The Covert Element (36 page)

I glared at Gunner.

"So anyway . . . back to the drugs. Behind this secret door in the
lab was another whole lab they used for cooking up meth. It had a
souped-up ventilation system that piped in fresh air and pumped
the ammonia smell out a vent stack that ran alongside one a the
corn bins. The stack was high enough so the air thinned out the
smells. That’s why people didn’t notice more ammonia than would
be normal around a place like that.

"Attached to the meth lab . . . and still underground . . . they
had an assembly line for packaging the meth in heavy plastic – like
one a them shrink wrappers, only thicker bags. They’d put a one-pound baggie of meth inside a forty-pound paper bag of cornmeal.
Then that bag would go on the truck with all the rest of the meal.
They’d ship the stuff to warehouses in Chicago, Minneapolis,
Milwaukee . . . all over the place.

"Every truck would have maybe 800 bags of meal. And about
20 of ‘em had drugs. So even if somebody had stopped the trucks
and sampled the bags, they probably wouldn’t have found anything.

"Anyway . . . when the bags got to their destination, other
druggies would separate out the meth and re-bag the meal. So they
made money off both the drugs and the corn. Pretty darn efficient,
if you ask me."

"What about the ingredients for the meth? Did they find
those?"

"Just like we guessed, the anhydrous was in a big tank in plain
sight. The bone meal was in a pile under a tarp, right behind the
bins. And the iodine came in gallon jugs they kept in the lab.
‘Course they had summa the iodine in the feed store for the farmers,
too."

"What about the lithium? Where’d they get that?"

"There was a shed out back at the Elevator where they kept all
the batteries. They were mostly electric car batteries. FBI hasn’t
figured out where they got ‘em from yet."

"So that all worked out pretty much like we figured, eh,
Gunner?"

I was feeling pretty good about deciphering the drug
ingredients and the location of the lab.

"Pretty much. And it was a big drug operation, too. FBI figures
they were shipping out somewhere between a hundred and two
hundred pounds a week. At about 10,000 bucks a pound, that’s . . .
that’s a big bunch a dough. Street value would be maybe ten times
as much after it all gets broken down into grams and eightballs and
such."

The lab was much bigger than I had guessed.

"Wow. One to two million dollars a week. Ten to twenty million
on the street. That’s got to be a bust for the record books."

"Sure would be . . . if we’d actually found the drugs. But mosta
them were already sold and gone. Only found about twenty pounds
on hand. But that’s still big."

I could feel my ego deflate a bit.

"Okay. So that’s the drugs. Who were the dead guys?"

"Well, the first one you know already. Juan Fuentes aka
Raphael Santos. From all accounts, a great soldier who got kinda
crazy over fightin’ the cartel . . ."

"
Los Cinco
?"

"Uh huh. Anyway, he was around those animals for so long his
moral compass kinda got whacked out. He’d do anything to bring
down the cartel. Damn near did it, too."

"Only ‘damn near’? I thought he had all kinds of info for the
cops that would allow them to decimate the whole
Los Cinco
operation. What happened to that? Wasn’t his info any good?"

"The part he had on him . . . the computer drive . . . that was
good – real good. Between Mexico and the U.S., they tapped into
more than a billion dollars worth of cartel money in overseas bank
accounts and investments. But that was as far as the information on
the drive went.

"Apparently, Santos was smart enough to hang onto the rest of
the info till he could cut a deal with the Feds and get into Witsec.
Everybody’s still lookin’ for where that stuff might be. No luck so
far."

"Was Fuentes really the head guy at
Los Cinco
?"

"Yessir.
El Jefe!
The big Kahuna.

"He’d been workin’ his way up from the bottom for years. The
man had a mission and I guess he figured the ends justified the
means. The Mexican
Federales
like him for more than a dozen
murders and a bunch of other stuff. If you sleep with the hogs, you
can’t help gettin’ dirty."

Taking down the head of an international drug cartel was no
small accomplishment. Although, in all honesty, I guess he’d taken
himself down. He’d planned to surrender to authorities all along.

"How about the suits in the body bags? What’s their story?"

"Names are Dosdall and Ashcroft. They were outta Chicago.
Guess they were cartel flunkies – a lawyer and an accountant. FBI’s
got its forensic accountants poring over files from those guys’
offices. Maybe they’ll find some dummy corporations or some cartel
assets or something useful. Frankly, I’m not interested in that
paperwork stuff. More a get-my-fingers-dirty kinda guy."

I tried to recall the last time I’d seen Gunner with dirt under
his nails.

"Anything else interesting?"

"The FBI guys said Santos had dropped a radio transmitter in
the parking lot outside the Elevator. It’s the kinda thing terrorists
use to set off explosives. They never did find any bomb, though.
They can’t figure out what that’s all about.

"You don’t have any guesses, do you?"

"Me? Why would you ask me? How would I know about
missing explosives?"

Gunner gave me the hairy eyeball.

"Just thought I’d better ask. Sometimes it seems you know
more than’s good for ya."

"Sorry. I’ve got nothing to say about explosives."

"One other thing . . . not really to do with Bellechester. I don’t
s’pose you know how the two Mexicans in the river cabin got
there?"

"Yeah. They conked me on the noggin in
your
LEC parking lot
and hauled me up there in a fishing boat. Thought I already told you
that."

"You did. What I want to know is how one a them got dead and
the other one got tied up."

"I tied the guy up . . . after I wiggled out of their evil clutches.
The dead guy? Seems like one minute he was talking and the next
he was dead on the floor. I sure as hell didn’t shoot him. You can
check my guns for ballistics."

"Won’t need to do that. It was a rifle round. From a military
gun . . . like maybe an M4."

"Huh."

"So you don’t know where that bullet came from I s’pose?"

"Honestly, Gunner . . ." I chose my words carefully. "I didn’t
see anybody shoot him. And I can’t say why somebody would want
him dead . . . less they’re maybe a Good Samaritan or something."

Gunner looked me up and down.

"That’s about what I figured you’d say.

"Anyway, I turned the alive guy over to ICE. Seems he wasn’t
s’posed to be here at all. No passport. No visa. No papers of any
kind."

"So what do you suppose will happen to all those workers at the
Elevator? How will they sort out who knew what and who should be
doing some time in prison?"

"Don’t know for sure. Immigration’ll prob’ly just load ‘em all
up and ship ‘em back where they came from – which I’m told, is
Mexico."

Damn. Fuentes was right about repatriation.

"If we send them back to Mexico, won’t they just bribe their
way out of prison and join back up with the cartel? That can’t be the
right answer."

"None of my business to decide . . . or yours either. Not a
perfect world, you know."

Not by a damn shot!

Beth had listened silently this whole time. Now she spoke.

"Who was the woman who shot Santos?"

"Oh, yeah. Almost forgot about her. She was Santos’ wife,
Elena. Her uncle was Enrique Calderon. He headed up the cartel for
a lotta years before he died. I guess blood relation gave her, and her
husband, a leg up on takin’ over the top spot. Prob’ly part of Santos’
plan from the beginning."

"What will they do with her? Is she going to prison in the U.S.
or what?"

"Yes, Ma’am. She killed Santos in front of a whole bunch of
witnesses. You caught her red-handed with the murder weapon.
When they tack on time for her part in the cartel, I’m pretty sure
she’ll be locked up for a l-o-n-g time."

"Thank goodness for that, at least," Beth said. "I’d hate to have
gone all Fight Club on her only to find out that she was going to
skate."

"Skate?" Gunner and I said together.

Beth looked wounded.

"You know . . . get off on some technicality."

Gunner and I nodded, but didn’t speak.

"Oh, shut up!"

Beth rose.

"Guess I’ll go soak my knuckles. Smacking someone’s jaw with
your fist kinda hurts. You should try it sometime if opportunity
arises. Oh, wait. Wasn’t there an opportunity just recently?"

Beth blew on her knuckles as she left the room.

Gunner and I looked at each other.

"She’s got a point," I said.

"Damn straight."

CHAPTER FIFTY

I figured it was only right that Bull should know the
information we’d heard from Gunner. The next day, I dropped by
his cabin.

There were no signs of life. But I thought I’d knock anyway.

I stood on the wooden floor of the front porch waiting for Bull
to answer my knock.

"Who’s there?"

I just about jumped out of my shoes. Bull was standing right
behind me. I mean, he was literally two feet away.

"What the hell? You trying to scare me to death. I just had a
run-in with some pretty mean dudes and I’m still a little jumpy."

"Gotta practice sneakin’."

"Well, practice your sneakin’ on somebody else, okay?"

Bull ignored my plea.

"Why are you here?"

"I wanted to fill you in on what Gunner told me about the big
bust at Bellechester Organic. Thought you might want to hear the
details."

Bull brushed past me and through his front door.

"C’mon in."

Bull sat in "his" chair. I chose a spot facing him.

"Okay. Shoot."

His face didn’t betray the slightest bit of interest in the subject.
But if he was willing to listen, I knew he wanted to know.

I relayed all the information that Gunner had told Beth and me
yesterday.

"The cops seem perplexed about the radio detonator Fuentes
was holding. And Gunner asked who shot the Mexican on the river.
I played dumb."

I smiled.

"You’re good at that."

I tried a different tack.