Obsession (23 page)

He motioned to the guards. “Give them both what they need—food, water, medicine. Just keep them locked up here until I decide what to do with them.”

Miriam took her husband’s hand. “Let’s go greet the future of Edmondsville.”

****

Zeke stood in the living room and shook the small brown-skinned woman’s hand. Mother was right. She did have a lovely smile. Big brown eyes. Long dark hair. The modest dress she wore did little to hide the fact that she had large, perky breasts. He could hardly wait for her to join him in the bedroom. His pulse quickened, and his mouth grew dry. First, he had to get rid of the old crones

“Mother, why don’t you and Sister Rose take the Chosen One out for a little while. I’m sure the congregants would love to see him.”

He watched as Miriam lifted Jake out of the crib and handed the baby to Daniella. The toddler cooed, leaned his forehead against hers, and patted her cheeks.

A sense of déjà vu washed over Zeke.
Why was the child doing that?
The girl wasn’t sick, was she? Nonsense. She was as healthy as a horse.

Miriam and Rose left with the baby, and he approached the young woman. He placed his hands on her shoulders and turned her around.

He smiled and she grinned back. Her smile continued to stretch, then twisted like a rubber mask. The smile, once inviting, grew enormous, lewd and leering. Red eyes rimmed with black glared at him and bugged out of her ashen gray face. Her hair writhed with thousands of snakes. A forked tongue licked his face and burned his cheek. Her fetid breath reeked of methane and sulfur.

Stumbling over furniture, breathing heavy, he shouted, “Get back, you demon, Satan’s child.”

She hopped toward him on cloven hooves, her pointed tail whipping around her, shredding his pants and slicing his legs.

She tore at the waist of his pants and hissed, “Give it to me. Give it to me!”

He screamed, ran into his bedroom, and slammed the door.

Chapter Seventeen

Alejandro spent an hour on the satellite phone with Isabel explaining the situation. The boss lady was not happy. Failed to see how six little Indians could be of any assistance in the rescue efforts. Couldn’t appreciate their contribution to the party, until he pointed out the cliff-dwellers’ extensive knowledge of the caves. Emboldened by her silence and tacit agreement, he convinced her the cabin’s location, well out of sight of Edmondsville and its armed lookouts, would make an excellent staging area for the operation. For good measure, he threw in the fact that it was well away from
her
compound—so no one would ever know where she and her family lived. At last, she agreed to send Tio, Pepe, and the troops. Then, the boss lady said she was coming, too.

Now he stood outside the cabin door and watched the billowing cloud of dust rise up from behind the hilltop. Had the phenomenon not been accompanied by the sounds of giant lawnmowers, he would have thought a tornado approached. In a sense, a tempest
was
on the horizon: Hurricane Isabel.

A dozen ATVs and six MUVs descended upon the little cabin’s front yard blowing gas fumes, dust, and gravel in the air. Alejandro covered his eyes with his forearm to deflect the detritus. One by one, the vehicles shut down until he could hear his own voice again. “
Hola
! Welcome to base camp for Operation Jake.”

Isabel removed her desert camouflage helmet and shook out her long dark hair. She glanced around, her face a mixture of disgust and amusement.

“This is not what I would call a five-star hotel.”

“It’s more than adequate for our purposes.” He pointed to the nearby stream. “We have water and are completely out of sight.” The door squeaked and Angie slid alongside him. “I’m told the cult members don’t get out very often, so it’s unlikely they’ll wander through here anytime soon.”

Isabel nodded at Angie, then frowned. “What’s with the nun?”

Alejandro glanced down at the little woman who had appeared at his side without a sound. “Sister Teresa? I told you about her.”

“There’s no need for her to hang around.” Isabel flicked her hand. “She can go. Now.”

The nun bristled. “I’m not going anywhere.”

Alejandro stared at her. “You speak English?”

“
Un poco
.”

He wondered what else the woman had failed to share with them.

Sister Teresa continued in Spanish. “I’m staying right here until the girls are returned to their homes. If it weren’t for me, they wouldn’t be in Edmondsville, being forced to do God only knows what.”

Isabel rolled her eyes. “Tio, Pepe. Set up camp. As soon as you find the vodka, bring it to me. It’s going to be a long night.”

The nun watched the flurry of activity with wrinkled brow and pursed lips.

“Sister Teresa,” Alejandro whispered. “If you really want Senora Isabel’s help, you need to wipe that look off your face.”

She shook her head. “I’ve made a deal with the devil.”

The tone of her voice irritated him. She came to
him
, not the other way around. “Sister, you, of all people, should know better than to judge a book by its cover.”

She shot him a sharp look. “What do you mean by that?”

He waved Angie over. “This woman is here to tell you that her father, a ‘very religious man’
is
evil incarnate.” He translated and the redhead nodded agreement. “That woman over there” he pointed to Isabel “may have crime in her blood, but she’s done more to help poor villagers in Chihuahua than the government has.”

“You call growing marijuana helping people?”

“I
heard
you.” Isabel strode over to the porch and joined the heated conversation. “What do you give them? Prayers? I give people
jobs
. There’s no market for rocks and stones. What
else
would you have them grow?”

The two women, one young, curvaceous and raven-haired, the other old, squat and wimpled, faced one another.

Isabel placed her fists on her hips.

Sister Teresa’s face grew red, and she took two steps closer to the cartel boss.

Half-expecting a cat-fight, Alejandro grabbed Angie’s elbow and pulled her away from the confrontation.

“Apples, coffee, wine.” The nun shouted. “That was my plan all along. It’s why the
ejiditarios
agreed to send the girls to go work in Edmondsville. The money they earned was going to go into the agricultural cooperative.”

Mouth agape, Isabel glared down at her now weeping opponent.

“What are you talking about?”

“The Tarahumara have plots of land,
ranchos
, with two or more households on them. They work together, help each other out. Mostly they raise corn, beans, subsistence farming.” She hiccupped. “There are some areas in the Sierra Madre where the natives have been able to get enough capital to buy apple trees, grapevines for wine, and coffee plants. They aren’t millionaires, but they aren’t starving to death.” Her voice hitched. “Our babies are dying of malnutrition.”

Isabel’s face softened. “Children shouldn’t go to bed hungry.” She put her arm around the nun’s shoulders. “Let’s go sit down and talk.”

Alejandro whispered to Angie, “Are you seeing what I’m seeing? Or am I hallucinating?”

“I heard that,” Isabel shouted over her shoulder and flipped him the bird.

****

Over the next few hours, desert camouflaged tents popped up all over the pasture like mushrooms. Lanterns and fires glowed as the men heated up their rations. A semblance of peace fell over the troops, and Alejandro hoped the planning and training for this event would at last pay off. Tarahumara scouts were already en route to the cult compound. Once they returned with the number and location of lookouts, they’d be ready to go. But right now, all they could do was wait. Eyes half-closed, he sat in the dark and recalled the other plans his handler and the ATFE higher ups had set into motion.

Although he had argued against the idea, once the attack on Edmondsville was a go, Alejandro had been instructed to call the town tavern,
El Hombre Loco,
and use code to place beer and liquor orders for the fiesta to celebrate on their return. Through a tap on the seedy dive’s lines, the US-Mexico joint task force on disrupting drug trafficking organizations would learn the exact latitude, longitude, date, and time of the attack. When Angie had arrived on the scene, the idea of rescuing a kidnapped baby and capturing
narcoterroristas
and
crazy cult members in the same fell swoop had been irresistible to his handler.

Think of all the points they could make, his handler had said. The higher-ups would be happy, both governments would win, and it was hoped, end some of the anti-Mexican sentiments inflaming the American media. Alejandro thought it was a recipe for disaster and had told his handler as much, asking him if he was trying to create Armageddon. US-Mexican relations aside, the two ATFE Special Response Teams from opposite sides of the border hadn’t been working together long enough to handle an operation of this magnitude.

He pointed out that the last thing the Mexican government should want was their very own version of Jonesville meets Waco meets Ruby Ridge. When his handler started questioning him, asking if he needed to come in from the field, Alejandro had backed down. But he just couldn’t get rid of the feeling that something terrible would happen if the new plans were set into motion. He tried to shake the premonition by thinking of other things, like Ramon Mendez, Isabel’s father. Where
was
that bastard?

Just the thought of that monster having a good life after slaughtering his little nephew and maiming his surgeon brother made Alejandro’s head pound and his ears throb. He shook his head and took deep breaths to lower his heart rate and calm down. The throbbing remained. He looked around. It wasn’t his heart that was pounding, it was drums. And they were coming closer.

Tio rushed up to the cabin and pointed to a crowd of people coming down the hillside, their faces illuminated by flickering lights. “Who the hell are they?”

“I have no idea.” Alejandro turned to yell for the men to grab their arms, when Sister Teresa materialized at his side.

“Oh. My. God.” She breathed. “I told them to stay away.”

“Who?”

“The other Tarahumara. I told them we’d handle this.”

The drumming came closer accompanied by a din of violins, accordions, and shouting. What were they shouting? No, it was singing. “How did they find us?”

“The sixth man who came with me, the youngest, was supposed to go home and stay there. Keep his mouth shut. He must have told
everyone
in the valley.” Sister Teresa sighed and shook her head. “It’s a
tesguinada
. A beer drinking party. Julio’s been brewing that beer for a week in preparation for planting corn on his
rancho
. They must have decided to bring it here to thank you for agreeing to save their girls. Odd. Usually they have a party
after
someone does them a favor, not before.” She glanced up at Alejandro, her brow creased. “They have
tesguino
at everything except funerals. They must think you and your men might not come back alive.”

If he followed his handler’s orders, the Tarahumara could be right. There
had
to be a way to stop Armageddon. But how? If he didn’t make the call, he’d be insubordinate and get demoted, or worse. If he did make the call, all hell would break loose, and the only people left standing would be wearing ATFE Kevlar vests. He had to think of something, or Sister Teresa’s prediction could come true.

Illuminated by the flickering campfires, bobbing flashlights, and waving lanterns, the crowd of colorfully dressed villagers appeared in the center of the campsite, looking like a surrealistic painting of a carnival lost in the wilderness. A burro brayed, and then another and another, in what seemed to be a chorus of complaints about the weight of the barrels strapped to their backs.

Alejandro bit his lower lip. His shoulders and belly shook with suppressed mirth.

Sister Teresa glared at him. “It’s not funny.”

No, it wasn’t funny. It was ridiculous. Absurd. Fellini-esque. How would he describe this in his debriefing? How would he tell his real bosses that in the middle of nowhere, in the midst of the most complicated US-Mexico law enforcement operation ever planned, he had hosted an Indian beer drinking party?

****

Angie sat on the front porch of the little cabin, sipped a cup of scorched coffee, and watched the natives pass around gourds of beer. An old woman had approached her earlier in the evening and offered her a drink. She’d frowned, mimed throwing up, and the woman had backed off. Apparently, Angie had found the universal sign for “I’m-gonna-hurl-if-I-drink-that.” After that, the singing dancing crowd left her alone. It was just as well, she wasn’t feeling very sociable.

Alejandro, on the other hand, was in the thick of things, hanging with his gigantic buddies, Tio and Pepe, swapping war stories. In the old days, she would have been the life of the party, provided the host offered good booze and hard drugs. Now she observed the celebration as if watching a National Geographic special—except this was one she could reach out and touch. Had she been a sociologist or an anthropologist, she would have thought she’d died and gone to heaven. Instead, she kept thinking, I need to sleep. When will this party be over and how can we make these people go home?

Vodka bottle clutched in her hand, Isabel sauntered over to the stoop and plunked down beside Angie. “Welcome to the
other
Mexico,
chica
.” She raised the bottle, took a swig, and nodded toward the natives. “Wait till you get home and tell Sarah about your trip. She’s gonna split a gut laughing when you tell her about tonight.”