The Supremacy License

by Alan Lee

  If Manny had no further information to provide, all this would be for nothing. And he had a sneaking suspicion that El Gato, one of the world’s foremost troublemakers, would not be snared so easily.

  As he stared at the ceiling, he got another text.

  >> Hola, migo. I assume you’re at some exclusive spa, getting your body hair waxed. Because you are a sissy girl.

  >> I got a call from Sheriff Stackhouse. OWS downtown. I’ll get her out and buy her some food tomorrow, unless you show up first.

  >> Stackhouse says you’re in hot water with your supervisor.

  >> After you get fired, you can work at Hardees and learn how to properly grill burgers.

  >> Text me if you need anything. I’m there.

  Manny grinned at the message from Mackenzie August, his roommate. OWS was their code word for Old Woman Sofia, the homeless Hispanic lady he ate breakfast with. She’d been picked up by the police again. Tomorrow morning, Mack would collect her and do his best. She was kinda sweet on Mack, anyway.

  Text me if you need anything. I’m there.

  He would be, too. Anything Manny needed. The way their friendship worked, picking each other up from prison didn’t seem that far-fetched.

  He replied, Thanks, Mack. I owe you.

  Tell Stackhouse hot water is my favorite water.

  Home in a few days.

  He laid down the phone and listened to men on the far side of the cell block shout.

  His aching face kept him awake two more hours.

  28

  Twenty-two Years Earlier

  Manuel Martinez couldn’t fall asleep. The other prisoners weren’t even trying; they stayed up laughing and smoking, shaking his flimsy rusted bunk when they fell against it. He needed sleep so bad it made him cry.

  He was only thirteen, he shouldn’t be in the same cell as these men. The administration would discover the error soon—he prayed. But who cared about a nothing little boy? So many reeking bodies in such a small space. His heart pounded until it hurt his ears.

  He stared at the broken cement ceiling of Complejo Correciónal Las Cucharas, in Puerto Rico, and felt he was at the very bottom of the world, with all its great weight bearing down to crush him.

  29

  Nineteen Years Earlier

  Manny watched America slide under the plane’s starboard wing. He tried to wake his mom to see the beaches, but she wouldn’t. Empty bottles of airplane liquor spilled from her lap when she moved.

  The young stewardess arrived to clean up the bottles. She winked at Manny, the third time she’d done so.

  He was seventeen. He’d paid for the plane tickets himself, money earned from fighting, his knuckles still raw. He also paid for her Immigrant Visa, secured the sponsorship from his uncle, and submitted the paperwork.

  America. Freedom. Hope.

  Tears streamed down his face. He was never leaving again. He’d do whatever it took.

  The plastic top of the seat’s armrest broke, he was squeezing it so hard.

  30

  That night in Cell Block B he fell asleep with the phone on. An incoming message activated the screen and its bright light woke him. It was one in the morning.

  >> Do you know why people are attracted to you, Manuel Martinez?

  >> Of course, your handsome face helps. But it’s more than that.

  >> It’s because you have hope. You constantly smile. Our world is difficult and rough and it grinds us down. You know this more than most. And yet…you are in good spirits. Always.

  >> Your resilience is one reason I think of you so often.

  >> That, and you beat two of my guardians with a formal dining chair. I’ve been fantasizing about that since.

  >> Are you hiding?

  >> Where oh where are you, my love?

  Without having to be told, he knew the unknown number belonged to Catalina. She was texting in Spanish.

  You tell me first.

  >> You aren’t at your house.

  >> You aren’t at your office.

  >> Are you looking for me? I am flattered…and, yes I’ll say it, aroused.

  He rubbed his bleary eyes.

  His secret was still safe. She didn’t know where he was. If she did, she’d be taunting him about being in jail.

  You could make my job a lot easier. Give me your location.

  >> I’m no longer at the palace.

  I know. I made sure of that.

  >> And if I tell you, will you come here?

  Yes.

  >> And what would we do?

  He slid the phone under the thin wool blanket as a guard walked by with the brightest flashlight ever built. After pausing to listen for the guard’s retreat, he pulled it out again and dimmed the screen’s brightness.

  We would go to bed together. Like we did a lifetime ago, as kids.

  >> And then?

  And then I would arrest you.

  >> Oooh, with cuffs, I hope.

  >> Manuel, my heart, you know your police cannot catch me. So instead, please, join us.

  >> I won’t wait forever.

  When do you leave?

  A longer pause. Then…

  >> Saturday.

  31

  The guard with the flashlight returned at 4:30am. Manny rolled out of bed, hungry and raw and tired, like he was made of rust, and he said every curse word he knew in English.

  The guy behind the blinding light said, “This says you go by Sinatra?”

  Manny nodded and yawned. Scrubbed his chin. He needed a shave.

  “But that’s not your real name."

  “Maybe. Maybe not. I do it my way.”

  “Clever. Let’s go, Sinatra, you’re cooking breakfast for all these fine gentlemen.”

  Ignacio never stirred.

  This early, the walk across the lawn reminded him of turning off a shower—a sudden rush of chill and loneliness. A handful of other guys trudged with him, heads down. He stamped his foot to restore full sensation to his leg.

  Two detention officers let them into the kitchen one at a time, subjecting each to a strip search. They called him Pretty Boy and the inspection was rigorous and thorough.

  Compared to the basketball courts and the bathrooms and lockers, the kitchen struck Manny as pristine. Commercial grade galvanized steel appliances and mopped floors and racks of cooking utensils. A head chef bawled orders and inmates moved like sleep walkers, fetching ingredients from muscle memory.

  Rafael García moved through the kitchen without affecting it. He had no responsibilities and even the head chef seemed to recognize his otherness. Rafael was only here because he had to be, but he would not cook. And no one dared ask him. Compared to the other men in the kitchen, Rafael was shockingly handsome. He eventually amused himself by drying mixing bowls coming out of the washer.

  Today they cooked oatmeal re-rack. Manny stirred the oatmeal with a steel paddle as another man added small portions of hot water and margarine. No one called him Sinatra. He was Pretty Boy or New Fish.

  After thirty minutes of work, Rafael strolled close.

  Manny said, “So you go by Arroyo now.”

  Two inmates stepped between them. Like they’d been ready. The shorter of the two, a man with only one eye, raised a metal spatula to Manny’s throat and said, “No le hablas, perra.”

  For the first time, Rafael made eye contact with him. His expression didn’t change but he arched an eyebrow.

  Manny debated taking the spatula and gouging the man’s remaining eye. But he raised his hands in surrender. Before he turned back to the oatmeal, he said, “Cute name, Arroyo. That’s not what I called you in Los Angeles. You forget your old friends.”

  He grabbed the paddle and stirred again.

  Rafael didn’t reply. From the corner of his eye, Manny could see him drying with the rag. Thinking and drying, and looking his way occasionally.

  Manny stood in line for the shower for an hour before lunch, saving a spot for Ignacio. Cell Block B had only two showers
and the line boggled the mind. Ignacio arrived to take his spot and the men behind made no complaint—this was common practice. Ignacio paid for the favor with a bowl of Ramen noodles, which Manny heated and devoured. He still didn’t trust the gathering at the chow hall.

  He went to the yard again during lunch. The same small guys were there, walking and exercising under the broiling July sun.

  The buzzer rang and most of Cell Block B exited into the yard in a controlled mass movement, a sea of yellow. Manny stayed on the track, keeping his distance from Bill Wolfe and Chilly the Kid and other faces he remembered.

  Rafael began his circuit of the track, walking proud with hands clasped behind. His gaze found Manny and he closed the distance. They met at the farthest point in the yard, away from the crowd.

  Rafael spoke in Spanish.

  “You will be killed later today.”

  Manny said, “About time.”

  “Unless I call it off. You knew me in Los Angeles? What did you call me?” He spoke softly and Manny did too.

  “I called you Rafael Garciá in Los Angeles. So did everyone else. I knew your sister, Catalina. Last time I saw you was at Scotty’s. You left soon after for Honduras.”

  Rafael nodded. He twisted to look at the mob around the basketball court, then to his two body guards, then back to Manny. He nodded again. “Okay.”

  “We worked together.”

  “We worked together,” repeated Rafael. He stuck out his hand and Manny shook it. A truce struck. “You look familiar. But I don’t remember the details.”

  “Forget about it. It’s been ten years. I don’t even remember what people called me then.”

  Rafael pointed at Manny’s face, an accumulating mess of swollen bruises and burns. “Sorry about your face. My man did that.”

  “I broke the code. I knew the rules. But I wanted to speak with you. Whatever you got going on here, I want in,” said Manny.

  “You want in.”

  “Yes but I get out in two weeks. I’m only here because of a prisoner transfer thing, a screw up,” said Manny. “The guards, they don’t know their ass from apple butter.”

  “Two weeks,” repeated Rafael.

  “Yes.”

  “Good. I’m glad for you. But I’m gone tomorrow.”

  Manny expressed surprise. “Tomorrow? Walking free?”

  “I’ll talk to Santiago before I go. Tell the guys to back down. See if you can be of use the next two weeks.”

  “Where are you going? I won’t be far behind, leaving this place,” said Manny. “And I liked working with the García family.”

  Rafael chuckled. “In two weeks? By then I’ll be the President of Panama. Or dead.”

  He said it as a joke but Manny heard the truth underneath. His ears rang. President of Panama.

  Rafael said, “Stay out of trouble. Obey the code, Sinatra, and the guys will let you be.” He turned to continue his walk. “I like that name, by the way.”

  32

  That night, after lights out, Manny turned on his phone again. A rush of messages from Beck waited.

  >> Okay, I did some research on Panama. The country is in election season.

  >> There’s a growing swell of support for a right-wing revolutionary party, led by Ricardo Herrera. But no one’s seen Herrera for months.

  >> I bet you a dollar that Ricardo Herrera is another alias of Rafael Garcia.

  >> Ricardo is expected to make a dramatic appearance soon and potentially swing the election.

  >> I spoke with a contact in the US Department of Foreign affairs, and they fear the right-wing revolutionary wing plans a congressional coup, with the intention of altering the constitution, no matter the results.

  >> And yes, that’s almost exactly what happened in Honduras ten years ago.

  >> I think Rafael Garcia was telling the truth.

  Manny’s head swam. Just how influential was Catalina? She was about to topple a second government? Or was it a third?

  >> Yesterday I was sure you were fired.

  >> But now, after passing the Panama news to Weaver, I detect a glimmer of hope. =)

  >> And possibly I’ll get a promotion, which is far more important.

  >> Additional agencies are getting in on this. You uncovered something big. A week ago, they didn’t want to risk a stand-off with El Gato. But grabbing her, plus Rafael Garcia/Ricardo Herrera is a no-brainer.

  >> Rafael will be tailed by aerial assets when he leaves tomorrow. Ideally he’ll lead us directly to El Gato. Otherwise, we’re prepping to make the arrest at the airport.

  >> Just tell me this…

  >> Why did you go into the prison without my help?

  >> Some banal reason having to do with male pride and insufficiency issues, I bet.

  Good question, Beck. He had several answers.

  One, he knew Weaver would forbid it and that Beck was a rule follower. So he couldn’t tell her.

  Two, he liked Noelle Beck. More than he liked most people, and he didn’t want her injured or fired.

  Three…male pride and insufficiency issues. Catalina was a deeply personal issue for him.

  Manny lowered the phone when he heard footsteps. Part of him wanted to call Allan Johnston now. Wake him up and get the hell out of his jail cell. And yet…

  …he still didn’t believe that Catalina and Rafael would be caught so easily. Powerful men and women don’t get that way by being naive and uninformed.

  No, he couldn’t leave yet. Rafael was scheduled for release tomorrow, but when? Manny might have one more shot at him in the kitchen. But for what reason? To get more information?

  Or to assassinate him with a paddle. He liked both options.

  The approaching footsteps stopped at his cell door. He heard a squeaking sound and a thump— someone had opened and sat in a metal chair outside his cell.

  He rose on the top bunk, peering out the security window.

  The walkway and common areas were partially lit even this late. The man sitting outside in the chair nodded and said, “Good evening, Mr. Martinez.”

  It was Hubert, the steward of the Appalachian Palace. The hairs on Manny’s arms pressed against the jumpsuit he still wore.

  “Beunos noches, Hubert. You here for a conjugal visit?”

  The man smiled. Polite and brief. “For the sake of your cell mate, let’s keep our voices down. It’d be better for Ignacio’s health if he remained asleep.”

  “I understand.”

  “You can imagine my surprise, Mr. Martinez, to find you here.”

  “Imagine my surprise, amigo, at being found.”

  “The underworld, as it’s often called, is vast. I am a small part but I have access to its unimaginable resources and information.”

  “What, like a villain newsletter?”

  Hubert smiled again and struck Manny once more as a kind, friendly old man. “More or less. Do you know why I came here, instead of simply requesting you be made to disappear, Mr. Martinez?”

  “Because I didn’t shoot you in Harlan.”

  Hubert raised his fingers. “There are two reasons. That is the first. You spared my life and thus I feel compelled to return the favor. We are gentleman, after all, even if our world is bloodthirsty. Most of my guests are…blunt and brutish, or spoiled and entitled. I find you strike the appropriate chord, Mr. Martinez, between cultured and cutthroat. A rarity.”

  Manny debated telling Hubert that he preferred to be called Machiavellian, but balked. He might be requested to define it. Also, he was experiencing an emotion uncommon for him—fear.

  “Second, and more importantly, I want to know why you are here.”

  Manny’s mind churned. Did Hubert not know about Rafael? Did Catalina never tell him? For all of Hubert’s resources, he appeared ignorant.

  He asked, “Why’s that matter, Hubert?”

  “Did you know federal agents are crawling through my home as we speak?”

  “They won’t find anything incriminating.”

&
nbsp; “Of course not. But the establishment I operate is absolutely reliant upon discretion and secrecy. You’ve already cost me credibility with my future guests, you understand. Repairing our reputation could take years. I need to know if your current endeavors present a further threat to me or Catalina García.”

  “I’m a US Marshal,” Manny replied quietly. “You think the only thing I got going on is the Catalina affair?”

  “Tell me why you are here, Mr. Martinez. The only plank you and I proceed on is mutual respect.”

  “I’m here to surveil.”

  Hubert made an ‘And?’ motion with his hand. He needed more.

  Manny said, “I’m telling you nothing else, Hubert. The mutual respect isn’t infinite. I busted you and your men tried to kill me. We’re even, I think, and now I’m onto something else. You want to avoid additional trouble from the feds? Take off and forget I’m here.”

  Hubert regarded him silently for a full minute. Manny took the chance to slow his pulse and clear his mind. He needed rational thought, not panic.

  Hubert said finally, “I don’t believe you.”

  “I don’t care, ese. Surely, as a card carrying member of the underworld, you understand the need for secrecy.”

  “Why are you here?”

  “Not your business.”

  “I see.” Hubert stood and collected his chair. “You have a reputation, Mr. Martinez. As an officer of the law who abuses prisoners under your care.”

  “You heard wrong. I abuse criminals before they become prisoners. When they can still fight back.”

  “Yet still, this warning seems appropriate. Good luck.” He nodded and walked off.

  Manny’s stomached twisted. A feeling of dread.

  Boots outside his cell. His door clanged and opened. The loudest sound he’d ever heard. Men came in with high-powered flashlights.