Smoke Signals (A John Tall Wolf Novel Book 4) Page 12

  But he wanted to know who was soothing him.

  He turned his head to look up and saw Marlene.

  She said, “You’ll need to get to your feet soon. We have to find Tall Wolf.”

  Chapter 29

  Cascade Mountains — Washington State

  After patching up Basilio Nuñez the night before with the medical supplies he helped his captors find, John questioned him, testing the man’s claim that he could be of help in bringing his superiors to justice.

  Basilio, sitting on his camp bed, told John the drug growing operation in the Cascades belonged to Fausto Zara. He also confirmed the new location of the marijuana processing camp that Ernesto had given to John. He told them how many campesinos worked as growers and processors: an even hundred. “No, ninety-nine,” he said, “after that one ran away.”

  He pointed a finger at Valeria. Ernesto slapped his hand down.

  “Fifteen guards,” Ernesto said. “Fourteen, not counting me. Five to keep the workers from running away; ten to chase off intruders.”

  “Just scare, not kill?” John asked.

  “Julián said to kill only if we must.”

  “Who’s Julián?” Rebecca asked.

  “That pig’s cousin,” Valeria said. “He is much smarter, has better manners.”

  “But he’s still in firm control?” John asked.

  Ernesto nodded. “He could turn that one loose on us, if he chose.” Meaning Basilio. “He told us as much. But if we live within the rules, he prefers things peaceful.”

  “You think he might feel differently now?” John asked.

  Basilio laughed. “Julián wants to be loved by everyone, the maricón.” Faggot. “But if his life or money was threatened, he would kill like anyone else. Like me.”

  John looked at Ernesto. He seconded Basilio’s opinion with a nod.

  “What about the other guards?” John asked. “If the workers tried to flee, would the guards shoot them?”

  “Some would,” Valeria said.

  Ernesto nodded. “Some, yes … but not without this one,” he pointed a thumb at Basilio. “Not if he and Julián were removed.”

  “That or we could bribe them,” Valeria said.

  “They’re all corrupt?” John asked.

  “They’re all poor, señor,” Ernesto said. “The idea of having enough money to start a decent life is a powerful thing.”

  Basilio laughed and said,“The growers and the guards both, including Ernesto there, they are all coños.” Pussies.

  Ernesto thrust the butt of his rifle into Basilio’s gut, knocking him off the camp bed.

  John lifted Basilio to his feet, increasing the volume of the man’s moans.

  “Always risky to insult a marine,” John told him.

  Ernesto nodded, sending a clear message more pain was available.

  With that in mind, Basilio told his captors that others from the new camp would come by in the morning to reclaim as many things as they could carry. Julián would not worry about Basilio’s absence. The fact was, Basilio was sure his cousin would be glad to see the last of him.

  “So, if you let me go, I will not return to him. I’ll go home to Mexico.”

  The plea was directed at John. He looked at Ernesto and Valeria.

  Ernesto only shook his head.

  Valeria said, “Ask him where the bribe money is being kept at the new camp.”

  John relayed the question to Basilio with a look.

  The man refused to say another word.

  Ernesto inclined the barrel of his rifle in Basilio’s direction.

  John said, “It probably wouldn’t look good on my résumé if I let you execute him.”

  Valeria asked, “What if we leave him for the bear? Have you seen the bear?”

  Basilio hadn’t, but John and Rebecca nodded.

  John said, “Interesting idea. If we stake him out and a bear attacks him, that would be pretty much a gesture of fate. Who could be blamed?”

  Basilio’s jaw dropped. He seemed to think it would be his captors’ collective fault.

  They staked him to a sturdy tent pole erected on open ground anyway. Ate dinner while he watched. Left food on the outdoor dining table where the scent might attract … who knew what? John laid down the conditions under which Basilio would spend the night.

  “Each of the four of us,” he gestured to the Batistas, Rebecca and himself, “will take a two-hour shift watching you, in case you look appetizing to any of the wildlife. If something should come along and you need help, just call out where the bribe money is hidden. We’ll scare away or kill any predator.”

  Ernesto chuckled.

  “You might need to say please for Ernesto or Valeria to come to your aid,” John added.

  He took the first watch. Basilio didn’t say a word to him.

  Just before John was ready to leave, he told Basilio, “If you think my friend Lieutenant Bramley will be the one to feel sorry for you, that would be a mistake.”

  John told him what Rebecca had done to Serge Marchand. “Left him with just one testicle.”

  Basilio was greatly disappointed to hear that.

  He had been counting on the white woman being his salvation.

  John heard a voice behind him ask, “¿Realmente?” Really?

  He turned to see Ernesto coming to take his shift.

  He’d obviously heard what John had said.

  “Es verdad,” John said. It’s true.

  “Qué mujer.” What a woman. “I think my Valeria might do as much.”

  Ernesto didn’t say a word to Basilio as he stood watch. At Ernesto’s insistence, Basilio’s shins and thighs, as well as his wrists, had been tied to the pole. He could slouch but he couldn’t sit. Whenever the bound man started to fall asleep on his feet, Ernesto would grunt or growl. Basilio’s eyes snapped open every time, thinking the bear was coming for him.

  Basilio wanted to curse his tormentor, but he was smart enough to know that as bad as things were they could always become worse. He had done worse to others. So he held his tongue. At first, Basilio tried to convey his contempt with hateful looks. The problem with that was he couldn’t match Ernesto’s glare.

  He knew now that in any fairly matched contest, the round-faced bastard would kill him.

  Un marino? A marine? Madre de dios. Mother of God.

  The bastard had fooled everyone.

  So Basilio resisted in the only way he could. He held fast to his secret. He didn’t tell Ernesto where the bribe money was hidden. That and prayed silently that if the bear came it would prefer a fat coño to a wiry sicario.

  Hitman. Yeah, sure. Basilio didn’t feel much like a killer now.

  Basilio’s slim hope was that he would somehow be able to charm the white woman, who under other circumstances he would have found appealing. So tall and every inch something he’d love to explore. At the very least, the time he spent alone with her would be an opportunity to fantasize, and why not? If a man was nearing his death and knew his last time with a woman was behind him, the next best thing would be to imagine a final conquest.

  Even that pale pleasure was denied him, though, when he saw the woman, not alone but with Valeria Batista. The two women had decided to share their guard duty. It wasn’t hard to imagine that Valeria had learned of what the other bitch had done to that poor bastard in Canada. Cost him one of his huevos.

  Eggs. Balls, as the yanquis would put it.

  Dios, he could see Valeria taking both of his, if he gave her the least excuse. He didn’t even look at the women when they took their camping chairs opposite him, each holding an automatic weapon. His whole body ached now from being tied to the pole. His feet and legs felt like they were on fire. He resisted saying so, lest he give the cabrónes any ideas.

  Still, he listened to the women talk.

  You put two of them together you couldn’t stop them from doing that.

  Valeria asked Rebecca, “Is it very cold in your country?”

  “In w
inter, yes. In spring and autumn, about half the time. Summer is wonderful, but it never lasts as long as we’d like.”

  “There is nowhere warm?”

  “Vancouver is mild compared to most other places, but it’s not really warm, except in summer. Most everyone who can afford it spends time in the U.S. or the Caribbean during the winter.”

  Valeria sighed. “Los ricos are always comfortable.”

  Rebecca understood the meaning by context. “Rich people aren’t always happy, but they usually stay warm, yeah.”

  “It is true what Señor Tall Wolf says, you are with the police?”

  Rebecca nodded. “Yes, it’s part of my family tradition.”

  “Are you important in your police job?”

  Rebecca laughed. “I’ll find out how important I am any day now.”

  She told Valeria the story of her confrontation with Serge Marchand.

  Valeria clapped and said, “Maravillosa.” Wonderful.

  “Yeah, well, we’ll see about that. I might have to flee to the U.S.”

  Just like me, Valeria thought.

  “So what’s your story?” Rebecca asked.

  “I was a maestra, a teacher. For the little ones. I was happy. The boy next door, I always thought he wanted to be my novio. Sweetheart, yes?”

  Rebecca smiled and nodded. “And?”

  “I wasn’t very nice to him at all. I didn’t think he was the least bit guapo. Handsome. In school we were always the two best students. He had to work much harder for his grades, though. He was always polite to me, never improper. I was polite to him, never interested. I thought that didn’t matter, but the day came when he left to join the military. He knocked on my door, bowed to me and said, ‘I will miss you very much.’ Nothing else except, ‘Hasta la vista.’”

  “Good bye?”

  “Yes, but also until we meet again. I never gave him a second thought while he was away. Not until I was twenty-one and I received a wedding proposal from a much older man. He was the mayor of our town. He was also a …” Valeria searched for the right word.

  “A bastard?”

  “That, of course, yes. But I want something else.”

  Rebecca came up with it intuitively. “A front man for something else.”

  Valeria smiled. “Yes, a front man for a drug cartel.”

  “Whose cartel?” The question came from Basilio not Rebecca.

  He’d been listening all along, interested.

  “Cállate,” Valeria yelled. Shut up.

  Basilio opened his mouth to reply, thought better of it and zipped his lip.

  “My parents were very worried because the mayor had told them things could go very well for them or very badly. Their lives were in my hands.”

  “That’s awful,” Rebecca said.

  Valeria said, “I didn’t know what to do. I thought I would have to marry this horrible old man, but my parents had another plan. They went to our neighbors. The parents of my old schoolmate. My parents knew he’d become a marine, something I never took the time to find out. My parents asked his parents if there was some way he might help me. They said possibly.”

  “They had to check with their son first, before saying yes,” Rebecca said.

  “That and decide how willing they were to risk their own safety. While everyone was waiting the mayor grew impatient. He was not used to being denied anything he desired. He talked to his cartel friends and they sent a sicario — a killer — to knock on my door just as my schoolmate had.”

  “What did he say?” Rebecca said.

  “No one ever found out. Before he could knock a second time he was shot through the head. To make sure the mayor understood the significance of this, he received a note. It was nailed to the door of his house. Usted y todos los de usted será el siguiente. You and all yours will be next.”

  Rebecca asked, “Did the mayor take it to heart?”

  “The man who died at my doorstep was a feared murderer. That he could be killed was like the hand of God reaching out to protect us. The mayor hid in his house. What happened next was even more important. A squad of marines appeared at my parents’ house. All of them were in uniform and wearing masks to protect their identities. Except for one. My old schoolmate. He was wearing a white tuxedo and his face was exposed.”

  “That is too cool,” Rebecca said, squeezing Valeria’s hand.

  Tears in her eyes, Valeria nodded. “Ernesto said to me, ‘If you would do me the honor, I think you would be safer as my wife.’ He and the marines walked me, my parents and his parents to the church. I was wearing jeans and an old blouse. He told me I looked beautiful. The priest was waiting for us.”

  “What a great guy,” Rebecca said.

  “There were marine helicopters flying overhead to make sure no one tried to stop the ceremony. After we were married, everyone in the wedding party got on board a helicopter and we left my hometown forever. Ernesto told me he would release me from my wedding vows as soon as he could be sure I was safe. I told him I never wanted him to let me go.”

  Rebecca felt her heart swell. She realized she felt the same way about John. They wouldn’t need a small army to accompany them, but it was time for them to exchange a few vows, too.

  “Ernesto knew he had to leave Mexico. He had exposed his identity and challenged the cartel directly. They would have to kill him or the other bosses would know they were weak and would come to seize their territory.”

  “Sí,” Basilio said.

  Valeria didn’t bother to chastise him this time.

  “Ernesto crossed the border and came here,” she said. “A year later, when he had some money, he sent for me, and now here we are. I only hope we can stay or go to your country. Maybe we could buy warm clothes there.”

  Rebecca laughed. “I’ll certainly stand up for you, if you choose Canada. If my vote of confidence still means anything at the time.”

  “Your friendship will mean everything.” Valeria got to her feet. “Perdóname.”

  She walked over to Basilio and spoke softly in Spanish, “You heard everything I said?”

  He said nothing, only nodded.

  “Do you believe I was telling the truth?”

  After a moment’s hesitation, he inclined his head again.

  “Good, because now you know why I love my husband. You also know what kind of man he is. The American man and the lady from Canada are good people, but they haven’t known the desperation Ernesto and I know. So you will believe the message Ernesto gave me for you: Tell me where the bribe money is or you will be next.”

  Basilio told her.

  Chapter 30

  The New Processing Camp, Cascade Mountains — Washington State

  Julián decided the time had come to di-di. The American soldiers who fought in Vietnam had appropriated the expression from the natives. Julián’s father had told him it meant, “Get out of Dodge pronto.”

  Make a necessary retreat fast.

  It had only been on his death bed that Julián’s father, Juan, had told his son the truth of who he was, up to a point. “I screwed up my very first semester of college, at a really good school, too, and got my ass booted out the door.”

  “What did you do?”

  “Well, this was way back before the Internet, but I sort of anticipated crowd-sourcing.”

  His father had to explain the term to him. “It means in any community there’s a large body of resources an individual can tap into. These days, the resource is usually money. You tell the group of people ‘my kid is sick or has this really great opportunity. He or she needs some money. Will you please help?’ You got all that?”

  Julián had nodded. He was bright from the start. Like his old man.

  “Okay, so I get to college, I sign up for my classes, and right away I think: There are plenty of people here, upperclassmen, who took all the same classes I’m taking. They know all the right answers to all of the tests. The ones who got good grades on term papers know just what the professors are looking
for. I saw this wealth of knowledge as a potential resource. So I set up shop in a coffee bar just off campus. Put the word out I was looking for copies of tests and papers that would guarantee straight-A’s in the courses four or five hundred other freshmen and I were taking.”

  “Isn’t that cheating?” Julián asked.

  His father stroked his cheek. “I looked at it as accelerated learning. I set things up so none of the upperclassmen had to use their real names. I gave each of them a code identity. I charged my fellow freshmen a fee for the information and passed ninety percent along to the pool of money the upperclassmen shared.”

  That was when Julián asked the question that endeared him to his dying father. “Was your ten percent the most money anyone got?”

  “Yeah, it was. There was more money in the pool but it was shared by a lot of people. My cut was mine alone. The problem was, the idea got too popular. People who’d taken classes that would never interest me wanted to get in on the action. People started coming to my dorm room not the coffee bar. It got so popular there was a line out my door anytime I was in my room. People noticed and somebody ratted me out.”

  “That’s when you had to leave college?”

  “Yeah, and also when I lost my student draft deferment. Next thing I know, I’m in the army, trained as a rifleman and sent to Vietnam. I can’t think of anything but, ‘Shit, I’m going to get killed over here.’”

  “But you didn’t,” Julián said.

  His father laughed and began to cough. Something he’d done a lot of lately.

  “Maybe I did,” he said, “that was where I started smoking and now this goddamn lung cancer is going to do me in. Any fucking minute now, it feels like. The only reason I got out of Nam, though, was because the lieutenant who headed up my unit took care of me.”

  “Why did he do that?”

  “He liked me. We looked so much alike everybody thought we had to be brothers. He was real close in age to me, too. He’d gotten into West Point at seventeen. Skipped a couple grades on his way to college. So he was only three years older than me. But he had a world of knowledge I lacked about how to survive in Indian country.”