No Way Back: A Novel (35 page)

He took the gun from his belt. A small-caliber pistol equipped with a silencer.

“Do not insult my father. My father would only say one thing to you. To your face, El Pirate.”

“And what would that be, Lauritzia?” Cano tapped the gun against his side and came closer. “Your dick-sucking coward of a father. Tell me, what would that be?”

“This.”
Lauritzia stood on her toes and spit in his face, the hatred burning through her eyes like an X-ray.

Cano wiped off the spit with the back of his hand and smiled. “Now I see why it’s been so tough to kill you. It is hard to kill anything that has so little regard for its own life.”

“Then do it!
” Lauritzia exhorted him. She thought of Wendy, who might be returning at any second, and glared back at him with burning, ready eyes. “Do it now. I am not afraid. You have already killed the fear in me a hundred times. A little more with each of my brother and sisters. So there is nothing left, only my heart, which curses your soul for the people who can no longer speak. Go on, shoot me!” She pushed out her chest. “Your power is weakened to me. There is nothing you can take from me any longer, but my spite. The rest is gone.”

“
Shoot
you
?
” Cano rubbed his mouth, unable to conceal his snicker. “Who said anything about shooting you, my darling.” He slowly unscrewed the silencer from the gun and put it back in his jacket pocket. “No one who escapes El Pirate twice dies so easily, especially one who holds such an illustrious status as you. The last of your line. No . . .” He pushed open his jacket and showed the knife he had killed the waiter with. A short, two-inch, military-looking blade with a curl at the edge. “I think for you there is only the blade. And you should know, Lauritzia”—Cano thumbed its edge to show its sharpness—“that this is something I do very, very well. And anything done that well takes time. Lots and lots of time. Don’t you agree?”

CHAPTER SEVENTY-TWO

I
n the chill of the Colorado night, outside the motel room, the pockmarked man climbed across to the third-floor balcony.

It was not difficult, once he saw that Cano had arrived at the motel. His work was almost done. Patience had always been his trait, and now the bear had set foot in the trap.

And now he would cut it off.

It was not hard to hoist his way up there. The small terraces were only eight feet apart in height, so he easily pulled himself up. And in the darkness no one would see. This time he was careful not to make a sound and carefully moved the balcony door ajar, enough to hear what was going on inside, keeping himself concealed behind the heavy drapes.

After so long, his heart accelerated to be so close.

“Do it now,” he heard the woman say. “I am not afraid.” He smiled. Lauritzia had always been the brave one. Even as a child she would dive into the swimming hole from thirty feet.

“Who said anything about shooting you?” Eduardo Cano said. The man watched through the curtains as the killer took out his knife.

The man carefully removed the gun that he had tucked into his belt. He had waited a long time for this moment, and of all the things he thought might go through his mind as he was about to do the one thing he had dreamed of for many years, he never imagined it would be this: That in the place of his home people would be parading through the streets, dancing and wearing masks, this very night. The churches would be open for business deep into the night. All the undertakers would stay up late too.

He slid the door open and could not hold back his smile. Today was the Day of the Dead. November 2.

What a day to die.

CHAPTER SEVENTY-THREE

T
his time Lauritzia did show fear. She could not help it. She had made her peace with God many times, and in ways, longed to be with her brother and sisters, who she believed with everything in her soul were in heaven now.

But this . . .
Her eyes shot fearfully to the knife. Since she was a child that had been her one fear. To be cut. Even the slice from a thorn unnerved her. So now it was this.

“You say you no longer have any fear for me,” Cano said with a shrug, circling the room. “So we will see. We will see just what you have left. I suspect I will find something. Are you still a virgin? You’re a sweet piece of pie, Lauritzia. I can see that. Do you really want to die without ever feeling how a man feels inside you? Even one you despise. You might not hate me as much as you think! I could make that happen, Lauritzia. Give you a little thrill before you go. What do you say?”

“I say the only way you will ever put yourself inside me is if I’m dead.” Lauritzia tightened her fists. “And even then, I would not let you—”

“Ha!”
Cano laughed greasily. “I’m not so bad.” He stepped closer. “You smell nice. The smell of someone who wants exactly what she thinks she doesn’t. What she doesn’t know. I bet you’re wet down there, my little
niña
. Wet for it with a man who represents everything you revile, right? Who has taken everything you love from you. Wet and juicy. What do you say?” He tapped the blade against his cheek. “If I cut off a nipple, you may beg me to do it. Or beg me to kill you, I think. You say I am powerless, eh? So we’ll see. We’ll see just how powerless I am.”

Cano circled, the burning eyes of a wolf hunting its prey. He unbuckled his belt. “So tell me, my brave Lauritzia, what would you say to me, now that I am here? To the one who has slaughtered your brother and sisters, with as little thought to it as if I were ordering a beer? You must have dreamed of this moment. So here’s the chance. It’s just me. The famous El Pirate. See, I’ll even put this away.”

He placed the knife back in its small sheath hanging from his belt. “It’s just you and me. Tell me what words you have for the killer of your entire family? I am yours. Nothing to say?” He laughed. “What do you think your dog piss of a father would have said?”

“He would say, in the name of God, Eduardo Cano, prepare to meet your judgment.”

A voice rang out from behind Cano, and a man stepped out from behind the curtains holding a gun. Cano spun around in surprise.

“And I hope that judgment is painful and endless, El Pirate, and I pray with all my heart, for that reason only, that there is indeed a hell.”

“Papa!”
Lauritzia exclaimed, her eyes as wide as if Saint Anselmo himself had appeared in the room.

It had been more than three years.

“So,” Cano said, chortling with a look between bewilderment and amusement, “the fisherman has finally reeled in his big catch. The one who’s been eluding him all these years. So was it you, Oscar, my old right arm, who lured me out here? Was this your plan all along? How very, very shrewd. You deserve big applause, Oscar. I mean this. You do.”

“Get away from him, Lauritzia. This man is about to die, and I do not want him to soil you one more second. It’s over for him. In this world. The rest, I can only hope, is only just beginning . . .”

“Papa,” she uttered again, still in shock, and moved away.

“So this is the big finale?” Eduardo Cano showed his teeth and laughed. “You sound like a fucking priest, Oscar. This is your big revenge? The afterlife? Eternal damnation. As if I need you to consign me to hell. Well, I hope it tastes sweet. Very sweet. You look a little thin, Oscar. Have you been eating your own cooking?”

“I’ve been living on the dream of one day holding this gun at you, Eduardo, and now I feel pretty full. You asked what I would say . . . well, I too have dreamed of this. And what I ask you is,
why
? Why, Eduardo? Was it that I betrayed you? The one you took up from nothing. Because of what I knew. Who we were meant to kill that day . . . You could have taken any of my children, and it would have kept me in anguish for the rest of my life. But
all
? Even their unborn children. Even unfed dogs do not act like this.
Why?
”

Cano wiped his face and looked into Oscar’s eyes; even holding the gun, Oscar seemed to shrink from his presence. “You think it was to protect myself, eh, Oscar? Or my friends up north who let us battle to the death in our own country? You are a fool. It was because I thought it would bring you out from under a rock, you cowardly cur. It was because each one, I thought,
Now, this will bring him back. To face me
. So that I could kill you myself. So I could strangle the life out of you with my own hands. No man could sit by and watch his family slaughtered one by one. But you didn’t come. Each one, you still chose to hide, while I took the things you loved. What of
that
, Oscar? Even the most cowering lizard in the desert does not behave like that.”

“I was in U.S. custody, you bastard. I could not come.”

“Well, now the coward has his revenge. Go on, get it over.” Cano turned his back to him. “I’ll make it easy for you. See if you have the guts. Go on. Right in the back of the head. Isn’t that want you want, Oscar? You can brag about it. The killer of El Pirate. Do it now. Take your big revenge.”

Oscar moved up behind him and placed his gun to the back of Cano’s head. “Do you know what day it is, Eduardo?’

“The day the worm catches a cow and has his banquet.”

“It is November second.”

“Ha, the Day of the Dead! What a fucking joke! Now go on. Before it becomes November third. I’m sure your daughter can’t wait to see my brains sprayed all over her pretty outfit.”

“No more talk, Eduardo. Your time has come. See you in hell.”

Oscar stiffened to shoot, but in the same instant, Cano’s hand darted toward his belt and came out with the blade sheathed there, and as if in the same motion, he thrust it downward and spun away from the gun and dug it into Oscar’s knee.

Oscar yelped, buckling, the gun firing wildly, the bullet missing Cano’s head and shattering a lamp by the bed.

Cano pivoted and came upward with the blade, slashing Oscar across the forearm, tearing the gun from his grip and sending it rattling across the floor.

Lauritzia screamed.

“I told you to shoot me, Oscar, didn’t I?” Cano said, his eyes now ablaze with a coyote’s gleam, and he kicked Oscar’s legs out from under him, toppling him to the floor, and reached into his belt and took out his own gun. He thrust his knee onto Oscar’s chest and pushed his gun into Oscar’s mouth. “I gave you the chance, didn’t I? What a pair you are. One is a coward and the other one only talks of heaven. You know what day it is? Of course I do, Oscar, this is the day
you
die. Not me.”

Oscar looked up, his eyes darting in futility, his thoughts rushing to Lauritzia. His arm flailed, seeking to locate his gun on the floor, his fingers grasping. Cano raised the muzzle to the roof of Oscar’s mouth. “You were a cook when I found you, and you will always be just a cook. I am El Pirate. No one tells me when I die. I tell
you
! Now, eat this, asshole—”

“No—you are wrong, El Pirate!” It was Lauritzia who spoke, who now pressed her father’s gun to the back of Cano’s skull. “Just this once we do.”

She squeezed.

Cano spun, his eyes wide in terror, as the side of his face caved in, like a building imploding. He rolled off Lauritzia’s father and landed face first on the floor. Even dying, his hands kept grasping and twitching, like an animal moving around without its head, trying to locate his gun. His eyes rolled up, but they still had that arrogant laughter in them.
I decide who lives and dies. I do.
His chest still rising and falling with his breath, as if he were some vampire Lauritzia had seen on TV, who would not die.

He would never die.

She went up and put the gun against his temple. “For me, heaven will have to wait, but for you, hell is ready, El Pirate.”

She pulled the trigger again. This time he didn’t move.

“Just this once, we do.”

CHAPTER SEVENTY-FOUR

D
eputy Director Carol Sinclair, third in line at the Department of Homeland Security, stepped into the makeshift offices of the joint task force investigating the deaths of Agent Raymond Hruseff and David Gould.

With her was Richard Sparks, who headed up the FBI’s New York office, along with three military-looking men in suits.

The dozen or so agents manning phones or sitting behind computers sat up or hastily threw their jackets on.

“Where is Senior Agent Dokes ?” the deputy director asked them.

At first, no one spoke up. Not that anyone actually knew his whereabouts. Only that he was in the field. Following up on a lead. Dokes was their senior officer in the investigation. You didn’t rat out your superior, even when your superior’s superior came into the room. Even with a good chunk of the U.S. military police standing behind her.

At least for about five seconds.

“He’s not around, sir,” a nervous agent said, standing up. “Agent Holmes may be able to help you. I know they’ve been in touch.”

“Thank you,” the deputy director said, her tone clipped and about as frigid as a glacier.

Sinclair continued down the hall, stopping at the glass-enclosed workspace that was home to the task force’s senior leadership. It took about a second for the redheaded agent at the desk to see who stood at his door. He jumped up, throwing on his jacket and straightening his tie, his mind doing eighty to figure out just why they were here. “Ma’am!”

“I’m looking for Senior Agent Dokes.” The deputy director stepped into his office.

The Homeland Security agent cleared his throat, the first time he’d been addressed directly by someone of this rank. “I’m afraid he’s not here, ma’am.”

“And where might I find him?” She had a handful of files in her hands. “There are some questions he needs to answer.”

Questions that had landed on her desk about how David Gould’s blood had shown up in a completely different place from where Dokes claimed he was killed. Questions relating to certain government postings throughout his career. That coincided with other events that now had come to light.