Certain Dark Things(52)

“Can we afford that?”

“I’ve got a bonus,” Ana said. “I put the bulk of the money into the savings account and I have cash, in the cigar box under the bed, for emergencies. So yes, we can afford it.”

“Cool.” Marisol went back to checking her phone, but she paused to give her mother a smile before running off to school.

Ana sat for a few more minutes at the table before making her way to her bedroom. The Virgin shot her an accusing glance from her shrine, but Ana could not allow herself to feel any remorse. She was going to capture a pair of vampires with the assistance of a known criminal group and she was going to do it for money, but f*ck it, sometimes you have to sin in order to earn your way to paradise. Or in her case, a couple of tickets to Cuba and the promise of a comfortable life.





CHAPTER

20

Mexico City was an apocalyptically dysfunctional place at the best of times, what with the pollution, the flooding, the teetering concrete slums, and the city sinking into the lake bed upon which it was built. However, that day, with the sun hiding behind thick clouds and the rain coming down so heavily, it was damn hellish. Rodrigo wished he could head home, back to the sunny, arid North. But there was too much work to be done.

Rodrigo closed the blinds and circled his desk, standing before a bookcase and staring at a picture of himself when he’d been much younger, sitting behind the wheel of a convertible. When he’d started working this business, Rodrigo hadn’t intended to get himself so involved with vampire narcos. He just liked cars. Vintage cars, custom cars. His brother had a garage and a gentleman had come in one day to get some work done on his vehicle. He’d struck up a conversation with Rodrigo and they’d talked cars, and the man wondered if he was a good driver. It turned out the old man was a Renfield who’d come from Europe with a few bloodsuckers two years before, right after vampires started immigrating to Mexico in big numbers.

The U.K. had major restrictions against vampires, but it wasn’t the only country with a hard attitude when it came to bloodsuckers. Spain and Portugal had plain expelled them in 1970. France, Germany, and Italy didn’t like them much either, though they had not kicked them out. There had been major clashes in the late ’70s and a clusterf*ck in Paris in 1981. By 1985 Mexico City was a no-vampire zone. Also by 1985 Rodrigo was a Renfield.

Rodrigo tore his eyes from the photo and glanced at the phone number on the notepad.

Rodrigo didn’t have as many contacts in Mexico City or as much pull as he would have liked, but he did have people he could rely on. So far, they’d produced nothing. Atl had vanished into thin air, slipping into Mexico City with an ease he thought was beyond her capacity. But a nice juicy tidbit had just rolled in.

An employee with the Secretariat of Public Safety informed him that the person assigned to the case of the girl Nick had killed was called Ana Aguirre. Lately Aguirre had been accessing the databases and pulling information about both Nick and Atl. That the investigator could have tied the killing to Nick did not sound so far-fetched, but Atl … that could not be a mere coincidence. This woman knew something.

Rodrigo dialed the number and waited.

“Hello?” a woman said.

“Is this Detective Aguirre?” he asked.

“Yeah.”

“I’m calling about a mutual friend. His name is Nick Godoy.” He could hear her adjusting the telephone, moving the mouthpiece closer.

“Who are you?”

“Look, I’m really terribly sorry for disturbing you, but I’m interested in knowing how your investigation is going. I’m especially interested in hearing why you are looking into Atl Iztac.”

“Who are you?” she asked again.

“Why are you linking Nick to Atl?” Rodrigo countered.

“Who have you been talking with?”

“That doesn’t matter.” She hung up on him. Rodrigo smirked.

He thought about calling her back, but decided he had bigger fish to fry. Nick’s dad had sent a text message, wanted to know how things were going. Although Rodrigo had very little interest in talking to his boss, he decided he might as well do it now. It was better to get these things out of the way.

“Hello, Mr. Godoy, it’s Rodrigo,” he said.

Rodrigo was very polite to Godoy. He never called him by his first name, even after all these years. He’d been twenty, driving merchandise across the border for small-time gangs, when he met Godoy. Rodrigo was smart, bookish, spoke English without an accent, didn’t look the part of a gang member. Godoy, an ambitious vampire who had made it through both world wars, took notice of Rodrigo. Godoy’s Renfield was getting creaky, and this young chap was brighter than your average goon for hire. Godoy saw potential. Rodrigo saw money.

“My boy, I’ve been expecting your call.”

Yes, and Godoy always called him “my boy,” even though Rodrigo was hardly a boy anymore. To be fair, he supposed everyone was a “boy” to the vampire. Godoy was inching toward a hundred and looked fortyish. Sometimes Rodrigo’s back ached and he envied the vampire’s youth. Other times he was glad to get old and one day, very soon, slip out the back and into retirement.

“I’m sorry I took so long. We’ve been busy,” Rodrigo explained.

“So I heard. Nick phoned.”

“Oh?” Rodrigo said. He was supposed to be the only one contacting Sinaloa.