The Border: A Novel

by Don Winslow

  She leaves it at that.

  He reaches out to Orduña.

  “I think your guy is dead,” Orduña says. “He mouthed off to Iván, Iván had the camera turned off and then did him. Probably in some horrible fashion unsuited even for the internet. You’re asking me to look for a corpse, Arturo.”

  “Will you look anyway?” Keller says.

  “What’s this guy to you?”

  “An old friend.”

  “Really?” Orduña asks. “Because we have him as one of Adán Barrera’s old sicarios. Which makes him an unlikely friend of yours.”

  “You know how it goes.”

  “I do,” Orduña says.

  He tells Keller that the Esparza brothers have abandoned the place where the raid occurred and are currently in the wind.

  “You’re looking for them?” Keller asks. “No offense, but I thought they were sort of untouchable.”

  “Yes, but less so than they used to be,” Orduña says. “Don’t get me wrong, they still have a lot of influence, but I’m getting drumbeats from Mexico City that some people wouldn’t mind if they got touched. So you looking for a job? There’s always one for you here.”

  “Thanks,” Keller says. “Try to find Callan, would you?”

  He tells his own people—well, those who still care what he tells them—to beat the bushes for the Esparza brothers. It’s a natural request that screens his interest in Callan, but the fact is that if Callan is still alive, he’s probably in proximity to the Esparzas.

  Iván will keep his hostage close.

  Until he finds the best deal or decides just to kill him.

  The Esparzas have gone to ground—deep. None of the usual sources have much of a clue as to where they are—satellite runs, computer traffic analysis, phone intercepts all come up empty.

  Social media is wondering about it, too. All the blogs, Twitter, Snapchat, the usual suspects are speculating as to where the leadership of the Sinaloa cartel has gone.

  Well, they know where Elena and Luis have gone. The “red press” was full of lurid photos of their bodies splayed on the highway in pools of blood. So that mystery is solved, but where are the Núñezes, father and son? And where are the Esparza brothers? Rumors of a bloody raid on one of their havens, backed up by Iván’s posting the execution of the raiders, are rife, but where are they now?

  And, people wonder, who is the mystery man who had the stones to tell Iván Esparza “Fuck you”? Clearly he’s a yanqui, but who? Is he alive or dead? He even picks up a nickname, El Yanqui Bally—“the Ballsy American”—and a norteño band with allegiance to Tito comes out with a narcocorrido about El Yanqui Bally making Iván Esparza look like an asshole.

  A song like that, Keller thinks, could get Callan killed.

  If he hasn’t been already.

  Keller contacts Nora.

  Has to tell her there’s no word.

  Christmas is coming.

  And with it, the big heroin shipment that will determine everything.

  City sidewalks, busy sidewalks

  Dressed in holiday style . . .

  Keller thinks of this old song as he arrives in New York two days before Christmas. Marisol has decided not to come. After Ana’s death, she’s not in the mood to celebrate the holidays and Keller strongly hinted that there was a business element to his trip and that she might be in the way. Now he’s on Fifth Avenue working his way through the crowds of last-minute shoppers.

  The shipment is scheduled to come on Christmas Eve, a smart move as every law enforcement agency is stripped down to skeletal staffs. Not the NYPD Narcotics Division—Mullen will be working and he has a squad of highly trained, heavily armed officers standing by to bust Darius Darnell at whichever mill the heroin goes.

  Which Cirello will tell them as soon as it’s on its way from Jersey. If for some reason the heroin goes somewhere else, Cirello will tell them that, too, and they’ll improvise. Hidalgo is in San Diego to arrest Eddie Ruiz as soon as the Darnell bust goes down. Others will pick up Eva Barrera on money-laundering charges.

  If, if, if—it all goes well.

  Bobby Cirello is tired of being a tool.

  Sick of being a toy in everyone else’s game.

  Has a game of his own now.

  He finds a parking spot on Garretson Avenue and walks into Lee’s Tavern. Mike Andrea and Johnny Cozzo are already in a booth.

  “About time you remembered who your friends are,” Andrea says. “We was beginning to think you’d become a moolie.”

  “You got plans for Christmas Eve?” Cirello asks.

  Keller has dinner with his son.

  Doesn’t sound like a big deal but it’s a big deal. This meal is overdue by about twenty years, and it’s taken him a solid year of phone calls, letters and emails to get Michael to meet him tonight.

  Keller is nervous.

  What do you say to a kid—a man now—whom you basically abandoned in childhood to go chasing monsters? How do you explain that you chose that over him, that he wasn’t as important as bringing down a nemesis? That your need for revenge was greater than your love for him? How do you ask him to forgive the unforgivable?

  You don’t, Keller thinks.

  You don’t put that on him.

  You just have dinner, is what Althea advised. Just have dinner, make small talk, ask him about his life, take it one small step at a time.

  He made reservations at a trendy place called Blue Hill. It’s a little too “foodie” for him but he thought Michael might like it and it’s a place he probably can’t afford on his own. And it’s down in the Village, so easier for Michael to get to from Brooklyn. Now he sees Michael come down the stairs into the restaurant and look around for him.

  Keller walks up to him. “Michael.”

  “Dad.”

  It’s awkward—they don’t know whether to shake hands or hug so they settle for something in between. The hostess takes them to their table and they sit down, Keller with his back to the wall.

  “Thanks for coming into Manhattan,” Keller says.

  “Thanks for coming up from DC,” Michael says.

  Jesus, he looks like his mother, Keller thinks. The same blond hair, the green eyes, the lips that are always poised to break into a sardonic smile.

  “Is this place all right?” Keller asks.

  “Yeah, it’s great.”

  “Farm to table,” Keller says.

  “Right.”

  The server comes over and goes into his routine. They decide to go with the tasting menu with dishes like “murasaki sweet potato” and venison in a blackberry sauce.

  “How’s work?”

  “Yeah, it’s fine,” Michael says. “We’ve been picking up some industrials. Nothing very exciting, but it brings in some money.”

  “And you’re editing?”

  “I am,” Michael says. Then he gets that slightly mischievous look on his face and asks, “How’s your work?”

  “I guess you read the papers.”

  “Online,” Michael says. “The alt-right sure doesn’t like you.”

  “The left’s not so crazy about me either,” Keller says. “But I want to know about you. Tell me about you.”

  “Not much to tell,” Michael says. “I mean, I like the film work. I’m pretty good at it.”

  “I’ll bet you are.”

  “Spoken like a dad,” Michael says.

  “About time, huh?”

  Later, Michael studies the dessert offerings. “Okay, I think I have to try the malted triticale porridge.”

  “What’s that?”

  “‘White chocolate, apple, and beer ice cream,’” Michael reads. “You game?”

  “Why not?”

  The malted triticale porridge is, well, interesting. Michael seems to enjoy it. Maybe aided by the wine and beer they’ve consumed, the dinner has been more relaxed than Keller feared.

  “What are your plans for Christmas?” Keller asks.

  “Going to my girlfriend’s family
,” Michael says, rolling his eyes. “On Long Island.”

  “I didn’t know there was one,” Keller says.

  “A Long Island?”

  “A girlfriend.”

  “There is,” Michael says.

  Then silence.

  “Does she have a name?” Keller asks.

  “She does,” Michael says. “Amber.”

  “Pretty name.”

  “Pretty nineties,” Michael says. “How about you? For Christmas, I mean.”

  “Working,” Keller says.

  Which might have been a mistake because he sees his son stiffen up.

  “Drug dealers don’t take Christmas off, huh,” Michael says.

  “Not these drug dealers,” Keller says, cursing himself for bringing the gun into the cell. After dessert, he pays the check while Michael taps into his phone.

  “There’s an Uber just four blocks away,” Michael says. “A couple of minutes. You want it?”

  “I’ll grab a cab.”

  “Old school,” Michael says.

  “I’m old.”

  They go up to the sidewalk.

  “Let’s do this again,” Keller says. “More often.”

  “More often than every twenty years?” Michael says.

  He’s Althea’s son, Keller thinks. And yours. He can’t help taking a shot, it’s in his DNA. “Merry Christmas, Michael.”

  “Merry Christmas, Dad.”

  Keller is half a second from telling him that he loves him, but he doesn’t do it. Too much, too soon, and Michael might rightfully resent it.

  Michael gets into his Uber.

  Keller gets to his room, showers and then tries to sleep. It’s not happening. He gets up, makes himself a weak scotch from the minibar and puts the television on.

  Thinks about calling Mari, but it’s too late.

  He’ll have to wait until morning.

  Tomorrow will be endless, anticipating the bust.

  A sign of the times that he can’t set himself up at the DEA’s New York office because he doesn’t know who he can trust. Would sit it out with Mullen but he can’t be seen at One Police, either, because that would put Mullen in the crosshairs.

  So he’ll stay in his room, work things on the phone.

  The truth of it is, though, there’s not a lot for him to do except monitor the situation and hope. All the active parts are in other people’s hands now.

  So many things could go wrong.

  Darnell could get hinky.

  Cirello, knowing that he’s finally going to be able to bust this thing, could unconsciously tip his hand—a change in behavior, in attitude, hell, just the look on his face. Same with Hidalgo. He’s smart, an experienced undercover, but Ruiz is smart too, with a survival instinct like Keller has never seen.

  And what if Denton Howard has found out? He’s tight with Lerner, but how tight are either of them with Caro, Ruiz, or Darnell? Close enough to tip them, warn them off?

  Everything has to go right and it only takes one thing going wrong.

  His phone rings. It’s Marisol. “I couldn’t sleep. I was thinking about you.”

  He tells her about his dinner with Michael and she thinks it’s wonderful, she’s so happy for them both.

  “Te amo, Arturo.”

  “Te amo también, Mari.”

  Darius Darnell’s grandmother loves him.

  Cirello can see that.

  The woman is ancient—“ninety-three and going strong, honey”—and tiny, her thin hair as white as fresh snow, and her hand trembles as she heaps more sweet potatoes on Darnell’s plate. “My baby don’t eat enough.”

  Cirello feels like he’s going to explode—smothered chicken, pork chops, greens, sweet potatoes, and Grandma is threatening them with pecan pie.

  He had just left his meeting in Staten Island when Darnell called. “What you doin’?”

  “Nothing, why?”

  “We, you know, busy tomorrow night,” Darnell said, “so my grandma doin’ Christmas Eve dinner for me tonight. Wants me to bring a friend, thought maybe that’s you.”

  “Me?”

  “I don’t wanna bring no thugs or whores to my grandma house,” Darnell said. “You minimally respectable, know how to use a napkin. And we got shit to go over, you know?”

  Cirello knows.

  He sits there filling his face, thinking about tomorrow night.

  Betrayal on top of betrayal on top of betrayal.

  What he’s going to do with this nice woman’s baby.

  Darnell bought her this house in East New York because she wouldn’t leave the old neighborhood. It’s still sketchy and violent, but she’s as safe as a baby in a crib because nobody is going to lay a hand or a harsh word on Darius Darnell’s grandma. She could walk past fiends and muggers with fifty-dollar bills hanging out from her pockets and no one would touch her because it would be a slow death sentence.

  Darnell has everyone within five square blocks on the arm. His slingers on the corner look out for her, his boys walk or drive her wherever she wants to go, some uniform cops in both the Seven Five and the Seven Three get fat Christmas envelopes for looking in.

  The grocer delivers to Darnell’s grandma.

  The pecan pie is insane.

  Cirello helps clear the table and load the dishwasher, then Grandma opens her present, a new microwave.

  “Baby, I don’t need this.”

  “It’s for your Stouffer’s,” Darnell says.

  “I do love my Stouffer’s.”

  “Boys be by tomorrow, install it,” Darnell says.

  Grandma looks at Cirello. “My baby too good to me.”

  “Impossible,” Cirello says.

  She admires the oven for a few minutes, then sits down in her chair and sips a sherry. Two minutes later she’s sound asleep.

  “That woman raise me,” Darnell says, looking at her. “I was in V-Ville, she the only one who write me.”

  They go over the plans for tomorrow. The shipment is due in Jersey at eight o’clock. Cirello says they should split the shipment into two halves, two vans, twenty kilos in each. That way if, God forbid, one gets hit, Darnell can pay back the loss with the other. One goes to the mill in Castle Village, the other to a new place they’ve built on the top floor of a building on West 211th and Vermilyea in Inwood. At the corner, on Tenth Avenue, is a restaurant called Made in Mexico, which Darnell thinks is fairly comical.

  “You take the Castle Village van,” Darnell says. “I’ll go with the Inwood one. Done by ten, everyone home in time to open presents.”

  “You going to see your kid?”

  “Christmas morning,” Darnell says. “You?”

  “I’ll hit the family in Astoria,” Cirello says. “I have a ya-ya of my own.”

  “A ‘ya-ya’?”

  “A Greek grandma.”

  “You good to her?”

  “Not as good as I should be,” Cirello says.

  Darnell is quiet for a long time, like he’s thinking about something, trying to decide whether to tell it to Cirello or not. Finally, he says, “This my last one.”

  “Christmas?” Cirello asks. “You sick or something?”

  “Last shipment,” Darnell says. “I’m getting out the dope business.”

  “Are you serious?”

  “As a broken leg,” Darnell says.

  How much rice can a Chinaman eat? he asks Cirello. He’s fat with money and legit investments—could live off just that tower—why take any more chances? This shipment is his 401(k).

  “Thought I should let you know,” Darnell says, “so you could adjust for the loss of income.”

  “I’m good,” Cirello says. “I made enough.”

  “Hope you put some of this away,” Darnell says. “Not lose it on basketball, nigger clang a free throw and you broke again.”

  “I quit gambling,” Cirello says.

  “That’s good.”

  “It’s more than that, isn’t it,” Cirello says. “It’s more than the risk.�
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  “Tired of the thug life,” Darnell says. “The hustle, the violence, the paranoia. Knowing someone always looking to take your place, can’t trust no one. Got no real friends . . . You my best friend, Bobby Cirello, and I barely like you. How sad is that?”

  “Pretty sad.”

  “No, I just wanna sit back,” Darnell says, “watch my kid play lacrosse—lacrosse, that’s crazy—maybe get back with my ex, maybe not, I don’t know. I just know I’m done with this. Tomorrow, it’s over.”

  Ain’t that the fat truth, Cirello thinks.

  The fat, ugly truth.

  He looks at Darnell’s grandma asleep in the chair.

  In the drug game there are no innocent bystanders.

  Keller meets Mullen and Cirello by the Christmas tree in Rockefeller Center to go over the night’s plans.

  Cirello confirms the time and place—the heroin will come over from Jersey shortly after eight p.m. and be driven to an address on West 211th. Mullen’s guys will stake the place out but lay way off until Cirello bangs anything into a text.

  Then they go in heavy.

  “Darnell will be there?” Mullen asks.

  “Yeah,” Cirello says. “This one’s too big to delegate. Anyway, I’ll have him on camera, receiving the drugs in Jersey.”

  As soon as Darnell is in cuffs, Keller will activate the arrest of Eddie Ruiz.

  Ruiz will connect Lerner.

  And he’ll rat on me, too, Keller thinks.

  Doesn’t matter.

  Not with what else is at stake.

  “We’re good to go?” Keller asks.

  Cirello nods—good to go.

  They split up.

  Keller kills the day doing tourist things, so if Howard does have him up, surveillance will see a guy who came to New York to see his son, do some Christmas shopping, enjoy New York.

  He wanders around Rockefeller Center, visits St. Pat’s, goes into Bergdorf’s and buys Mari a bracelet. Then he walks along Central Park to Columbus Circle and up Broadway, grabs a burger and a beer at P.J. Clarke’s, then catches a movie at the Lincoln Plaza Cinemas.

  “Don’t fuck it up,” Cirello says.

  “I was pulling hijacks when you were potty training,” Andrea says.

  But Cirello can tell he’s edgy, nervous. He should be, Cirello thinks, he has a couple of mil at stake. “If Darnell makes you for this, I’m not helping you. You’re on your own.”