A Perilous Pursuit

by Diane Gilmore

  His voice seemed to fade as Taylor became once again lost in her thoughts, the same recurring line of questions that had plagued her mind since last night. She couldn’t concentrate on anything other than Craig.

  She was puzzled by the abrupt change in his behavior these past couple of days. He’d changed his mind about staying with her during the tour break and was quiet and withdrawn, in another world of thought. Then he decided to take a trip to New York for the weekend at the last minute, alone. She tried weighing the events of the recent past, but she couldn’t quite put her finger on just what would have sent his mood into such a tailspin.

  Why was he distant with everyone, especially with her? And why did he just up and leave for New York, effectively evading any kind of questions about whom he was visiting and why? They were ceaseless, disquieting questions that Taylor couldn’t answer.

  After the meeting, Susan walked with Taylor to her office.

  “What’s with you this morning?” Susan asked as she sat down and made herself comfortable. “You’re a million miles away. I don’t think your dad appreciated it.”

  “Something’s on my mind.”

  “The understatement of the year,” Susan cracked. After a pause, she said, “So, what’s up?”

  “Craig.”

  “That’s not unusual these days.”

  “I’m serious,” Taylor said. “He’s been acting strangely the past few days, and I’m curious about what’s been going on with him. And with Shaun.”

  “I thought you said Shaun was in New York.”

  “That’s what Craig told me last night,” Taylor said, recalling their conversation, “but somehow I’m having trouble believing it.” There was something more to his story, she guessed, but how was she going to penetrate the deliberate wall of silence he built around the issue last night?

  “I think you’re imagining things,” Susan said. “Do you think Craig would lie to you?”

  “I’m not saying he’s lying,” Taylor said distantly, then sighed and shook her head. “Oh, I don’t know what I’m saying. There’s just something about this situation that’s odd, that’s all, but I haven’t figured out what it is.”

  “I know what your problem is,” Susan replied. “You can’t handle the fact that Craig took off without you.”

  “What? That’s not true,” Taylor retorted.

  “You’ve been together for quite a while now,” Susan continued. “This is the first time he’s wanted to be alone for any length of time. You’re not attached to him at the hip, you know. Give him some space. He’ll be back to his old self in no time.”

  Taylor laughed. “You seem to be the authority on such things.”

  Susan shrugged. “It’s true! Men are all alike in some ways, no matter where they come from. It’s as if they belong to some international order of behavior. They can be worse than women about tending to their fragile egos, I’ll tell you. And musicians are ten times worse, as you and I well know. Don’t worry about Craig. He’ll be back to normal by next week.”

  “You’re probably right,” Taylor said, her spirits lifting. “I’ll probably hear from him tonight. He promised to call.”

  Then she chuckled. “Wait till he gets a look at New York City. He’s probably having the time of his life!”

  Chapter 12

  Another hard blow across his face sent Craig reeling.

  Two of Cabrera’s pistoleros had handcuffed him to the base of a jump seat in the back of the plane before it even took off and were now towering above him, conducting their own mob-style “interrogation.”

  Huddled on the dirty floor of the aircraft, Craig could see up into the cockpit. Even for a private plane, it had been customized to include a vast array of long-range navigational equipment, digital radars, and communication scramblers. The rest of the plane was practically empty, containing only a few old seats and a bare metal fuselage. The gas fumes that permeated the area were enough to make him sick.

  The large Mexican who had met him at the airport now stood above him, berating him in broken English.

  “So you think you can just turn your back on us?” He struck Craig again.

  He didn’t wait for an answer, but began to scrutinize Craig’s watch which he had pulled off Craig’s wrist as soon as they boarded the plane. The co-pilot and the other man who met Craig outside the terminal had his duffle bag open, rummaging through its contents like a band of looters. They ignored Craig momentarily while they divided up his clothes, money, and passport. They especially liked the cell phone, going through his photos and apps, playing with it like a toy.

  The Mexican put the cash in his pocket and put the watch on, now claiming it as his own. He turned his attention back to Craig.

  “Who you talk to about us? Tell me!”

  “No one,” Craig stammered, still in a state of shock. “I—”

  “Mentiroso!” the Mexican barked. “Liar!” He raised his hand and struck Craig hard with the butt of his gun, hitting Craig with such force that his head slammed back into the metal fuselage. Craig felt the blood begin to course down the side of his face. He closed his eyes to keep from seeing double. His head pounded from the blow.

  The Mexican jammed the gun against his temple. “I should kill you now!” he shrieked. “Well, you going to see El Jefe now. Your godfather will take care of you. You in Mexico now, gato, and you better cooperate, or else!”

  Craig remained silent. His head still throbbed and the hurling accusations made his larynx paralyze with fear. He couldn’t do a single thing but stare at his captor in mute panic.

  The Mexican sent a final, vicious kick to Craig’s stomach. “Now you will be silent, or we will play some more!”

  Craig huddled quietly on the floor, trying to stay calm as the plane hummed beneath him. The fear he felt made his heart throb in rhythm with every pulse point in his body, and he could taste the blood that pumped into his mouth from the beating. The Mexican stared at him angrily. The others followed suit, and the duration of the trip was spent in silence, with Craig’s captors leering at him viciously.

  The sun was reduced to an orange smudge on the muddy Mexican horizon when the plane, after negotiating imposing hillsides and jagged cliffs that made Craig’s stomach spin, roughly touched down on a primitive dirt airstrip cut into a group of trees in the silent countryside. The pilot threw open the cabin door and Craig saw other men, “loaders,” who tended to Cabrera’s arriving and departing cargos. They held AR-15’s, and ominous looking Dobermans paced the area. A large sedan awaited them in the near-darkness, its windows tinted completely black and without its headlights on.

  Craig’s captors took off his handcuffs and pushed him into the back seat between them. As they rode in silence, the dark shell of the car seemed to enclose him like a tiny prison. Another powerful set of communications equipment flowed along the car’s front dashboard, a radio that could, no doubt, reach Latin America and beyond.

  The automobile drove along narrow back roads that were obscured by thick growths of deep woods and foliage. Presently they drove up into the hills, where in minutes a sprawling estate and huge, two-story house sprang into view, looking like an ominous black shape in the darkness. Craig felt a tingle of fear dance along his neck. The building looked like a prop out of a horror movie.

  The car arrived at a circular tiled driveway and stopped at the front door, where a young Mexican houseboy stood waiting, whom Craig guessed to be no more than ten years old. One of the men fired a command to him in Spanish, and the boy quickly led them through the large, luxuriously furnished rooms to the living room.

  There Craig saw a huge, gleaming marble bar that spanned one side of the room. Beyond the huge sliding glass doors, a spacious patio looked out across the rich pastures and hills in the distance. A shiny black tray sat on a nearby end table, contain
ing a handsome assortment of solid gold coke straws and gem-studded pipes. A half-kilo bag of snow-white cocaine lay open on the tray for anyone in the house who cared to partake of it.

  Pierre Montagne leaned casually on the bar, and on the massive suede sofa sat Robert Cabrera. The boy retreated quietly to the adjoining dining room, peering curiously around the corner every now and then to watch the action.

  Cabrera stood up when Craig was brought into the room. He stared at Craig for a long moment, his arms folded squarely in front of him, analyzing his captive like a cat studying its prey before tearing it apart. The room was silent, the only sound being the ticking of a clock from somewhere, although at that moment, Craig couldn’t pinpoint it.

  Craig hadn’t seen Cabrera in nearly a year, and now Cabrera looked bigger, even more powerful and dangerous than he remembered. He surveyed Craig with eyes that glowed with the crazed inner fire of an alpha predator. His look was controlled, frightening.

  “You’ve kept me waiting a long time, Phillips,” he said finally. His voice was unusually mellow and calm, a quality that Craig knew effectively concealed what he was thinking and disarmed an unwary enemy.

  Craig felt like he was standing before the devil himself, and it scared the hell out of him. He stared at him, silent.

  Cabrera chuckled cynically. “You seem quiet for one who had so much to say about me a week ago.”

  Craig could just imagine the report Pierre brought back to his superior after his visit to Fairchild Management Group. The bastard, he thought.

  Cabrera’s thick brows arched as he surveyed Craig’s facial cuts and bruises. “What’s the matter, kid? Play too hard with the boys on the way down?”

  “Where is Shaun?” Craig asked, trying to hide his fear. “What have you done with him?”

  “I didn’t bring you here to answer your questions,” Cabrera snapped. “You’ll see your brother when I say you will.”

  He waved his hand toward the sofa’s matching leather chair in mock etiquette. “What kind of host am I? Please, sit down.”

  Craig hesitated. Someone pushed him hard, down into it. The men stood on each side of the chair, towering above him.

  Cabrera casually walked over to the bar and poured himself some tequila from the bottle that sat on the counter. He downed the shot in one swallow, then walked back to where Craig was sitting.

  “We have to get a few things straight first. You made a big mistake, trying to ditch me like you did. That took some balls, even for a punk like you.”

  “I didn’t ditch you, at least not in the way you think,” Craig answered, keeping his voice as steady as he could. Stay calm, Craig told himself. He felt like he was facing a wild animal who was about to lunge and rip him to shreds. He had to focus on keeping an even, nonthreatening tone, like slowly backing away from a snarling beast and hoping it wouldn’t pounce. “An opportunity presented itself to me to make the band a success, and I took it. It’s something I’ve worked for all my life. I swear I didn’t sell you out to anyone. I have a new life now and a new career in the States. I can’t help you with whatever you have in mind. I’ll give you what you want. Just let me get Shaun and go home.”

  Cabrera looked at Pierre and laughed. “So he thinks this is a little excursion like a tourista, no?” He directed his gaze back at Craig, his expression turning serious. “You’re not going home, Phillips. This is your home now.”

  A gut-twisting, nauseous chill went from across Craig’s chest to his stomach as he stared at Cabrera, momentarily unable to speak. He willed his body not to start shaking.

  “You’re up to your ass in trouble with me, boy,” Cabrera said in a cold, clipped voice that normally forbade any protests from his workers. His words stung Craig like a whip. The beast was getting agitated. “I don’t take kindly to rats who disappear from my service in a blink of an eye for whatever reason. You will find those who tried in unmarked graves. I find your behavior insulting, and if you don’t watch yourself, you will be joining them.

  “Is that what brought you to this side of the world? To look for me?” Change the subject, Craig told himself, hoping that would dampen Cabrera’s temper that seemed to be roiling under his calm exterior like a flash flood.

  “Don’t flatter yourself, Mr. Rock Star,” Cabrera replied with a cynical sneer. “For your information, the Prime Minister decided to crack down on our network over there and I had to disappear.”

  Cabrera poured himself another shot.

  “Enough small talk. I’ve called you back into active duty because I need you,” Cabrera said, getting down to business. “And the first job I have for you involves Bruce Fairchild.”

  “Bruce? How do you know him?” Craig asked, but his mind was calculating. If he knew about Bruce, then he knew about Taylor. He had to protect her.

  “Naturally, Fairchild wouldn’t tell you how he double-crossed his own law partner twenty-five years ago.”

  “You worked with Bruce?”

  “Fairchild and I had a very successful law practice in Manhattan,” Cabrera said.”

  The lines tightened around Cabrera’s mouth as he continued probing the past. “I had a very lucrative trading operation going in the firm that was, shall we say, a little under the radar. It would have lasted indefinitely if he had just kept his mouth shut and not sold me out to the SEC. I had planned on getting even with him as soon as I was released from the country club. Unfortunately, he left town soon after I started serving time, and I’ve had, well, too many other things to occupy myself with since then to put the time and effort into finding him. That is, until now, when the job will be easy.”

  “What does all this have to do with me?”

  “You are going to be the one to give Fairchild what he’s had coming all these years,” Cabrera said. “I’m getting ready to carry out the most exquisite, prolonged revenge possible on that son of a bitch.”

  “But it was a long time ago!”

  Cabrera’s eyes burned into Craig. “Whoever crosses me doesn’t get the chance to regret it. If you play your cards right and do as you’re told, you will live to be the one exception to the rule.”

  Craig stared at him in disbelief. Cabrera was filled with age-old, utter hatred.

  “What are you planning to do?” he finally asked.

  “Putting a contract out on Fairchild would be too fast and convenient,” Cabrera reasoned as a satanic smile played at the corners of his mouth. “I have something even better in store for him. I haven’t finalized all the details yet, but if all goes as planned, you will go back to the States one more time to see the gringo law descend on that little business of his.”

  A chill swept over Craig. A setup.

  “A bust,” Craig said.

  “You still catch on quick, don’t you?” Cabrera replied. “I’ve been producing some choice heroin that will knock your ass off. There won’t be a trace of a cut, not a footstep in it. It’ll be so pure and placed in such a way that the feds will conclude that it could only have come from inside his own company. They’ll have a field day with him.”

  He began pacing around the room as if the very idea gave him a spur of untamed adrenalin.

  “After you plant the stuff,” he continued conversationally, talking about his plan as if he were planning a picnic in the park, “you’ll tip off the feds to its location, then be finished with your business in the States once and for all.”

  Cabrera stopped walking and chuckled a soft, menacing laughter that was filled with hate instead of humor. “Fairchild won’t know what hit him if it’s done right, and you are the only one who could get close enough to pull the job off.”

  The need for revenge had kindled within him for years, Craig realized, and he was appallingly confident about his plan.

  Craig contemplated Cabrera’s idea. With Cabrera’s conne
ctions, Craig’s position in the Fairchilds’ lives, and with the right planning and resources, Cabrera could well pull off such a stunt. Craig also knew, even with the American drug laws less stringent than in other countries, heroin was no joking matter. After the discovery was made and the dust cleared, Bruce Fairchild could be faced with decades in prison, minimum, with no concrete proof of his innocence. Even if he could beat the charge, the scandal would financially ruin him.

  Craig kept his voice even. “Impossible. I would need too much time to carry out a job like that.”

  “When I start the process, you’ll have plenty of time,” Cabrera countered. “I will see that the goods are prepared and packaged for you to take across the border.”

  “Me take it across the border?” Craig echoed him, aghast. “Now you’ve really lost the plot. I can’t just waltz across the border with a crap load of heroin.”

  “A simple mule run through customs. You’ve done it lots of times before.”

  “I could get caught with the bloody shit!”

  Cabrera frowned impatiently. “Do I have to spell it out for you? You’re responsible for getting it back to L.A. and planting it. Period. I will get to the right people and see you past the border.”

  Craig shook his head. “How could I do anything to hurt Bruce Fairchild, let alone set him up for a major drug bust? He’s my bloody manager, for God’s sake!”

  “And his daughter is your amour, is she not?” Pierre quipped from the bar. His words were loaded with ridicule.

  Craig pointed to Montagne. “You leave her out of this,” he warned, his eyes narrowing.

  “After you pull off this job to my satisfaction,” Cabrera continued, ignoring Craig’s threat, “and if you can restore my trust in you again, then we can work out the arrangements for your return to my service—under my conditions, of course.”