They saw four identical brown Suburbans, each roof festooned with a rack of what is known in the law enforcement community as “Bubble Gum Machines,” approaching and then disappearing beneath the canopied entrance to the Grand Cozumel Beach & Golf Resort.
“American Express is here,” Castillo said.
“What the hell does that mean?” Roscoe asked.
“Juan Carlos calls them that because he never leaves home without them,” Castillo explained.
“Your friend has a CaseyBerry?” Britton asked.
“I could do no less for the only honest police officer in Mexico,” Castillo said. He turned to former Marine Gunnery Sergeant Lester Bradley.
“Lester, stand by the door. Our guests are about to arrive. The rest of you are cautioned not to make any sudden moves when they arrive.”
Three minutes later the doorbell chimes bonged pleasantly. Lester pulled the door open. Three burly police officers came through the door, each armed with an Uzi submachine gun. They quickly surveilled the room, and then one of them gestured for whoever was still outside that it was safe to enter.
Jack Britton was impressed. During his career with the Philadelphia Police Department, he had once served on the SWAT team. His professional assessment of these people was that they really knew “how to take a door.”
A short, stocky, unkempt olive-skinned man in a baggy suit and two more uniformed officers carrying Uzis came through the door.
Max dropped the suntan lotion bottle, rushed toward the man, put his paws on his shoulders — which pinned him to the wall — and then enthusiastically lapped at his face.
“Carlitos, you sonofabitch, you taught him to do that to me!” Juan Carlos Pena said.
“No, it’s the remnants of your breakfast on your unshaven face,” Castillo said.
Pena pushed Max off him, and then he and Castillo approached each other and embraced.
When they broke apart, Pena asked, pointing to the Sienos, the Brittons, and Roscoe J. Danton, “Who are these people? Excuse me for asking, but I have learned to be very careful when I’m around you.”
“Dr. Britton, Sandra, is a philologist,” Castillo said. “Her husband, Jack, is not nearly so respectable. He used to be a cop. The Sienos, Susanna and Paul, have an even less respectable history, and Mr. Danton is a practitioner of a profession held in even lower prestige than being a congressman. He’s a journalist.”
Pena smiled.
“Well, he must like you. Carlito only insults his friends,” he said. “Which means I can move on to Question Two: What brings you to beautiful Cozumel? White-sand beaches and the sun setting over the sparkling Caribbean will not be a satisfactory answer.”
“We come to offer you a unique opportunity,” Castillo said.
“I’m afraid to ask what that might be, but I suppose I don’t have a choice, do I? Tell me about my unique opportunity.”
“Very few men are ever offered, as you are about to be, the opportunity of advising the President of the United States, Joshua Ezekiel Clendennen, vis-à-vis how he should handle the Mexican drug cartels.”
“You didn’t have to come all the way down here — or up here; my guy at the airport said you came from Argentina — to ask me that. You already know the answer.”
“And what would that be, Señor Pena?” Susanna Sieno asked, in Spanish.
“Get people in the U.S. to stop buying illegal drugs,” Pena said.
“Ouch!” Castillo said.
“Carlitos, you know I’m right. If you Americans were not buying drugs, we Mexicans wouldn’t be slaughtering each other for the profitable privilege of moving them through Mexico and then across the border.”
“You’re right, Juan Carlos, but that’s not an answer the President will like.”
“Why not?”
“Let me tell you what we’re really doing here, Juan Carlos,” Castillo said, and did so.
“You’re telling me,” Juan Carlos asked when Castillo had finished, “that the President of the United States is not playing with a full deck?”
“I wouldn’t want this to get around,” Castillo replied, “but I estimate there are no more than forty-two of the normal complement of fifty-two cards in his deck. He doesn’t think he’s Napoleon, and he doesn’t, so far as we know, howl at the moon. But…”
“So why hasn’t he been moved out of the Oval Office and into a padded cell?”
“We’ve already forced one President — Nixon — to resign or face impeachment, and actually tried to impeach one — Clinton — in the Senate. Both times, it nearly tore the country apart; we don’t want to do that again.”
“‘We’?” Pena asked softly.
“I meant ‘we Americans,’” Castillo replied. “The decision to — how do I say this? — live with Clendennen and try to keep him from doing real harm was made primarily by the secretary of State, Natalie Cohen, Generals Naylor and McNab, and a few others in pay grades much higher than my own. I’m just a simple old soldier obeying orders.”
“You didn’t make that up,” Pena said. “You stole it.”
“What?”
“I saw that movie, Carlitos. George C. Scott, playing General Patton, was trying to lay some crap on Karl Malden, who was playing General Omar Bradley, and when Bradley called him on it, Patton said, smiling, what you just said, ‘I’m just a simple old soldier obeying orders,’ and Malden/Bradley said, ‘Bullshit.’”
“I can’t imagine General Bradley saying ‘bullshit’ under any circumstances,” Castillo said prissily. “General Bradley marched in the Long Gray Line and was an officer and a gentleman.”
“Oh, God,” Pena said, laughing. “What you are, Carlitos, is an idiot with a death wish. Only an idiot with, say, twenty-two cards in his deck would come back here the way you have.”
“What’s that supposed to mean? There’s a big sign in the airport that says ‘Welcome to Cozumel!’ That didn’t mean me?”
“Juan Carlos,” Svetlana asked, “what do you mean ‘death wish’?”
It took Pena a moment to frame his reply, and when he gave it, his tone was dead serious.
“About six weeks ago, Svetlana,” he said, “specifically on April twenty-second, eleven men were shot to death at KM 125.5 on National Road 200. That’s near Huixtla, in the state of Chiapas.
“One of the bodies remains unidentified, but there is reason to believe that it is that of a Russian, an agent of the SVR. Two bodies were identified as those of Enrico Saldivia and Juan Sánchez, both known to be members of the Venezuelan Dirección de los Servicios de Inteligencia y Prevención, commonly referred to by its acronym, DISIP. The remaining bodies were all Mexican nationals. Two of them belonged to the Zambada Cartel, which is run by Joaquín Archivaldo. These bodies were further identified to be former Special Forces soldiers—Mexican Special Forces, trained and equipped by American Special Forces — who changed sides.
“The other six men are known to have been members of the Sinaloa Cartel, which is run by Joaquín Guzmán Loera and Ismael Zambada García.
“Those two cartels are normally at each other’s throats, but in this case were working together. What they had done was kidnap an American Special Forces officer, Lieutenant Colonel James D. Ferris, with the idea of exchanging him for a man named Félix Abrego, who had been convicted in the U.S. of the murder of several American DEA agents. He had been sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole and was then confined at the Florence Maximum Security Prison in Colorado.
“The American President, Clendennen, elected to abrogate the long-standing U.S. policy of not negotiating in situations like this, and their plan had proceeded to the point where, on April twenty-second, they were transporting Colonel Ferris to the Oaxaca State Prison, where his exchange for Señor Abrego was to take place.
“En route, their convoy of vehicles was intercepted by parties unknown. Colonel Ferris was liberated and shortly thereafter was welcomed home by President Clendennen in Washington.
/> “Everyone in the convoy — Russian, Venezuelan, and Mexican — died. As each was shot at least two times in the head, it had the appearance of what is known in law enforcement circles as a ‘professional hit.’
“The Zambada and Sinaloa cartels, the Venezuelan DISIP, and, I would suppose, the SVR, believe our Carlito was the parties unknown — the shooter, so to speak — and are very anxious to get suitable revenge for his assault on their prestige. I have heard that after he’s tortured to death, they plan to decapitate his corpse and hang his head from a bridge over the highway in Acapulco, with his genitalia in his mouth.”
Castillo opened his mouth to protest, but in the split second before the words “Hey, I didn’t shoot any of those bastards and you know it!” were to come out of his mouth, Castillo closed it.
That’s moot. While I didn’t actually shoot anybody, rescuing Jim Ferris was my operation. I planned it and I ordered its execution. I had no idea Juan Carlos planned not only to have his men kill them all, but also to personally fire two coup de grâce rounds into their ears, and would have told him not to had I known. But that’s also moot.
And it wouldn’t have mattered if I had left all of them neatly trussed up, but alive, at the side of the road. They would still know I was responsible for grabbing Ferris and would still be planning to hang my head from an Acapulco bridge with my severed dick in my mouth.
“And that, Sweaty,” Juan Carlos said, “is why our Carlito’s presence here suggests he has a death wish.”
“You’re underestimating him again, Juan Carlos,” Sweaty said calmly. “My Carlos is not a fool, and he certainly doesn’t have a death wish.”
I think that’s what they call blind loyalty.
“You’re underestimating these people, Sweaty,” Pena said.
“I never underestimate my enemies,” she replied.
“I gather these people aren’t planning to hang your head from an Acapulco bridge?” Castillo said.
“Why should they?” Pena said.
“Do you really want me to answer that?”
Castillo looked at Roscoe J. Danton, who looked sick.
“You have a question, Roscoe?” Castillo asked.
“He’s serious, isn’t he?” Danton asked. “If they catch you, these cartel people are going to… do what he said?”
“That would seem to be Comandante Pena’s professional opinion,” Castillo said.
“I investigated the incident—” Pena began.
“Incident?” Danton blurted. “A massacre is what you just described.”
“… at KM 125.5,” Pena went on ignoring him. “And I turned in my report to the procurador general de la república, who is something like the attorney general in the United States. My report stated that the murders had been committed by parties unknown, most probably in connection with the drug trade. I further stated that since my investigation had turned up no suspects, the crime would most probably go unsolved.
“Shortly afterward, Señor Pedro Dagada, an attorney who has several times represented members of both the Zambada and Sinaloa cartels in their brushes with the law, happened upon me while I was having lunch in the Diamond.”
He paused and then went on, “For your general edification, Señor Danton, ‘the Diamond’ is what we call the five-star Camino Real Acapulco Diamante hotel in Acapulco. In English, that’s the Royal Road Acapulco Diamond. Got it?”
Roscoe nodded uncomfortably.
“As I was saying, there I was in the Diamond, having lunch, when Señor Dagada appeared, greeted me warmly — which I found a little surprising, as I have sent a number of his clients to prison — and insisted on buying me a drink.
“Thirty minutes and three drinks later, Señor Dagada asked me, just between old pals, not to go any further, if I had any ideas about what had happened at KM 125.5 that I had not put in my report to the procurador general. He also confided in me that the procurador general, an old pal, had shown him my report.
“So I said, ‘Pedro, I wouldn’t tell even you this, old pal, if you hadn’t told me the procurador general had shown you my report. Just between us, the procurador general knows as well as I do what really happened out there at KM 125.5.’
“To which he replied, ‘Well, what was that?’
“To which I replied, ‘The Americans sent us a message. Don’t kidnap our diplomats who are also Special Forces. Special Forces doesn’t like that, and we can’t control our Special Forces any more than you can control your cartels. They got their guy back and left the bodies on the road at KM 125.5 as a polite suggestion not to kidnap anybody from Special Forces again.’
“And then Pedro asked, ‘You got a name?’
“And I said, ‘Well, there was a guy named Costello down here.’
“And then Pedro asked, ‘Costello or Castillo?’
“And I said I didn’t know for sure, but there was a guy down here named one or the other and I heard he was Special Forces looking for Ferris. He disappeared just about the time what happened at KM 125.5 happened — as did Ferris. ‘So draw your own conclusions, Pedro.’”
“You gave him Charley’s name?” Roscoe asked, horrified.
“You’re not listening. He already had Charley’s name. And I suspect he knew a good deal about Charley,” Pena said drily. He turned to Castillo. “So, what’s on your agenda now, John Wayne, in whatever little time you have left before they cut off — among other parts — your head?”
“I thought I’d take Roscoe here to Drug Cartel International Airport and let him take some pictures to show the President how hard we’re working.”
“I’ve already seen Drug Cartel International, thank you just the same,” Danton said.
“But the President, Roscoe, knows very little about it,” Castillo said. “And we want to keep him abreast of things, don’t we?” He turned to Juan Carlos Pena. “Keep in mind the idea is to stall the President until he tires of this nutty idea and moves on to another. So, what we’re going to do is take Roscoe with us to Drug Cartel International and then let him write his news story, together with pictures of the Outlaws suitably garbed and heavily armed, putting their lives on the line going about the President’s business by going, so to speak, literally into the mouth of the Drug Cartel dragon.
“We will send Roscoe’s story to the President with my report. My report won’t say much except that we are gathering intelligence, and are about to go to Budapest, from where I will report again.”
“What are you going to do in Budapest?” Juan Carlos asked.
“I haven’t figured that out yet, but whatever it is, it will be something that will keep the Commander in Chief thinking I’m really working hard for him. Getting the picture?”
“Yeah,” Pena said thoughtfully. “So, what do you want from me?”
“Can you cover my back when we go to Drug Cartel International?”
Pena visibly collected his thoughts before he replied.
“If you go there, the cartels will know about it within an hour.” He paused to let that sink in, then went on: “I can cover your back. But I won’t, Carlito, unless I have your word that you and Sweaty get on your airplane the minute we get back and get the hell out of here.”
As visibly as Pena had, Castillo visibly framed his answer. Pena saw this and took advantage of it.
“I don’t want to see your heads hanging side by side from that bridge I mentioned, Carlito.”
“It’s that bad, huh?” Castillo asked.
Pena nodded.
“My God!” Roscoe said.
“Your head hanging from the bridge, Roscoe, I could live with,” Pena said. “But I have a soft spot in my heart for Romeo and Juliet.”
“Okay,” Castillo said.
“That’s your word of honor, Carlito, right?”
Castillo nodded.
“Say it.”
“Word of honor,” Castillo said.
“Okay.”
“Is there time to drive there and back today? I don’t think
flying in would be too smart.”
“That would depend on what you were flying,” Pena said. “If you had a Black Hawk helicopter, you could make it to Drug Cartel International and back before supper.”
“Sorry, Juan Carlos, I don’t even know where mine is. It’s not where I left it after we grabbed Ferris, and the CIA’s satellites can’t find it.”
“The CIA’s satellites?” Danton and Pena repeated just about simultaneously.
“Natalie Cohen was afraid it would wind up in the wrong hands and asked Frank Lammelle, the DCI, to find it for her.”
“It didn’t wind up in the wrong hands, Carlito,” Pena said. “You should listen to Sweaty and stop underestimating people.”
“You’ve got it?” Castillo asked.
Pena nodded.
“I can have it on the roof here in fifteen minutes,” Pena said. “Then we will go to Drug Cartel International, Roscoe can take your picture, and then we will come back here. Where, your luggage having been packed while you were gone, and loaded aboard your airplane, you can immediately take off for… Where did you say you were going? Budapest? Agreed?”
Castillo, after a moment, nodded.
“Only one thing I can think of,” he said. He turned to the Sienos.
“Where do you want us to drop you off?” he asked.
“What?” Paul Sieno asked.
“You know, Miami? Tampa? Palm Beach?”
“What are we going to do in Palm Beach?” Susanna Sieno asked.
“Susanna, you heard what the man said about these people. Stalling Clendennen in Mexico is not going to be a vacation on the CIA’s dime. They’d cut off your head, and Paul’s, as quickly as they’d cut off mine.”
“I was thinking about that,” she said.
“Good,” Juan Carlos said.
“Juan Carlos, could you pass off Paul and me as your cousins from, say, Colombia? Better yet, Havana?” she asked.
“What the hell, Charley,” Paul chimed in. “Maybe we could learn something about these people that somebody on top could use.”
“You understand,” Juan Carlos said, “that if these people find out who you are—”
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