‘And he wants passage too?’
‘No. He sees opportunities here,’ Pieraro replied. ‘Mostly he wants me gone. But some payment was involved.’
Jules closed her eyes. ‘How much?’
The merchant banker, the one with the silicone-enhanced mistress, suddenly spoke up. ‘It was nothing. Now can we get the hell out of here?’
Jules struggled for his name. Denby… Denby… Moorhouse. ‘So you paid off Roberto, the coke-dealing paramilitary fascist?’ she asked incredulously. ‘Oh well, that’ll turn out fine, I’m sure. He won’t be back for another bite of the cherry, will he! I mean, do any of you actually need me? Everything seems to be running tickety fucking boo without my input. Perhaps I should just piss off and leave you to get on with it.’
‘Listen,’ said Moorhouse, stepping forward. He was a short man with all of the attendant psychological problems. Jules estimated that standing face to face with his girlfriend, he’d be smothered by her breast implants. His features were flushed and he was sweating profusely. ‘We have had a very stressful morning here. Those people began arriving before dawn. The hotel has been locked down for hours by security men. We were stuck in our rooms, no air-conditioning, no cable, no idea what was happening. If it took a couple of trinkets and baubles to get that Colombian thug to run interference for us, that was well worth it. Now, I suggest you start earning your money and get us the hell out of Acapulco.’
Tempted to pistol-whip him, Jules merely nodded silently. She then turned her attention back to the vaquero. ‘Miguel, can I talk to you? Privately. For two minutes. Do we have two minutes?’
The background roar was building, but not in a way that that made her think a boilover was imminent. Pieraro patted his wife on the shoulder and gently rubbed the head of his youngest child, a little boy, who was crying silently. He bent down to whisper a few words in his ear before kissing his forehead. With the child settled, for the moment, he and Jules walked off to the other side of the terrace.
‘This conga line of relatives and… whatever,’ she began, ‘have you planned on provisions and stores for them? Because I haven’t. We had an agreement – your wife and children. I don’t recall agreeing to take all the supporting cast from Three Amigos.’
Pieraro looked physically pained. His next words came out like teeth extracted one after the other. ‘If you cannot take them, you cannot. I will explain.’
The man’s discomfort was so palpable, so deeply etched into the fissures of his sunburnt face, that Jules had to look away. She covered the moment of weakness by pretending to scan the hotel grounds for trouble. Unfortunately, standing right in her line of view were his family, the sorriest, most bedraggled-looking losers she’d seen in a long time. The crowd at the hotel gates were young, middle-class white people with a leavening of upper-echelon Mexicans; they were frightened, but still well fed and used to having their own way. Miguel’s family looked like they’d turn around at one word from her and slouch off to their fate.
Jules risked a quick glance at her paying customers. They seemed entirely nonplussed, and she supposed they had no reason to question the arrival of the Pieraro clan. The vaquero had clearly established himself as a powerful figure in their eyes only yesterday. If that power meant he could drag along his extended family, they would probably accept that. After all, they were all too used to the privileges of power themselves.
The crowd noise intensified noticeably, spilling over and around the Fairmont’s centrepiece architectural statement, the main hotel built in the form of a giant Aztec pyramid. She could see dozens of other guests on their balconies, hiding from the disturbance outside, and too many of them were pointing at her little group. Time to go.
‘Listen,’ she said. ‘This isn’t over, not by a fucking long shot. I cannot take all those people you’ve brought. I don’t have stores for them and they won’t be allowed off the boat at the other end – not to mention the trouble it’s going to cause with everyone who actually paid for their passage. But, we don’t have time to get into this now. We need to get away from this city. It’s going under. Right now. I’ll take your extras on today – take them a safe distance down the coast, away from the city. That’s where it’s going to be worst. But then they will have to get off, Miguel. Do you understand? You need to talk to them about where that might be. I’m sure they have relatives somewhere, in some stagnant backwater, who’ll take them in. Probably be glad of the extra pairs of hands come bean-harvest time. But I can’t take them.’ She held Pieraro’s eyes this time, not flinching away from the falling man she saw in there.
‘Because they cannot pay,’ he said at last, with an air of injured dignity.
‘If you want to make me the bitch, okay – because they cannot pay. Nobody is going to fuel and provision me if I cannot pay. That’s the only reason I’m taking those rich arseholes anywhere. They’re buying my fuel, my food, my arms and ammunition, and surely even you can see that, right now, nothing trumps that.’
‘My family, they have brought their own food,’ Pieraro reasoned, in a dry, flat voice. ‘Beans. Dried meat. Flour. They will not be a burden.’
‘Oh my God, I can’t believe we’re even having this discussion. You are not an idiot, Miguel. You know how things are, you know what’s coming… Fuck, you know it’s already here.’
‘They are my family, Miss Julianne. Mi familia. Do you not have a family of your own?’
His attempt at guilting her out produced only a short, bitter laugh. ‘Oh Miguel, that is so not a road to go down with me. Look, we have to move. Now. Get everyone down to the… the Heritage, was it? Get them onto the buses. We have to get around to the bay, to a big jetty up the beach from the Hyatt – do you know it? Good. Fifi and Thapa will be waiting there. It is going to be a very crowded trip out to the Rules.’
Pieraro closed his eyes. ‘Thank you,’ he said, as if in prayer.
‘But we’re dropping them off, Miguel. Somewhere. Okay?’
‘Okay. Somewhere safe.’
The crackle of gunfire started up, muted by distance and smothered by the sudden roar of an enraged, terrified mob.
‘I think Roberto has taken off his smiley face,’ said Jules. ‘Let’s get the fuck out of here.’
33
ACAPULCO BAY, ACAPULCO
‘Jeez, Julesy. We taking a mariachi band with us? Cool.’
Fifi had switched over to a Larry the Cable Guy camouflage baseball cap, with the trademark fish-hook in the bill. Jules ignored the hat, especially the Confederate flag.
‘Don’t start, Fifi. Just get them on board.’