C
HAPTER
F
OUR
Washington, D.C.
The most powerful man in the world leaned back in the chair behind the big desk and cursed bitterly under his breath as he looked at the flat-screen TV mounted on the wall. The huge screen was broken up into eight windows, each showing a feed from a different newscast. All the major broadcast and cable networks were represented.
And every one of them was talking about John Howard Stark.
“Were all these running at the same time?” the president asked the attorney general as he used the remote to mute the audio on the TV. The two men were alone in the Oval Office.
“No, we put the feeds together,” the AG said. “I thought it might more effectively demonstrate the threat this way.”
“One old man in Texas is not a threat.”
The AG shrugged, making it clear that while he wasn't going to openly challenge the president's statement, he didn't agree with it, either.
“What do you think we should do?” the president asked.
He hated asking questions like that, nakedly begging for advice. But he had to because deep down he knew that despite the trappings of the office, despite the very real power that he possessed by virtue of being commander-in-chief, he was out of his depth here. A few times early in his career, he had run for president, but he had never really, truly believed that he would
be
president.
And he still wouldn't be if one of his predecessors hadn't gotten so carried away with his messiah complex that he believed he could order a nerve gas attack on American citizens and get away with it.
The past decade had been a political roller coaster, with the country split almost evenly down the middle between right and left. The stranglehold that the left had on the news media and the courts, though, had been enough to ensure that they held nearly all the reins of power during that time. They should have been able to consolidate that power even more so that they would be assured of never having to give it up, but a series of unfortunate events had prevented that from happening.
The first one had involved the very man whose face looked out now from that big screen, John Howard Stark. He had stood up to the Mexican drug cartels, stood up to the federal government as well, and embarrassed the president. That debacle had been followed by others along the U.S.âMexico border, and the situation had gotten bad enough that the party had dumped the incumbent and elevated her vice president to the top of the ticket for the next election. He had won, of course, and then proceeded to make things even worse with his smug, arrogant, heavy-handed demeanor and his tendency to think that he could get away with anything because he was so adored by the public.
That had all come crashing down with the trouble in the little town of Hope, Texas, and the revelation that the government was funding a secret biological and chemical weapons laboratory in the mountains of West Texas. When the president had ordered the unleashing of one of those weapons on American soil, with the intention of killing American citizens, it had almost ruined everything. He had been impeached and ultimately arrested when he refused to surrender power. Of course, he hadn't been imprisoned but had been taken secretly out of the country. Now he lived in a luxurious villa in the south of Franceâpaid for by the American taxpayers, naturallyâand was writing a book about how he had been the victim of a sinister right-wing conspiracy.
His vice president had taken over the presidency only long enough to resign, which meant the Speaker of the House had ascended to the office. She was hated virulently even by members of her own party and had been told in no uncertain terms that she would
not
be running for reelection when her term was over. The party was doing its best to distance itself from the extremes of the past two chief executives, and so they had turned to an obscure congressman who had been around just long enough to have some decent national name recognition.
He'd had no business winning, and he probably wouldn't have if not for the constant barrage of vicious attacks on the opposition candidate by the news media. It was a rip job, pure and simple, and a particularly savage one, and it had worked.
And so the country had a president who sat in the Oval Office and didn't have any earthly idea what he was supposed to do next.
He could tell that the look the attorney general gave him was a pitying one, but there was plenty of scorn in the AG's eyes, too. The attorney general said, “We're already doing all we can do right now, sir. You haven't commented on the matter yet, and it would probably be best if you didn't. I'll issue any statements that need to be made through the Justice Department.”
“Are you going to bring charges of civil rights violations against this man, Stark?”
“That will depend on what the investigation uncovers.” The AG grimaced. “It won't be easy. There are several witnesses who have already told the police that the three suspects were trying to steal Stark's truck and attacked him first. There's, uh, even some security camera footage showing one of the men pulling a gun.”
“The gun that Stark used to shoot the other two.”
“That's right. The fact that the three suspects all have records of violent crimes in their past doesn't help, either. One of them, Chuy Mendoza, was on probation for the sexual assault of a minor.”
“Good Lord,” muttered the president. “It's going to be hard to portray them as innocent victims in all of this.”
“Yes, it is,” the attorney general agreed. “There's a good chance the matter never would have come to our attention if Stark hadn't been involved.” The AG paused. “He's red-flagged in all the computers at Justice, State, the IRS. . . .”
“Well, I should think so.” The president reached a decision, although it was a pretty noncommittal one. “All right, Charles, use your own discretion in pursuing this. I trust your judgment.”
“Of course, sir. Thank you.”
The attorney general got to his feet and left the Oval Office.
The president sat there watching the talking heads discuss John Howard Stark. The sound on the TV was still off. The president didn't really know a lot about Stark, just what the general public knew: the war with the cartel, the tragic death of the man's wife, that well-intentioned but horribly misguided business about turning the Alamo back over to Mexico. . . . Stark claimed that he just wanted to be left alone, but he had been a thorn in the side of the liberal establishment for years now. Something needed to be done about him. Maybe not now, maybe not over this particular incident. This might not be the right time.
But soon, the president thought.
No man could be allowed to stand in the way of social progress.
C
HAPTER
F
IVE
Several weeks later
Antonio Gomez didn't know what he wanted to do more, throw up or run. Maybe throw up,
then
run. That would work. That would get rid of the ball of sickness rolling around in his belly and get him out of here before things got bad.
But he didn't do either one of those things. He stayed right where he was, because he didn't want Ignacio “Nacho” Montez to think he was a coward. If that happened, Nacho would do one of two things: be disappointed in him, which was bad enough, or kill him, which was worse. Maybe.
Nacho had brought Antonio and two more young men out here to take care of a problem, as he put it. Antonio knew what that meant. Nacho was going to hurt somebody.
Their car was parked behind a shed so it couldn't be seen from the road. The four young men had gotten out of the car and stood beside it, waiting in the darkness. It seemed like they had been here forever, but Antonio knew it had been only half an hour or so.
Carlos Montez, Nacho's hulking younger brother who liked to be called Chuckie, like the evil doll in that old movie they had seen one night when they were all stoned, dug a joint out of his shirt pocket and opened his lighter to set fire to it.
“What the hell you doin', man?” Nacho demanded.
“I just thought it would make the time pass quicker,” Chuckie said.
“You can't do that,” Nacho said in a tone of mingled annoyance and tolerance, the way you'd talk to a little kid who didn't know any better. “You don't want anybody seein' the light, and you don't want Jimmy smellin' no reefer when he drives up and gets out of his car. He'd know somebody was here.”
“Oh. Yeah, I guess you're right.” Chuckie snapped the lighter closed and slid the joint back into his pocket. “Later, when we're done, okay?”
“Sure, man.” Nacho laughed. “You brought enough to share, didn't you?”
“Yeah, I guess.”
“He's screwin' with you, man,” Jalisco said.
Antonio didn't know what Jalisco's real name was. That was all he'd ever heard anyone call the tall, pockmarked hombre. Unlike Antonio, Nacho, and Chuckie, who had all been born and raised on the Texas side of the border, Jalisco was from Mexico. He scared Antonio as much as Nacho did, maybe even more. He dropped hints that he was in good with one of the cartels, and Antonio believed him.
The highway that ran from Devil's Pass to San Antonio was about half a mile east of the isolated house where Antonio and the others waited. Antonio saw headlights going by on the road and wished he was over there in one of those vehicles. He wouldn't care where it was going, as long as it was away from here.
Nacho moved closer to him, nudged him with an elbow.
“You nervous, Antonio?”
Antonio managed to shake his head and keep his voice level as he said, “No, man, I'm fine.”
“You'll be finer when this is over. You'll really be one of us then. It's gonna be good. You'll see.”
“You sure we're not gonna kill him? Just rough him up some, right?”
“Yeah, man. We don't want no real bloodshed. Just teach him a lesson, so he don't even think about holdin' out no more.”
Antonio swallowed hard, hoping that Nacho wouldn't notice. He had to do something about the lump in his throat, though. He nodded.
“Sounds good,” he said.
“You get in some good licks, that's all you gotta do. We'll know then you one of us.”
Before Antonio could say anything else, Jalisco announced quietly, “Here he comes.”
A pair of headlights had turned off the highway and were bouncing toward the house over the rutted dirt road. Once again Antonio fought down the urge to be sick. At least this would be over soon, he told himself.
The four men crowded into the thick shadows behind the shed. The approaching car's engine was loud, and so was the Tejano music blasting from its stereo speakers through the open windows. When both of those noises cut off abruptly, the night suddenly seemed painfully quiet.
A car door slammed. Antonio and the others started to emerge from their concealment behind the shed.
Another door slammed.
Jimmy Rodriguez wasn't alone.
Nacho paused for a second, muttered, “It don't matter,” just loud enough for his companions to hear, and moved out again, pulling a gun from under his shirt as he did so. It was a Glock nine millimeter, and Nacho was proud of it and showed it off every chance he got, like it was his baby.
Jalisco had a gun, too, Antonio knew. He and Chuckie carried only knives. The guns were just to make sure Jimmy didn't put up too much of a fight, Nacho had said. He would have to take what was coming to him.
Two figures were moving toward the porch. Nacho called out, “Stop right there.”
They froze, and at that instant, Chuckie clicked on the powerful flashlight he had taken from the car. Its beam washed over the two people standing there, hands raised in an attempt to shield their eyes from the unexpected, blinding glare.
Jimmy Rodriguez stood there, and next to him was his fourteen-year-old sister, Sonia. Antonio's stomach clenched as he recognized her. They hadn't gone to school togetherâAntonio had graduated several years earlier, and Sonia was only about to start high school as a freshmanâbut he knew her anyway. She was really pretty and sweet, and it wasn't her fault that her older brother had gotten mixed up with some bad hombres.
“Nachoâ” Antonio began.
“Well, this is a surprise,” Nacho said, ignoring him. “You bring your
hermana
along to protect you, Jimmy?”
“Sonia, get back in the car,” Jimmy snapped.
She took a step, then stopped as Nacho said, “No, no, no, you stay right where you are, little one.” He and Jalisco split up, Nacho going right, Jalisco going left, as they approached the two frightened teenagers. They stayed on the edges of the cone of light so that the guns they held would be visible.
Jimmy said, “Nacho, I don't know what you want, but Sonia's got no part in it. Lemme give her my keys. Let her drive away from here.”
“Why, I can't do that,” Nacho said in a tone of mock surprise. “She's only fourteen years old. She got no driver's license. You wouldn't want me to let somebody break the law like that, would you?”
“What do you want?”
“You been skimmin', man. You five grand short over the past couple weeks. The hombres can't have that.”
“It's a lie,” Jimmy said indignantly. “I been straight up. I always been straight up, you know that, Nacho. We go way back, you and me.”
“Back far enough I know not to trust you.”
Jimmy said, “Look, I got two thousand in the house. I'll give it to you, you give it to the hombres. I don't mind doin' that if it'll fix things, even though I never skimmed a cent, man. You'll do that for me, won't you, Nacho?”
Nacho grinned and said, “Oh, we'll take the two grand, all right . . . after we're finished with you and little Sonia.”
“I told youâ”
Nacho cut in on Jimmy's angry, desperate outburst by turning his head and calling, “Antonio!”
After another hard swallow, Antonio stepped forward. This was his part, he supposed. He'd give Jimmy a beating, and then they could get out of here. He hoped they wouldn't hurt Sonia before they left.
Hands clenching into fists, he said, “I'm sorry about this, Jimmyâ”
“Hold on,” Nacho said. “You'll need this.”
He pressed the Glock into Antonio's hand. Antonio stood there shocked, unable to move.
“Shoot him in the head,” Nacho said quietly, his voice little more than a whisper. “Walk up to him, point the gun at his face, and pull the trigger. That's all you gotta do.”
Sonia burst out, “No!” and then put her hands over her face in horror as she began to sob.
Antonio forced words out of his mouth.
“You said . . . you said . . .”
“You should've known better, man,” Nacho told him. “Why'd you think we brought along the machete?”
Jimmy broke and ran.
He made it two steps before Jalisco drilled a bullet through his thigh. Jimmy cried out, grabbed at the wound, and tumbled to the ground, raising a little cloud of dust as he landed.
“Sonia, run!” he screamed through his pain.
She was too scared to move, though. She stood rooted to the ground between the car and the house.
“Go ahead now,” Nacho told Antonio. “You can do it. He's squirmin' around, though, so you'll have to aim good.” Nacho caught his breath. “No, wait! I got a better idea. We'll make him watch while I give Sonia to Chuckie. Then you can shoot him.”
“I . . . I . . . I can't.”
The Glock slipped from Antonio's fingers and thudded to the dirt at his feet.
Nacho's arm whipped up and around and his knuckles cracked viciously across Antonio's face. He screamed curses in Spanish.
“You drop my gun!” he screeched. “You drop my gun in the dirt, youâ”
Jalisco's gun spat fire twice. Jimmy jerked as the bullets struck him. The little automatic he had dug out of the top of his boot fell from nerveless fingers, unfired.
The shots made Nacho stop his frenzy. He looked expressionlessly at Jimmy's body as blood continued to well from the wounds in his chest.
“Well, I guess we won't make him watch after all,” Nacho said.
“But I still get Sonia, right?” Chuckie asked.
Nacho jerked his head toward the girl and said with a sleepy smile, “Go for it, brother.”
Sonia ran then, terror finally galvanizing her muscles, but she was much too late. Chuckie dropped the flashlight and lunged after her. The light hit the ground, and the brilliant beam broke the landscape up into weird shadows as it illuminated the chase. Within a few yards, Chuckie caught up to Sonia, loomed over her like a great bird of prey, and swooped down on her.
Antonio caught a glimpse of that terrible sight over his shoulder as he looked back. He was running, too, toward the highway, and he expected to feel a bullet from Jalisco's gun smash into his back at any second.
No more shots rang out, but Sonia started screaming and kept screaming. Even over the pounding of his heart, Antonio could still hear the sound all the way to the highway, where the rumble of passing trucks finally, thankfully, drowned it out.