Authors: Russell Blake
Alejandro nodded, and she turned, Matt leading the way, a column of lost and weary travelers on a mountainside with only the wind and the glimmering heavens to guide them, leaving danger in their wake as they headed toward an uncertain future.
~ ~ ~
The driver of the lead vehicle flinched when the orange ball of flame blasted skyward from the ravine ahead.
“What was that?” the gunman in the passenger seat demanded, his Mac-10 machine pistol in his lap.
“Beats me. But we’ll know soon enough.”
By the time they pulled to a stop by the roadside, the Land Rover was a charred, twisted hulk far below them in the ravine. The driver got out of the car and moved to the edge of the drop, hands on his hips as he watched what remained of the SUV burn. The passenger and the three gunmen in the rear of the first vehicle joined him, and the second truck rolled to a halt next to them. The driver walked over to the new arrival and gestured at the wreck.
“He went off the side.”
“Ha. I thought he’d lost us. At the rate he was going, he’d have been in Peru before we were out of the pass.”
“Looks like maybe he should have slowed down, eh?”
“Well, that’s one problem we can scratch off the list.”
“Yeah, nobody’s walking away from that. You see it blow?”
“From around the curve. I caught the last of it.”
The driver sighed. “All right. Let’s head back. I’ll take a few photos with my phone, and when we get service, I’ll send them to Bastian. He’ll be happy.”
“That’s the understatement of the year.”
The second SUV executed a three-point turn and trundled back down the hill as the driver walked back to the edge and memorialized the scene with his phone’s camera. His men milled about, smoking and chatting as he took pictures from different angles. When he was done, he nodded.
“All right. Mount up. No point hanging around here.”
The gunmen piled back into the vehicle, and the driver put the transmission into gear, glad the chase was finally over. Bastian had made it abundantly clear that failure wasn’t an option, and he hadn’t wanted to have to tell his superior that the Sotos had somehow evaded them yet again. That wasn’t a recipe for a long life in his line of work, and he breathed easier on the trip back down the mountain, the driver now taking the curves at a moderate speed, happy to be headed back to their temporary headquarters for some deserved celebration after a job well done.
Chapter 14
Washington, D.C.
The older man pulled his long overcoat tight around him and clamped his hat in place as he walked into the evening wind on a crowded sidewalk in Georgetown, looking like any of tens of thousands of tired bureaucrats and lobbyists in a city overcrowded with anonymous gray men. He’d gotten the call only an hour before and had dressed and left his home in Virginia in a rush to make the rendezvous.
The coffee shop was a bohemian nod to 1950s beat culture, which the name made clear: Kerouac, the latest in a growing trend of pseudo-independent restaurants that were actually chains owned by multinational corporations. The older man pushed through the door and was greeted by a carefully engineered chaos, the overstuffed chairs with threadbare seats and peeling earth-tone walls as bogus as the framed black and white photographs of Ginsberg and Kerouac and the rest of the beat generation’s icons, which he knew from a recent
Washington Post
article were identically hung in each of the chain’s forty-four outlets, with another dozen planned inside the next ten months.
A bearded student wearing a beret and an Irish fisherman’s sweater greeted him with a tired stare from behind a carefully worn counter, its edges scarred from eons of use that existed entirely in the minds of the carpenters who’d fabricated it to exacting corporate specifications.
“What’s it gonna be, daddy-o?” the barista asked, his insouciant moue the only genuine expression in the place.
“Cup of coffee. Black.”
“Javanese or Costa Rican?”
“Rican.”
When the older man had paid and collected his oversized mug of coffee, he turned to scan the largely empty room – it was far too late in the evening for anyone but first dates looking to seem innocuous to each other, and his rendezvous, who was occupying one of two seats in the corner, studying a magazine as though it held the secret to eternal bliss.
He sat down across from the younger man and took an appreciative sip of the rich brew before setting it down on the table between them.
“You’re sure it’s her?”
“Absolutely. Took a while to filter through the system from Interpol, but it’s a match. You can see from the side-by-sides.” The younger man handed him a single sheet of photo stock with two images on it.
The older man’s eyes pored over the images – one from the traffic camera near the residence of his son, Peter, taken moments after he’d been murdered in the dead of night, and the other a grainy shot apparently from a security camera, given the time and date stamp in the lower right-hand corner.
“Christ. This is already…too damned old. Where was it taken?”
“Mendoza, Argentina. A casino.”
“Argentina! What the hell…” the older man spat.
“I know. Which explains why none of our efforts to track her have yielded anything. South America isn’t known for its hypervigilant surveillance. Not much has changed since half the Third Reich disappeared there at the end of the war.”
“Those that weren’t welcomed into the DOD with open arms, you mean. Ancient history.”
“Anyhow, this was circulated on Interpol for ID purposes, and it took some time for us to flag it.”
“And?”
“And so far there’s been no identification that I know of. But it puts her in Mendoza, which is a start.”
“Not exactly a hub of our operational strength, though, is it?”
“We don’t have anyone on that coast. Just a few low-level data collection operatives. Nobody field-trained.”
“Lovely. Where does that leave us?”
“I asked the Buenos Aires head of station to nose around and see what he can come up with, but frankly, I think you’d be better served with a freelancer.”
The older man looked around the area. “That bitch killed Peter,” he hissed.
“Yes. But I’m not sure it would be in your best interests – in any of our best interests – for a death squad to be traced back to the agency. Especially since there’s no official tie-in.” The younger man paused, dreading the older man’s reaction to the message he was delivering. “And a freelancer would have more latitude to, well, take certain liberties with the local laws that might not fly with an official team.”
The older man’s eyes gave nothing away, his stare as cold as the grave, his irises two drops of black oil in a dead sea. “I trust you have a short list of deniable contractors for me?”
“Of course.” Another piece of paper changed hands, this one with three names on it. “I made a few calls. The top name is unavailable. So it’s either number two or three.”
The older man read the stats. “Impressive.”
“None of these are amateurs.”
“What kind of support can I expect?”
“You’ll have the full unofficial cooperation of the Buenos Aires station.”
The older man took another swallow of coffee and rolled it around in his mouth like he was sampling a fine wine. “Cost?”
“Won’t be cheap. Figure a nickel.”
The older man nodded. “Which of the two candidates would you recommend?”
“The husband and wife team.”
“Why?”
“Because we’re after a woman, the female’s intuition could come in useful. Just an emotional preference from my end. Either would probably be equivalent.”
The older man thought for several moments. “Can you deal with the contract if I decide to pull the trigger?”
“Of course.”
“And you’re sure we can’t handle this through official channels?”
“My instinct says no. Even in our world, somebody’s going to want to know the justification for devoting resources to this. But it will mostly come down to risk. There’s no way it will make it through committee. Trust me on this.”
“You know your shop better than I do.”
“It’s not like the good old days. There are no more cowboys. Everything’s more regimented. Structured.”
The older man shook his head and then finished his coffee. “How do you want to handle the funding?”
“I’ll get you an account number. It would be best if the funds stayed offshore.”
“I can arrange that.” The older man stood and shifted his fedora further forward on his brow. “Sooner the better.” He looked around the room. “I think we’re done here. Anything else?”
“No.”
The older man hesitated as he turned, as if a thought had just occurred to him. He fixed the younger man with an icy glare, his expression flat. “Don’t screw this up. I want her.”
“I know you do. I’ll pull out all the stops.”
The older man spoke softly. “Don’t disappoint me on this.”
“I won’t.”
Chapter 15
Jet glanced at Hannah, her little head bouncing against Matt’s shoulder as he marched along behind Alejandro, who had taken the lead once they were well away from the road. She was asleep, which was a small miracle, but didn’t surprise Jet. Hannah had proved not only resilient but also capable of drifting off under the most difficult of circumstances. For a moment, Jet envied her that ability, and she smiled wistfully.
The scrub was thinning out as they climbed. They’d found a trail that paralleled the road far below.
Alejandro pointed out droppings along the way. “Goats. They’re all over this area. You can hear them at dusk and dawn. I still remember that from camping.” He paused, looking around. “There are mines in this stretch. Silver and copper. I used to visit them with my girlfriend. Most are closed down, but they’ve recently reopened several.”
“That’s nice. But how will any of that little bit of trivia help us?” Rodrigo grumbled.
Alejandro shot him a black look. “If we can find one along this stretch that’s still active, if we’re really lucky, they’ll have strung a phone line. If not, at least come morning we can expect workers to show up, at which point we can get a ride.”
“Why would they give us a ride?” Jet asked.
Alejandro grinned at the stars. “I can be very persuasive.”
Rodrigo nodded. “Our family runs this part of Chile.”
Matt snorted. “Didn’t look like it back at the hotel.”
Rodrigo stopped, and Jet could see his jaw muscles tighten. “You have no idea what you’re playing with here,” he warned, his tone menacing.
“Rodrigo,” Alejandro said, “they aren’t the enemy. She took out most of those gunmen. Don’t waste your energy. We’re still a long way from the mine.”
“I don’t like his attitude,” Rodrigo pressed.
“Save it for the Verdugos.”
Rodrigo resumed trudging along the dusty track, and the tension of the moment diffused. An hour later they came over a rise and took a break on the summit. Rodrigo shook a cigarette out of a nearly flat packet and lit it. Alejandro peered into the distance. “You see that road? Dirt, off to the left, cutting across that slope? I believe that leads to one of the mines I’m thinking of. It’s an old one that shut down operations, but a new company came in and began digging again. The price of silver has increased enough to make it viable.”
“It’s a long way off,” Rodrigo complained, inspecting his ruined shoes with a frown.
“Not that far. We should be able to make it before morning,” Alejandro said.
Jet stretched her arms over her head and shouldered her bag again. “I’m game. But I need to go freshen up. I’ll be back in a minute.”
When she returned, she was no longer carrying the bag. Her pockets were bulging, and she had an extra jacket for Hannah as well as one for herself, but nothing else. A duffel full of clothes would require far more energy to haul than it was worth, and she could always buy more clothes once they were off the mountain. “That’s better. Lead the way, Alejandro. The sooner we get there, the sooner we’ll know whether you can make a call and get help.”
Alejandro checked his watch. “It won’t be light for another five hours. We should be able to find one of the mines within two or three – this isn’t that big an area, and they’re all fairly close together. The only reason to cut a road into these hills is to access mines, so we get to that road and follow it, we’re home free.”
“What if it’s not one of the operational ones?” Rodrigo asked.
“Then we keep going till we find one that is.”
Rodrigo shook his head. “I was afraid you’d say that.”
They made it to the road in a little under an hour and took another break. Jet strode along the edge and peered at the surface before returning. “Tire tracks. Fresh, given that it rains a fair amount here. That’s positive. This is probably one of the working mines.”
Matt nodded. “Let’s hope so. Not that I don’t enjoy a nice evening constitutional, but I’m about ready to call it a night.”
“Shouldn’t be that far now,” Alejandro said. “Most of the mines are only a few kilometers off the main road.”
“With our luck this will be the exception,” Rodrigo said, probing his tender feet through his dress socks, his shoes by his side. “What a nightmare.”
“No point in whining. This is the least of our worries. We still need to deal with…with other matters. Tomorrow’s going to be another very long day,” Alejandro cautioned. “Come on. Might as well hit it. We can rest once we’re at the mine.”
The trek lasted another hour and a half, mostly uphill, and by the time they reached the mine grounds, everyone was beat. Alejandro and Rodrigo went to reconnoiter around the few temporary buildings near the mine opening while Jet attended to Hannah, who had awakened and needed to relieve herself. Matt gathered wood and leaves and created a fire pit from stones to stave off the worst of the chill from the icy wind coming off the Andean slopes. Once her motherly duties were done, Jet returned with Hannah and sat next to Matt, who was waiting for the brothers to return so he could borrow their lighter.