To The Lions - 02 (38 page)

“I
just know.”

“Am
I supposed to throw the bombs at the guards?”

“No.
 
This is just a diversion.
 
Start screaming and yelling after they go
off.
 
Burn toilet paper.
 
All that stuff you guys do when you riot.”

Salvador
was dumbstruck.

“Can
you do it?”

“Yes.”
 
Salvador glanced at the bathroom.
 
“I’d heard you were in
el aposento
and were due to pay money to El Toro this morning,”
Salvador whispered.

“Word
travels fast.”

“He’s
going to kill you,” Salvador said.

“He’s
going to
try
to kill me.”

 
“Is
la
capitana
in on it?”

“Yes,
but she’s with me.”
 
Gage pressed the
money into Salvador’s hand.
 
“You’re my
only friend here, Sal.
 
Keep all this
quiet.
 
Just hurry out, get those items,
and get everything ready in the cell.
 
You’ll see the guards mustering and—”

“At
two minutes after nine I should make the explosions.”

“Exactly.”

Salvador
extended his cuffed hands, bumping fists with Gage.
 
“You saved me.”

“Now
you can save me.”

“Make
El Toro cry like a
perra
, okay?”

Gage
smiled at his friend.
 
“Hide those items
and go to work.
 
There isn’t much time.”

As
Salvador stood and tucked the aluminum and money into his underpants, de la
Mancha wrapped up her call.
 
She hurried
back into the room, asking if all was set and ready.

“Yes,”
Gage answered.
 

“Oh,”
she said, reaching into her bag.
 
She
produced a bundle of letters, tossing them to him.

They
were from Justina.

“Where
were these?”

“They
were holding these from you, probably on orders of El Toro.”

“But
I got one of them,” Gage said.

“The
mail is run by trustees.
 
I’m sure El
Toro let you have one to tease you.”

“Prick,”
Gage muttered, eyeing the envelopes.
 
There were twenty-five of them.

“That’s
typical of the little tortures around here,” Salvador said, clapping Gage on
the knee, his cuffs jangling.

De
la Mancha called her guard back in, telling him to un-cuff Salvador and release
him back into general population.
 
As he
was led out, Salvador nodded at Gage.

“Nine-oh-two,
mi amigo
.”

When
the two men had left, she un-cuffed Gage.
 
“Salvador’s in,” Gage said.

“I
just hope his timing will be right.”

“He’ll
mix the items at nine-oh-two.
 
After
that, we can’t control how long the reaction takes.”

“Gage,
how will you subdue El Toro?
 
He’s got a
gun.”

 
“I need a bag or backpack or something that
looks like it might have the money in it.”
 
She started to move but he stopped her.
 
“Just know, when this goes down, there’s no turning back.”

“I’d
rather die than turn back,” she answered with conviction.
 
“So you’ve now got a plan?”

Gage
explained.

* * *

The
main bay was unusually quiet for the hour just after breakfast.
 
Typically, other than late afternoons, this
was one of the most raucous times of day.
 
It was when prisoners, cooped up all night with their cellmates, enjoyed
a brief respite from the man they were forced to spend their remaining lives
with.
 
Conversations ranged from debts
owed, to loved ones, to who was copulating with whom.

But
on this morning, as El Toro and a select few stood near the doorway to the long
hallway, staring through the wire glass, the remainder of the prisoners talked
in quiet voices.
 
Los Leones, all of
them, were the quietest.
 
While they
didn’t know exactly what was occurring, they’d heard whispers that today was to
be a landmark.
 
The other non-Leones
prisoners were obviously alert enough to sense the sea change and some, like
Salvador, had gotten word of a coming windfall for Los Leones.
 
Rather than risk a beating, or worse, most
prisoners kept to themselves, quietly speculating about what might happen.

At
8:48 A.M., when Salvador had been released back into the main bay, he was stopped
by a hulking León and questioned by El Toro about why he was summoned.
 
Salvador lied, saying that he took a phone
call telling him that his mother was in the hospital and would die soon.
 
El Toro shoved Salvador away, telling him he
hoped his cunt of a mother would die in screaming agony.

A
short time later, as the steel minute hand on the large main bay clock audibly
clicked to 8:57 A.M., one of the guards appeared in the hallway.
 
Baton in hand, he opened the door, pointing
it at El Toro, motioning him from the main bay.

El
Toro wasn’t searched, wasn’t even escorted away with any measure of
caution.
 
The two men could have been old
friends.
 
In fact, as they passed by the windows
in the hallway, El Toro could be seen laughing at something he’d just been told
by the guard.

And
at his back, just above his waistline, bulged the hard outline of the .44
caliber AutoMag.

Chapter Twenty-Six

Capitana
de la Mancha stood by the back door of her office.
 
Even though Gage couldn’t see her, her
breathing was audible from where he stood in the bathroom.

“You
can’t release emotion like that, de la Mancha,” Gage commanded.
 
“Calm down.”

“I’m
trying, damn it.
 
And I think it’s about
time you start calling me Angelines.”

“Okay,
Angelines, keep your head about you when this all goes down.
 
I have no idea if the guards will hear the
explosion.”

“But
Teresa will,” she said, walking to her desk.
 
“Can’t believe I didn’t think of that.”

“Who?”

“My
assistant.”
 
Angelines spoke on the phone
for a moment.
 
“She’s leaving.”

“What
reason did you give her?”

“I
sent her home because of her hangover.
 
She probably thinks she’s getting fired.”

Gage
surveyed his items.
 
On the counter next
to him was an overnight bag.
 
In front of
him were two soft drink bottles, both made of green plastic.
 
He’d washed them out before fitting broken,
pill-size chips of aluminum, taken from the back of the refrigerator, down
inside of each bottle.
 
In his right hand
was the liquid drain cleaner.
 
He viewed
himself in the mirror.
 
His forehead was
greenish-blue, marked by yellow at the edges of the bruising.
 
His right hand, gripping the drain cleaner,
was also bruised and topped by abrasions on his knuckles.
 
His elbow showed the gash that he’d first
sustained at that Waco gas station—the gash that he’d ripped open several times
since.
 
He felt nauseous due to the pain
in his kidneys and, after the activity of the last few days, his back and
shoulder ached.

As
he stared into his own eyes, Gage briefly thought about the fantasy that was
Navarro’s payoff.
 
Go to prison for a few
years and never work again.
 
And while he
still believed Navarro to have been mostly genuine—even though he’d left out
some crucial pieces of intelligence—Gage was angriest with himself for falling
into such a pit of greed.

Gage
knew that, with his vocation, his life was likely to be short and marked by
numerous valleys.
 
That, despite the
cherry highs—his loving parents, making it through Special Forces selection,
Monika, Justina—his life’s destiny was one of great pain.

“And
shit situations like this,” he ruefully whispered.
 
Though he’d never admit it aloud, he didn’t
think he and Angelines would make it out of Berga alive.

Today
was the probably the day his number would finally get punched, courtesy of a
thuggish Spanish criminal syndicate.

Gage
Hartline had been fed to the lions.

But
that didn’t mean he couldn’t do the world some good on his way out.

So,
when the phone buzzed and Angelines placed her hand on the receiver, Gage vowed
to make this first leg of the plan successful—and eliminating that scum El Toro
would be a fine start.
 

It
was now exactly 9:00 A.M.

Angelines
lifted the phone, telling her guard that, after sending El Toro in, he should assemble
all available guards in the main bay in full riot gear.
 
She stared at the ceiling as she
listened.
 
“Because I said so!” she
yelled back.
 
“I’ve got good intel that
something’s about to happen.
 
Don’t say
anything to El Toro, either.
 
Just wait about
thirty seconds and send him in.
 
Then
make the call.
 
Got it?”
 
She listened, giving Gage a tight smile.
 
“Good.”
 
She hung up.

Gage
immediately poured each soda bottle a quarter full with the drain cleaner.
 
Moving as fast as he could manage, he capped
them both, doing all he could not to shake the bottles as he placed them inside
the overnight bag.
 

This
was the tedious part.

Leaving
the bag unzipped, he rushed across the office, placing the bag in one of the
desk chairs.

The
clock now showed 9:02 A.M.

C’mon, Salvador!

After
a moment, the door buzzed and El Toro strutted through.
 
The guard, talking urgently on his radio,
closed the door behind him.
 
Then the
outer door could be heard closing.
 
Gage
was standing to the right, near the window, behind the sofa.
 
His hands were in front of the sofa’s back
rest, the handcuffs around his wrists, appearing locked.
 
Angelines was beside the back door, at the
far end of the room.

El
Toro swaggered across the floor, evil-eyeing Gage and stopping fifteen feet from
the bag where his money supposedly sat.

He
wasn’t close enough.

Gage
had capped the bottles just a few moments before.
 
The seconds ticked in his mind…
13, 14, 15…

El
Toro reached behind his back, producing Angelines’ .44 AutoMag, distinctive due
to its long vent-rib barrel.
 
He aimed it
at Gage’s head, point-blank range.

“I
have your money,” Gage said.

“I
asked Viejes about visitors,” El Toro replied, saying the words toward
Angelines.
 
“And I was told there
weren’t
any, other than that skinny shit
Semental.”

“
La capitana
got the money from my friend
on her way in,” Gage said, hitching his head at Angelines.

Lowering
the pistol a fraction, El Toro’s animal eyes flicked across the room.
 
“You didn’t tell me nothin’ ‘bout no off-site
meeting, bitch.”

“I-I-I
didn’t know about it yesterday,” she stammered.

Get it together, Angelines!...32,
33, 34…

“Mmm-hmm,”
El Toro mused.
 
“Bet you went back to the
aposento
last night and let this
marieta
do you, didn’t you.”
 
He turned to Gage.
 

“Què
diu el meu gust xufa agrada?”

Knowing
it was an insult but having no time for Catalan translations, Gage spoke
Spanish as he said, “Can you just take your money so I can leave here?
 
I don’t want any more trouble from you and
your friends.”

“I
don’t want any more trouble,” El Toro mocked in a feigned little girl
voice.
 
He narrowed his eyes.
 
“Where’s the money?”

...50, 51, 52…

Please let Salvador’s bombs explode
first!

Again
Gage hitched his head, this time to the coral-colored bag on the guest
chair.
 
“As you’ll see inside that bag,
the money is in small, unmarked bills.”

As
if his street-smarts sensed that something was wrong, El Toro stood
motionless.
 
Only his eyes moved to the
bag.
 
He sucked on his teeth, curling his
lip to show a flash of gold.
 
“Get the
bag for me.”

Taking
care to keep the loose handcuffs pressed against his body (so they wouldn’t
clatter to the floor) Gage started to move.

The
pistol came straight up as El Toro said, “Not you,
marieta
.”
 
The pistol
traversed to Angelines.
 
“You.”

…58, 59, 60!

Gage
could see Angelines trying to stifle her panic.
 
“Sancho,” she protested meekly.
 
“I was standing back here by the door in case you were, well…in case you
were going to do something to our prisoner.”

“Oh,
I’m going to do something to him if my money is not in that bag.”
 
He twisted the pistol, holding his aim on her
as he screamed, “Now get the damned bag, bitch!”
 
Spittle flew from his mouth, a thin line of
saliva hanging from his snarling lower lip as he stood there huffing.

Gage
turned to Angelines as he worked the conundrum in his mind.
 
The aluminum chips were thicker than anything
Gage had ever worked with.
 
In fact, he’d
been trained with standard aluminum foil, only a fraction of the thickness of
the refrigerator’s soft aluminum.
 
How
long?

He
nodded at Angelines.

…72, 73, 74…

Though
her first step showed hesitation, she got herself moving, coming up behind her
desk, around it, and confidently grasping the overnight bag.
 
Gage held his breath as she gave the bag a
few good shakes, then slung it at El Toro.

Good girl!

The
bag thudded at the prisoner’s feet.

* * *

In
the main bay, as the prisoners were trudging back to their cells, the guards
were huddled in the center, grumping that there appeared to be no sign of a
riot whatsoever.

“This
has got to be another of that stupid bitch’s drills,” one of the guards said.

“Yeah,
but did you see who she summoned right before?”

“Who?”

“El
Toro.
 
Maybe she sent us out here so we
wouldn’t hear her moaning.”

“I
dunno.
 
Rumor is he forces himself on
her.
 
Something about Los Leones killing
her son if she doesn’t cooperate.”

“Man,
I bet that’s some good stuff.
 
Got an ass
that won’t quit!”

“El
Toro better not hear you talking about his ass like that.”

Laughter
all around, followed by more bitching.

As
the group of guards chuckled, three explosions rocked the building from the
second terrace, followed by large clouds of acrid white smoke.

“Holy
shit!” the lead guard said, lowering his riot mask.

Chaos
reigned as the guards thundered as one unit to the second floor.

Fights
broke out.

Burning
toilet paper descended like confetti.

To
a man, every prisoner yelled and screamed and raised general hell.

Salvador
the Semental had come through.

* * *

Back
in the office, just after the bag had landed at El Toro’s feet, a thud in the
direction of the main bay made everyone turn.
 
It was followed by another.
 
And
another.

Then
the phone rang.

…80, 81, 82…

“The
hell was all that?” El Toro yelled.

“There’s
construction on the new roof,” Angelines said dismissively.

As
the phone continued to ring, El Toro turned his eyes back to the bag at his
feet.
 
Despite his rage from a moment
before, the toss of the bag clearly surprised the man who was used to having his
way with the prison’s captain.
 
Then, as
his mind came back to the impudence she’d shown, he adjusted the pistol on
Angelines and said, “Who the hell do you think you—”

BOOM!

Despite
the office’s cavernous size, the explosion was cataclysmic inside its enclosed
walls.
 

Of
course, creating a hydrogen bottle bomb from aluminum mixed with a potassium
hydroxide-based drain cleaner was an imperfect science.
 
The drain cleaner was the first
variable.
 
Gage had no way of knowing its
makeup other than the active ingredient that had been printed on the
bottle.
 
He’d assumed, since it was a
commercial brand, that it might have had a higher concentration of potassium
hydroxide than something a person could buy off the shelf—and perhaps it
did.
 

The
second major variable was the aluminum.
 
What was its purity?
 
He’d trained
with aluminum foil—would the density of the aluminum change the reaction
time?
 
Had he made the chips too
large?
 
Too small?

And
the third was the bottles.
 
How thick
were they?
 
And did he mix in enough of
the drain cleaner for the amount of aluminum he’d used?
 
Also, did the amount of oxygen count?
 
Here in Berga, if Gage remembered correctly,
the altitude was around 2,400 feet.
 
He’d
done his bomb training just above sea level.

All
things considered, with the numerous variables in play, it had taken about
twenty-five seconds longer than Gage had expected.
 
But, in the end, the desired result was the
same.