Cartel (39 page)

Halfway across the bridge the Suburban rammed him again, but the Olds was no lightweight and she stayed on course.

Coming down off the bridge, the two northbound lanes split into four lanes and led to a portico under which were four security booths. Only three of the lanes were open for public use. The far right lane was marked OFFICIAL USE ONLY.

Scott aimed straight for it, pedal to the floor.

A CBP officer saw the Oldsmobile coming when it was still a hundred yards away and pulled the alarm. Red and blue strobe lights flashed and a klaxon sounded. A steel crash barrier popped up from the pavement and blocked the lane. Two CBP officers appeared with M-16s and took aim at the Oldsmobile.

Scott stood on the brakes and fought the wheel to keep the car pointed straight at the barrier. He wanted the engine block as cover in case the CBP officers started shooting.

They didn't shoot, but they kept their weapons trained on Scott even after the car came to a stop thirty yards from the barrier. Then the Suburban slewed to a stop behind the Oldsmobile. More CBP officers showed up with more M-16s. Scott counted at least six rifles, all aimed at him.

Scott raised his hands and pressed his fingertips against the windshield. He kept his eyes fixed straight ahead as he said, "Jake, keep the girls in the car, and all of you keep your heads down. Do not look out. Do you hear me?"

"Yes, sir," Jake said.

His wife said, "Scott, what are you-"

"Victoria, as soon as I get out, I want you to get out, slowly, hands in plain sight, then help Benny out. Do you understand?"

"Yes."

Scott reached down with his left hand, feeling for the door handle, moving slowly and keeping his right hand pressed against the windshield. He found the handle and pulled it. He opened the door very slowly. The CBP officers started shouting instructions all at once. Everything was jumbled and contradictory. Scott ignored them and stepped out of the car. Keeping his hands raised, he walked to the front of the car and stopped. He could almost feel the pres-sure on the triggers of the guns aimed at him.

Behind him he heard the Oldsmobile's back door open. He didn't turn around. He heard Benny moan as Victoria helped her out of the car.

"I'm a DEA supervisor," Scott shouted. "I'm stationed in Laredo. My family was kidnapped and taken to Mexico. I found them and brought them back. We have a Mexican po-lice officer with us who's been shot. She needs medical at-tention."

No one moved. No one said anything. But all the guns stayed pointed at him.

Then a voice behind Scott shouted, "I'm U.S. State De-partment. This man is my prisoner."

Turning his head just a tiny bit, Scott saw Jones stand-ing behind him, ten feet to his left. He was holding up a set of credentials. His other hand was pressed against his side. Blood covered the lower part of his shirt and the front of his pants. His forehead was bleeding too.

"He's wanted for murder in Mexico," Jones said, his voice strained. "I have authorization to turn him over to the Mexican Attorney General's Office. Do not allow him to en-ter the United States."

"This police officer," Scott nodded at Benny, who was only on her feet because Victoria was holding her up, "has been shot." Still keeping his hands in plain sight, Scott jerked a thumb at Jones. "He shot her. She needs immediate medical attention."

"She is a police officer," Jones said. "But she's wanted for murder in Mexico. She has no right to enter the United States."

A female CBP supervisor, who was standing behind the officers with the M-16s, looked at Scott. "Do you have DEA identification?"

"My name is Scott Greene. If you've seen the news, you know who I am." He pointed to Jones. "This man kidnapped my wife and children." He nodded at Victoria. "That's my wife, and my children are in the car."

"None of that is true," Jones said. "This man is a-"

"I've heard just about enough out of you," the supervi-sor said. "Shut your mouth until I figure this out." Then she looked at Scott for a long time. Scott felt the seconds tick by. Then the supervisor said, "You and your family can come across." She pointed to Benny. "But she's a Mexican national. She needs to seek medical attention in Mexico."

"She's a key witness in a major narcotics and corruption case," Scott said.

"I don't have the authority to allow her into the coun-try."

Scott nodded. "Yes, you do. You can grant her a one-day visa, just long enough to check out what I'm telling you."

The supervisor shook her head. "Not under these cir-cumstances."

Scott pointed to the ground under his feet. They were seventy-five yards north of the river. "This is U.S. soil, right?"

The CBP supervisor nodded.

"She is a material witness in a federal case. I'm a DEA agent, and she is in my custody."

The supervisor glared at Scott. "Are you armed?"

He nodded toward the Oldsmobile. "There's a pistol in the car but it's empty."

The supervisor tapped one of her officers on the shoul-der. "Go out there and bring them in." She shot a look at Jones and added, "All of them."

Several of the officers formed a ragged skirmish line and advanced cautiously toward the Oldsmobile. All of them kept their M-16s ready.

Behind him, Scott heard a tire squeal. He glanced back and saw the Suburban make a U-turn around the end of the concrete lane divider and race south across the bridge.

* * * *

Mr. Jones lay on the lumpy bed staring up at the slow-turning ceiling fan. It ticked every time it made a revolution. Tick...tick...tick. He had been listening to it for hours. Lis-tening to the ticking of the fan and sweating. It was hot out-side, hotter still in his room. Despite the heat, he kept the window closed and the door shut with the room's one chair braced against it. He didn't want visitors, especially in his condition.

He didn't know what time it was. After midnight, he knew that, because he'd heard church bells chime twelve times. He was pretty sure he'd fallen asleep after that. It was still dark outside. Angry shouts had woken him up a few minutes ago, that and the sound of a bottle breaking in the parking lot. He could still hear people out there. None of the rooms had air conditioning. The El Matador motel was the kind of place where people stayed up all night getting drunk and high and slept half the day, until the heat drove them back outside in search of a breeze and more booze.

The gunshot wound in his belly didn't even hurt any-more. A while back he had wrapped some ice in a towel and pressed it on the wound, thinking the cold might help stop the bleeding. The ice was long gone, leaving just the sopping wet towel draped over his bare abdomen. But the bleeding had slowed to a trickle. Things were looking good. A few more hours rest and he could figure out a way to turn this situation around. That was his thing, what he was good at, turning shit into sugar. He just couldn't...focus. He watched the fan turn and listened to the tick, tick, tick...

Two weeks later the story was still the lead on every net-work news program and on the front page of all the big newspapers. The cable news channels basically ran the story all day. New revelations kept coming out that added fuel to the fire.

Without knowing who else in the government was in on the conspiracy-and that is exactly what he thought of it as, a conspiracy to help the Sinaloa cartel smuggle tons of co-caine, heroin, and methamphetamine into the United States-Scott Greene had uploaded the video to YouTube and sent the link to the all major networks and newspapers.

His debriefing by DEA had taken a solid week. Word was that upper management was split on what to do with him. A friend at headquarters told him that half the chair warmers there wanted to fire him, and the other half wanted to give him a medal.

Scott didn't care. As far as he was concerned, the so-called War on Drugs was nothing but a sick joke, one that would actually be funny except for the fact that a lot of brave men and women in law enforcement and a whole lot of innocent civilians had paid for the punch line with their lives. Finding that video was like discovering that during World War Two the United States had secretly teamed up with Nazi Germany to fight Japan. It made no sense. Yet, there it was, the facts captured on a twenty-two minute video taken at a secret meeting in Mexico City.

So he exposed the secret.

And in the DEA safe house in Houston, where he and his family had been living for the past two weeks, Scott couldn't escape the headlines. They were on his iPad and on the TV news crawl:

"Secret video shows U.S. may have backed Mexican cartel."

"Cartel scandal rocks CIA."

"Spy agency claims case officer in Mexico went 'rogue'."

"Houston DEA chief resigns amid probe."

"Body of 'rogue' CIA officer found in motel in Mexico."

"Cartel scandal threatens administration."

"Congress appoints special prosecutor. CIA director resigns."

"Mexican president resigns."

"Special prosecutor says indictments of 'top' U.S. offi-cials 'likely.'"

...and on and on.

Naturally, the media had dubbed the scandal "Cartel-gate." Some of the talking heads were even speculating that the scandal could take down the president. Scott wasn't so sure about that, but he didn't care one way or the other. What he did care about was doing the best thing for his family. What that was, though, he had no idea.

Not yet anyway.

****

After another week, Scott found himself at the Grey-hound terminal in Houston, standing with Benny and Rosalita beside an idling bus. It was 6:10 a.m., and bus 6440 was scheduled to depart in five minutes. The rest of the pas-sengers had already boarded and a porter was closing the last door to the luggage compartment beneath the main cab-in.

Benny's left arm was still in a sling. The doctor said the wound was healing nicely. He also said that the bullet had nicked an artery and that if Victoria hadn't kept pressure on both sides of the wound, odds were that Benny wouldn't have survived.

Standing next to the open bus door, Benny held up two U.S. Immigration permanent resident identification cards with her good hand. Her photo was on one card; Rosalita's was on the other. "Thank you."

"You're welcome," Scott said. "And by the way, I could have gotten you a couple of plane tickets. Ohio is a long drive, especially in a bus." According to the schedule Scott had seen, this bus made seventeen stops along the way, including transfers in Texarkana and Memphis, and wouldn't arrive in Cincinnati until noon tomorrow.

Benny rested her hand on her daughter's shoulder. "I want Rosalita to see her new country up close."

Scott knelt beside Rosalita. "Are you excited about meeting your aunt and uncle and all your cousins?"

She smiled and nodded. "I can't wait."

Turned out Rosalita already spoke some English and had learned a lot more in the last three weeks.

"It gets cold up there," Scott said. "But you'll be able to build a snowman for Christmas."

"How cold is snow?"

"Pretty cold, but it's also a lot of fun. Like an ICEE."

"What's an ICEE?" she asked.

Scott stood and rubbed her hair. "You'll find out."

"Have you decided?" Benny asked.

"I'm going to law school."

She smiled. "I think that's a good decision. No more guns and no more shooting."

"I might keep one gun around," he said. "Just in case. But hopefully no more shooting."

Benny wiped tears from her face.

Scott felt a lump rising in his throat. He coughed to try to get rid of it but that didn't work. "You better get going."

She leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek, then turned around and led Rosalita up the steps. They disap-peared inside the bus. A few seconds later the door closed, the brakes hissed, and the bus rolled away.

Scott waved goodbye. Then he turned around. Under the overhang outside the terminal, Victoria and the kids were waiting. He walked over and kissed his wife.

THE END

CHUCK HUSTMYRE spent 22 years in law enforcement and is a retired federal agent. He specialized in violent crime, drug trafficking, and fugitive investigations and severed as a tactical team sniper. Chuck is also an award-winning journalist, the author of several nonfiction books and novels, and he wrote the screenplays for the Lionsgate movies HOUSE OF THE RISING SUN and END OF A GUN. For more information or to contact Chuck, visit www.chuckhustmyre.com.