Rebel Island (Tres Navarre #7)(34)

Valenzuela was older, more confident. He wore beige slacks and a white guayabera as he did every day. He was a large, messy man with unkempt hair. Everything about him suggested disorganization, but he ran one of the tightest drug operations in Central America. Not a kilo escaped his notice, and he never forgot a name or an insult.

The men talked for almost an hour. They agreed that the border war between the cartels was a major opportunity for smaller players. They could form a new pipeline, quadruple their profits within the year. With the cartels at each other’s throats, the border could become a free trade area, a NAFTA for drugs.

Stoner just about had Orosco and Valenzuela convinced. Everything would be fine. They didn’t need to fear reprisals. Orosco started to relax.

Lunch arrived, specially catered from Stoner’s favorite Kingsville deli. The four guards took the meal boxes from the delivery boy at the door. Valenzuela and Stoner were breaking out the cold beer when Orosco’s phone rang.

No one knew where he was. Only a select group of people had his mobile number. He answered the phone.

A man’s voice said, “Go to the bathroom.”

The line went dead.

Orosco hesitated only briefly. He’d been in the drug trade most of his life. He knew that some things went beyond logic. Most people would ignore something like a random phone call, but Orosco’s gut instincts had saved him dozens of times. He excused himself from his colleagues and went to the restroom.

He was standing at the urinal when the restaurant exploded. The restroom door blew off its hinges and smoke billowed into the room. Orosco dropped to the tiles and curled into a ball. He was shivering like a child when he stood up.

He looked into the dining room, which was now in flames. Papa Stoner, Valenzuela, the bodyguards—all sprawled motionless on the floor, their clothes smoldering and peppered with holes. The walls bubbled with fire.

Orosco ran for the exit, tripping over bodies. His eyes stung with acrid smoke. He made it outside and ripped off his smoldering jacket. Thank god he had his own car keys.

He opened the door of his Mercedes and found a note on his seat, next to a sugar-candy skull.

The note said, They are watching. Never again.

Orosco was whimpering. His hands couldn’t work the keys. He heard sirens getting closer. He had to get away. He got in the car and slammed the door. He didn’t know why he’d been spared. Perhaps he was too insignificant to the cartels. Perhaps they wanted him on their side, so they had let him keep his life.

He turned the ignition, and the steering wheel blasted apart.

He was still alive when the paramedics found him. The police could identify him from his license plates and the ID in his wallet, which was fortunate. His face was hardly human.

Later, the police described with grudging admiration how the bomber had rigged the airbag system, turning it into a bomb that delivered high-speed metal filament shrapnel rather than air.

Orosco lived for three days, long enough to tell the police what had happened. He served the purpose the assassin required. He spread a warning to anyone else contemplating a break with his cartel employers.

The assassin left no trace, aside from several other candy skulls strewn around the perimeter of the restaurant. The police were never able to find the man who delivered lunch. Orosco could not give a description. Orosco’s mobile phone gave no information about where the call had been placed.

It was this incident that led the media to give the assassin a name: Calavera, the skull. Some were horrified by the assassin’s efficiency. Some decided that criminals killing criminals was none of their concern. But everyone agreed: Calavera had earned his pay. He had as much capacity for mercy as the candy skulls he left in the Gatsby’s parking lot, grinning up at the eyes of Dr. T. J. Eckleburg like some kind of challenge.

When I was done relaying the story to Maia, we were both quiet, listening to the storm outside. There wasn’t much to say about Calavera. The story spoke for itself.

“You scuttled the boat,” Maia said. “Why?”

“I don’t want Calavera to get away.”

“Why not?”

I didn’t answer.

She was right. It would’ve been easier to leave the killer an out, let him brave the storm, hopefully sink to hell if he tried. Why would I want to cross a man like Calavera?

“You want to control the situation,” Maia said. “It’s not so much about the killer, is it? It’s about Ralph again.”

“It’s always Ralph with you, isn’t it?”

Maia dug her toes into my ribs. “I’ve got guilt, too. But I handle it differently. I wouldn’t try to stop my career. If I wasn’t pregnant, I mean.”

“Convenient excuse.”

“Oh, yeah.” She winced as she rearranged her legs. “So convenient. The point is, Ralph’s death made you feel powerless. You don’t want anything else to get out of your control. You tried leaving investigation completely, but now that you’ve got a killer on your hands, you can’t stand the idea of him getting away from you. You’re maybe not so different from Jesse Longoria.”

“All right, that was low.”

“I’m wrong, then?”

“Completely. Well…mostly.”

“Ralph, I think, would have something to say about now.”

“Yeah?”

Maia nodded. “‘You’re full of shit, vato.’”