Bode Bonner's body teemed with testosterone and endorphins, hormones and morphine-like brain chemicals that magically washed away the pain and twenty years from his body and guilty thoughts of his wife and budget deficits from his mind.
He felt good.
It was the end of another day in the life of a Republican governor up for reelection in a red state: easy, if not exciting. At least his schedule allowed him plenty of free time to stay in shape. He had just finished pumping iron at the YMCA fronting the lake; now he was running five miles around the lake. Blood still engorged his arms and chest; consequently, he was running without a shirt-not a recommended practice for most middle-aged men and certainly not for a politician up for reelection.
But Bode Bonner wasn't like most middle-aged politicians.
First, for all intents and purposes, he had already won reelection. And second, he didn't look middle-aged. His belly was still tight and his abs still sharply etched. His shoulders were still wide and his arms still thick with muscle. His legs were still strong, even if his right knee burned with each step. So he ran with Ranger Hank but without a shirt.
"Hank, don't fill out your daily logs anymore. Reporters can get hold of them. Damn nosy bastards."
The State Capitol sat on a low rise at the northern boundary of downtown Austin. Eleven blocks down Congress Avenue, the Colorado River marked the southern boundary. In town, the river was called Lady Bird Lake, in honor of President Lyndon Baines Johnson's beloved wife, Claudia Alta Taylor Johnson, known to the world as Lady Bird. A ten-mile-long hike-and-bike trail looped the lake. Bode jogged the lake almost daily. He wasn't alone. The trail was crowded with walkers, joggers, bikers, dogs, and especially "Praise the Lord," Ranger Hank said.
— young, hard-bodied, barely-dressed women.
Bode glanced back at the girl who had just jogged past. She wore Spandex shorts that appeared painted on her tight buns and a tube top that barely constrained her prodigious chest.
"Amen, brother."
Running the lake was the part of living in Austin that Bode enjoyed the most, even if he and Hank were the only Republicans on the trail that day. Or any day. Point of fact, a Republican living in Austin was lonelier than a white guy in the NBA. Texas was Republican, but the capital of Texas was Democrat. Austin was the liberal, leftist, loony blue hole in the bright red donut that was the State of Texas. The newspapers, the UT faculty and students, the residents, even the homeless people-everyone in the the whole damn town was a Democrat. The only Republicans in town lived in the Governor's Mansion or worked at the Capitol.
Which drove the Democrats in town nuts. They couldn't stand the fact that Republicans outside Austin-which is to say, every Texan who didn't live in Austin-kept sending Bode Bonner back to the capital. To their city. To live among them. To govern them. So they vented their anger by writing scathing letters to the editor of the local left-wing rag that masqueraded as a newspaper and scathing messages posted on blogs no one read, so desperate to be heard-the Internet gave everyone a voice, but no one was listening. At least not to Democrats in Texas. So they consoled themselves with their abiding faith that they were morally and intellectually superior to the vast majority of Texans who pulled the Republican lever, assured that they voted Republican only because they weren't smart enough to vote Democrat. That's it! We're not wrong! They're just not smart enough to know that we're right! Satisfied with that explanation to this perplexing human condition, they patted each other on the back and got stoned. But they couldn't deny a simple fact: they lost. They always lost.
Which made jogging among Democrats in Austin considerably more enjoyable for the leader of Republicans in Texas.
"Sweet female," Ranger Hank said.
He pronounced female as if it rhymed with tamale. Ranger Hank wore jogging shorts and the massive leather holster packing his gun, cuffs, Mace, and Taser. He sounded like a car wreck with each stride. He gestured at the firm bottom of the girl jogging just a few strides in front of them. With the buds inserted into her ears and connected to the iPod strapped to her narrow waist, she was oblivious to their conversation.
"What do you figure?" Bode said. "Junior?"
"Sophomore."
Since Democrats constituted your nonviolent offenders for the most part, Ranger Hank served more as Bode's personal driver, caddie, jogging partner, and fellow appraiser of the female anatomy than his bodyguard. Hank likened their jogs around the lake to an episode of American Idol, except the girls weren't singing.
"Damn, she's only a year older than Becca. I kind of feel bad for staring."
"But she's not your daughter."
"Good point."
He stared. She was a brunette with deeply tanned skin. Her tight buns were mesmerizing. Hypnotic. Bode's concentration was so complete that when she abruptly pulled up to tie her shoe, he almost plowed into her. He grabbed her by the shoulders to prevent knocking her down. He lifted her up, and she turned to him, close, almost as if she were in his arms. He inhaled her scent. She smelled of sweat and estrogen and youth and vitality and animal urges that ignited his male body. She looked even better from the front. But she wasn't tanned; she was Hispanic.
"You okay, honey?"
She removed one ear bud and gave him a once-over-the fine March day had turned warm so sweat coated his chest and no doubt made him look younger than his forty-seven years-and he saw the recognition come into her eyes. He expanded his chest and tightened his arm muscles and waited for the expected, "Oh, my God-you're Bode Bonner!" But it didn't come. Instead, she pulled away as if he had a poison ivy rash. Her eyes turned dark.
"You're a fucking Nazi!"
She replaced the ear bud, pivoted, and jogged away. Bode watched her tight buns bob down the trail.
After a long moment, Ranger Hank said, "You want I should arrest her?"
"For what?"
"Being a Democrat."
Bode exhaled and felt all the hormones and endorphins drain from his forty-seven-year-old body.
"If only it were a crime, Hank. If only it were a crime."
Ranger Hank drew the Taser from his holster.
"Can I at least Tase her? Fifty thousand volts, she won't speak in complete sentences for a week."
Eleven blocks north, Jim Bob Burnet sat in the Governor's Mansion watching Fox News, which ran 24/7 on the television in his office. He pointed at the screen.
"You want to go national in the Republican Party, that's the ticket."
Eddie Jones slouched on the couch.
"You can't get the boss on?"
"Another governor from Texas is the last thing the party wants at the top of the ballot."
Consequently, Jim Bob did not encourage Bode Bonner in that direction. What was the point? Just as he had wondered when his father had encouraged chubby little Jimmy Bob Burnet to play football at Comfort High.
"So this is it for him?" Eddie said. "Governor of the great State of Mexico?"
"If he were governor of Montana or Colorado or even Okla-fuckin'-homa, he'd be the leading presidential candidate. He's a regular Roy Hobbs."
"Who?"
"From that baseball movie, The Natural. Bode Bonner's a natural. He's got it all. The looks, the style, the voice-the man was born for the White House. But he was also born in Texas. And after George W., that disqualifies a candidate."
"That don't seem fair."
"This is politics, not preschool."
But it wasn't fair. Jim Bob Burnet had long ago accepted the fact that he would live and die in Bode Bonner's considerable shadow. But he could not abide the fact that he would also live and die in Karl Rove's shadow. Rove took his man to the White House; Jim Bob would not. When people spoke of politics and the making of presidents, Rove would always be the man from Texas. It seemed so unjust. Jim Bob had a Ph. D. in politics; Rove had never even graduated college. But Rove had George W. Bush-a candidate with a pedigree-and in politics that was a hell of a lot more important than a college diploma. A political strategist was just a jockey-he was only as good as the horse he was riding. Rove rode George W. from the Governor's Mansion all the way to the White House where they proceeded to make LBJ look good when it came to presidents from Texas, and that was full-time work. When media types asked Jim Bob about Rove's political genius, he always wanted to say, "Well, Rove proved his genius advising one American president-how'd that work out for America?" But Rove still cast a dark shadow over Texas, so Jim Bob kept his mouth shut. And his dreams shuttered.
There would be no White House for Jim Bob Burnet.
So, even though his candidate regularly repeated his desire to jump into the national political waters, Jim Bob talked him down from the ledge every time. Because the only thing worse than not taking your candidate national was taking him national and watching him fail spectacularly. Consequently, Jim Bob had resigned himself to a career of getting the Republican governor of Texas reelected every four years for the rest of his life-not exactly the work of genius-and teaching a class on politics at the LBJ School of Public Affairs. State politics. Not federal politics. Texas, not Washington. Minor leagues, not the majors. He often felt like a baseball pitcher with a ninety-eight-mile-an-hour fastball stuck in the minors his entire career. Sure, he was playing baseball, but…
"So, Professor, what exactly is my job description?" Eddie said.
"Odd jobs."
"Odd jobs?"
Jim Bob nodded. "Your skill set uniquely qualifies you to handle certain tasks for me during the governor's campaign for reelection."
Eddie Jones was not educated or refined or possessed of a particularly pleasing personality, but he was handy to have around when it was dark out.
"Like what?"
"I don't know yet. But things always come up during the course of a campaign that require special attention. Unforeseen things. Unexpected things. Unpleasant things that require an unpleasant man."
Jim Bob Burnet would never get his candidate into the White House, but he sure as hell wouldn't have his candidate kicked out of the Governor's Mansion. So he had hired Eddie Jones as an insurance policy of sorts. The sort of insurance seldom needed but which could prove career-saving if needed. A stop-loss policy. The business of politics was often unpleasant and often required an unpleasant man. He turned to the TV. The news returned from commercial break to a female Yale law professor arguing in favor of ObamaCare. They listened for a minute, then Jim Bob pointed the remote and muted her voice.
"Damn," Eddie said, "that bitch's voice sounds like the brakes on an old Ford pickup I had back in high school. And she's ugly as sin to boot. Hope to hell for her sake she can suck a tennis ball through a garden hose, otherwise she's gonna have to pay a man to screw her. Cash money."
Yes, Jim Bob thought, Eddie Jones was the right man for the job.
"The governor, he is a very lucky man," Congressman Delgado said, "to have such a wife as you. And that I am not thirty years younger, for I would take you away from him."
"You're very sweet, Congressman. And thank you for the late lunch."
Lindsay Bonner was still high on adrenaline when she and Ranger Roy followed Congressman Delgado into his downtown Laredo office situated on the north bank of the Rio Grande. The receptionist took one look at the blood on her suit and jumped up.
"Mrs. Bonner-are you okay?"
"I'm fine."
She was more than fine. She was a nurse again. At least for a day.
"She saved a boy's life," the congressman said.
"The doctor saved his life. I helped."
"You were amazing. Awesome, as the young people say. It was very exciting-would the boy live or die?"
"What boy?" the receptionist asked.
"Mexican boy," the congressman said. "He works for a cartel, probably Los Muertos. The federales shot him. They could not take him to a hospital, so they brought him to the clinic. Jesse and Mrs. Bonner, they opened the boy's chest right there in the clinic-oh, Claudia, you should have seen all the blood. Yes, it was quite a day."
Ranger Roy's eyes had lit up at the sight of the congressman's pretty receptionist. So, like a good mother, Lindsay left her son to his awkward attempts at romance. She followed the congressman into his office. They had come back to retrieve their overnight bags. The state jet would be at the airport in an hour, and she would be back in the Governor's Mansion in two. Back in her prison, as if she had been given a twenty-four-hour furlough. She had escaped for a day and remembered how much she missed her old life. She had helped save a boy's life.
"Why would he work for a drug cartel?"
The congressman gestured her to the floor-to-ceiling window facing Mexico.
"Because on that side of the river, there is no one else to work for. The two main sources of income for Mexicans are money sent home by relatives working in the U.S. and drug money. The sad truth is, Mrs. Bonner, the Mexican economy would collapse without drug money. Even here in Laredo and other border towns on our side, the economy is driven by drug money. The cartel lieutenants, they pay cash to buy big homes over here because the neighborhoods are safer and the schools are better. They raise their families and coach their kids' soccer teams in Laredo and commute each day to work in Nuevo Laredo."
"They're here, in America?"
"Oh, yes. They are here, the money is here, and so the corruption is here, too. The cartels bribe law officers on this side to look the other way when shipments cross the river. And with such money comes violence. It will be here, too. And it will change our lives, just as it has changed theirs."
He flipped through newspaper clippings on his desk.
"Twenty men killed in Acapulco… seventy-two in Hidalgo… one hundred sixty in Durango… one hundred eighty in San Fernando… They set fire to a casino in Matamoros and killed fifty-two. They murdered twenty-two journalists and ten mayors last year and the leading candidate for governor of the state of Tamaulipas, which includes Nuevo Laredo. They hang people from overpasses-imagine driving the interstate through Austin and seeing bodies swinging in the wind. We do not do that sort of thing in America. But in Mexico, governors, mayors, judges, prosecutors, police chiefs, they all get killed. The last chief in Nuevo Laredo was killed the same day he started. And just last week, guards at the state prison in Nuevo Laredo opened the gates and allowed the prisoners to walk out."
"Why?"
" Plata o plomo. Silver or lead. The cartels tell politicians and police they must take the money or they will take a bullet. They pay one hundred million dollars in bribes every month… and they kill a thousand people every month." He shrugged. "At least in Mexico it is easy to know which politicians took the money."
"How?"
"They are still alive."
He gestured south across the river.
"The cartels engage in street battles in broad daylight. The city posts alerts on Facebook and tweets on Twitter to warn the citizens, and the schools have shootout drills to teach the students to lie on the floor until the gunfire stops, just as we once had nuclear bomb drills in our schools. Imagine if there were running gun battles in downtown Austin or Houston or Dallas every day-that is what Mexicans in Nuevo Laredo live with. Because of us. Would we live with that because of them? What if today the mayor of Denver were assassinated and tomorrow the governor of Oklahoma and the next day the police chief in Los Angeles? And all by Islamic terrorists? What if the Saudis were sending thirty billion dollars each year to those terrorists, which they used to kill forty thousand Americans the last four years? We went to war over three thousand American deaths. But that is exactly what we are doing to Mexico. Each year we send thirty billion dollars to the cartels for illegal drugs. And they are terrorizing Mexico-with our money. And our guns."
He waved a hand up and down the river.
"Four thousand gun shops line the Texas side of the river, from Brownsville to El Paso. Sixty thousand guns in Mexico have been traced back to U.S. dealers, guns that killed Mexicans."
"Why doesn't our government stop it?"
"The gun lobby is very strong, Mrs. Bonner. The Congress, we cannot even ban the assault weapons. Gunrunners pay straw purchasers to buy ten, twenty AK-47s at one time-the gun shops know those guns are going to the cartels. Obama proposed to ban such multiple purchases, but the gun lobby scared him off."
"He didn't stand up to them?"
"He wants to be reelected." The congressman exhaled. "We arm and fund the cartels, but we blame the Mexicans for the violence on the border. Just as we blame the illegal Mexican immigrants for all that is wrong in America, even though we are to blame for much that is wrong in Mexico. But to blame is easier than to accept responsibility."
"I thought the cartels were fighting each other?"
"Yes, they are fighting for the right to sell dope to the gringos. If we would stop buying their drugs, the violence on the border would end. Mexicans would live in peace-and in Mexico. The best way to stop illegal immigration is to stop the drug trade. But the flow of drugs across the border is relentless, like the wind."
He pointed down at the bridge spanning the river.
"That is International Bridge Number One. Interstate 35 begins right there at the bridge and ends at the Canadian border. That is the drug super-highway. Half of all drugs smuggled into the U.S. travel up I-35. That is what the cartels in Nuevo Laredo fight for, and that is what Mexicans die for. What that boy today almost died for."
"You said he worked for a cartel?"
"Yes. Most likely Los Muertos. "
"The dead."
"It is the most powerful cartel in Nuevo Laredo. And El Diablo is the most dangerous drug lord in all of Mexico."
The congressman now motioned at the Mexican side of the Rio Grande.
"See the white building there, and the tall wall, just across the river? That is El Diablo's compound. He is young, only forty-six, handsome and quite charismatic, something of an icon among his people. He takes money from the rich gringos and gives to the poor Mexicans, like Robin Hood. Or perhaps Pancho Villa. He is the de facto government in Nuevo Laredo. He funds everything-schools, hospitals, the church…"
"The church takes drug money?"
"Everyone in Mexico takes drug money."
"Why?"
"Because it is the only money in Mexico. El Diablo, he gives away one billion dollars each year. The Justice Department labels him an international criminal and puts a ten-million-dollar bounty on his head, but the people of Nuevo Laredo, they view him as a hero. He is beloved by his people. They say he is an honorable man."
"A drug lord?"
"Or he was… until we killed his wife."
"We?"
"FBI, CIA, DEA… who knows?"
"How?"
"By mistake. Five years ago, they had the surveillance on his compound, and they thought it was him in the caravan, so they tried to kill him. Only they killed her."
The congressman blew out a breath.
"They say it changed him."
"In what way?"
"Before he was just a businessman, selling drugs to Americans just as we sell weapons to the world. He did not take our attempts to kill him personally. He understood it was just business. But after his wife, that is when he became El Diablo."
Lindsay Bonner stared south across the Rio Grande at the white compound.
"The devil."
Enrique de la Garza stared at the woman's image on the seventy-two-inch flat-screen television mounted on the wall of his office in the white compound on the south bank of the river. The high-definition made her seem to be standing so close to him that he could almost inhale her scent. Her creamy smooth skin, her sensual green eyes, and most of all, her wild red hair. He liked the red hair on an Anglo woman. And she was a very alluring woman, the governor's wife.
"Counting all residents of Texas will determine the future of Texas," she was saying on the television. "And the future of the border."
The Laredo station had interviewed her that morning in Congressman Delgado's office just across the river from Enrique's compound. She was in town to encourage Mexicanos in the colonias to complete the census reports. Of course, she would not venture into the filthy colonias herself; she was just a pretty face to attract the media.
A very pretty face.
He picked up the high-powered binoculars from his desk and walked to the bulletproof plate glass wall facing north and peered across the river at the top floor of the building in Laredo where the congressman kept his office. Was she still there? Just a few hundred feet away from him? He would like very much to meet her, the governor's wife.
"Mr. de la Garza, you still there?"
The voice on the speakerphone brought Enrique back to the moment. He dropped the binoculars from his eyes-but not before noticing the two Border Patrol agents down on the far riverbank, peering through binoculars at him-then replaced the binoculars on his desk and picked up the remote; he pointed it at the screen and froze the frame on the image of the governor's wife. He then said to his New York broker on the phone, "Yes, Senor Richey, I am still here. Waiting for an answer."
"I gave you an answer."
"I am waiting for a better answer."
Enrique's spacious office occupied the fourth floor on the north side of the compound, which was built around a courtyard with a pool. He walked to the courtyard side and gazed down at the pool, where Carmelita, his ten-year-old daughter, sat on a chaise in her school uniform and texted on her iPhone, and Julio, her seventeen-year-old brother, played the grand piano. He opened the louvered windows slightly to allow the music in… ah, Bach. Enrique straightened the Monet on the wall then picked up the gold-plated AK-47 from the credenza.
"Mr. de la Garza," the voice on the speakerphone said, "I told you. The subprime market tanked. We didn't see it coming."
"Then why did your firm bet that it would tank? You put one billion dollars of my money in subprime mortgages, and then your firm bet against those same subprime mortgages, did you not? Is that an honorable way to conduct business?"
" Honorable? " His broker chuckled. "No, no, no, we don't do honorable on Wall Street. We do 'legal and illegal,' at least some of the time. And our actions in this instance were completely legal, according to our legal department."
"Perhaps. But not very wise. You bet against me and now my account is worth half its original value."
"Well, I had nothing to do with that. I'm not responsible for what our trading division-"
" Senor Richey, I did not amass a seven-billion-dollar fortune by allowing others to act dishonorably toward me."
Enrique slid open the sliding-glass door and stepped out onto the balcony overhanging the Rio Bravo del Norte, what the gringos call the Rio Grande. He inhaled the lovely spring day then pointed the AK-47 down at the Border Patrol agents standing on the other side of the river next to their green-and-white vehicle parked on the river road and pulled the trigger. The bullets splashed into the water just in front of the agents. They dove behind their vehicle. He emptied the clip. He was not trying to hit them, just to make a point.
But one agent did not appreciate Enrique's point.
He walked to the rear of his vehicle and opened the tailgate. He emerged with a shoulder-mounted grenade launcher. He aimed it toward Enrique, but the other agent grabbed the weapon. The two agents got into a heated argument. Apparently, the Border Patrol frowned on its agents firing missiles into Mexico.
Which amused Enrique de la Garza.
He stepped back inside and heard a frantic voice on the speakerphone: "What's happening? Is that gunfire?"
Enrique's office door opened, and Hector Garcia, his second-in-command, entered with a bound-and-gagged man in tow. Julio followed, albeit reluctantly.
"Excuse me one moment, Senor Richey," Enrique said to the speakerphone. "I must terminate an employee."
Enrique placed the AK-47 on his desk then stepped to the far wall and removed from a rack his prized four-foot-long handcrafted machete with the razor-sharp carbon steel black blade and the engraved mahogany handle. The employee's eyes got wide, and he tried to scream, but only a muffled sound came from his gagged mouth. Enrique and Julio followed Hector as he pulled the employee out onto the balcony and over to the railing then pushed his head down. But the employee struggled against Hector.
"Remove the gag," Enrique said.
Hector removed the gag.
"Felipe, look at me."
He turned his face to Enrique. Felipe Pena was only twenty-two, but he had lived a full life. A full, mean, cruel life. Four years before, Enrique had taken the boy into the cartel, hoping to save his soul. But it was not to be.
"You came to me, did you not?"
Felipe nodded.
"You swore allegiance to God, to me, and to the honor code, did you not?"
Another nod.
"You understood that violating the code is a crime punishable by death, did you not?"
Another nod.
"And what does the code state? Please tell me, Felipe Pena."
As if reading from the scripture: "We do not kill women, children, or innocents. We do not sell the drugs to Mexicanos, only to gringos. We do not ourselves use the drugs. We tithe twenty percent to charity and church."
"Now, Felipe, have you lived your life by the code?"
He pondered a moment, then his shoulders slumped.
"No, jefe."
"Did you use the drugs?"
"Yes."
"Did you sell the drugs to Mexicanos? "
"Yes."
"Did you kill an innocent?"
"Yes."
"A ten-year-old girl you raped?"
"Yes."
"Why? Why, Felipe Pena?"
The boy now cried.
" Jefe, it was the drugs."
Enrique shook his head and sighed.
"The drugs. That is why we do not ourselves use the drugs we sell to the gringos. It is a filthy habit that blackens the soul with hate and cruelty, that does not allow one to live an honorable life. Felipe, if you were a soldado with another cartel, I would send Hector to put a bullet in your brain. But you are my soldado, you are my responsibility, your acts are my acts… so I must personally dispense justice to you. That child's parents have demanded justice, and I must give them justice. They look to me for justice because there is no other justice in Nuevo Laredo. Only me, Enrique de la Garza. I am the law in Nuevo Laredo. Felipe, I too have a ten-year-old child. If you raped and killed my Carmelita, would I not demand justice? If a man raped and killed your child, would you not demand justice?"
"Yes, I would."
"Yes, Felipe, you would. You would demand justice. And I would give you justice. Now you must give justice to that child's parents."
Enrique de la Garza now rendered his judgment.
"Felipe Pena, you have not lived your life with honor-will you now die with honor?"
He blinked hard to clear his eyes of the tears, then he stood tall.
"Yes, jefe, I will."
Felipe turned back, bent his head over the railing, and awaited his fate with honor.
"Felipe, would you like to pray?"
"No, jefe. I am not worthy enough to pray to God."
"Felipe, your family will never go hungry or homeless."
" Gracias, jefe. "
Enrique held the machete out to Julio.
"Take it, my son, and dispense justice."
His son now appeared nauseous.
"Father, I cannot."
"Son, this is not a pleasant task, I know, but it is a necessary one. If the people of Nuevo Laredo are to one day look to Julio de la Garza for justice, you must be strong enough to dispense justice. Man enough."
He saw the hurt in his son's soft face. He was not strong like his older brother. He was shy and sensitive, like his madre. Since his mother's death, Julio had never been the same. Sometimes Enrique worried that his son was homosexual, but he quickly put such thoughts out of his mind.
"I am sorry, Julio. You are your mother's son, with the gentle soul."
Enrique turned back to Felipe Pena, grasped the handle with both hands, raised the blade above his head, and then swung the machete down with great force, cutting Felipe's head off cleanly. His head fell the hundred feet to the river below. Blood spurted from his open neck. Hector grabbed Felipe's legs and flipped him over the railing. His body now joined his head in the Rio Bravo.
Enrique exhaled and suddenly felt tired. Dispensing justice in an unjust world always made him feel weary. He carried every judgment with him like a cross. But justice was his burden to bear. And he had learned that nature disqualified some men from honorable lives. He now heard a gagging sound and turned to see Julio throwing up over the rail. He handed the boy his silk handkerchief.
"Run along now."
Julio walked quickly inside but stopped when Enrique called out to him.
"Oh, Julio, your Bach-it was very nice. Muy bueno."
" Gracias, padre."
"Did the tutor arrive for your sister?"
"Yes, Father, she is here."
"Tell her I want to discuss Carmelita's progress in reading the ingles. Last night, when she read to me, she did not understand many of the words."
"I will tell her, Father."
"Also talk to your sister about spring break-where would you children like to go? Perhaps Cancun? We will make plans over dinner with your brother."
They used to take family vacations to Europe, but with the international warrants for his arrest and apprehension and the $10 million bounty on his head, their vacations were now restricted to friendlier venues. Cancun was always nice. And California, of course.
"Yes, Father."
Julio made a hasty exit. Fortunately, Enrique's first-born son would one day be man enough to dispense justice in Nuevo Laredo. Julio would never be man enough.
"He is a good boy."
Hector said nothing, but Enrique knew he thought his second-born son weak. Enrique decided not to address the matter again. Not now, at the end of the day. The sun would soon fade into the Rio Bravo; the breeze had turned cooler and held the promise of a fine evening. He pointed the machete up to the clear sky.
"Hector, I saw on the Fox News that the gringos have deployed a Predator drone over the border."
"That is correct, jefe. From the Corpus Christi Naval Air Station."
"I do not like it in my sky over Nuevo Laredo. Please shoot it down."
Hector gazed skyward.
"They will not be happy if we do."
"Who?"
"The gringos."
"Hector, I did not ask if it would make the gringos happy. I simply asked that you shoot it down."
Hector was a former captain in the Mexican Army's special forces. He had been trained in counterinsurgency tactics and advanced weapons systems by the U.S. Army, to fight the very cartel that now employed him. Enrique had offered him a substantial raise. "If you are a paid killer," he had said to Hector, "why not be well paid?"
"The drone, it flies at an altitude of over seven thousand meters."
"What would it take?"
"A missile."
Enrique grunted. "Then let us purchase a missile. Surely the Russians have what we require." He gazed skyward again. "I would very much like to shoot that Predator down."
Hector shrugged. "Okay. I will shoot it down."
" Bueno. "
He handed the bloody machete to Hector for cleaning then waved to the Border Patrol agents who had witnessed the termination of Felipe Pena from the far riverbank. Hector exited the office, and Enrique returned inside and to his phone conversation with his broker.
"I have returned, Senor Richey. Terminating employees is a difficult affair."
"Tell me."
Enrique checked his clothing-a Tommy Bahama silk camp shirt over silk slacks and leather huaraches — for blood. A few droplets had splattered his trousers.
"Do you use baking soda or ginger ale for blood stains on silk?"
His broker's voice on the speakerphone: " What? Blood stains? Silk what?"
"Trousers. No matter, there are more where these came from. So, where were we?"
"I asked if that was gunfire."
"Oh, yes, it was. Just a little target practice."
"Skeet?"
" Gringos. So, Senor Richey, to resolve this dispute honorably, you must restore half a billion dollars to my account within three business days or I will be forced to file a complaint."
There was laughter on the phone.
"Mr. de la Garza, you can file a complaint with the SEC or the FBI or the NFL, I don't give a shit. But it'll be a cold fucking day in hell before my firm refunds half a billion dollars to anyone. You don't know who you're dealing with-we're connected in D.C. The Feds don't fuck with us. So you can file your complaint with God Himself, but you ain't getting your money back."
Enrique chuckled.
"Oh, no, Senor Richey, I file my complaints with Hector Garcia."
"Who the hell's Hector Garcia?"
"He is the head of my complaint department. When a customer fails to pay his account timely or the government interferes with my business or a business associate acts dishonorably toward me, Hector Garcia resolves my complaint. And he will resolve my complaint with you by walking up to you one dark night there in New York City and putting a gun to your head and saying, 'You should not have dishonored Enrique de la Garza,' and then he will put a bullet through your brain."
There was no laughter now.
"Who the fuck-? You can't threaten me! This is America!"
"No, mi amigo — this is Nuevo Laredo."
Enrique disconnected his broker and shook his head in amusement.
Gringos.
They think we are just the stupid Mexicans to be taken advantage of by the smart Americans. We run a thirty-billion-dollar-a-year enterprise, but we are stupid? We transport fifteen thousand metric tons of marijuana, cocaine, and heroin north across the border annually-despite fifty thousand federales on this side and twenty thousand Border Patrol agents on that side-but we are stupid? We launder thirty billion U.S. dollars through banks in America, Panama, Ecuador, and Europe each year, but we are stupid? And now the gringos open their roads and highways under NAFTA to Mexican trucks- even though they know the cartels now own the Mexican trucking companies! — thus allowing us to ship our dope directly to every town and city in America, but we are stupid? Ah, but the gringos must believe that we are just the stupid Mexicans because that allows them to feel better about themselves- allows them to feel superior to the rest of the world — even though they are the ones smoking, snorting, and shooting all that filthy dope into their bodies.
Oh, to be so stupid.
Enrique de la Garza employed American brokers and bankers, lawyers and accountants, financial planners and investment advisors; none asked too many questions, such as "Where do you get all this cash from?" He was one of three hundred individuals identified as off-limits to U.S. banks under the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Act, so the U.S. government can say they are doing something to stop the drug trade, but their government does not enforce their own law because the banks want their profits. Just as the gringos want his products. Oh, the appetite they have for the marijuana and the heroin and the cocaine! Insatiable. And extremely profitable. Enrique's empire had grossed over $5.5 billion U.S. last year and was on track to gross $6 billion this year. His personal net worth now exceeded $7 billion; he had billions invested in U.S. real estate, stocks, and bonds. He ranked one hundred thirty-four on the Forbes list of billionaires. Twenty-four years ago, he had started with nothing but a Harvard degree, and now he had an empire that spanned the globe. Markets in North America, South America, and now even to Europe he transported his products via a fleet of 747s-there was no radar over the Atlantic Ocean-something no other cartel had even imagined. By land, by sea, by air, even by tunnels two miles long he transported his products north, always one step ahead of the gringos. Innovation, that was the key to staying ahead of the competition and foreign authorities. Enrique de la Garza possessed vision-he saw what others could not even imagine. And now, at forty-six years of age, he had it all-wealth, power, respect, the admiration of his people, good children-everything a man could desire… everything except the love of a woman. His eyes returned to the image frozen on the television.
A woman like her.
He often found himself longing for a woman again. For love. For romance. His wife had always said he was a hopeless romantic, and perhaps he was. But he had been without romance since her death five years before. Five years he had mourned for his beloved Liliana. He still loved her; he would always love her. But he wanted to love and be loved again, to feel a woman close to him-not a woman who wanted his money; those women he could have any day-but a woman who wanted him, as Liliana had.
Perhaps a woman like the governor's wife.
He stepped to the full-length mirror on the wall and examined himself. He was well-mannered and well-groomed, educated and sophisticated, still lean and fit from his beisbol days, but… gray streaks now marred his jet-black hair and goatee and made him look old. As old as he often felt. Older than his years. When he watched American baseball on the cable channels, always the advertisements were for the erectile dysfunction drugs and hair color for men. Enrique had no need for Viagra, not yet, but… He ran his fingers through his hair and stroked his goatee just as the door opened and Hector appeared.
"?Jefe! "
Enrique raised an open hand.
"Hector, do you think I should use that 'Just for Men'?"
"Just for what?"
"The hair color. To wash away the gray."
"Oh."
Hector was bald.
"Uh, I do not know, jefe."
"Do you think she would find me more attractive?"
"Who?"
Enrique gestured at the television screen.
"The governor's wife."
"Oh, yes. Definitely."
"You are not just saying that?"
"No, no."
"Hector, I need a woman-"
"I will go get you one."
"No, not that kind of woman. A wife. A mother for Carmelita."
It was very difficult these days to be a single parent with all the bad influences on children-the Internet, cable TV, violent video games, iPhones-he had caught Carmelita texting a boy at her school the other night. She was only ten! He wished their mother were still alive. She knew how to raise children. And how to be firm. Sweet Carmelita, she knew how to wrap her father around her little finger.
"Make a note for Hilda. Next time she comes to cut my hair, have her bring that hair color."
" Si."
"Now what is it that you need, Hector?"
"?Jefe!?Esto es urgente! Your son needs you!"
Enrique de la Garza-known to the rest of the world as El Diablo-turned from the mirror and took one last long look at the woman's image on the television screen.
"She is a very beautiful woman, no? I should like very much to meet her one day, the governor's wife."