The Wrong Hostage (13 page)

“Most of the time,” Lane said. “But wait. I need something to drink. My mouth is dry all the time.”

He went to a small bar refrigerator and pulled out an unopened carton of orange juice. Before he could break the seal and drink, Faroe took the carton.

“Hold on,” Faroe said. “I’m not a big fan of liquids packaged in Mexico.”

Lane opened his mouth, closed it, and waited.

Faroe inspected the waxed carton carefully. The fold-back ears on the “open here” side were still sealed. When he looked inside the fold at the other side of the top, he spotted a tiny hole where someone had slipped a hypodermic needle through the paper. He showed the hole to Grace and to her son. Lane looked confused.

Grace didn’t.

“Let’s walk,” she said to her son. “Fresh air is better for clearing your head than orange juice.”
Especially that juice
.

When they walked out into the muggy afternoon, two guards stood up quickly and reached for their guns.

Faroe kept walking.

Grace tugged Lane in his wake.

The guards hesitated, then fell in line about ten feet behind Lane.

As soon as the trail widened, Faroe stepped back and put his arm around Lane to steady him and speed him up. Grace was doing the same
from the other side, but Lane was too big for her to hold him up alone, much less to make him walk faster. The three of them moved as a unit to the water’s edge, where waves were breaking on the sand.

The guards, once they saw where Lane was headed, slowed down to light cigarettes. They were at least fifty feet behind.

“Keep your voices down,” Faroe said quietly. “They can’t hear us over the sound of the waves.”

Lane nodded that he understood, but he still looked confused.

To Grace he looked terribly vulnerable.

“What’s going on?” Lane asked, shaking his head hard, trying to clear it. “Is this as bad as I think it is?”

A
LL
S
AINTS
S
CHOOL
S
UNDAY AFTERNOON

G
RACE GLANCED QUICKLY AT
Faroe, not knowing how much to tell Lane.

“How bad do you think it is?” Faroe asked the boy.

Lane was silent for a moment, but he was thinking hard. In the ocean air he seemed more alert. He looked at his mother, then at the hard-faced man she’d brought with her.

“I’m really a prisoner, right?” the boy asked.

Grace wanted to soften Lane’s words.

Faroe stopped her.

“I know this is tough,” he said, touching her hair gently, “but we won’t get anywhere by sugarcoating it.”

Faroe looked at the boy, who was only a few inches shorter than himself, and said bluntly, “You’re a hostage.”

Lane blinked. Then he raked his fingers through his hair and yanked, trying to force himself to focus. “I can’t think!”

“They’re drugging you,” Faroe said. “Probably only in the orange juice.”

“What?” Lane said sharply.

“Keep your voice down,” Faroe said. “It’s probably a sedative. It’s a common tactic for controlling hostages. They don’t want to hurt you. They just want to keep you fuzzy.”

“Okay,” Lane said. “Okay. That’s good. I was thinking I was getting really sick or going crazy or something. The nightmares…Jesus. I can’t
believe people spend money to feel like crap.”

“You’re not crazy,” Grace said quickly, squeezing his shoulders with her arm. “You’re the sanest person in a crazy mess.”

“Hostage,” Lane said, tasting the word, testing the reality. “So what am I hostage for? What do they want? Money from Dad?”

“We don’t know for sure,” Faroe said. “We should know more in the next day.”

“But if you don’t know, how can—”

“Honey, Joe’s a professional at this sort of thing,” Grace cut in, reaching over to smooth the hair out of her son’s eyes. “He’s the best there is. But he’s only been on the job a few hours. He needs more time to investigate.”

Lane glanced at Faroe with new interest. “A professional? Really?”

“That just means people pay me money. But yeah, I’ve dealt with hostiles like your Chicharrones Brigade. They’re just dumb soldiers. We need to find out who the generals are.”

That triggered something in Lane’s drugged mind. He turned to his mother. “Where’s Dad?” he asked urgently.

“I—I’ve—” Grace began, but her voice cracked.

“We haven’t been able to reach him,” Faroe said. “Why do you ask?”

“Because Mr. Calderón came to see me yesterday, today too. I think. It’s all kind of…fuzzy. He brought juice and food and asked me where Dad was.”

“Carlos Calderón?” Grace asked.

Lane fought to call up the memory. Like a lot of reality since his mother had left, memory was slippery. He frowned, remembering the past twenty-four hours in bits and pieces, flashes of light and darkness. “Yeah, Mr. Calderón was kind of pissed, uh, mad when I told him I didn’t know where Dad was. Like he thought I was lying. I think he hit me a couple of times. Can’t really remember. Nightmare…”

Grace’s hand clenched hard around Lane’s shoulder and she bit back every word she wanted to scream.

“Why isn’t Dad here?” Lane asked. “Calderón said I could go home if Dad came down to sign me out.”

Grace looked away, hiding the tears and rage and fear in her eyes.

“Your mom’s pretty upset about this,” Faroe said calmly. “She hasn’t
been able to contact your dad. It’s one of our top priorities.”

Lane stared at the sand.

“Do you have any idea where your dad might be?” Faroe asked.

Lane’s answer was a shake of the head. Then he looked up at Faroe. “I haven’t heard from him in weeks. He used to come down on a helicopter once every three or four weeks, supposedly to drop in to say hi to me, but he spent hours talking with somebody at the school office and barely waved at me.”

Grace’s heart turned over. No matter how tall Lane was, how fast he was growing, he was only a few months past being fourteen. He was a boy whose world had been turned upside down.

“We’ll find your dad, get this thing straightened out,” Faroe said. “Don’t worry.” He reached over and gave the boy a poke on the shoulder, man-to-man stuff that was cover for a quick glance back toward the guards.

They were smoking and laughing. Forty feet away, maybe more.

With the skill of a pickpocket, Faroe pulled a flat, compact cell phone out of his jeans. He palmed the phone and gave it to Lane, shielding the exchange with his body.

“Hide this in your room,” Faroe said in a low, intent voice. “We need to stay in touch in a way that the Chicharrones Brigade can’t monitor.”

Lane looked down at the phone in his hand. “Cool.”

“Don’t look at it,” Faroe said. “Don’t look at them.
Look at me
. Don’t look away from me when you put the phone in your shorts.”

The boy turned his body slightly, slipped the phone into one of the many pockets in his cargo shorts, and never stopped looking at Faroe.

“Good,” Faroe said. “The battery is fully charged, but I didn’t have time to get fresh batteries brought in. We have to decide on a communications schedule.”

The boy put his hands in his pockets and tried to match Faroe’s relaxed stance. “Gotcha.”

Faroe smiled. Once the drugs got out of the kid’s system, he’d be a pistol.

“Every night, at one
A.M.
,” Faroe said, “pull out the antenna and turn on the phone. It’s set to vibrate, not ring, so they won’t hear it outside the cottage. If I haven’t called you by five minutes after one, shut down and
power up again at five in the morning. Can you do that?”

Lane thought a moment. “One might be a little tough but I’m used to getting up early for the twice-a-day workouts. I’ll figure something out.”

“Set an alarm and put it under your pillow so the guards can’t hear it.”

“You
do
sneak around for a living, don’t you?” Lane said with genuine admiration.

“The first thing I ever needed to hide was a
Playboy
magazine. I know all the teenager tricks.”

Lane flushed and gave his mother a quick sideways glance.

Grace didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. “It’s okay, baby—Lane. It comes with age and the Y gene.”

The boy looked relieved and embarrassed at the same time. He glanced back to Faroe. “Can I call you?”

“Only if you’re certain you’re in immediate danger, the kind of situation my boss—ex-boss—calls a matter of extreme urgency.”

Grace flinched, remembering how Dwayne had defined it:
A terrorist with a gun held against a hostage’s head
.

“But I don’t think that will happen,” Faroe said. “The negotiations haven’t really opened yet.”

Swallowing hard, Lane nodded.

“The other reason to call me is if you hear from your dad,” Faroe added. “Just hit the speed dialer. There’s only one number in the memory. It will ring in New York, but whoever answers will always know how to get hold of me and your mom. If they can’t reach us for some reason, ask for James Steele. You have all that?”

Lane nodded and touched the pocket where he’d concealed the phone. He grinned at Faroe.

“Thanks,” he said. “I already know where I’m going to hide it.”

Faroe tapped him on the shoulder. “Good. If I’m going to make burros of the bad guys, I need your help.”

Grace saw a sudden proud smile spread across her son’s face. He was in charge of his own fate now, in a way he hadn’t been when she and Joe arrived.

He understands Lane better than Ted ever did. Or ever wanted to
.

A familiar mixture of sadness and anger swept through her. She crushed
it. Lane needed her focused on helping him, not on her past mistakes.

Faroe gripped Lane’s shoulder gently. “Okay. Now I want you and your mom to kill twenty minutes looking at the gulls and the waves and talking about soccer and grades and the girls you never see anymore. If I’m not back by then, go to your cottage. I’ll meet you there. And don’t worry about the guards. They’re on a short leash.”
For now
.

“Where are you going?” Grace asked.

Faroe didn’t answer. He just headed with long strides toward the chapel.

Grace started talking about soccer.

One of the guards braced Faroe as he walked past.

“Where do you go?” the guard demanded.

“Church,” Faroe said. “To pray for the boy’s safety.”

The guard’s smile was as thin as a new moon. “You are wise.”

O
UTSIDE
E
NSENADA
S
UNDAY AFTERNOON

F
AROE STOPPED IN FRONT
of the small chapel whose wooden doors had been burned gray and black by the sun. Salt air from the nearby ocean had corroded the doors’ wrought-iron hinges to reddish shadows. A plaque beside the entrance said that Jesuit monks had built the place in 1789, with the help of God and the local Indians. Now the adobe brick walls were slumped like an old priest’s shoulders.

The guard who had followed Faroe lounged against the outside of the adobe wall that surrounded the chapel, not crowding his quarry but clearly keeping his eyes open. The guard’s hand was on the Glock he carried butt forward in the waistband of his jeans. It wasn’t a particularly threatening gesture—if you were used to seeing armed men.

A pepper tree with a trunk three feet thick filled the side yard of the little adobe chapel. The tree shaded a stone fountain so old that the inscriptions had worn away. Through the lacy green curtain of leaves, Faroe caught a glimpse of a swirling black cassock. A priest was entering the church through a back door.

Father Rafael Magón was a little late, but he was there.

Without a glance at his guard, Faroe walked into the shadowed chapel and pulled the wooden door closed behind him. His eyes adjusted to the dim light coming through four dusty stained-glass windows. The altar was made of tarnished tin and ancient wood. The figure of Christ on the cross must have been carved in the nineteenth century, or even earlier.
The Savior’s face was dusky, his features thick, his body drenched in blood. He was
muy indio,
like the parishioners he absolved.

The confession booth was set in an alcove beside the altar. Faroe slid onto the rough bench reserved for
penitentes,
but he left the privacy curtain open so he would know if anyone came in the chapel’s front door. Through the wooden grille, he made out a swarthy man with black hair and careful blue eyes.

“Father, forgive me, for I have sinned and it’s been a long, long time since my last confession,” Faroe said. “But then, the same is probably true of you.”

The vivid blue eyes focused sharply through the grate. “Confession is a one-way sacrament,” the priest said softly. His English was polished, almost without accent. He could have been raised in San Diego rather than Mexico.

“Then where does a wayward priest confess?” Faroe asked.

“Who are you and what do you want?” The voice was still soft, but it was cold with the understanding of power.

“I’m a man who knows you’re more than the simple
indio
priest you seem to be. I want to know why a highly placed and well-educated priest, one with powerful sponsors in Rome, finds himself absolving murderers and drug lords.”

Behind the grate Magón was like a mosaic of a man rather than flesh itself.

“All of God’s children need pastoral guidance,” the priest said. “All congregants are human. Therefore they are sinners. The church goes where it is most needed.”

“There’s a big jump from ministering to aiding and abetting. You seem more interested in your corrupt sinners than in the boy Lane Franklin, an innocent who could die of your neglect.”

The wooden grate shot aside. “Who are you?” Magón demanded again, his voice low. “Give me the truth or this charade ends.”

What Faroe gave him was a level, unflinching look.

The little chapel was quiet for a long time.

Magón blinked and glanced away, a man thinking, and thinking hard. When he looked at Faroe again, he seemed less certain, more wary. He
settled back on his side of the wooden wall.

“You have a good friend,” Magón said, “a man I trust as I trust few on earth. He told me to be here but he couldn’t say why. He merely said he believed you could be trusted.”

Faroe leaned against the wooden wall on his own side of the screen. The air inside the thick-walled little chapel was humid, still, shielded from the restless storm churning up from Cabo San Lucas.

The place smelled dangerous, not confessional.

No risk, no reward,
Faroe reminded himself dryly.

“Judge Silva has hired me to negotiate her son’s release,” Faroe said. “At the moment, we aren’t even sure who to negotiate with, since the target of this extortion is Ted Franklin. Lane is merely the pawn. Will you help?”

Magón bowed his head and stayed motionless for several long breaths. Then Faroe heard a rustling sound, like cloth shifting. A thick leather wallet appeared in the little window.

“Cigar?” the priest asked quietly.

“No thanks.”

“Do you object if I have one? It’s my principal vice. Some of my brethren think I take too much pleasure in them, so I only smoke when no brothers are around.”

“Go ahead, I won’t report you to the archbishop of Tijuana. Does he realize you’re a Vatican spy?”

Magón’s only answer was the metallic sound of a lighter being struck. A few seconds later Faroe smelled smoke from a decent Havana cigar.

“Vatican spy?” Magón asked with a faint smile. “Isn’t that what is called an oxymoron, like ‘military intelligence’?”

“Some of us heathens think the church is as much a political institution as it is a religious one.”

“The church does what it must,” Magón said.

“So do I. I don’t have cathedrals and armies of priests behind me, which makes it a lot easier for me to slide between cracks and disappear into the shadows. That makes a lot of people nervous. What nationality are you, Father?”

The question seemed to surprise Magón. He thought about it for a moment, shrugged, and answered. “I was raised in Logan Heights barrio, in
San Diego, but I was born here in Baja.”

“Down around El Alamo,” Faroe said.

Black eyebrows raised in surprise. “You are clairvoyant?”

“No, but I know that the Magonistas who didn’t get their asses shot off in 1911 ended up in the
ejidos
and the mines around El Alamo. There’s even a little community called Ojos Azules.”

Blue eyes.

“You’ve been there?” Magón asked.

“Yes.”

“Most Mexicans know very little about the Magonistas. It’s one of the sad things about my country. Our history is only found in the shadows. You’re an odd gringo that you see those shadows.”

“I never knew my father very well,” Faroe said. “I was born late in his life. The only trips we ever took were to the mountains east of here, between Ojos Azules and El Alamo. My father was either crazy or a shaman, or both at once. The poor people accepted, even celebrated, his differences. He was a marijuana smuggler back before marijuana became an international commodity. He loved to smoke weed and he loved that wild country and its stoic people. After he died, I came down to Ensenada to go surfing. The ocean was the color of his eyes.”

Magón studied Faroe’s face. There was nothing to see but intent green eyes, wariness, surprising intelligence, and the relaxation of someone who was used to being alert without being anxious.

“Yet here you are,” the priest said. “Between the surfer and the man you are now lies much history, yes? You have a hard look about you, the look of a policeman rather than a smuggler.”

“I was a cop once,” Faroe said, “just like that guy outside with the gun, just like the Chicharrones Brigade keeping Lane in his four-bedroom prison. You don’t have to be honest to carry a badge. Or a crucifix.”

“So cynical,” Magón said wryly.

“It’s a dirty job, but if someone doesn’t do it, everyone will have to. There are still some innocents in this corrupt world. Lane is one of them.”

“And his mother?”

“What about her?”

“I was wondering if there might be some personal relationship between
you and the beautiful judge.”

It was Faroe’s turn to be surprised. News of the hot act in the marina parking lot had made it to Mexico sooner than he’d expected. “Since when do the
federales
report to you?”

Magón looked puzzled. Then he dragged on the cigar, making its tip glow beneath a pale layer of ash. “I didn’t need a
federale
to tell me there is something between you and the woman. I saw the three of you walking down there on the sand. A close relationship would explain why you’re trampling where angels fear to tiptoe.”

“You have your motives,” Faroe said. “I have mine. The only real question is if we can find common ground.”

Magón sighed. “I don’t want Lane harmed. That’s true of all my charges. But Lane is…different. Intelligent enough to fear, brave enough not to show it, a natural athlete, a superb student once he realized it mattered, and with surprising insight into adults for a boy his age.”

Something in Faroe began to relax. The risk he’d taken was very close to paying off. “Can I count on you to keep Lane safe while I try to untangle this mess?”

“This ‘mess,’ as you call it, is quite complicated. It’s not likely to yield to the efforts of a single man, no matter how skillful or dangerous he is. The outcome is in God’s hands.”

“My objectives are more limited than yours,” Faroe said. “If necessary, I can work alone. Your pope wouldn’t like the results.”

“This situation has very high stakes. No one controls all the players. No one can guarantee the outcome.”

“Not even God?”

“He works in ways we mortals don’t always understand.”

“Save it for the believers. I hold individual mortals responsible for earthly outcomes.”

Magón straightened. “You’re threatening me.”

“Amen.”

The priest’s blue eyes stared through the little window, studying Faroe. Magón puffed quickly on the cigar and his face disappeared in a billow of smoke. When the air cleared, his eyes had changed. They were direct, hard.

“If I am as corrupt as you suspect I might be,” Magón said, “why wouldn’t I run straight to the men who hold Lane?”

“Because you learned this secret in the confessional, Father.”

“Only believers are protected by the sanctity of the confessional.”

“A lawyer, as well as a diplomat and a spy,” Faroe said dryly. “I should have expected no less from the Vatican. Yes, I’m taking a calculated risk with you. I trust our mutual friend in Rome. He may or may not know what you’re up to but he knows you’re more complex than you appear to be.”

“A cynic, yet still a man of some faith,” Magón said.

“I’ve learned to trust a few people. Damned few.”

“I, too, have faith in a few people. For the moment I’ll keep the confidences of a man who walks into danger by choice.”

Faroe almost smiled. Under other circumstances, he would have enjoyed Father Rafael Magón, radical pragmatist and Vatican spy.

“Where can I find Hector Rivas?” Faroe asked.

“Why?”

“He holds Lane’s life in his murdering hands,” Faroe said.

Savoring his cigar, Magón considered the request for a full minute. A feudal lord and
traficante
like Hector Rivas Osuna had many enemies. A man like Faroe could find many ways to ambush even the highly protected Hector.

“I have nothing to gain by killing Hector,” Faroe said, understanding the reason for Magón’s hesitation. “With Hector dead, Lane would be in more danger, not less. I’m here to negotiate before anyone gets real nervous. Nerves and guns scare the hell out of me.”

Magón looked at the tip of the glowing cigar and sighed a smoke-laden breath. “Normally, I wouldn’t be able to answer your question. Hector is always on the move, never sleeping in the same place twice in a row. Sometimes he moves several times in the same night.”

“Yeah, well, the man has a lot to worry about,” Faroe said sardonically. “History is one long list of people who lay awake wondering who to trust. Some of them guessed right. Others died young.”

The priest smiled, then sighed again. “One of Hector’s nephews is getting married. I will perform the ceremony this weekend at the Rivas
rancho
east of Jacumba.”

“My condolences to the bride,” Faroe said under his breath.

“Tonight there’s a celebration in Ensenada,” Magón said. “Hector is the patriarch of an extended clan. He will attend the party, even if only for an hour or so.”

“Ensenada is too big to search in an hour or so. Can you narrow it down?”

“Try the Canción. It’s a restaurant on the grounds of the Encantamar, just off the ocean walk, the
malecón,
in Ensenada. Hector likes the abalone there.”

“Thank you, Father.”

“Understand that Hector Rivas Osuna is a ticking bomb.”

“Anything in particular that will set him off?”

“Everything, at any moment. He has become addicted to rock and nicotine.”

The confessional window slid closed.

Shit. A crackhead toking doctored Mexican cigarettes. He could blow up at any instant
.

The chapel was so quiet Faroe could hear the gentle trickle of water in the fountain beneath the pepper tree.

The complex Father Rafael Magón had vanished.