She radioed Director Chavez, told him her interview with Salvador Perez had been unsuccessful, and asked him to meet her at a coffee shop not too far from her apartment.
“What’s going on, Moreno?” he asked after he arrived.
“I didn’t mean to be deceptive, sir, but I didn’t want to say too much over the air in case our transmissions are being monitored. Have you seen this?”
She thrust her phone into his hands and showed him the video of the attack on the Mariposa.
“Some of these look like our guys,” he said, disappointment etched on his face. “Has this been confirmed?”
“Not yet. We’re still waiting for local law enforcement to respond.”
“If you haven’t heard from them by now, chances are you aren’t going to. They’ve most likely been killed or paid off by now. We need to get our troops in the air and on the ground as soon as possible.”
She grabbed his beefy arm before he could rise from his seat.
“Wait. There’s more. Finn Chamberlain, the woman who sent me the video, is on a bus traveling from Chichén Itzá. The driver is this man.” She showed him the picture Finn had sent her. “His name is Javier Villalobos. I think he’s the top enforcer for the Jaguars and he’s been ordered to kill Finn to coerce me into ending my investigation.”
“How many people are on the bus?”
“Thirty-nine passengers, a guide, and the driver.”
“Forty potential witnesses.” Director Chavez grimaced. “I doubt he plans to leave any of them behind. What are you suggesting we do? Try to save forty people and leave the countless others at the resort to die?”
“No, of course not. If we cut off the head of the snake, the body will die. I know who the leader of the Jaguars is. Before we take her in, maybe we can convince her to call the whole thing off.”
“Are you saying the man we’ve been looking for all this time is a woman? Who?”
“Her name is Ines Villalobos. She’s been right under our noses this entire time.”
“How do you know it’s her?”
“Javier Villalobos is her grandson. I saw his picture in her apartment and can say without a doubt he is the man driving Finn’s bus. Based on what Salvador Perez told me, I have reason to believe Javier is the Carver, Ines’s second-in-command. The owner of the car tied to the hit men who killed Perez’s family is Idoia Ocampo. Ruben Huerta texted me a few minutes ago. He was able to identify Idoia Ocampo as Ines Villalobos’s sister. Mrs. Ocampo died five years ago, three years before the vehicle she allegedly owns was purchased and four years before the local post office box attributed to her was opened. There have been several other big-ticket items purchased in her name after her death as well. Ines Villalobos has apparently been using her deceased sister’s identity to launder money and run her operations.”
“Ruben uncovered all that?” Director Chavez asked. “His skills are being wasted in Records. I need to move him up to our floor and pair him with you full-time. The two of you make a good team.” He leaned forward, obviously intrigued by her recitation of facts. “What else do you have?”
Luisa didn’t look down at her notes because she didn’t need to refer to them in order to conclude her tale.
“Ines Villalobos’s apartment is filled with jaguar-related memorabilia, which I initially thought were a nod to her Mayan heritage but are actually clues to her secret identity. Most of the evidence I’ve found to tie her to the case is circumstantial, I know, but there is one last thing. When Gilberto Ruiz tried to kill me this morning, he said everyone I loved was going to die today. The only person who knows I’m involved with Finn Chamberlain is Ines Villalobos.”
Luisa normally tried to be circumspect about her personal life, but she hadn’t thought twice when Mrs. Villalobos had pressed her for details about her fledgling relationship with Finn. Could one slip of the tongue cost her everything?
“It can’t hurt to talk to the Villalobos woman and see what she says,” Director Chavez said. “If you’re right, you’ll look like a genius. If you’re wrong…”
“It could cost me my career. As long as it saves lives, it’s a price I’m willing to pay.”
“This is your op, Moreno. Tell me how you want to run it.”
“Let’s take your car. Mrs. Villalobos watches the street constantly and would have no problems recognizing my vehicle. I don’t have any reason to come home this early in the day, so spotting me entering the building would raise her suspicions. I don’t want her to know we’re coming. Your windows are tinted dark enough that she won’t be able to see inside even if she spots your car. Once we get inside, I’ll run point and you can back me up. How long has it been since you’ve climbed three flights of stairs?”
He patted his round belly. “About twenty pounds ago, but don’t worry about me, Moreno. I’ve got your back.”
❖
Finn’s anxiety continued to grow the longer she went without word from Luisa.
“When did she say she’d call you back?” Ryan asked.
“As soon as she could. It hasn’t been that long.”
“It’s been half an hour. We’ll be back at the hotel in ninety minutes. Then what? They gun us all down at the same time? We’ve got to do something. If this guy is as dangerous as your friend says he is, there’s no way he’s letting any of us make it off this bus alive.”
Finn didn’t want to admit Ryan might be right.
“Maybe we should get Richard involved and ask him to help us.”
“But what if he’s in on it, too? He knows this guy by name and must have worked with him before if he was willing to let him take over after Leo split. Until we know which side everybody’s on, we can’t trust anyone. I tell you one thing, though. If today’s my day to die, I’m not going down without a fight.”
“What do you have in mind?”
“We could rush him,” Ryan said. “He can’t take us all on at once. Wesley and LeeAnne are school bus drivers. One of them could take the wheel after we take Javier out.”
Finn thought it over. The plan was risky, but if they got enough women to buy into it, it might work. As long as they weren’t afraid of getting hurt. Perhaps even killed. The bus’s aisles were so narrow two people couldn’t stand side by side. They would have to make their run single file, which meant the women who volunteered to be at the front of the line would be in the most danger.
“Are you in?” Ryan asked.
“Yeah, I’m in.”
Instead of waiting for Luisa to save her, perhaps it was time for her to save herself.
❖
Luisa knocked on Mrs. Villalobos’s apartment door and moved out of the potential line of fire.
“Mrs. Villalobos, it’s Luisa. May I come in?” She waited for a response. Hearing none, she knocked again. “Mrs. Villalobos?”
Director Chavez drew his gun.
“One more,” he whispered. “Then I knock the door down.”
He had obviously been watching the same movies she had. They could have asked the building manager to unlock the door for them, but she hadn’t wanted to bring him into the situation in case he was on the Jaguars’ payroll. She hadn’t seen him when she entered the building, but had he seen her and Director Chavez and alerted Mrs. Villalobos that they were coming?
After she knocked on the door a third time, Director Chavez waved her out of the way so he could hurl himself against it.
“Ines Villalobos, this is Director Arturo Chavez with the Federal Police. Officer Moreno and I are coming in.”
He aimed his attack at the door’s hinges, which easily tore loose from the frame. The door canted to one side, then fell in with a crash.
Luisa scanned the room. On the TV, images from security cameras aimed at the interior and exterior of the building—and, she realized with a start, inside her own apartment—flickered across the screen.
She felt sick. She had moved into the building less than a week ago and she already needed to move out. She had treate
d her apartment like a sanctuary. Her refuge from the dangers that awaited her outside its walls. How ironic was it that the one place she had felt safe had actually been where she had been most vulnerable?
She moved further into the room. The chair in front of the TV and the one in front of the window were empty because Mrs. Villalobos was sitting on the windowsill. Her feet and legs were inside the apartment, but her upper body was angled toward the ground thirty feet below. She gripped the sides of the window with both hands, ready to pull herself inside or push herself out into space.
Luisa holstered her gun and raised her hands.
“Come back inside, Mrs. Villalobos,” she said as Director Chavez radioed for additional units. “We just want to talk to you.”
Mrs. Villalobos smiled. “You’re a clever girl, Luisa. From the minute I laid eyes on you, I knew you would be the one. Carlos Ramos came close to figuring everything out, but not as close as you.”
“What happened to him?” Luisa asked as she slowly moved forward. “Did you have him killed?”
Mrs. Villalobos looked insulted.
“Have him killed? Silly girl, I took care of him myself.”
“How?” Luisa tried to keep her talking. The longer she could keep the conversation going, the lower the likelihood the situation might end badly.
“I invited him over for dinner. Unfortunately, something in my chilaquiles didn’t agree with him.”
Luisa swallowed hard, wondering if she would have found Mrs. Villalobos’s tamales just as disagreeable in two days’ time.
“What did you do with Ramos’s body?” she asked.
“I wrapped him in a rug and had two of my men throw him out like trash,” Mrs. Villalobos said matter-of-factly.
Luisa looked at the area rug in the living room. She had been drawn to the bright colors the first time she visited Mrs. Villalobos’s apartment. Now she knew why the rug had caught her eye. It wasn’t as worn as the rest of the furniture and accessories in the apartment because Mrs. Villalobos had been forced to replace it after she used it to cover up the murder of Carlos Ramos.
“He’s probably buried under tons of garbage in a landfill somewhere,” Mrs. Villalobos said with a cruel smile. “Unless, of course, he was dumped in a fifty-gallon drum filled with gas and set on fire. It’s hard to say. As you’re well aware, my men can be rather creative sometimes.”
Out of the corner of her eye, Luisa saw Director Chavez slowly circling around the left side of the room. She moved right, hoping she could distract Mrs. Villalobos long enough for Director Chavez to move close enough to grab her and pull her back inside.
“It’s all over, Mrs. Villalobos. We have two of your men in custody and one is already talking. We know about Javier. We know about the attack on the Mariposa. And we know about you. We know everything. So please come quietly and—”
“Do what? Spend what’s left of my life in prison? No.”
Mrs. Villalobos shook her head so hard she nearly lost her grip. Luisa held her breath and Director Chavez stopped in his tracks, both waiting to see if Mrs. Villalobos would regain her balance or continue to lose it.
“You can make a deal,” Luisa said after Mrs. Villalobos settled back into place. “You can make things easier on yourself.”
“How?”
The look of curiosity on Mrs. Villalobos’s creased face gave Luisa hope she might be getting through to her.
“Call Javier and your men at the Mariposa and tell them to stand down. Whatever you have planned for today, call it off.”
“And you’ll cut me a deal?”
Luisa wasn’t authorized to make any offers. She turned to Director Chavez, hoping he would take the lead.
“Yes, I’ll cut you a deal,” Director Chavez said. “I will be happy to work with you as long as you work with us.”
Mrs. Villalobos slowly reached into the pocket of her housedress. Luisa and Director Chavez trained their guns on her in case she drew a weapon of her own. Mrs. Villalobos pulled out a cell phone and punched in a number.
“Javier, it’s me.” Mrs. Villalobos looked up and met Luisa’s eye. “Kill them all.”
She let the phone drop and released her grip on the window. Her feet flew into the air as gravity tugged her toward the ground.
“No,” Luisa cried.
Director Chavez made a desperate lunge but managed to grab only air.
Luisa heard screams and honking horns from passersby as Mrs. Villalobos’s body hurtled toward the street.
“You were right.” Director Chavez sounded as stunned as she felt.
“Yes, but what do we do now? Our best chance to end this mess just threw herself out that window.”
Director Chavez pushed himself to his feet.
“Call Forensics. I want a team to go over every inch of this place to see if even a shred of Carlos Ramos’s DNA is in here. Tell them to bring an electronics expert, too, so we can search her phone, security system, and anything else she might have around here. We need to identify who the other members of her organization are and where the money is. Ruiz may be able to help with that. He’ll probably start singing like a bird as soon as he finds out his boss is dead. While you’re doing that, I’ll call the captains of the Yucatán and Quintana Roo state police forces and get them to send some troopers after the tour bus. They should be able to pen Villalobos in and take him down before he hurts anyone.”
“And then?”
He placed a heavy hand on her shoulder.
“Pack your riot gear. You and I are going to Cancún.”
The Federal Police had seventeen thousand patrol cars and dozens of planes and helicopters at its disposal. Troops could be in Cancún in a matter of hours. But when they arrived, Luisa feared, it might already be too late.
❖
The women sitting near Finn and Ryan had overheard most of their conversation. It didn’t take long to bring the others up to speed, one whispered conversation at a time. Some were alarmed, naturally, but most managed to keep their cool.
Finn felt a buzz in the air. Tension. Excitement. Camaraderie.
She checked her watch. One thirty. Only an hour away from the resort. They had sixty minutes to put their plan into action. If Javier had an automatic weapon, he could mow them all down when they tried to rush him. But if they somehow managed to take him by surprise, they would be home free—as long as they didn’t end up sending the bus careening off the road or into oncoming traffic.
“Are you ready?” Ryan asked.
“Give me a minute.” Finn’s phone vibrated while she was trying to build up her courage for what needed to be done. She checked the display. “It’s my editor,” she said for Ryan’s benefit. She pressed Accept and brought the phone to her ear. “Brett? What’s going on?”
“I should ask you the same thing. I sent you to Cancún to cover a story. I didn’t send you to become the story.”
“You know what’s going on?”
“A bunch of female tourists held captive by one of the most notorious drug cartels in Mexico? It’s breaking news on all the major networks. I thought it was a hoax or, at worst, the opening line of a very bad joke. Now I know it’s true. Are you all right?”
“For now.”
Finn knew she shouldn’t have been so surprised to hear that word had already trickled back to the States about her plight. Jill wasn’t the only person at the resort with a cell phone. She—or someone else—must have reached out to the media to let them know what was happening. Was that what Javier and the rest of his cohorts wanted? To have the eyes of the world upon them? The real question was now that they had everyone’s attention, how did they plan to exploit it?
“What do you need me to do?” Brett asked.
Finn almost laughed at the absurdity of the question. “This situation is a lot different than trying to put the next issue of the magazine to bed. I know you’re used to being in charge instead of leaving the decisions to someone else, Brett, but I’m afraid there’s nothing you c
an do.”
“You know me. I can’t sit around with my thumb up my ass. That would be a fate worse than—” Brett caught herself before she said the word Finn didn’t want to hear. Especially now. “Stay safe.”
“I’ll do my best, but I’m afraid that’s out of my hands.” Tears stung Finn’s eyes as she considered everything she might be about to lose. Including her life. “Thanks for everything.”
“Don’t say that. It sounds too much like good-bye.”
That’s because it is.
“I’ve got to go,” Finn said. “I’m expecting another call.”
“Finn, don’t hang—”
Finn ended the call before the emotion she heard in Brett’s voice made her break down completely. She was barely holding on as it was. Her tenuous grip on reality was slipping by the second. It wouldn’t take much to push her over the edge. When her phone rang again, she thought it might be Brett calling back to get in the last word. The perks of being the boss. When she looked down, however, she didn’t see Brett’s name or number on the screen. “It’s Luisa.”
Ryan turned toward her and leaned forward, her body language tense and her face fraught with anxiety. “Well, answer it.”
Finn hoped Luisa had the answers she, Ryan, and the rest of the group so desperately needed to hear.
“Luisa? What did you find out?”
“Hold tight, mariposa. Help is on the way. State troopers are coming to intercept the bus. They should be there any minute now.”
As soon as Luisa said the words, Finn heard sirens. Far off at first, but growing steadily closer. Ryan and the rest of the women cheered when the police cars pulled even with the bus and flanked it on all sides.
“Take that, fuckhead,” Ryan said as she flipped Javier the bird.
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