Taking Chances (53 page)

Chambers’s lips were twisting into a sneer. ‘So tell me, just why do you think you’re in prison here, Galeano?’ he challenged. ‘Four years it’s taken you to buy your way out, so just who do you think your friends out there were trying to appease by putting you in here at all, if not the Americans? And I don’t know about you, but I’d call four years a pretty long gesture for a man who likes to think he’s got as much power as you do.’

‘Chambers, you don’t know the half of it,’ Galeano responded. ‘And I’m sure as hell not going to take the time to explain. But I will tell you this. If you think the general here is your safe ticket around this city then you’re running straight up a blind alley, because he’s got no more power to help you than your dead girlfriend’s got power to come back and fuck you.’

Chambers’s face hardened, showing that the barb had struck home.

Gómez stepped in. ‘All right, let’s cut to the chase, Galeano,’ he said. ‘You got us here to talk about a deal, so let’s hear something before we get on our way.’

Galeano handed his water to a flunky, then massaged his heavy chin. ‘The woman who went on the Larry King show and told the world my nephews killed your girlfriend,’ he said, ‘she did a lot of damage. It could be she’s put us in a position where there’s no longer any deal to be cut.’

‘Get on with it,’ Gómez snapped.

Galeano shot him a look. ‘But like with most things,’ he said, dragging his eyes back to Chambers, ‘there’s always a way round it. So the deal is this: you lay off my nephews and I’ll give you Molina. That means you’re going to have to go public and tell the world the woman on Larry King got it wrong. You do that, and Molina’s all yours. Tell you what, we’ll even give you evidence to get him shipped to the States to stand trial. Unless you decide to do with him what he did with your girlfriend.’ He shrugged. ‘It’s your call.’

Chambers looked at Gómez.

Gómez nodded and they turned to walk out of the room. At the door Chambers turned back. ‘What about the kids?’ he said.

Galeano waved a hand. ‘Gutter scum,’ he snarled.

‘I want your word that you’ll lay off them as of now,’ Chambers said.

Galeano’s piercing eyes narrowed. ‘You got it,’ he said.

Gómez opened the door.

‘So do we have a deal?’ Galeano demanded.

Gómez looked back over his shoulder, then started to grin.

Galeano’s face twitched. ‘Deal or no deal you’re a dead man, Gómez,’ he growled. ‘And you, Chambers. What they did to your girlfriend is going to be nothing to what they’re going to do to you, you motherfucking son of a bitch.’

Chambers turned back. He too was grinning.

‘Don’t underestimate me, Chambers,’ Galeano warned. ‘One word from me and you won’t even get as far as your next step out of here.’

‘Give the word,’ Gómez challenged. ‘Give the word and watch your whole fucking empire go up like Apollo 13.’

‘Shove it up your ass, Gómez,’ Galeano snarled. ‘You don’t scare me.’

‘And you don’t scare me,’ Gómez responded. ‘But I’ll tell you what does,’ he added, glancing at his watch, ‘is all the shit those nephews of yours are going to give up now that my men have got them in jail.’

Galeano visibly blanched, but made a quick recovery. ‘You’re bluffing,’ he growled.

‘And do you know why it scares me?’ Gómez continued, taking a knife from his pocket and going back into the room where he began cutting all the cables that connected Galeano’s impressive technology. ‘It scares me because of all the hits you’re going to order the minute you get word I’m telling the truth. I wonder how long we can keep your nephews alive,’ he mused, ‘before you pay one of my men enough to get your
sicarios
through?’

‘You can bet your ass,’ Galeano seethed, ‘that if you’re not bullshitting me here, then it’ll be you they come for first, Gómez. You and that shitfuck journalist there who I should have had killed four years ago along with his cock-sucking whore of a girlfriend.’

Chambers and Gómez looked at each other. Gómez’s eyes were gleaming. ‘
Adios
, Galeano,’ he said, pocketing his knife. ‘We won’t be meeting again, ’cos not even all those lawyers you’re aiming on getting lined up to keep your extradition dragging on for years can save you from what’s coming your way.’ And with a final salute to the chef, Gómez led the way out.

Minutes later Chambers and Gómez were back in the fresh air, where one of Gómez’s bodyguards helped him detach the recorder he had strapped inside his shirt. When they were finished Gómez pocketed the tape, and slipping in behind the wheel of his car he waited for Chambers to get in beside him.

‘I think we got all we needed,’ he said, as they drove out of the complex. ‘A confession to ordering the hits on the kids, and on Rachel. It’ll be up to the Feds to get a
confession
out of their arrests in LA–’ He looked at Chambers. ‘I did tell you they’d made arrests, did I?’ he said.

‘No,’ Chambers answered.

‘A couple of days ago. So it’ll be up to them to get a confession from the punks they reeled in that they were getting their orders from Galeano. Anyway, he’ll have figured out by now that one of us was wired, so once he’s got his command station active again there’s going to be a price on our heads that’ll make this nation’s GNP look like a poor man’s power bill. And having his nephews in custody isn’t going to cut us any slack either.’

Chambers looked at him in amazement. ‘You mean you weren’t bluffing about the nephews?’ he said.

He shrugged. ‘The raid on the Tolima estate is scheduled for midnight tonight,’ he said. ‘Our intelligence informs us that’s where the nephews are holed up, and as they’ve been reneging on some deals with the guerillas in recent months, they’re not going to be able to rely on their paid protection the way they once could. In fact, I’ve got good reason to believe the guerillas are going to start shooting any of the bastards that look like escaping.’ He glanced at Chambers. ‘And if you’re thinking you want to be a part of that raid then you just start thinking again. As of now you’re going underground and if need be I’ll put you in chains to keep you there.’ He grunted. ‘Though why I should care about your miserable ass when I got my own to look out for sure beats the hell out of me.’

Chambers turned to stare out of the window.

‘I know what you’re thinking,’ Gómez told him. ‘You’re thinking all this should have happened four years ago, right after Rachel was killed. And you’re right, it should have. But I couldn’t even get close to Galeano back then. His friends in the Government had him all padded out with their own protection – that is,
the
ones you didn’t manage to send down with him. It’s taken time, a lot of time and a lot of manpower, to get us to the point we’re at now. Even getting into the prison with a wire on and a knife in my pocket, the way we just did, would have been impossible as recently as a month ago. You just got to wait for grudges to come up, disaffection to come down and allegiances to break apart. That’s the way things work around here, and well you know it. But if you think you’ll ever get Galeano back to the States to stand trial you’re falling into a fool’s haven, because it’s never going to happen. Yeah, I know I told him it would, but he’s got enough cash and enough lawyers to keep that case stalling until long after the world’s lost interest. What he doesn’t have, though, is the crystal ball that’s telling me he’s going to be in La Picota for the rest of his worthless existence.’

Chambers looked at him, waiting for an elaboration, but Gómez only chuckled and pressed his foot down harder on the gas.

‘The next few days are going to be critical for you and me,’ he said finally. ‘That’s how long it’s going to take for all this to wrap up the way we need it to, that’s presuming it does. Until then, you could spend your time making up your epitaph, ’cos you’re likely going to need it. Or,’ he added, glancing over with a grin, ‘you could start working out what you’re going to do with Molina, because, in my opinion, you deserve a shot at that bastard before his arrest becomes official.’

‘You mean you’ve got him?’ Chambers said, feeling a twist in his gut.

‘Not yet,’ Gómez answered. ‘But have faith, my boy, have faith.’

An hour later Chambers was inside a run-down
finca
on the road to Medellín, with a dozen armed guards in the surrounding tangle of shadows and trees. The moon was just a pale ghost of itself as it rose in the twilight; and the eerie sense that he was never going to see Gómez
again
, as the Mercedes disappeared in the distance, was something he was struggling to put down to nothing more than an understandable paranoia.

Alone in her room Sandy kept a near twenty-four hour vigil on the news, not daring to pick up the phone to anyone for fear the call might be traced back to where she was. So far she had learned nothing about Tom, but comforted herself with an assurance that if anything had happened it couldn’t fail to make many more bulletins than one. Ellen was still unconscious, and according to the news an hour ago, it was now feared she was slipping into a coma.

Sandy’s heart went out to Michael. She knew that Ellen had been breathing unassisted for a while, so Michael’s hopes must have been soaring, until some kind of complication had set in and the life-support machines were reconnected. And this on the day that the FBI had announced they were charging the two men they had arrested in connection with the murder of Kris Santiago, and the shooting of Ellen Shelby McCann. It was looking much more likely now that the charge would turn into one of double murder.

Sandy looked down at the cluttered desk in front of her. If Ellen died, and with Rachel already dead, she couldn’t help but be aware that she, the woman neither Michael nor Tom wanted, would be the one still left in their lives. It was a horrible, painful reality to face, that she might occupy a place in the world that others wanted for somebody else. But she wasn’t in control of the way things turned out; there was nothing she could do to bring Rachel back, nor could she perform a miracle to save Ellen.

It wasn’t likely that Galeano’s men would find out where she was, but if they did, she had already written a will. The thought of dying terrified her, though perhaps it was the kind of death she would suffer,
should
they manage to track her down, that terrified her the most. So she stayed locked in her room, reading, watching TV and checking that nothing was overlooked in her will.

Her remaining shares in World Wide she had left to Tom – or to Michael if Tom didn’t make it. Right now it didn’t seem that the movie would ever start shooting again, but if it did she knew how vital it was to remove all of Ted Forgon’s power. Apart from allocating her shares, she had taken further steps to ensure that Forgon never again made a single decision regarding the film that meant so much to Tom. What was more she had made certain that Forgon would know she was behind the ignominy and defeat he so badly deserved.

Her apartment and jewellery she had left to Nesta, and everything else she owned she had bequeathed to the people who were looking after her now. Even if no-one else understood that, Tom would, presuming, of course, that he made it through whatever hell he was enduring now, and that he didn’t fall into the trap of taking the revenge he had promised himself on Salvador Molina.

Michael sat at Ellen’s bedside, his head resting on one of the blue padded bed rails, his hand barely touching hers. He was almost asleep, so exhausted now by his vigil that the whole of his life had lost shape and meaning. He didn’t understand what had happened, why her lung had suddenly collapsed again and she had started slipping away when she had been doing so well. With all his heart he had believed that it was only a matter of hours before she would open her eyes and look at him; before they could ask her to cough to help them remove the tube that was still in her lungs. Instead, they had been forced to reconnect the tube, which was once again pumping and sucking air in and out of her body, along with all the other life-preserving elements that were keeping her there.

By contrast the baby was coming along so well that he was now breathing alone, and one of the IVs in his scalp had just been removed. His skin was no longer red and shiny; it was turning pink and healthy, and his hair was coming through quite thick and black. Not long now, the doctor said, before Michael would be holding him and feeding him. Each time Michael looked at him he could feel the tears sliding down his face. This was Ellen’s son, the child she wanted so badly, that he loved not only because it was theirs, but because it was hers. It didn’t matter whose loss would be the greater, his or his son’s, all that mattered was that they remained together, the way Ellen would want.

Her parents had gone back to the house now, leaving him alone with her, the way he preferred. It wasn’t that he wanted to keep them away, but their fear, their terrible anguish and confusion made his own worse. He guessed that his gaunt, unshaven face held the same hardship for them, though they all, in their own ways, tried to comfort each other. He wondered how they would all be managing without his mother, who was going quietly on with the everyday chores, and driving back and forth to the hospital bringing food and the kind of solace only a mother could provide.

Selfish though it was, he wished desperately that Robbie were there, as he couldn’t bear the thought that Robbie might never see Ellen again. The house felt silent and empty without him – Spot’s pining was hard to watch without wanting to hold the scruffy little dog and weep into his fur. He wondered how it would be, just him, Robbie, the baby and Spot. It felt all wrong without Ellen, in fact without her he knew nothing would ever be right again.

He tried to tell her some of this, leaning on her bed rail and whispering over the monotonous hiss and puff of the ventilator. But in the end he was so tired that he fell asleep where he was, moving into a dream that was so
deep
and impenetrable that he didn’t feel her hand stir beneath his, nor did he see her eyes flicker open before, very gently, they flickered closed again.

Chapter 24

THE TV WAS
on, the sound turned down low, as Chambers, now wearing the combat clothes he’d been allocated, dozed in a badly sprung chair behind the boarded-up windows of the
finca
where Gómez had left him. The room was spare and dusty, plaster flaking from the walls, damp creeping across the ceiling, and the boards underfoot creaked with every move.