Ballistic(119)

Heartless bastard.

The evening before, on the bus north, Jerry had arranged for a criminal contact in Tijuana to vouch for him to a veteran coyote. The cayote told him he was arranging for a large group of forty pot smugglers to cross into the U.S. near Tecate late in the evening in two days’ time. Jerry was told his group could tag along if they would haul packs of marijuana wrapped in hemp cord during the hike, and Jerry readily agreed. He was then given the exact time and place of the crossing.

Next he used an acquaintance in Nogales who owed him a favor. The man put him in touch with a drug ring working the plaza there. He was told of a tunnel that ran from Nogales over the border into Arizona, and the entire morning in Tijuana he worked his new mobile phone to make contact with the right people in the right places. Finally, after the Gamboas were collected and he was cut free from the toilet by the Gray Man, Jerry Pfleger completed the arrangements with more calls to Nogales and Tucson, and promises to everyone he spoke with.

Promises that were mostly lies.

The lies Jerry Pfleger had told in the past twenty-four hours would have a lot of people out to kill him, of this the American embassy officer had no doubt. His plan would fuck over some of the scummiest, most vengeful, and most dangerous men in northern Mexico, a region known for dangerous men. All these men knew his real name, knew his business associates, and knew where he worked. There would be no going back to business as usual when this ordeal was over.

But Jerry Pfleger was more terrified of the Gray Man. If he somehow survived this ordeal, he would deal with whatever came after. For now he had a job to do.





FORTY-THREE



Court, Jerry, and the Gamboas drove a stolen Ford Lobo truck east through the morning, arriving at Nogales before noon. There they checked into a motel that was hardly any better than the one they’d left in TJ.

They sat around all afternoon, ate, talked. The Gamboas prayed, and Court and Jerry picked at their raw and red wounds, waiting for nightfall.

Jerry’s plan was all about his own preservation. He would tip off the DEA at the last minute to the invasion of pot smugglers near Tecate, he would insinuate heroin was being smuggled along with the pot, and he would exaggerate the number of mules from forty to one hundred.

And he would hope like hell that this took any heat away from the Arizona side of the Nogales tunnel for the time the Gamboas needed to get over the border.

It was the best way to increase the Gamboas’ chances because the Gamboas’ fate was, to Jerry Pfleger, a matter of life or death.





At eight in the evening Court tied Jerry to the toilet in the bathroom, and he left the motel with the Gamboas. They drove the Lobo up to the border to International Street, made a right, and then drove down a little hill. On their left was the border fence, rusted tin and a few layers of chain link and barbed wire. On their right were some simple homes on the hill. The asphalt road ended, and they continued on gravel and dirt for fifty yards, then parked in front of a wooden shack.

One man stood outside. Even before Court climbed out from behind the wheel, he could tell the man had a gun under his lumberjack shirt.

This was the cayote. He’d be crossing with the family, meeting with their ride to Tucson. He would accompany them all the way there.

The cayote eyed the gringo, said nothing at all.

Court didn’t like this one damn bit. The lives of these three, four if you counted Eddie’s unborn son, all depended on the actions of this drug-running, piece-of-shit scumbag giving him the stink eye.

But neither Court nor the Gamboas had any other options. They had to trust Jerry. Not his honesty or fidelity. No, he wasn’t doing this for those reasons. He was doing it for self-preservation, so Court felt his motivation was sufficient.

The cayote motioned the Gamboas forward into the shack, and Court stood with them a moment in the darkness on the dirt road. “I will never be able to thank you,” Elena said to him. She sobbed.

“Just make it over there. Look up some of Eddie’s old friends. Navy men, DEA guys. They are good people. They will help you. Have that baby.”

She smiled. “I will do that.”

She hugged him, tears filled her eyes. “Please save Laura. You are her only chance. And please be careful yourself,” she said.

She turned and headed for the shack. Court shook Diego’s hand next. “You are in charge; you understand that, don’t you?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Your uncle Eddie went to the U.S. as a young man, and he made a success of himself. No matter how his life ended . . . he had a life.”

Diego nodded, looked into the starry sky. “I would be proud to live like my tío Eduardo.” He turned and disappeared into the shack.