“I spent enough years prosecuting special crimes to know never to underestimate the darkness of the human soul. And there’s no reason these people wouldn’t be just as active in Mexico City or Playa Azul or even on board a cruise ship. Where all the tourists are.”
“Like you and your sister.”
“I think Jen was targeted on that cruise,” Beth said. “By Rafael and Marta Santiago.”
“It’s a theory. But it still doesn’t explain what happened to you. ”
Beth had been thinking about this, too.
“I guess I poked my nose in where it didn’t belong,” she said. “And got it cut off.”
68
By the time they reached Playa Azul, she could feel a headache coming on.
Nothing to be alarmed about just yet, but her episodes usually began and ended with a migraine, and there was no point in taking chances.
“I’m gonna need to lie down soon,” she said.
“You okay?”
“Just a headache. I’ll be fine when I’m horizontal.”
This may or may not have been true. She had no way to predict what might happen in the next hour-or minutes, for that matter-but she saw no reason to alarm Nick.
“I know a hotel that has decent rooms,” he said, “and even better rates.”
“Thanks.”
As they pulled into the city, caught up in another traffic jam, Beth looked out her window and couldn’t help feeling as if she’d never left this place-and in a way, she hadn’t.
A cruise liner sat in the harbor, probably the very same ship she and Jen had taken down from Long Beach almost a year ago.
Playa Azul’s streets were bustling as usual, but there seemed to be an extra current of excitement in the air. Everywhere you looked there were flowers and multicolored banners, storefronts filled with candles and full-sized skeletons, wrapped in garlands and gold satin.
It occurred to Beth that today was Halloween in the states, but this didn’t look like any Halloween she’d ever seen and she wasn’t quite sure that that was what was going on here. All she could think about was Nick’s talk of religious cults and the world of brujas and La Santisima.
Then, as they turned a corner, they drove past a storefront that featured a grinning skull atop an ornate, flower-laden altar, bright red roses poking out of each eye socket.
Nick glanced at the display. “All this time I’ve been spending in Mexico and I forgot all about the festival.”
“Festival?”
“ El Dia de los Muertos. The Day of the Dead.”
“How appropriate. I don’t suppose this has anything to do with El Santo and company?”
“Hardly. El Dia de los Muertos is a celebration that dates all the way back to the Aztecs. It’s about families coming together to honor their lost loved ones.”
Nick turned the wheel and rounded another corner, pulling up in front of a small, boxy-looking hotel that couldn’t have held more than ten rooms.
The sign out front read: CORONA POSADA.
Climbing out of the car, they grabbed their things and went inside to the front desk only to be told that because of the festival there were no vacancies. But when Nick explained that they were only here for the night-slipping the deskman a fifty in the process-two adjoining rooms miraculously became available.
Ten minutes later Nick opened the door to Beth’s room and ushered her inside, dropping her suitcase near the closet. The place was tiny but clean and well maintained, with a view overlooking a beautifully manicured garden.
Beth was impressed. But then anything looked better than a hospital room.
“What did I tell you?” Nick said.
“Very nice. But I don’t expect you to pay for this.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
“I may have been out of commission for the last couple months, but I’ve still got money in the bank and I’m good for it.”
“Just get some rest, okay? We’ll talk about this later.”
Beth smiled. Was he really this good of a guy?
Yes, she thought. Maybe he was.
Nick crossed to the door, looking back at her, and she was surprised to find herself suddenly understanding Mary/Marion’s unbridled enthusiasm this morning.
“I’ve gotta run an errand,” he said. “But I should be back in about an hour or so. I’ll be next door if you need me.”
“Would you mind leaving your computer? I’d like to look at those photos again.”
He nodded, then reached into his backpack, pulled out the netbook, and set it on the table by the door.
“If you’re up to it after I get back, we can start retracing your steps in town, see if it jars anything loose.”
Then he was gone.
Beth stared down at the garden for a moment, then retrieved the netbook and took it to the bed. But her head was really pounding now, so she set the computer aside and lay back, trying to get her bearings, thinking how strange it felt not to be staring up at the ceiling of her hospital room.
Sleep. That’s what she needed.
She hadn’t had any since her episode last night.
So she closed her eyes, hoping the headache would go away without incident.
But when she opened them again, she was back on the deck of the cruise liner, looking out at the rolling ocean.
69
He found the house without difficulty, using Google maps on his cell phone to guide him to a neighborhood crowded with parked cars, some of which looked as if they hadn’t moved in a couple decades.
The Corolla fit right in.
The roads in this part of the city were graded but unpaved, and the houses all had rings of dirt around them, looking worn and well lived-in.
Back in LA, as Vargas had waited for Beth to pick out clothes at the thrift store, he’d made a call to his cousin Tito in Tijuana, who had hooked him up with a contact here in Playa Azul.
The contact, a guy named Ortiz, was said to be well connected in the area. But if Ortiz was making any money through those connections, it sure as hell didn’t show in his choice of houses.
Vargas parked his car out front and emerged to find a couple of teenagers squatting in the front yard, smoking cigarettes. One of them eyed him suspiciously, then jumped to his feet and ran around the side of the house.
As Vargas worked his way up the drive, the kid returned, accompanied by a hulk in a wifebeater T-shirt.
“You Ortiz?” Vargas said in Spanish.
The hulk replied by stopping him in his tracks, then spun him around and patted him down.
Satisfied that Vargas was unarmed, the hulk gestured for him to follow and they walked around the side of the house to the backyard, where a cluster of men were seated at a beat-up picnic table passing a joint and drinking bottled beer.
The hulk made eye contact with one of them-a small, muscular guy-who looked up at Vargas and smiled.
“Hey, pocho, you finally made it.”
Pocho was not a term of endearment. It was a slur against Mexican-Americans-which was ironic, considering Ortiz was a transplant, born and raised in San Diego. But Vargas let it pass.
As if he had a choice.
“Traffic,” he said. “I assume you’re Ortiz?”
“That’s me,” the guy told him, then got to his feet and shouted toward the back of the house, “Hey, Yolanda, open the shed!”
A moment later an attractive girl with a neck tattoo and a permanent scowl on her face emerged carrying a key dangling from a leather strap. They followed her across the yard to a walk-in shed, and Vargas couldn’t help but notice that her jeans had been airbrushed on.
“Don’t be staring at my cousin’s ass, pocho. She’s likely to take a razor to your albondigas. ”
He smiled as he said it (Ortiz seemed to be one of those guys who were always smiling), but the threat was clearly sincere and Yolanda looked like just the girl to carry it out.
Averting his gaze, Vargas waited as she unlocked the shed, threw the door open, then turned on her heels and headed back to the house without a backward glance.