Blood of the Assassin (Assassin Series 5) (21 page)

“Have you recovered from the collision? I heard you suffered brain damage or something. Couldn’t happen to a nicer guy.”

“Speaking of brain damage, what are you doing to catch the German, besides wasting my time when I’ve come to see your boss?”
El Rey
asked.

“None of your business. But as I told you, he’s busy, so I’m handling all of his duties until he can free up.”

“Not good enough. Now get out of my way, or I’ll move you.”

Briones stepped back and regarded the assassin. “What is it with you? Much as I’d love for you to try, after what’s happened today, I’m surprised you’d even show your face here. In case you haven’t picked up on it, the mood towards cartel killers isn’t at its most forgiving right now.”

El Rey
paused, eyes narrowing. “What happened today? You lost me.”

“Ah, I keep forgetting. You’re not in the loop. This morning, three cartel gunmen tried to kill the captain. They failed, but it looks like they grabbed his wife, too. So he’s a little preoccupied, you could say. Much as I’m sure you believe everyone lives and breathes to serve your needs, it’s not the case. He’s got his hands full today, so for the last time, what the hell are you doing here and what do you want?”

El Rey
nodded. “Hmm. No wonder. So that’s why all the additional security. I had no idea. Do you know which cartel, just out of curiosity?”

“What’s it to you which one of your scumbag employers tried to knock him off? Why – you want to offer to do the job for them and collect a bonus?” Briones spoke as though explaining photosynthesis to a five-year-old.

“No, you dolt. It’s because I still have extensive contacts, even though I’m out of the game. And I’m curious which group would raise the stakes to the level that they would try to take Cruz out. That would bring a lot of heat for no good purpose. Seems counter-productive, is all. They’re in the business of making money, so this is a little out of character.”

“Well, Mister Curious, it’s the worst of the bunch. Los Zetas. And it’s unclear as to why they would be suddenly gunning for him, although I would guess that he’s at the top of every cartel’s kill list because of his position.”

“I’m not so sure that’s true. He would just be replaced by someone else, so it wouldn’t solve anything.”

“You’re wrong. It was them, and their intentions were obvious. Hard to mistake three armed hit men trying to gun you down.”

“And you say they have his wife?”

Briones realized his error – he’d talked too much. It was time to do some damage control. “That’s none of your affair. It has nothing to do with catching the German.”

“Are you really so dim that you believe that the leader of our little group having been attacked and his wife kidnapped isn’t going to affect the effort to find Rauschenbach? Or are you telling me that you think he’s going to remain unaffected? That the hunt for the assassin will get a hundred percent of his attention?”

Briones regarded
El Rey
with curiosity, in spite of his hatred. “What’s it to you, anyway? I didn’t get the impression that you cared whether we got him or not.”

“I care because this is my assignment, and it was made clear to me that I was to do everything I could to stop Rauschenbach. If your part of the effort is distracted by personal problems, that will affect everyone, including me. Frankly, I’d just as soon not have to work with any of you – you’re about as effective as homeopathy, but apparently CISEN wants to play nice and include you, so I’m stuck in a position I’m not thrilled with.”

“Why don’t you just quit? Do us all a favor.”

“I wish I could.”

“What does that mean?”

El Rey
peered over Briones’ shoulder at Cruz’s door. “Nothing. I need to talk to your boss. When will he be available? And please spare me the bit about talking to you. I need to discuss some issues about the site, and he was there with me yesterday. You probably haven’t even been there yet, am I right? So talking to you would be about as useful as talking to a rock.”

Briones hesitated, then put aside his enmity and nodded. “Wait here. I’ll go interrupt him and see when he’ll be available.”

El Rey
watched as Briones hurried to Cruz’s office and disappeared inside, only to return again two minutes later.

“He’s on a conference call that will probably go on for quite a while. I’ll see that he gets in touch when he’s done. Figure an hour or two.”

“Great. So the situation is already interfering.”

“Like I said. He’ll call when he has a free moment.”

El Rey
shrugged and turned, then paused and looked back at Briones. “Just out of curiosity, who’s the ranking Los Zetas honcho in D.F. these days? Used to be
El Jaguar
, if memory serves. That still the case?”

“Sounds right.”

El Rey
glanced over his shoulder at the men watching the encounter from behind him.

“Tell your boss I’ll be waiting for his call. I’m headed out to the site for another look around. I had a few ideas of how to further tighten things up.”

Briones didn’t answer. The assassin sauntered back to the elevator, and a few moments later the steel cube swallowed him up and some of the tension in the room dissipated. The distinctive ring of Briones’ line sounded from the common room’s work area, and before long the encounter with the assassin was out of his mind as he dealt with a flurry of calls while Cruz coordinated with the team that was investigating Dinah’s disappearance.

Rauschenbach dropped his luggage on the bed and surveyed with relief the room at the upscale apartment hotel he’d checked into for three nights. The trip had been grueling, and he wanted nothing so much as to take a long hot shower to wash away the fish stink – the trawler had been right on time, but it was at least fifty years old, every one of which had been spent as a working fishing boat, which meant that every surface was saturated with the residue of the sea. When he had finally climbed off just before dawn and been spirited ashore in the creaky old scow’s tender, he felt like he’d spent the night in the hold with the cargo of dead shrimp.

The port had been quiet and his passage unnoticed, but when he found his appointed rendezvous spot for a ride inland to the airport, things had gone awry – the vehicle hadn’t been there. He had waited for an hour, watching the sun come up, but once day had broken he had felt exposed and decided not to wait. There were any number of possible explanations for the car not making it, from a breakdown to an accident, but it was doing him no good to wait in vain.

There hadn’t been much in the way of transportation in the tiny berg of Puerto Madero, so he was left to fend for himself with the local bus that ran to and from Tapachula, a medium-sized city whose international airport was only six miles from the port.

He’d found a passable family restaurant that was just opening for the working crowd, and wedged himself into a booth, his gear next to him. Watching the dining room fill, he’d had a friendly conversation with the waitress, who had told him where to catch the bus over his third cup of coffee and assured him that they ran every hour or two.

The ride had been everything he’d expected, and it had been with considerable relief that he’d arrived at the small airport and made his way to the passenger terminal, where he was informed by an uninterested ticket vendor that the next flight to Mexico City left in three hours. He paid his fare, noting the machine-gun armed soldiers loitering in groups around the building, and after a hurried washing-up in the men’s room, had settled in to wait in the departure lounge, which would have made any bus station in Europe seem lavish by comparison.

The flight had taken a little over an hour, and when he had arrived in Mexico City he had spent some time in the airport internet café looking for suitable accommodations. He wasn’t worried about his identification – it was indistinguishable from the genuine article, even under close scrutiny. Nobody at the airport security checkpoint in Tapachula had given him a second look, and his passport had been barely glanced at by the ticket agent. He had worried that the lack of an entry stamp would be a problem, but needn’t have – nobody seemed to care.

The apartment hotel he had found was perfect for his needs – anonymous, large, in a decent area of town – not inexpensive, but not five star by any means. The sort of place thousands of businessmen stayed in all over the world when their companies assigned them to spend a week somewhere, poring over a sales office’s books or meeting with prospects. Rauschenbach fit the image of his fellow lodgers – shopworn road warriors with ever-diminishing prospects – and was as forgettable as any of them.

He walked to the window and parted the drapes and found himself looking out over miles of shabby buildings, traffic snarling through the clogged streets four stories below him, laundry hanging on lines, corner markets advertising cheap beer and artery-hardening snacks. He exhaled with a sense of accomplishment – he was here, in Mexico City, the difficult part of entering the country laughably easy, in retrospect. His choice of crossing via Guatemala had been a good one – the border zone was patrolled in a haphazard fashion, and once inside Mexico there was virtually no security other than army patrols whose purpose seemed as much to intimidate the local population as to stop smuggling or prevent human trafficking.

He unpacked his bag and hung up his clothes, and then secreted his valuables in the room safe before stripping down and taking a long shower. Once finished, he caught sight of himself in the partially fogged mirror and smiled at his hair, now dyed gray and trimmed close to his head. He looked completely different than he had even a few days before starting his junket, when his hair had been longer and chestnut colored, with only hints of gray at the temples.

Rauschenbach was an expert at changing his appearance, so this latest incarnation was routine for him. A few small tweaks would add ten years to his age, and a perennial three-day growth of beard would further disguise the inherent fitness evident in his face. He knew from experience that nobody suspected older men of anything, their usefulness and vitality dried up, so he would be virtually invisible as the downtrodden, fifty-something widower he appeared to be.

He tossed the clothes he had worn on the boat into a plastic bag, to be disposed of somewhere other than the hotel, and resolved to run his first productive errand of the dwindling day – to buy several sets of clothes, so that he would further blend in with the local population. These were small things, but he was meticulous, and it was the small things that could trip one up. He had an entire laundry list of items he would need to get, but first things first: clothes, a good meal, and then some sleep. There would be plenty of time tomorrow to scope out the target and arrange for a meeting with his contact. For now, he wanted to get a sense of the place, soak in the local ambience, and familiarize himself with the pace so he wouldn’t stand out.

Being a human chameleon was as much a mental adjustment as it was being adept at changing his appearance, and when he took a sanction that required him to be in a foreign country for any length of time, going the extra distance to immerse himself in the local culture was a necessary step. He wasn’t worried about the language issue – his Spanish was fluent from living in Spain – but he was concerned about the accent, which would place him as not from Mexico. Probably not a huge issue, but the more time he spent listening to the locals chat, the more he could modify the giveaways so he would be undetectable.

When he exited the lobby, offering a polite smile to the reception clerk as he passed the counter, he was immediately struck by the sheer multitude of teeming humanity on the sidewalks, business hours having ended and the population now making its way home from work. The melodious cacophony of horns provided a contretemps to the blaring music from storefronts desperate to attract the attention of potential shoppers. At first it seemed chaotic to him, an incessant din of unbearable noise pollution, but as he settled into the pedestrian flow and ambled down the medium-sized thoroughfare it all began to make a certain kind of sense. Every city had its own beat, its own tempo, and Mexico City was no different. He had never been there before, and so had no idea what to expect, but what he found was similar to Madrid or Rome, albeit dirtier.

That was good. People would be in a hurry in a busy big city, less likely to notice things that didn’t immediately concern or affect them. It would make his job easier if the gestalt of the place was bustling, which it was.

He paused by a trash can and deposited his clothes bag, confident that it would be retrieved within minutes by an enterprising homeless person who didn’t mind the fishy smell, and then meandered for block after block until he came to a clothing store featuring decent quality men’s casual wear.

Fifteen minutes later he was back on the street, three new pairs of pants and four shirts the richer, and he continued his walk, taking a circuitous route back to his hotel. The district he was in was working class, residences mixed with commercial buildings, with no apparent zoning or restrictions that he could tell. The tops of many of the buildings were unfinished, rebar sticking out at odd angles from the remnants of structural beams, the workers having never bothered to cut them off. Bright colors seemed to be mandatory, and many façades were painted a psychedelic rainbow of neon hues, with no evidence that anyone had given any thought to the neighboring schemes, resulting in a somewhat desperate carnival atmosphere.

One commonality were the bars that adorned every window within two stories of street level – a reminder that in addition to being one of the world’s most populated cities, it was also one of the more crime-ridden. Razor wire and broken glass topped every wall, and most of the buildings had the look of fortresses that had been secured against even the most inventive and industrious intruders.

Two blocks from the hotel, he came across a cell phone store and purchased a Nokia with a local number that he could charge with a pre-paid card containing a hundred minutes. The transaction was efficient, and the clerk dutifully marked down the information from his passport – a requirement that had been created to quash the rash of kidnappings that plagued the city, where ransom calls were routinely made from cell phones with no owner information.