West of Laredo by Tom Armbruster (novel24 .txt) 📖

“Amanda is safe and content at Child Welfare on Webb Avenue in Laredo. I will be happy to drive you to the border and you’ll be close enough to the Child Welfare to walk from there. Of course, if Child Welfare has rules about picking up a child once it has been placed in custody. At Child Welfare’s discretion you may have to demonstrate to a Judge that you are fit to pick her up, and of course they’ll need your documents and latest pay statements.”

There is silence on the other end.

Months later Lee learns that the parents, Spirit and Denver Jones, never showed up at Child Welfare's door, and the girl is living happily with a family in McAllen.


*36*


Monday morning and Lee opens her e-mail, black coffee on the left, mouse on the right. Things are coming together. El Mecanico is probably going to be charged soon, Dice is still alive, and Lee has chalked up a few wins on American citizen cases. She is feeling good.

The second new email's subject is Happy Fourth of July. She expects it is one of her A-100 classmates somewhere on the side of the world where it is already the fourth. She opens it. There is no message. Just a photograph of a gurney and a person being wheeled somewhere with a white sheet covering the body. At the bottom of the photo a line reads “With love from Michohuacan. It takes her no time at all to recognize it as a death threat from Sanchez. She calls Sinclair.

"I'll be right over."

Sinclair lives in Laredo but he gets into Mexico in 10 minutes. Record time.

"Let's see the e-mail."

Lee shows him. "Should I be nervous?"
"Anywhere else, no. Here, yes. Maybe it's time for you to go TDY somewhere. Like Kabul. Or DC. They can always use TDYers."

"Maybe I should go into the flower business, this diplomacy is killing me. And it seems like we are losing. We lost Fa, and almost Dice."

"Hey, none of that. We're not losing. We're doing good stuff. We may not be winning, but it's God's work in the fields, that's for sure. If Washington really went to war on this we might win, but Lee Penny against two drug cartels is not an even fight. You can't win the war on drugs on your own out here, but little victories, they count."

"I think I’m staying here."

"Well, you could. Diplomatic Security is here after all investigating Miguel, they might bring an armored car and they could give you some advice. I saw a cable asking for volunteers to your next post. Maybe they could use you now in La Habana. By the way," Sinclair says, "Your gardener is Cuban, did you know that?"

"Isola, the old guy?"

"No, the young one. I don't know his name."

Lee feels a jolt go through her. "What do you mean, Cuban? Did he show you his passport?"
"Are you kidding? Didn't have to. I said today, 'Donde esta la Rubia?' Where's the blonde? He said, in perfect Cuban, "'ta 'qui atra..." She's in the back. In Spanish it's pronounced "Esta aqui atras" In Cuban they drop the endings.

Lee feels the blood draining from her face. "I think I'm in big trouble."

"Why?"

"How seriously does DS take the no fraternization clause and the contact reporting requirement."

"Ah Lee. You had a relationship with the Cuban? You didn’t fill out a contact report? They don't care whether you have a wild sex life, they just want to know with who!"

Lee shakes her head, breaks down and cries. Sinclair doesn't know what to say. "We'll work it out. We'll work it out." In his mind he's thinking that when there are a thousand reasons to say 'yes' and one reason to say 'no' the State Department's final answer is always no. Fraternizing with a Cuban is a sure way to lose a security clearance and end a career, especially if she never reported the relationship in the first place. There are a thousand reasons to keep on a good officer like Penny, and one reason not to. The odds are not in your favor Lee Penny, Sinclair thinks to himself. But he says again, "We'll work it out."

“Should I go to DS now?”

“What do you think?”

“First I need to do the right thing, fire Usman, maybe fire Isola. Then I’ll tell Farrington, then I’ll write it up. Then if I have to resign, I’ll resign. I don’t need to go through the investigation if it’s an open and shut case.”

“Look, let’s get Dice taken care of first. You need credibility with DS in order to get him across to the US and into safety. Your credibility will be, well, low, after you do your contact report.”

“OK.”


*37*


Salvatore has always considered himself an international businessman. That's always given him an edge in one respect. If something needs to be fixed on the border, on either side, Salvatore's guys can fix it because they have always had access to international visas, even American visas. It's better not to use violence on the U.S. side. There, you kill a cop and you will pay. Salvatore always respected that, and it kept him from doing some things, but he understood that it was a business cost. In Mexico, a policeman, a police chief even, a judge, a prosecutor, a politician, no one is untouchable. It makes business easier. Just kill anyone who gets too honest or too courageous and the rest get the message.


For several years Salvatore has had his man "El Mecanico" inside the Consulate. If any of his people needed to travel to the U.S. for a little business, he could arrange it. It worked very simply. On the outreach trip, when Americans interviewed in Piedras Negras and Ciudad Acuna, Salvatore gave Marker a list. They paid Marker, and Marker gave the list to El Mecanico. El Mecanico was so easy. Salvatore laughs every time he thinks about the day Miguel was shown the video. It was on one of the outreach trips. Sometimes the Consulate team spent the night on the Mexican side, sometimes on the Texas side. Salvatore had his people ready either way. Turned out to be the Ramada in Del Rio. There was Miguel on camera with two teenager girls. They were really having a good time. Too bad for Miguel he wasn't on the Mexican side where having sex with a couple of teenage girls was not likely to get police attention. But in the U.S., sex with minors is a serious legal infraction, so Miguel not only faced the wrath of his wife if the video was handed to her, but he could also face some real legal problems. And then any jail would be sure to be rough, given how fellow inmates feel about those crimes. So Miguel was done. He was a Teco for all practical purposes.


In fact, the little visa business that he did was getting bigger every day. It would never be as big as the drug business, but it was very good business and it was attracting some very interesting customers from places like Afghanistan, Russia, Iraq and Iran. They paid good money and asked no questions. And money was no problem. There was never a negotiation or a request for discount. Just cash up front. So Salvatore came up with a plan.


Why not bring in some of these serious people into the fight with the Zetas? He was pretty sure they had some people who knew how to cause trouble. Why not let them get in the fight and he could go back to trucking drugs and selling visas? Then if the Zetas ever wanted to make peace, and he was a businessman after all, he could just turn his new partners loose and go back to business. But without El Mecanico back on board he had no visas to offer.


That's why he looked at La Rubia. The blonde. She was young, idealistic, single. No way to trap with just a plain old honey trap, after all she is single. It’s no crime for a single lady to have a lover. But what if her lover turns out to be Cuban? What if he is former intelligence, like Usman? Then, her little indiscretion becomes a security issue. And Salvatore might have her. A blonde Teco. Salvatore laughs. "Mi Rubia, La Teca."

Salvatore had a few Cuban friends. Only for the most critical shipments did anything ever go through Cuba, and only when the other routes shut down, but Salvatore had made contact with his friends and explained his troubles with El Mecanico. They offered up Usman, with the understanding that they would run La Rubia once she was in Cuba, but would keep hands off while she was in Nuevo Laredo. It was the perfect arrangement for Salvatore. Usman had not gotten any visas from La Rubia yet, but soon...


*38*


Lee is watching Miguel "El Mecanico" interview an applicant, clearly an agricultural worker. His hands are tools that have seen a lot of work. Miguel is in Window 3. She's in Window 2. Miguel is soft spoken. "Lo siento, senor," he almost whispers. "No le puedo dar la visa ahorra. Quizas la proxima vez." ‘Sorry, maybe next time.’ The applicant on the other side lowers his stack of papers that he hoped would convince the Vice Consul to let him in. He knows he is done. It was when Miguel told him that his wife lived in Seattle, overstaying her tourist visa. How did he know that? the Obrero wonders. In any case he offers no argument. Lee looks at Miguel. Miguel the roly