He jerked Haddad’s face from the dirt and pointed at Orlato. Haddad’s eyes bulged like a dog being crushed, and he chattered in Arabic.
The blond man shouted to his friend.
“He knows where they took him! He knows who has him.”
The tall man’s pistol suddenly appeared in front of Orlato’s face, locked dead center between his eyes. The flat copper snouts of its bullets slept in their cylinder crypts.
“Elvis Cole. Where is he?”
The tall man thumbed back the hammer.
“Ten seconds. Where is he?”
The blond man screamed, livid with rage.
“Think we’re bluffing, you will die. What did you do with him?”
Orlato abruptly realized he had only one chance. He had something they wanted, and that gave him power. Power was time, and time was life. He showed both palms, the knife now forgotten.
“Yes! Yes, they have him.”
Haddad barked in Arabic, but Orlato didn’t understand and did not care. The blond man pushed Haddad’s face into the dirt, and barked back. The tall man ignored them.
“Eight seconds.”
“Trade, me for him. The Syrian will trade.”
“I don’t negotiate.”
The blond man shouted.
“Tell us and live!”
“A trade! By morning he will be dead!”
“Five seconds.”
Orlato screamed.
“A phone call. I talk to the Syrian, we will work out a trade, and you will have this man. I swear it. I swear!”
The tall man hesitated, and Orlato felt a whisper of hope. The man they wanted was probably already dead, but if they let him call the Syrian, these men would not survive until morning. Orlato spoke quickly, bartering for his life.
“The Syrian will trade for me. I’m married to his sister. You will get your friend. I promise.”
The tall man glanced at his friend. No other part of him moved. The gun didn’t move. Just the head, turning and locking in place with the precision of a machine.
The blond man lifted Haddad’s head.
“He’s full of shit. This bastard knows.”
The tall man’s head swiveled back to Orlato.
“Three seconds. Where is he?”
Orlato felt a rush of fear, but still didn’t believe they would kill him. They would not risk losing their friend.
“He cannot help. None of them can. I am the only way you can get your friend back.”
The tall man said, “One second.”
Orlato reached for the knife, but by then it was too late.
Dennis Orlato’s last thought before he reached for the knife was one of fearful admiration. He thought:
“This man means it.”
Orlato registered a brilliant, blinding flash, and was dead.
4.
Joe Pike
Pike turned away from the body and walked over to Jon Stone’s prisoner, there in the desert in the fading bronze light. Stone had already strapped the man’s wrists behind his back and his ankles together with plasticuffs. When Pike arrived, Stone lifted the man’s head and peeled back his upper lip.
“Khat runner. Check out these teeth. Fuckers get green teeth from chewing the khat. Ain’t this green rotten?”
“Stop it, Jon.”
Stone laughed, and dropped the man’s head.
Khat was a shrub native to East Africa and the Arabian Peninsula, where people chewed the leaves as a stimulant. Poor man’s speed.
Stone’s prisoner was in his early thirties, with ragged black hair and big eyes crazy with fear. The light was fading and the clock was running. Every passing minute would put Cole farther away or closer to death. Time was everything, and speed was life. Pike wanted to press forward, but needed what this man could give him, and that would take time.
Pike pointed his pistol at the body.
“Do you understand what happened?”
The man spit out Arabic so fast, his voice was distorted. Pike had spent freelance time in Lebanon, Saudi, Somalia, the Sudan, and Iraq. He could get by, but wasn’t fluent.
Pike said, “Qala Inklizi.”
Telling him to say it in English.
Stone cracked the M4 across the man’s ear, shouted in Arabic, and the man settled down. Jon Stone was fluent.
Pike squatted in front of the man, and lifted his head.
“If you resist, I will kill you. If you lie, I will kill you. Do you understand?”
The man uttered a soft yes.
Pike pulled him into a sitting position.
“Name.”
“I am Khalil Haddad, from Yemen. Please do not kill me. I will do anything you ask.”
Stone stepped away and did a quick three-sixty of the horizon.
“We gotta roll, bro. We don’t want to be here if ICE choppers in.”
ICE. The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The U.S.–Mexican border from Tijuana to Brownsville was a hot zone of DEA agents after incoming dope, ATF agents after outgoing guns, and ICE agents trying to stop illegal entry. Pike was good with the heat.
“Check the vehicle.”
Stone trotted to the Escalade as Pike tipped his pistol toward the bodies in the cut.
“These people from India?”
“Yes.”
“Who killed them?”
“We did. Me and Orlato and Ruiz. It is what we do when they cannot pay.”
This was an honest answer. Bajadores were bandits who kidnapped people who were trying to enter the country illegally. The kidnappers would then demand ransom payments from their families or employers. This continued until the families could or would no longer pay, then the victims were murdered. Dead victims could not bear witness.
“Elvis Cole. You know who I’m talking about?”
“The man who came for the boy and the girl.”
“A young Latina. Krista Morales. An Anglo boy named Berman.”
“Yes, the boy and the girl.”
“Are they alive?”
“I believe so, yes, but I cannot be sure. My job was with these Indians.”
“Why were they taken?”
“They were with pollos a Tijuana crew brought north. No one knew they were Americans.”
“Korean pollos?”
Haddad looked surprised.
“How do you know these things?”
Pike struck him with his open palm on the forehead before Haddad finished the sentence. This was not a two-way conversation.
“Yes! Koreans. The Sinaloas stole them from the Tijuanas. The Syrian, he stole them from the Sinaloas.”
Pike felt Haddad was telling the truth. Tijuana, Sinaloa, Zeta, La Familia, on and on—if the U.S. side of the border was a hot zone of law enforcement agencies, the Mexican side was a war zone controlled by cartel factions who fought and stole from each other like rabid dogs. Pike was good with war zones, too. He felt at home.
“Is Cole alive?”
“This morning, yes. He was brought to our house for the Syrian.”
“Your house?”
“Where we kept the Indians.”
Pike hammered back the .357, and held it to Haddad as he had held it to Orlato.
“What happened to him?”
Haddad cringed, but Pike held him close. Haddad did not want to see what Orlato had seen. He did not want to see his death coming.
“Did the Syrian kill him?”
“I don’t know! Orlato and Ruiz and I, we left with the bodies. The others, they were to hold him for the Syrian.”
Pike pressed the gun hard into Haddad’s forehead.
“A prisoner?”
“Yes!”
“Was the Syrian going to kill him?”
“I don’t know! These men, they told me the Syrian thinks your friend is a federal agent.”
“How long ago was this?”
“Three hours! Maybe four!”
“When was the Syrian coming?”
“I don’t know!”
“Five mi
nutes? Five hours?”
“I don’t know! I can take you to the house! Maybe they still wait!”
Pike studied Haddad, then lowered the gun.
“Yes.”
Stone returned, and shook his head.
“No IDs or credit cards on the stiffs. Thirty-two hundred in cash. I took it. Registration shows the Caddy belongs to a Joan Harrell of San Diego. None of these shitbirds looks like a Joan.”
Haddad said, “Everything is stolen. He has thieves who get cars and trucks for him.”
“Keys?”
Stone held up the keys.
“Yeah, man. Good to go.”
“Drive.”
“We’re taking Mr. Green Teeth?”
“He knows the way.”
Stone ran hard for the Escalade.
Pike clipped the plastic binding Haddad’s ankles, but left his wrists bound. Pike pulled him to his feet.
Haddad said, “You are not killing me?”
“Not yet.”
The big Escalade thundered up in a cloud of dust. Pike pushed Haddad into the back seat, and climbed in behind him.
Stone powered away even as Pike closed the door. Driving hard. Pushing. They bounced over brush and rocks, and neither of them gave a damn if they tore the Escalade apart.
Haddad said, “This is not the way.”
Stone said, “Shut up.”
Pike said, “Faster.”
They ran hard toward the mountains, driving without lights. They had to move fast or Cole would be lost.
5.
It was full-on dark when they reached Pike’s Jeep, covered by brush in a low wash, two-point-two miles away. Pike pulled Haddad from the Escalade, proned him in the dirt, and wiped their prints from the Caddy while Stone cleared the brush. They rolled on in less than three minutes, Pike driving the Jeep, Stone in back with Haddad, the Escalade abandoned. They crept across the desert by starlight and moonglow that made the brush glisten.
Thirty-eight minutes later, they approached a small ranch-style home on a street of similar homes at the outskirts of Coachella, California, the most eastern of the desert communities. Two-car garages, rock lawns, clean sidewalks, streetlights.
Haddad said, “This one. On the right.”
“Cole is inside?”
“When I left.”
Stone said, “You better not be lyin’.”
It was nine-oh-five P.M. Early. Every house on the street showed light and life except this one. It looked like a corpse.
Stone said, “Shit, it’s fucking deserted. That place is black.”
“The windows are covered with dark plastic and wood.”
“So every light in the house could be lit, and we wouldn’t see it?”
“Yes. Or hear what goes on. The windows are all like this. We screw them shut so the pollos can’t open them, then cover them with the plastic and wood.”
Pike glanced in the rearview.
“Civilians?”
“I don’t understand.”
Stone jabbed him with the rifle.
“Women and children, dipshit. A family. You got innocent people living in there, or just dead men like you?”
“No one lives there. The house was empty.”
Stone said, “Who pays the bills? Water? Power? This shit ain’t free.”
“Maybe the Syrian. He gives us the address. We come, make it ready with the boards and plastic, and bring the pollos.”
Pollos. Spanish for “chickens.” As if the people they murdered weren’t human.
Pike circled, and approached the house from the opposite direction. He slowed as they passed.
“How many guards were with Cole?”
“Two. Washington and Pinetta. If the Syrian is here, one or two more.”
Pike thought, five guns.
Stone said, “Were you and your turd friends supposed to come back after dropping the bodies?”
“Yes. We have to clean the house, and get our things. Washington and Pinetta were going to leave with the Syrian. Ruiz was angry we had to clean.”
Stone moved the M4.
“Shut up. No one gives a shit about you having to clean.”
Pike continued to the first cross street, turned around, cut the lights, and pulled to the curb with a face-front view of the house. Pike locked eyes with Stone in the rearview.
“Three-sixty.”
Three-sixty meant circle the house.
Stone passed the M4 to Pike, and slipped from the Jeep. Pike watched him go, wondering if Cole was in the black house. He wondered if Cole was alive, or dead, or dying as they sat on the quiet street. He wondered if Haddad was telling the truth.
“You and your crew come back, how do you enter?”
“We park in the garage, never the street or the drive. We pull into the garage and close the door before we get out. This way the neighbors don’t see. The Syrian tell us this. He say never park on the street or the driveway.”
“There’s a door from the garage into the house?”
“Yes. Into the kitchen.”
“You need a key?”
“Orlato had it.”
Pike took out the keys Stone found in the Escalade, along with a garage remote. Haddad affirmed the remote would open the garage, and told him which key would unlock the door.
Pike tucked the key and remote away, then told Haddad to describe the floor plan. The house was a cookie-cutter three-bedroom. Kitchen, dining room, living room on one side of the house; master bedroom and two smaller bedrooms on the other, the two smaller rooms sharing a bath. The pollos had been kept in the smaller bedrooms.
Stone returned as Haddad finished the description, and slipped into the Jeep as quietly as he left.
“They wrapped it, man. I can tell there’s light inside, but I couldn’t see or hear anything.”
Pike broke down how he wanted to hit the house, then looked at Haddad.
“Do exactly what I said. Are we clear?”
“Yes.”
Pike put the Jeep in gear, cruised lightless directly to the house and turned into the drive. He drew his .357 as he slid from the Jeep. The rising moon put more light on them than Pike liked, but no one moved on the street.
Pike took Haddad by the wrists and pushed him to the left side of the garage door. Stone went to the right, and Pike clicked the remote without hesitation. As the door rumbled up, Stone immediately slid under. Pike pushed Haddad down, and crawled under with him. By the time Pike was under, Stone was set up to the right of the kitchen door, and Pike clicked the remote again to lower the door.
Haddad stopped.
“No cars. They are not here.”
Pike pressed the .357 into Haddad’s ribs and pushed him to the door.
“Speak when I tell you. Open the door.”
Pike held tight as the key fumbled into the lock and Haddad opened the door. Haddad was at the door because the men inside would expect him. If they saw Haddad when the door opened, Pike would have an advantage. If Pike drew fire, he would fall back to open a field of fire for Stone.
The door opened to a well-lit empty kitchen.
Pike whispered.
“Say it.”
Haddad called loudly.
“It is Haddad. We are back.”
Pike listened for a three-count, heard nothing, then pushed Haddad into the kitchen and immediately pulled him to the left. Stone crossed the kitchen at combat speed, gun up and good to go, cleared the entry, and disappeared into the house.
Pike tracked Stone’s progress by ear, pinning Haddad to the floor until Stone called from the back.
“Clear. We’re good.”
Pike echoed the call.
“Clear.”
Pike pulled Haddad to his feet as Stone reappeared in the entry, red-faced and furious.
“This fucker’s full of shit, man. The place is empty.”
Stone stalked over, and stabbed Haddad with his rifle.
“Cole wasn’t here. You lied out your ass!”
&nbs
p; Haddad’s eyes rolled toward Pike, pleading.
“I have not lied! Look in the living room! I will show you!”
The living room was empty except for three cheap futons set against the walls, and two cheap table lamps set on the floor. Duffel bags and blankets were lumped on the futons. Haddad lurched toward the futons, trying to point even with his hands tied behind his back.
“You see these things? These are our things. This is why we had to come back, to get these things. I have not lied. This is where I saw your friend when we left.”
The corner Haddad indicated was lit by a lamp. The opposite corner, on the far side of the living room, was dim with shadows. Pike glanced at the light corner.
“Take it easy, Jon.”
Stone stalked in a tight circle, moving from shadow to light as he burned off the adrenaline from his entry.
“Easy my ass, Cole in the corner. This is fuckin’ bullshit. I wanna kill somebody. You see what’s back there, you’re gonna wanna kill this prick, too.”
Haddad blurted out the words, speaking the way you speak when you fear for your life.
“He was there in the corner, by the lamp. I swear to you this is true. I saw him when Ruiz and I carried out the bodies. His hands were behind his back, like mine. Orlato was telling Washington and Pinetta to keep him here for the Syrian.”
Pike holstered his pistol and went to the corner. Even this close to the lamp, the light was meager. He studied Haddad, then considered Jon Stone. Stone looked like a blond shark adrift in the shadows.
Stone said, “We’re wasting time, bro. He wasn’t here. And if he was, they killed him and dumped the body.”
Pike said nothing. He took a knee, putting himself at Cole’s level with his back to the wall to see the room as Cole had seen it. He looked at the lamp, and that’s where he found the cricket.
“Elvis.”
Pike tossed it to Stone, who snatched it out of the air, and frowned.
“Jiminy effin’ Cricket?”
Stone tossed it back.
“The girl’s mother gave it to him.”
Haddad said, “I do not lie to you. I see him where you are. They wait for the Syrian.”
“Was he hurt?”
“I don’t know.”
“Was the Syrian going to hurt him?”
“I don’t know.”
Stone’s voice came low from the shadows.
“See the back, man. Go see what they were doing back there.”