by Lincoln Matt
“Well, that doesn’t make a lick of sense,” Holm said.
“I know,” I said, scanning the rest of the message. “Hold on. It’s long. They’re saying that they want to have her body shipped to Miami so they can examine it further, or fly to Santo Domingo themselves. They’re convinced it’s the drug that killed her, but they need more than they can get from a distance.”
“Wouldn’t be the first time we had a tech come on-site on a mission,” Holm reasoned. “What did the Dominicans say?”
“They’re still waiting to hear back from them,” I said. “And nothing about the drugs from the airport bust. That might’ve been one of the other techs, not Bonnie and Clyde.”
“I wonder if we can try to move things along for them,” Holm said.
“I’ll mention something to Alejandra,” I said. Then, frowning at my phone, “Nothing yet from Díaz. I wonder if they still have the kids in the hospital. They can’t keep them forever.”
“They can keep talking to them, though,” Holm pointed out. “Though there is a point of diminishing returns, I suppose.”
“Yeah, those kids experienced something horrible,” I said. “Not just the loss of their friend, but the whole experience in general. Giving them some space, for now, might be better for getting more information from them in the future.”
Just then, some men in suits, including one I recognized from the lobby earlier that morning, started to swarm into the restaurant from upstairs.
“They must be out for lunch,” I observed. “Come on, let’s grab some food for Alejandra and meet her up there so we can talk without being overheard.”
“Good idea,” Holm said.
I went up to the front and ordered something, messaging Alejandra the plan. She didn’t respond right away, but when she did, she said she’d meet us in my room and that she was tied up in an argument with one of the border towns’ mayors.
The waiter handed me the food, and I waved for Holm to follow me.
“C’mon,” I said. “Let’s get out of here before someone starts asking questions.”
CHAPTER 10
Ethan
Alejandra met us upstairs some time later, looking more than a little frustrated.
“That bad, huh?” I chuckled, handing her the lunch we had bought for her.
“Worse,” she grumbled. “But I’m here now.” She gave me a small smile and sat down opposite Holm and me at the hotel room’s desk.
“How was it?” Holm asked.
“They can’t figure out how to get along to save their lives,” Alejandra said, opening her lunch carton. “And now they’ve found out about the shoot-out at the border.”
“So soon?” I asked. “Did one of the officers tell?”
“I don’t think so,” Alejandra said. “After all, all that commotion would be hard to miss. That outlet we were at isn’t as remote as it looks.”
“Ah, I see,” I said. “Do they know about the murder yet?”
“I don’t think so,” Alejandra said, shaking her head. “Or at least if they do, no one’s talking about it, and I would think they would.”
“That’s good, at least,” Holm reasoned. “We don’t need anyone freaking out any more than they already are.”
“Agreed,” I said.
“Did you speak to your boss?” Alejandra asked, covering her mouth as she ate.
“Yes,” I nodded. “Our lab techs think it’s a drug that’s killing these kids, at least. But it has a strange mechanism in the body. I still don’t quite understand it. It didn’t show up on the girl’s blood tests, but there was something else elevated in her bloodstream… or something… I don’t know. I didn’t really understand what they were saying. We’re trying to get some of our techs down here to investigate in person since it’s such a tricky case.”
“That sounds like a good idea,” Alejandra said, pushing around some of the food on her plate. “Especially considering how little progress my own people seem to be making on this case.”
She gave the window a sour look.
“It’s understandable,” I said kindly. “This cartel is preying on the most vulnerable people in your society and reopening old wounds. There’s no doubt they’re doing this intentionally. It makes sense that an organization with an outside perspective like MBLIS would gain ground faster on a case like this.”
Alejandra gave me a weak smile and then changed the subject. “Anything on the victim? You found his wallet, right?”
I remembered that we’d been silent on the car ride back to the hotel, so I told Alejandra everything we had learned about our mysterious American victim.
“Interesting,” she said when I finished, taking a sip of water. “So he’s using a fake identity now. And there’s no record of this name in the system where he lives now.”
“None,” I confirmed. “Though that doesn’t mean much. He could be using a fake identity there as well, a different one. Likely so that he doesn’t get flagged as a criminal while traveling abroad.”
“He probably came to the island from Florida, though,” Alejandra reasoned. “Lots of people come to the Haitian side that way, to stay under the radar and get drugs. Or sex, or whatever else it is they’re looking for that they can’t find as easily back in the States.”
“He may have been planning to go somewhere else after leaving Haiti,” Holm suggested. “After all, he was trying to get over to the Dominican side.”
“We don’t know that for sure, though,” Alejandra reminded him, wiping her hands on a nearby napkin. “But he was near the border for some reason or other, I’ll give you that.”
“Either way, we have a picture of him now,” I said, pulling out the Louisiana ID I’d found in the victim’s wallet. “And the picture’s pretty accurate, from what I can tell. I think it’s a good idea to go asking around in the border towns, try to find out if anyone saw this guy.”
“Agreed,” Holm said. “That should be our next step.”
“Are you leaving now?” Alejandra asked. “I could come with you. It’s not as if there’s a lot going on here right now.”
“No,” I said. “It’s better for you to stay here, after what happened earlier. Besides, it will be good to have your eyes and ears at the conference, just in case something else comes up.”
Alejandra looked disappointed, but she acquiesced.
“I understand,” she said. “I’ll let you know if I come across any new information.”
“Likewise,” I said. “Just promise me you’ll stay out of trouble this time. I don’t want to have to come to rescue you again.” I laughed and smiled at her.
“I’ll do my best,” she said, giving me a wry smile of her own. “Come, I’ll show you out.”
With that, Alejandra packed up what remained of her lunch, and Holm and I followed her down to the lobby.
There, we found several of the suited men and women from the conference clustered around the front of the room and arguing loudly in Spanish. Alejandra groaned at the sight of them.
“What? What are they saying?” I asked, leaning in closer to Alejandra.
“I’m not sure. They’re all talking at once,” Alejandra said, shaking her head. “Let me go see.”
She reluctantly approached the group and spoke to them in their native language. They were resistant at first, and several of them continued to shout at each other over Alejandra’s protestations. But it quickly became clear who was in charge here.
Alejandra spoke to them sharply and took charge of the conversation. She asked them several questions and then returned to us, leaving them to continue to bicker amongst themselves.
“Well, you are a diplomat,” I chuckled at her as she approached.
She rolled her eyes. “I’ve gotten used to dealing with these people. Apparently, the border patrol officers have arrested a member of the cartel trying to cross over to the Dominican side. They’re holding him there until someone from the chief’s office can come to transport him to Santo Domingo for fu
rther questioning and sentencing.”
I exchanged a look with Holm. “Well, I think we know exactly what we’re going to be doing with our afternoon now.”
“Have they been able to get anything out of him?” Holm asked with a shrug. “Is this related to the shooting earlier?”
“I have no idea,” Alejandra said apologetically. “They don’t have very much information yet, just wild speculation.”
“What kind of speculation?” I asked.
Alejandra glanced back at the group, which had now resumed their loud argument, and rolled her eyes again. “Some of them are convinced there’s some kind of Haitian plot to take over the Dominican border towns,” she explained.
“Huh?” Holm asked, shaking his head in confusion. “You mean, officially? As in the Haitian government?”
“Yes,” Alejandra sighed and shrugged her shoulders. “There have been some rumblings about this throughout the conference, but I doubted it would gain much traction. It’s just such a ridiculous notion. The Haitians can barely take care of their own land. Why would they want ours? It’s just old anti-Haitian sentiment run amok.”
“So you don’t think there can be any grain of truth to these concerns?” I asked.
“Absolutely not,” Alejandra scoffed. “There’s no way. The cartel is a problem, to be sure, and it’s a great threat to us, but these conspiracy theories serve no one.”
“So how’d it get started if there’s no truth to it?” Holm asked.
“How does anything like this get started?” Alejandra shrugged. “People get scared, and then they leap to conclusions to justify their irrational fears. So here we are.”
By now, several of the conference-goers were screaming at each other again in Spanish. Alejandra turned back around and barked at them, which only seemed to calm them down slightly this time.
“Have you tried to reason with them?” I asked.
She gave a hollow laugh. “Tried, yes, but once you’re this convinced of something so unlikely, there’s no coming back from that. My main concern is reasoning with those who haven’t been convinced yet, but those are becoming fewer and further between as the hours pass.”
Just then, two of the men began to lunge at each other. Alejandra seemed surprised, and everyone else froze, so I rushed forward and wedged myself in between them, pushing them away from each other.
“Hey!” I yelled. “Knock it off! How is this helping anyone?”
Alejandra scrambled to my side and translated my words into Spanish with a similar force. The men just continued to glower at each other.
I relaxed my grip on them slightly, thinking they were done, but they took advantage and lunged at each other again, one of them pushing me out of the way in the process.
One of them ripped the other’s suit and knocked him to the ground, sending a glass coffee table flying and crashing down and sending splintering pieces flying against the wall in the process. Shards of glass sprayed over the crowd and newly panicked voices shouted out.
Holm and I ran after the two who were fighting while Alejandra tried to work through what was going on with the remainder of the group.
The guys were rolling across the ground. I reached down to pull them off each other again, but one of them turned around and took a swing at me instead. I ducked out of the way and grabbed his wrist, hard.
I twisted it and used the opportunity to grab him by the jacket with my other arm and hurl him up and away from the other guy who Holm was wrestling down now.
Alejandra came over to us.
“Why were they fighting?” I asked her.
She sighed again, shaking her head. “They disagree on the whole conspiracy, and they also disagree on how to police the border. They’re mayors of neighboring towns. There is long-standing bad blood between them.”
“Politics,” I grumbled.
“You wouldn’t be so dismissive if it were your home under attack,” the man I’d subdued spat back in broken English.
“And how exactly are you helping that situation?” I asked him.
He started to say something in English, but couldn’t find the words and spat something back at me in Spanish.
“He says that he’s protecting his people from having a militia invade,” Alejandra translated.
“He thinks the Haitian military is going to show up in his town?” I asked, confused.
“Not the Haitians,” she corrected. “The Dominicans. He doesn’t like the idea of the federal government or the military coming in and using his town as bait. He isn’t one of the conspiracy theorists, the other guy is.”
I glanced at the man whose arms Holm had pinned behind his back. He was wrestling hard to get away, but to no avail.
“And what does he say?” I asked.
Alejandra had a brief exchange with the guy, and she sounded frustrated toward the end.
“Don’t make it worse,” I reminded her.
“Of course, you’re right, Ethan,” she relented. “I forgot myself in my frustration. This one wants my father’s administration to intervene, which is good, but he also thinks we should go to war with the Haitians to prevent them from expanding into our territory. If only I could take the reasonable parts of both these men’s views and put them together, leaving out the crazy, we may have been able to come to a resolution here a long time ago.”
“It looks like our ride is here,” Holm said, jerking his chin in the direction of the front doors. Sure enough, one of the patrol Jeeps had arrived to take Holm and me to go venture into the other border towns.
“Do you think you can handle this here?” I asked Alejandra.
“I’ll be fine,” she said. “I think it’s long past time we hashed out a solution. Now that they’re beating each other up, it’s as good a reason as any to accelerate the timetable.”
“Even so, I’d be more comfortable if we left someone with you,” I said, turning to the patrol car and gesturing for one of the officers to come inside. He did so.
“Can I help you, Sir?” he asked me.
“Can you stay here with her?” I asked, gesturing to Alejandra. “Things are getting a little heated around here.”
“Of course, Sir,” he said, looking grateful to be given the opportunity to stay safely indoors for once.
“Stay out of trouble,” I reminded Alejandra.
“I’ll do my best,” she laughed.
CHAPTER 11
Ethan
Holm and I instructed the remaining patrol officer to take us back to the outlet near the border, where the Haitian cartel member was being held and prepared for transfer to Santo Domingo. We decided that looking around the border towns would have to wait until after we talked to the gangbanger. After all, we didn’t know how long it would be until someone from the chief’s office came to take him away.
“Have you been able to get anything out of him yet?” I asked the officer once Holm and I were in the backseat of the Jeep while he drove.
He shook his head. “Our translator is talking to him now, but he seems frightened,” he explained. “He’s just a kid. Can’t be more than sixteen.”
“Sheesh,” Holm groaned. “How do these kids get mixed up in this stuff, anyway? When I was his age, the worst I did was sneak some beers with some friends.”
“It’s the culture around here,” the officer said with a shrug. “They get brought in early. It’s either you deal, or your mother gets killed. Some of these guys were good kids in bad situations, but then they turn bad themselves.”
“Well, hopefully, this one isn’t lost yet, and we can get him to help us,” I said with a small smile. “Or at the very least, we can get him to be as afraid of us as he is of the other gangbangers.”
“You said translator before,” Holm pointed out. “He doesn’t speak Spanish?”
“Most Haitians speak French,” the officer said. “Though many are bilingual. This one seems to only speak French. No Spanish or English. Many Dominicans speak two or three of these languages, as
well. We’re a multicultural island.”
I checked my messages again. I had one waiting from Diane.
“I guess Bonnie and Clyde are on a flight to Santo Domingo,” I told Holm. “They couldn’t get the remains shipped to Florida, so they’re coming here.”
“Probably for the best,” Holm said. “That way, if something else comes up, they’ll be here.”
I nodded and checked to see if there was anything from Díaz, the young officer who had helped us interrogate the witnesses back at the hospital, but there was nothing yet. I sent him a message asking how things were going back in the capital. We needed those kids to talk if we were going to figure out what was going on down here.
We arrived at the patrol outlet not long after that, and the officer who had driven us led us to a holding cell in the back of the small, box-like building. There weren’t many people inside the building, and it was barren but for its dull yellow walls.
A young Haitian man who looked like he couldn’t even grow any facial hair sat chained to a desk opposite a kind-looking Dominican man in a patrol uniform like the others. He was tall and skinny and wearing tattered old clothes. The officer was speaking, but the kid wasn’t reacting, just staring down at the desk with a defeated look on his face. His eyes were red and puffy like he’d been crying.
“Are you the translator?” I asked the officer when Holm and I walked inside.
He looked up at me and nodded, holding out his hand to Holm and me each in turn. “I’m Officer Juan Espinal,” he said, gesturing for us to sit down next to him. We did so.
“I’m Agent Ethan Marston, and this is my partner Agent Robbie Holm,” I said. “We’re from MBLIS.”
“Yes, I heard,” Espinal said. “I’m very glad you’re here. We all are.”
“Have you been able to get anything out of him?” Holm asked, casting a cursory glance at the kid, who was actually crying now.
“Just a first name,” Espinal said. “Emmanuel. He hasn’t given me anything else. Every time I try to ask him anything, he just says, ‘they will kill me, they will kill me’ over and over and over again.”