies there,” Cross said, as if the other man had not spoken. “On paper. Then it’s off the books forever. Like the Witness Protection Program. Only one that works.”
“So you will do it?”
“I didn’t say that. I’m only saying, if I was to do it, that’d have to be her end.”
“Huh?”
“She wouldn’t get any of the money. Just the walkaway. That should be enough.”
“Yeah. Sure. Whatever you say. Who cares? Are you going to—?”
“Twenty-five thousand.”
“Huh?”
“Twenty-five thousand ounces of gold. That’s two hundred and eight bullion bars, ten pounds troy each. Half in hand, minimum of one month before we move.”
“That’s . . . how much?”
“At today’s quote, plus or minus a few bucks, seven and a half million.”
“He’s not even gonna blink,” the chauffeur said.
“Right. So you can tell your little asset that we’re not going for his snakehead scam either.”
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