Outside their door they could hear infectious norteño in a nearby square. An accordion was prominent. The windows were open because the evening air teased that it was heading toward the bearable, and the A.C. was off. Evans had convinced himself he had a moldinduced cough.
Alejo Díaz sat nearby, not saying anything and seemingly uneasy. This was not because of the bomb, but because he’d apparently found the task of becoming an expert on book collecting and Charles Dickens daunting, to say the least.
Still, Díaz would occasionally look up from Joseph Connolly’s Collecting Modern First Editions, his eyes on the bomb. Evans thought about diving to the floor, shouting, “Oh, shit! Five… four… three…” But while the Mexican agent had a sense of humor, that might be over the line.
A half hour later he was gluing the leather into place. “Okay, that’s it. Done.”
Díaz eyed his handicraft. “Is small.”
“Bombs are, yes. That’s what makes them so nice.”
“It will get the job done?”
A brief laugh. “Oh, yeah.”
“Nice,” Díaz repeated uneasily.
Evans’s phone buzzed with an encrypted text. He read it.
“Bait’s here.”
A moment later there was a knock on the door and, even though the text he’d just received had included all the proper codes, both men drew their weapons.
But the delivery man was just who he purported to be-a man attached to the Economic Development Council for the U.S. consulate in northern Mexico. Evans had worked with him before. With a nod the man handed Evans a small package and turned and left.
Evans opened it and extracted the copy of Charles Dickens’s The Old Curiosity Shop. Six hours ago it had been sitting in a famed book dealer’s store on Warren Street in New York City. It had been bought with cash by the man who had just delivered it, and its journey to Sonora had been via chartered jet.
Killing bad guys is not only dangerous, it’s expensive.
The American wrapped the book back up.
Díaz asked, “So, what are the next steps?”
“Well, you-you just keep on reading.” A nod toward the book in his hands. “And when you’re through with that, you might want to brush up on the history of English literature in general. You never know what subject might come up.”
Díaz rolled his eyes and shifted in his chair, stretching. “And while I’m stuck in school, what are you going to do?”
“I’m going out and getting drunk.”
“That is not so fair,” Díaz pointed out.
“And it’s even less fair when I’m thinking I may get laid, too.”
THURSDAY
The latter part of his plans did not happen, though Evans had come close.
But Carmella, the gorgeous young woman he met at a nearby bar, was a little too eager, which set off warning bells that she probably had designs to land a good-looking and apparently employed American husband.
In any event, tequila had intervened big time and the dance of your-place-or-mine never occurred.
It was now ten in the morning and, natch, hot as searing iron. No A.C., but Evans’s cough was gone.
Díaz examined his partner. “You look awful. Hey, you know that many of Charles Dickens’ most popular novels were first published serially and that he wrote in a style influenced by gothic popular novels of the Victorian era, but with a whimsical touch?”
“You’re fucked if you go in talking like that.”
“I going to read one of his books. Is Dickens translated into Spanish?”
“I think so. I don’t know.”
Evans opened an attaché case he’d bought yesterday and had rigged with a false compartment. Into this narrow space he added the Schiller he’d doctored last night and sealed it. Then he added receipts, price guides, scraps of paper-everything that a book dealer would carry with him to a meeting with a collector. The Dickens, too, which was packed in bubble wrap. Evans then tested the communications app on the iPad that Díaz would have with him-it would appear to be in sleep mode, but a hypersensitive microphone would be picking up all the conversation between Cuchillo and Díaz. The system worked fine.
“Okay.” Evans then checked his 9mm Beretta. He slipped it into his waistband. “Diversion’s ready, device is ready. Let’s do it.”
They walked down to the parking lot. Evans went to a huge old Mercury-yes, a real Mercury, in sun-faded Mercury brown, with an untraceable registration. Díaz’s car was a midnight blue Lincoln registered to Davila Collectable Books, which Señor Davila had quickly, almost tearfully, agreed to let them borrow.
According to the unwritten rules of times like these, the start of a mission, when either or both might be dead within the hour, they said nothing of luck, hope, or the pleasure of working together. Much less did they shake hands.
“See you later.”
“Sí.”
They climbed in, fired up the engines and hurried out of the lot.
As he drove to Cuchillo’s compound, Alejo Díaz could not help but think of the bus.
The people tomorrow, the tourists, who would be trapped and burned to death by this butcher. He recalled P.Z. Evans’s words yesterday and reflected that these people were also-to Cuchillo-acceptable sacrifices.
Díaz was suddenly swept with fury at what people like this were doing to his country. Yes, the place was hot and dusty and the economy staggered and it dwelt forever in the shadow of that behemoth to the north-the country that Mexicans both loved and hated.
But this land is our home, he thought. And home, however flawed, deserves respect.
People like Alonso María Cuchillo treated Mexico with nothing but contempt.
Of course, Díaz would have to keep his revulsion deeply hidden when he met Cuchillo. He was just a shopkeeper’s assistant; the drug lord was just another rich businessman with a love of books.
If he screwed that up, then many people-himself included-were going to die.
Then he was at the compound. He was admitted through a gate that swung open slowly and he parked near the modest front door. A swarthy, squat man who clearly was carrying a pistol greeted him pleasantly and asked him to step to a table in the entryway. Another guard gently but thoroughly frisked him.
Then the briefcase was searched.
Díaz regarded the operation with surprising detachment, he decided, considering he might be one minute away from being shot.
The detachment vanished and his heart thudded fiercely when the man frowned and dug into the case.
Jesus…
The man gazed at Díaz with wide eyes. Then he grinned. “Is this the new iPad?” He pulled it out and displayed it to the other guard.
His breathing stuttering in and out, Díaz nodded and wondered if his question had burst Evans’s eardrum.
“Four-G?”
“If there’s a server.”
“How many gig?”
“Thirty-two,” the Mexican agent managed to say.
“My son has that, too. His is nearly filled. Music videos.” He man replaced it and handed the briefcase back. The Schiller novel remained undiscovered.
Struggling to control his breathing, Díaz said, “I don’t have many videos. I use it mostly for work.”
A few minutes later he was led into the living room. He declined water or any other beverage. Alone, the Mexican agent sat with the briefcase on his lap. He opened it again and smoothly freed the Schiller and slipped it into his waistband, absently thinking about the explosive two inches from his penis. The open lid obscured prying eyes or cameras if there were any. He extracted the Dickens and closed the case.
A moment later a shadow spread on the floor and Díaz looked up to see Cuchillo walking steadily forward on quiet feet.
The Knife. The slaughterer of hundreds, perhaps thousands.
The stocky man strode forward, smiling. He seemed pleasant enough, if a bit distracted.