She looked up at him, her eyes wide with shock, terror. “I have no problem, darling. I swear.”
“Is it Carlos?”
She looked down at her plate and shook her head. “No, no.”
“What did he do?”
“He did nothing.
“Really, it’s not him.”
“Then what is it?”
“Please, please. Let’s forget I said anything.”
His voice dropped into little more than a whisper. When he spoke, he did so through clenched teeth. “Tell. Me. Now.”
“I just wanted some time alone. With the children,” she said. “Everywhere we go, we have guards. It just makes me self-conscious.”
“It keeps you alive, you ungrateful bitch.”
She nodded. He saw tears beginning to brim over. He considered letting it go at that. But obviously he needed to teach this little bitch a lesson. She’d either taken leave of her senses or she just didn’t appreciate all he did for her. Regardless, the woman needed to be taught a lesson.
He noticed her hand had slipped off the table and she clutched her stomach. “So you never complained before, but now you are. Now, it’s a big deal, yes? Suddenly you must complain.”
When she spoke again, her voice was barely audible. “Forgive me. I have no right to complain.”
“But here you are, feeding me this bullshit. You think this is a bad life? You think I’m giving my children, my babies, a shitty deal, right? I’m a bad Papa to my babies. Is that it?”
He turned and found one of his guards standing in the door leading from their bedroom onto the terrace. “Go get your boss. We’ll settle this bullshit once and for all.”
Rosa gave him a panicked look. “Miguel?”
He silenced her with a wave of his hand. They waited in tense silence for a couple of minutes. The security chief, dressed in khakis and a starched white shirt, sauntered through the Mendoza’s bedroom and onto the terrace. He winked at one of the guards, pointed a finger and smiled at the other one. When Carlos approached the table, he nodded politely at Rosa, but didn’t look at her too long. Rather, he turned to face Mendoza.
“You wanted something, sir?” he asked.
Mendoza leaned back in his chair. He laced his fingers together and rested the back of his head in the palms. “Carlos,” he said. “I have news.”
“News?”
“Yeah, news. I gotta let you go.”
Carlos smiled and began to shift on his feet. “Let me go? You’re firing me?”
Rosa interjected, “Miguel, no.”
His face whipped toward her. “You shut up!” he said. He underscored each word with a jab from his finger. “This is between him and me. Understand?”
“Is there a problem, boss?”
“You’ve offended my wife. Let’s just leave it at that.”
Carlos’s face tightened with anger. “Ma’am, is this true? I offended you somehow?”
Mendoza came out of his chair and punched Carlos in the stomach. The younger man staggered back, but almost immediately got his footing. He started to bring up his fists in a fighting stance, thought better of it and let them drop to his sides.
Mendoza glanced over his shoulder. He wanted to make sure the others were watching, particularly his wife, who now sat sobbing at the table. He knew they weren’t just questioning him, they were questioning his authority, his competency. They wanted to take him down. His wife, this pack of overpaid killers. They were all a bunch of damn savages. They all wanted what he had, and he needed to take them down before they took him.
He turned to the guards at his back. He nodded at Carlos. “Take him out.” The guards, both of them armed with Uzis, stared at him for a moment. “What, are you deaf? I said—”
One of the guards suddenly reached out, shoved him out of the way. He hit the ground, his outstretched hands breaking his fall. He heard autofire erupt overhead from the guards’ SMGs. Shell casings struck the ground and rolled underneath him. Somewhere in all the noise he heard his wife’s screams of terror. A moment later, the shooting had ended. He rolled over onto his rear. Carlos lay facedown on the ground, his back ravaged by bullet exit wounds. His handgun lay on the ground next to him, inches from his outstretched fingers.
Roberto Cardenas, the guard who’d shoved Mendoza to the ground, held out a hand to help him up. Mendoza slapped it away and came to his feet.
“You’re the new chief of security,” Mendoza said. “Think you can handle it?”
“Sure I do.”
“Good, clean up this mess. Then come with me. We’ve got a special delivery coming from America
“THE OLD MAN’S GONE crazy,” Cardenas whispered.
“Crazy?” Emilio Cortez replied, his confusion evident.
“Crazy, man. He just had Carlos killed for no fucking reason.”
“What the hell are you saying? Killed him why? When?”
Cardenas lightly gripped Cortez’s upper arm to steer him away from the others. He cast a last glance over his shoulder and watched as his team from Colorado unloaded Fox from the small jet they’d used to flee from the States. The big programmer’s body was limp thanks to drugs injected into him before they’d loaded him on the plane and returned to Mexico. The guys carrying Fox hauled him over to a black Mercedes, shoved him inside and shut the doors. Each took up a position next to the vehicle, apparently awaiting further orders.
Satisfied, Cortez turned his attention back to Cardenas.
“So, what happened? Why’d the old man have him taken out?”
Cardenas recounted the whole story. When he finished, Cortez slowly shook his head, feeling his stomach knot. He ran a hand over his mouth and swore. “He has lost it. And over some whore.”
“It’s not her fault,” Cardenas said.
Cortez shot him a look and the guy shrank a little bit. “So now you’re sticking up for her.”
“All I’m saying is, it’s not her fault. Mendoza did it, not her. She just asked to go into town without the guards. She wasn’t trying to start trouble. She sure as hell didn’t want Mendoza to flip out or Carlos to die.”
Cortez started to argue the point, thought better of it and clamped his jaw shut. The other man was right. Mendoza’s wife wasn’t the problem; he was the problem. He’d been losing his grip on reality for months now, becoming increasingly paranoid and irrational with each passing day.
“When’s the guy coming?” Cortez asked.
Cardenas checked his watch. “Twenty-five minutes.”
Cortez nodded. “Good.”
“Yeah, good unless Mendoza loses his cool and blows the deal. Then Jack Mace will turn tail and leave. And he’ll take his money with him.”
“The hell he will! Mace wanted this Fox guy in the worst way. You think that once he stands within grabbing distance of Fox he’s suddenly going to change his mind, turn tail and head back to Africa? All just because Mendoza’s a flake? C’mon, man, keep your damn head on straight. This