Blackout

by Dawson, Mark

  “I was. Not anymore. He was killed.”

  “I’m sorry—”

  She waved his apology away. “We were separated.”

  “How did he die?”

  “One of the president’s bounty hunters. You know about him? The president? What’s happening here?”

  “Just what I’ve read.”

  “The war on drugs,” she intoned. “Duterte promised that the fish in Manila Bay would grow fat on the bodies of criminals. My husband’s name was on a list. Someone killed him because of it.”

  “He was involved in drugs?”

  She shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe. Maybe not. His name was on the list. That’s reason enough.”

  Hicks shifted a little uncomfortably.

  Josie must have sensed it. “How about you?” she said, filling the sudden silence. “You said you had two.”

  “I do. Caleb and Lucas. They’re with my wife.”

  “She doesn’t mind you coming here?”

  “We owe Milton a big favour. She doesn’t mind.”

  “What did Milton do?”

  He found it easier to talk about it with her than he had with Ziggy. “My wife had cancer. She needed treatment in the States, but we couldn’t afford it. Milton found the money for us.”

  A car passed them and slowed for the turn into the compound.

  “What do you think?” he said to her.

  “Mendoza has a Porsche,” she said.

  “That’s not a Porsche.”

  “No.”

  She frowned. “You think he’s coming?”

  “Maybe. We haven’t got anything else to go on.”

  “Where is he?”

  * * *

  MILTON SEARCHED the property.

  It was of a reasonable size, and he took his time working his way through it. For the most part, he found what he would expect to find: summer clothes in the closet, utility bills filed neatly in a bureau in the space that was used as an office, neatly stacked laundry on a shelf above the washing machine. There was a laptop computer in the office, and Milton disconnected it and put it to one side, confident that if there was anything of interest stored on it, then Ziggy would be able to recover it.

  He moved into the master bedroom and, as he dropped down to his stomach to look under the bed, he found a black aluminium case. He pulled it out. It was locked, with two padlocks threaded through metal-reinforced grommets.

  Milton put the case on the bed, went back to the study and collected two paperclips from a bowl that he had noticed earlier. He opened the clips and bent each of them into an L shape. He used one of the clips as his pick and the other as his wrench, and, as he applied slight pressure, he was able to pop the lock. He repeated the trick for the second padlock, slid them both out of the grommets and opened the case. Nestled inside a foam inset were two Taurus PT111 Pro G2 handguns. The model was lightweight and had a thin profile, perfect for concealed carry. The guns were chambered in 9mm, and the case also contained two magazines with twelve-round capacities. Milton took one of the pistols, pushed a magazine into the butt and put it in his pocket. He would give the other one to Hicks.

  He had noticed something else under the bed. One of the floorboards extruded above the others and, when he investigated further, he saw that there were scraping marks around the bed’s metal feet. He pushed the bed aside so that he could take a closer look. The floorboard was loose and, using the claw of the hammer, he was able to prise it open.

  There was a void beneath the floor and, stuffed within it, Milton found a leather satchel. He took it out, unzipped it and counted ten thick bundles of banknotes. He riffled through one of the bundles and saw denominations for two and five hundred pesos. It was difficult to guess with precision, but he suspected from the number of notes that there was perhaps two million pesos in the bag. One hundred thousand dollars.

  He put the banknotes back in the satchel and went through into the lounge. It was approaching five in the afternoon.

  Where was Mendoza? They had no other leads to go on. There would come a point where he would look at another way to find a route back to de Lacey, but, until then, he figured that patience was the best policy.

  There was nothing to do but wait.

  * * *

  THEY WAITED in the car for five hours. It was ten minutes after nine and darkness had fallen when Hicks saw the glow of headlights at the end of the road.

  “You see it?” Josie asked him.

  He nodded.

  “That’s a Porsche,” she said.

  Hicks watched as the car slowed and drew to a halt at the gate. It was a white Boxster with the roof down.

  “What do you think?” Hicks asked Josie.

  She squinted through the darkness. “I think it’s him.”

  He took out his phone and dialled.

  “I’m here,” Milton said as soon as the call connected.

  “There’s a car at the gate. We think it might be him.”

  “Copy that. Leave the line open.”

  They watched as the guard came out of his hut and spoke with the driver. It was too gloomy to identify him save that he was male. The guard concluded the conversation and went back to the hut. A moment later, the gate rolled back and the car drove into the compound.

  Hicks put the phone to his ear once again. “The car’s coming inside.”

  “How many people?”

  “One,” he reported. “Male. It’s too dark to ID him.”

  “Copy that. Stay outside. If he comes back out again, follow him.”

  “Affirmative,” Hicks said.

  The line was quiet.

  “What’s he going to do?” Josie asked.

  “He’ll get answers.”

  “You’ve done this before,” she said. It was almost an accusation.

  “A few times,” he replied, watching the bright red glare of the taillights as the car headed into the compound.

  “I want to do this properly,” she said. “Mendoza—I want him to be brought in.”

  “He will be.”

  “I’m serious. I’m going to arrest him.”

  Hicks didn’t answer.

  Josie reached across and grabbed the phone from him. “This is Hernandez,” she said. “This gets done properly, Milton, you understand? I want to bring him in.”

  Hicks couldn’t hear Milton’s response.

  “That’s how we do it,” she continued. “Otherwise I’m going to go up to the gate now and tell them to let me in. Your choice.”

  Hicks looked at her: she was animated, her cheeks flushed and her eyes flashing with anger.

  “He wants to speak to you,” Josie said to Hicks, handing the phone back to him.

  “Hicks here.”

  “Get ready to come through,” Milton said. “If it’s Mendoza, I’ll tell you. I’ll need you both in here with me.”

  * * *

  MILTON WAS in the living room. He heard the motor of the garage door as it slid up and back and then the sound of a car’s engine as it was driven inside. The engine was switched off and the motor buzzed again as the garage door closed. He heard a car door opening and then slamming shut.

  Milton crossed the room to stand behind the door to the kitchen.

  A light was switched on in the kitchen; he saw the illumination beneath the door. He heard the sound of the microwave as it was programmed and then started, and, after a minute, he heard the ping as the program completed. He heard the hiss as a ring pull was opened.

  Milton held the gun in his hand, his back pressed up against the wall. He was calm. He knew what he had to do.

  The door opened, the light from the kitchen streaming into the room.

  A man came inside.

  Milton let him walk ahead and then stepped out from his hiding place.

  He raised his hand and, with a hard and firm downward strike, he crashed the butt of the pistol against the top of the man’s head.

  69

  BRUNO MENDOZA felt as though his head was sp
lit down the middle. It was the pain that brought him around; it throbbed and pulsed and, as he opened his eyes, he was rewarded with such a pounding that, for a moment, he felt as if he was going to be sick.

  He tried to bring his hands to his face but found that he could not.

  He glanced down.

  He was sitting on one of the wooden chairs from the dining room. A length of cord had been fastened around both wrists and looped beneath the seat of the chair. Another length of cord had been bound around his torso, securing him to the seat back.

  A man was sitting opposite him. He had positioned the standard lamp so that it made a silhouette of him, obscuring his face and shining into Mendoza’s eyes. The glare made his headache worse. He blinked the brightness away. When he opened his eyes again, he saw that the man had a pistol pointed at his head.

  “Wake up, Bruno.”

  He grunted woozily.

  “Speak English, please.”

  He swooned. “You—”

  “Your head’s a bit sore, is it?”

  “You hit me.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Who are you?”

  The man reached up for the lamp and twisted it so that the brightness fell down onto his own face.

  Mendoza recoiled. The man’s face was bruised and disfigured, his skin a mess of purples and blacks and reds, but he recognised him.

  Smith.

  “You’re supposed to be—”

  “Locked up?”

  Mendoza struggled, trying to free his hands.

  “I was locked up. That’s right. Because of you, wasn’t it?”

  The man reached for the shade and angled it so that it shone directly into Mendoza’s face again.

  He blinked. “No,” he gulped out. “I didn’t—it wasn’t—” He stopped.

  “Don’t worry,” Smith said. “I’d rather not have to hurt you. If you answer my questions, there’s no reason why anything bad should happen.”

  The threat was implicit and unmistakable. “What do you want?”

  “Let’s get back to me being locked up. You were involved, weren’t you?”

  “I don’t know—”

  Smith leaned forward and pressed the muzzle of the pistol against his forehead.

  “I think honesty is going to be your best policy here, don’t you? Let’s try again. What did you do?”

  Mendoza gulped for air. “They told me to have you transferred to Bilibid.”

  “And you did that?”

  “I didn’t have a choice.”

  “What?” Smith said. “They threatened you?” He gestured around the room. “Look at all this. You’re on the take. They paid you.”

  “They would have killed me if I said no. I didn’t have a choice, I swear.”

  Smith brought the chair a few inches closer. The angle of the light changed, and now Mendoza could see his face more clearly. He could see his eyes. They were icy cold, glacially blue, and without any hint of compassion or empathy.

  “We’re going to have a discussion,” Smith said. “You and me. I’m going to ask you a few questions about what happened and you’re going to answer them. If you don’t, I’ll have to persuade you why it’s better to cooperate. That won’t be a pleasant experience for you.”

  “I’m a police officer,” he managed to protest.

  “And I’m a fugitive on the run from a prison break. I’ve got nothing to lose. If you can’t help me show that I didn’t murder my friend, what use do I have for you?”

  “What do you want to know?”

  “Who have you been working with?”

  “He’s English.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “He had an accent like yours.”

  “What did he look like?”

  “Your height. Black hair. Well dressed. Like a peacock. He always wore a suit, even in this heat.”

  “Name?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Is it Logan?”

  “He never told me.”

  “How did he find you?”

  “I was working for someone else.”

  “Fitzroy de Lacey?”

  “Not for him, for his company. Tactical Aviation. They wanted me to find evidence that they could use to get him out.”

  “How long had that been going on?”

  “Two years? Three? I can’t remember exactly.”

  “But they paid for all this?”

  Mendoza nodded.

  “Go on.”

  “They said I would be working with someone else on a new project.”

  “When?”

  “A week ago. They told me to go to the docks in Tondo and this man met me there. He said there had been a murder that day. I said ‘Which one?’ We have murders every day. He said it was in a cheap hotel. An Englishman had killed a girl. We had you in custody by then—I knew it had to be you.”

  “And what did he want?”

  “He said to make sure that the investigation was wrapped up quickly. We weren’t to dig into it too far. I was okay with that. We’re too busy, and I didn’t think we’d find anything even if we did. And then he said you were to be transferred to New Bilibid.”

  “But suspects waiting their trials stay in Quezon City.”

  “I told him that, but he said it was important that you were moved.”

  “He say why?”

  “No.”

  “What else?”

  “I met him again the next day. He said that one of my officers was causing trouble. He said she was stirring things up. That wasn’t what we’d agreed, and he said that I wouldn’t get paid unless she backed off. So I told her. I said the case was closed, you were guilty, she needed to move on. But she wouldn’t let it drop. I found her at the bar where you and the girl went the night she was killed. She was trying to get the tape from the security camera.”

  “And?”

  “And I told the man.”

  “And then the barman was killed. Did you know?”

  “I saw the report.”

  “Was it you?”

  “No,” he said. “I didn’t—”

  “You might not have pulled the trigger, but he’d still be alive if it wasn’t for you, wouldn’t he?”

  Mendoza swallowed.

  “Keep going,” Smith said.

  “He called again. He said that my officer had gone to visit you in Bilibid. He told me to deal with her.”

  “Meaning?”

  He didn’t answer. “I had to get her to stop.”

  “What did you do?”

  “I tried to frighten her.”

  “Did you put something under her door?”

  “A picture of her son.”

  “And?”

  “A bullet.” Mendoza swallowed and looked away.

  “Okay,” Smith said. “You’re doing very well, Inspector. A few more questions. This man—how do you get in contact with him?”

  “I can’t—”

  “When you told him about the video at the bar, how did you reach him?”

  “A phone number.”

  “Can you remember it?”

  “I have it written down.”

  “Good,” he said. “You’re going to call him for me and set up a meeting.”

  He squirmed; the cord cut into the soft flesh of his wrists. “Please. I don’t—”

  “You’re going to call him and set up a meeting and then you’re going to the police station and you’re going to sign a confession admitting to everything you just told me.”

  “That’s not—”

  Milton stopped him mid-sentence. “Josie?”

  Mendoza was suddenly aware that there was someone else in the room with him. He heard the sound of footsteps and, as he turned his head to the left, he saw Josie Hernandez.

  “Did you get it?”

  She was holding a smartphone.

  “Josie?” he said.

  “Hold on.”

  Josie played with the phone.

  “He came back the n
ext day. He said that one of my officers was causing trouble. He said she was stirring things up—”

  Mendoza’s eyes widened a little as he listened to his own voice.

  “Josie—”

  “You piece of shit,” she spat at him.

  “It’s not what it—”

  Smith reached ahead and backhanded him. “Pay attention, Inspector. The recording is one thing. The other thing, and you want to remember this very carefully, is this: I know where you live. Here and your place in the city. And even if you run and you go somewhere else, I’ll find you. You might think that the man you were dealing with is dangerous, but you don’t know me. The reason you’re still drawing breath is because Officer Hernandez wants to do this the right way. But, and I swear to God, if you deviate a fraction from what I’ve told you to do, I’ll hunt you down and I’ll make whatever you think he might have done to you look like a gentle stroll in the park.”

  Josie had a pair of cuffs dangling from her hand.

  “Officer!” Mendoza barked. “What are you doing? Remember who I am!”

  Josie stared at him with undisguised disgust. “You have the right to remain silent,” she said coldly as Smith unknotted the restraints, stood the inspector up and prompted him to put his hands behind his back. “Anything you say will be used against you in a court of law.”

  Mendoza’s appeal to authority was abandoned pitifully quickly. “Josie, please.”

  She fastened the cuffs around his wrists and dragged back on the chain until he stood.

  “Please. Think of your family. Your son.”

  She struck him across the face and then, barely pausing, she continued. “You have the right to an attorney during interrogation. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed for you.”

  “It’s not what it looks—”

  “I’ve heard enough. You’re under arrest.”

  70

  MILTON HAD frisked Mendoza after he had knocked him out. He had found his Glock and his smartphone. He held up the gun now so that Mendoza could see it.

  “Just so you don’t get any stupid ideas,” he said.

  He laid the smartphone on the table. Mendoza was sitting at one end of the table. Milton had pulled a second chair around so that he could sit next to him. He rested his arm on the table, the pistol held loosely in his hand.