Borderland

by Peter Eichstaedt

  “Who did you talk to when you were there?” Lopez asked slowly.

  “Brigham Madsen. He’s related to Micah Madsen, the man who might be the next U.S. president. But you probably know that already.”

  Lopez shook his head. “Señor Dawson, we have suspicions that you have been engaged in subversive activity.”

  “That’s ridiculous. And you know it.”

  “We have a lot of problems with journalists here in Mexico. They like to put their noses where they don’t belong. We warn them, but they don’t always listen. Unfortunately, accidents happen. Mexico can be a very dangerous country.”

  “You’re not telling me anything new.”

  “We also have a problem with people who say they are journalists when they are not. We need to know what you were doing in this country and if you are who you say you are. By the way, Señor Dawson, you do not have a visitor’s card.”

  “I travel back and forth between El Paso and Juárez all of the time without one. I’ve done nothing wrong.”

  “Señor Dawson,” Lopez continued slowly. “I don’t like your attitude. We’re going to have to keep you here until we can learn why you are in our country.”

  “One phone call,” Dawson croaked. “Please. I can get this straightened out fast.”

  “This is not America, Señor Dawson. You of all people should know that. Here we follow Napoleonic law. Do you know that means? I’ll tell you. It means you are guilty until proven innocent.”

  “Napoleon would have been proud.”

  “Let me explain. You could be charged with disturbing the peace, impeding the legitimate exercise of authority, resisting arrest, and in addition to being in this country illegally, subversive activity.”

  “Please. Just one call.”

  “The minor charges carry a minimum sentence of at least two and a half years in prison and a fine. For the more serious charges, well, you could be in prison a long time.”

  “Please.”

  Lopez looked at Dawson for a moment, then picked up Dawson’s notebook, his tape recorder, his passport, and his wallet. He fingered the wallet again, extracting a couple of hundred dollar bills. Lopez folded them and stuffed them into his shirt pocket. “Because I am in a good mood today, you can make your call. Unlock him,” Lopez said to his men.

  Dawson felt the metal handcuffs fall away from his wrists. He slowly massaged each wrist, now red and raw. Lopez handed him the phone. With shaking hands, Dawson flicked through the screens until he found the number he wanted. He hit dial. He gingerly held the phone to his ear and waited for a long moment before he heard the call going through. Finally, he heard Garcia’s voice.

  “Dawson. What’s up?”

  “I’m in a Mexican jail.”

  Garcia laughed. “What the hell are you doing there?”

  Dawson groaned as Lopez made a circling motion for him to hurry with the call. “It’s a long story. Not a very funny one. They’re saying all kinds of shit. I’m a subversive. I’m here illegally.”

  “You are a subversive, Kyle. Don’t deny it.”

  “Don’t be a comedian. You’ve got to help me.”

  “Where are you?”

  “Nuevo Casas Grandes.”

  “You must be with Captain Lopez, aka Super Max.”

  “You know him?”

  “I’ve done some work with him. Nothin’ happens in that part of Mexico that he’s not involved in.”

  “Then get me out of here.

  “Put him on the phone.”

  “He’s threatening to keep me here.”

  “Give him the goddamn phone,” Garcia said.

  “One more thing. Call my boss, Ed Frankel. Tell him where I am.”

  Dawson handed to phone to Lopez.

  Chapter 36

  Nuevo Casas Grandes, Chihuahua, Mexico

  The next six hours had seemed like an eternity. Dawson stumbled through the door into Lopez’s office, but caught his balance, then squinted in the harsh glow of the humming fluorescent light. His face felt swollen, his lips were puffy and raw, his head thumped.

  Looking calm, but only slightly perturbed in the glare of the blue-gray light, Raoul Garcia sat on a metal folding chair, wearing his snakeskin cowboy boots, jeans, and a gray T-shirt. Sunglasses were parked on his boonie hat, pushed back on his head, he nodded at Dawson, a glimmer of humor in his eye. Dawson knew he’d soon be free. Dawson’s heart was in his throat. He’d never been so happy to see Raoul.

  “Mr. Garcia has come to ensure that you leave this country safely,” Lopez said with an air of relief, as if a troubling dilemma had been solved.

  Dawson looked at Garcia and cleared his throat. “Took you long enough.”

  “You okay?” Garcia asked.

  “Define okay.”

  Lopez motioned to a guard to release Dawson’s cuffs. The guard grabbed his hands, inserted a key, and the cuffs opened with a click.

  Dawson hesitantly touched his tender wrists. “Nice friends you have down here,” he said, glancing at Garcia, then Lopez.

  Garcia stood and nodded to Lopez. “I think we’re done here. Finito. Si?”

  Lopez returned the nod, then looked Dawson up and down with disgust. He pushed Dawson’s briefcase and its contents to the corner of his desk. “You are free to go.”

  Dawson loaded his bag, looped the strap over his shoulder, and turned to leave.

  “I hope you enjoyed your stay, Señor Dawson,” Lopez said.

  Dawson ignored the comment and pushed open the door.

  “Come back and see us some time,” Lopez added.

  Garcia closed the door behind them.

  Dawson sucked in a breath of the warm night air. Standing in the harsh light of a street lamp, he gently rubbed his throbbing wrists. Garcia hitched up his pants.

  “That was fun,” Dawson said.

  “I told you this was dangerous business.”

  “What the hell is going on? They appeared out of nowhere, arrested me, and tossed me in jail.”

  “A call from Trini Serna would be enough to do it.”

  “Serna? That SOB. Serna controls the Mexican police?”

  “Not exactly. The police protect the trucks coming from the farms.”

  “I was told they’re in on everything down here.”

  “That’s how the police make money—and stay alive.”

  Dawson looked down the street and into the darkness beyond the sporadic flicker of streetlights. “I think I’ve had enough. I’m going back to Washington.”

  Garcia froze, then shook his head at Dawson’s remark. “No. You can’t. Not now.”

  “Yes, I can. I know why my father was killed.”

  “Really?”

  “He was caught in the middle.”

  “Middle of what?”

  Dawson frowned. “Don’t play me for an idiot, Raoul.”

  “Nothing is what it seems, Kyle.”

  “People keep saying that. But you’ve got to start with the facts and go from there. The Mormon ties, the warehousing—it all fits. My father was a middleman. He facilitated getting the drugs into the country through the warehouses at La Peña and getting the guns out.”

  “You still don’t know who killed him. That’s what you said you wanted.”

  “It doesn’t matter who pulled the trigger. He’s dead now.”

  “It does matter because you’re not done yet.”

  “Yes, I am. I’m through.” Dawson stared down the street. The song “La Vida Loca” blared from a nearby bar.

  Garcia sighed deeply, then lifted his hat and ran a hand over his head. “You were right when you said something was rotten here.” He looked at Dawson with an air of resignation, his eyes apologetic.

  Dawson’s stomach tightened and he clenched his jaw. He glared at his friend. “You’ve been using me.”

  Garcia raised his hands in exasperation. “This mess can only be cleaned up from the outside. That’s you.”

  “Too many people have died. I’m not
interested in being the next.” Dawson shook his head disgustedly and looked again down the street.

  “You’re the big-time war correspondent,” Garcia said mockingly. “I thought you had grown a pair.”

  Dawson’s gut tightened again. Shit. That hurts. “You’re calling me out?” he said angrily.

  Garcia waved his hand to the black SUV parked nearby. “Get in the damned car. We need to get out of here.”

  “I have my own car. I can drive myself home.”

  “You think it’s still there?”

  Dawson climbed into Garcia’s vehicle and pointed down the road where he’d been stopped. Five minutes later they drove to where he thought he’d left his car. Nothing. “What the hell?”

  Garcia wheeled his vehicle to the side of the road and let the engine idle. “Well, looks like you have two choices. Walk or come with me.”

  “What did they do with my damned car?”

  “Impounded it, probably. For evidence.”

  “I need to get it back.”

  “Mexican law. They can keep it as long as they want. Evidence. You have no recourse. Sooner or later, it will end up on the street.” He stared as Dawson’s anger smoldered. “We need to get out of here. I called in some favors to get you released. I don’t want to press my luck.”

  “This is bullshit, Raoul. I feel like I’ve been raped and then tossed onto the street.”

  “You always did have a way with words.”

  “What the hell am I supposed to do now?”

  Garcia put the vehicle into gear, stepping heavily on the gas, and made a screeching U-turn on the dark highway, and sped through the town. “Report the car stolen. You’ll be reimbursed. I’ll get Lopez to verify it. Everyone will be happy.”

  “Whatever.”

  Garcia pushed a CD into the slot on the dashboard and adjusted the sound. Bouncy Tex-Mex music filled the vehicle.

  The throbbing in Dawson’s head intensified along with the aching in his gut. He touched his sore ribs carefully. There were few places where he didn’t hurt. “What do you have in the way of painkillers?”

  Garcia waved a thick finger toward the glove compartment.

  Dawson took a white plastic bottle from it and shook four ibuprofens into his hand, then swallowed them with warm water from a plastic bottle sitting in the console. Waiting for the pills to dull his pain, Dawson thought about what Garcia had said. Maybe he was right. The craziness along the border was everywhere. There was more to this story than met the eye—much more. Follow your instincts. You came down here to get a story. Not just a good story. A great story. His pulse quickened. Yes, but… His next move would depend on Raoul. “Tell me what is going on here.”

  “I wish I could.”

  “What? You’ve been with the DEA for seven years. You have to know.” He paused and stared at Garcia’s visage in the glow of the dashboard lights. “I’m tired of wandering around in the dark.”

  Garcia shook his head. “No need to get your panties in a knot, okay?” He took a breath and exhaled. “When I was in Afghanistan, I was doing some undercover work as a Special Forces operative for the DEA.”

  “Tracking the flow of heroin.”

  “That’s what helped me get the job I have now. But not long after I arrived here, they assigned me to undercover ops in Mexico.”

  “That’s how you got to know Captain Lopez,” Dawson said.

  “You catch on quick. So, I’ve been tracking the flow of narcotics all around the world. What the reports have been saying for the past few years is true. The Mexican cartels have gotten bigger and stronger.”

  “They’re multinational corporations.”

  “Since they control a lot of the cocaine coming out of South America, they’ve expanded their markets globally,” Garcia said.

  “Cocaine now moves from South America through West Africa and north to Europe.”

  “We know most of the players, the suppliers, the routes, everything.”

  “Then why doesn’t the DEA move against them?” Dawson asked.

  “That’s what I keep asking myself. The answer is simple. There’s a new policy in place now. We manage the drug trade, we don’t fight it. The decision came from way up the food chain.”

  “You’re not going conspiracy theorist on me, are you?”

  Garcia shook his head. “It’s the same mindset that gave us the Fast and Furious gun-running fiasco in Arizona.”

  “Which was to let all those high-powered weapons go across the border. The idea was to trap the big guys.”

  “Exactly. But no big guys were ever caught. Not even the little ones.”

  “Someone’s making money, then.”

  “Of course. The Mexican drug cartels are making billions. The money is propping up the Mexican economy.”

  “The U.S. underground drug economy?”

  Garcia nodded. “It’s all illegal, but it’s very real.”

  “Which goes back to what I said. I’ve had enough.”

  Garcia gave Dawson a rueful half-smile. He looked lonely. “When you went away to college in Santa Fe, I was jealous. I went into the Army because I had few options, Kyle. I turned down that football scholarship because someone had to help take care of my family. The first time I was in Iraq was during the first Gulf War. Then there was Afghanistan.”

  “I know all of that. What’s the point?”

  “The point is that I was shot at, I took shrapnel up and down my left side, and I was wounded three other times. For what? To make the world safe for a bunch of corrupt bastards who make billions of dollars illegally?” Garcia let his words hang in the air. “No,” he said, slapping his hand against the steering wheel for emphasis.

  “If you know what’s going on, then do something.”

  “Every time I start nosing around, doors are slammed shut. The department is compartmentalized. It’s for a reason. Security. Nobody knows the whole picture except for a few people at the top. I’m limited. I have a small window. That’s it.”

  “So, what do you want?”

  “I know something is going on, but I can only do so much. You can do more from the outside.”

  “An outsider is an outsider. I need inside information.”

  “I know.”

  Dawson was still hesitant. “What about you? What about Viviana and Miguel?”

  “I’m doing it for them,” Garcia said. He turned to Dawson. “And for my father,” he said softly.

  “Your father? Tio Juan.”

  Garcia nodded. “My father, your uncle.”

  “Juan’s Auto Body. We used to hang out there after school. What little I know about auto mechanics I learned from him. He died the summer after we graduated.”

  “Do you know how he died?” Garcia asked, an angry edge creeping into his voice, his eyes glistening.

  Dawson nodded. “An armed robbery or something. Wasn’t he shot?”

  “He was murdered,” Garcia said bitterly.

  A chill rippled through Dawson, settling in the pit of his stomach. “I…I didn’t know that.” He let Garcia’s words sink in. “Do you know who killed him?”

  Garcia nodded, his face barely visible. “Maybe you didn’t know that he did a lot of work for drug smugglers. He fabricated compartments for cocaine and heroin in car doors, under dashboards, false gas tanks…things like that. The drug smugglers loved him. He was the best in the business.”

  “What happened?”

  “It was the height of the cocaine boom. Don Diego Borrego was the biggest and baddest man in town. Everyone was trying to get in on the action back then. But Borrego wanted it all for himself. He didn’t want my father working for anyone but him.”

  Dawson sensed how this story would end. “So let me guess. Your father defied Borrego and did some work for another smuggler. Borrego had him killed.”

  Garcia’s jaw muscle flexed.

  Dawson looked out to the dark highway, then back at Garcia. “So who pulled the trigger?”

  “Fonseca an
d his Los Ríos gang were Borrego’s enforcers then, remember?”

  “Of course I remember. So Fonseca killed your father?”

  “That’s what people said. Not long after my father was killed, Fonseca was saying that people would answer to him if they crossed Borrego.”

  “That was twenty-five years ago,” Dawson said. “You’ve waited all this time?”

  “There was not much I could do about it back then. Not by myself, anyway. So I went into the army, signed up for Special Forces training.”

  “You were going to come back for Fonseca?”

  “That’s what I was thinking. But then Fonseca and his gang were arrested. Fonseca was convicted of murder and put on death row. I thought it was all over then. And, I was pretty well settled into the military.”

  “But then Fonseca was taken out of prison, put on probation, and given a job at Rancho la Peña,” Dawson said. “You must have been furious.”

  “They set the bastard free.” Garcia clenched his jaw again.

  “So you left the military, joined the DEA, and came back to El Paso to get him.”

  Garcia looked at Dawson darkly. “It’s not just about Fonseca anymore. It’s much bigger than that.”

  “Like how big?”

  “Fonseca is part of a group of corrupt bastards that includes some powerful people. I want to take them all down—and Fonseca along with them.”

  “Even if you die doing it?”

  “If I die, at least I know I did something worthwhile. How many people can die saying that? How many?”

  Dawson looked out as the road rolled below the tires in the headlights’ glare. “I don’t know, Raoul.”

  “What happened to you, Kyle?”

  Dawson clenched his teeth, then swallowed. “Nothing happened to me. Not a goddamn thing.” He wracked his brain, trying to decide what to do next. He fought against his instinct to say the hell with it and go back on the campaign trail. He thought about all of the leads he’d followed and where they’d taken him. There was one person who’d showed up on Fonseca’s probation files who had intrigued him. He took a deep breath and stared into the passing darkness. “Not all of Fonseca’s men died in that warehouse raid, did they?”