An Inconsequential Murder (30 page)

She stood up and went to close the open window. The afternoon air was now cold.

“
I told Victor about my life. He said he didn’t care what had happened before we met. He said that all he wanted was to protect me, to help me. He said he loved me and understood that if I did not love him, I would at least feel…” She stopped talking.

“
Mrs. Delgado, you don’t have to…” Lombardo said.

“
No, it’s fine. I want you to understand that I loved Victor in my own way for his kindness and his gentle way. So, you see, Captain Lombardo, it would have been impossible for me to have been so ungrateful that I would…”

“
That’s all right, Mrs. Delgado. I understand. I am sorry but I had to ask.” Lombardo got up to go. “In my profession, one sometimes has to do things that are, well, painful to people, cruel sometimes.”

“
I understand, Captain.”

As they walked to the door, Lombardo said, “I give you my word, Mrs. Delgado, the men who did this to Victor will pay for it.”

She smiled at him as if saying that he didn’t have to make that promise in recompense of what he had asked her. “I believe you, Captain. Just be careful in Guadalajara.”

“
I will,” he said, and added “again, I am sorry for having distressed you.”

Without a trace of self-pity in her voice she said, “In this country, Captain, poor girls learn early that they are going to suffer a lot of moments like this. No one expects us to behave ‘properly.’”

“
I imagine it is even more so if you are, uh, of a certain…I mean if you are a woman with looks that, uh…” said Lombardo.

“
Do you mean if you are a good-looking woman whose poverty makes her vulnerable to a certain type of man?” She looked straight at him with an air of pride and defiance.

“
Yes, that’s exactly what I wanted to say,” said Lombardo. Mrs. Delgado opened the door for him.

As they shook hand
s and Lombardo said good-bye, Mrs. Delgado looked at him and without letting go of his hand she asked, “Tell me, Captain: did you ask the questions in order to eliminate the possibility of a ‘crime of passion,’ or was it to satisfy your own curiosity?”

“
Both, Mrs. Delgado,” he said truthfully and after thanking her again for her time, he walked away.

Chapter
35: Lombardo Talks to the New Boss

The morning after his visit to the widow, Lombardo sat watching the news, and drinking his morning coffee. He paid little attention to the economic news that announced yet another crisis in the world economy and the analysis of the
“economic experts” that predicted a dire future for Mexico, which depended so much on oil and tourism.

Lombardo couldn’t concentrate on any of it because his thoughts were with the widow. It was clear that from the moment he saw her he had been smitten, utterly infatuated by her. God! She was at least 20 years younger. The old cliché “she could be my daughter” was never truer. Yet, he had never had such feelings for any human being, let alone a woman, before, so he didn’t know how to deal with them. He wanted to protect her,
take over where Victor had left off. Such a beautiful thing should not be left to the mercy of this world, of the uncaring humanity of this city, of men like that bastard who slept with her, got her pregnant, and then fired her. Those rich bastards got away with everything; they never had to own up for the crap and the damage they left behind, as they moved like sharks through this life.

“
Damn, I’m mixing my metaphors,” he said aloud as he got up from his easy chair. He went into the bedroom to dress. “I ought to look up the bastard and break his goddamned neck.”

His cell phone rang. “Captain Lombardo?” It was the new Director’s secretary.

“
Yes?”

“
Mr. Loera Neri would like you to come to his office as soon as possible.”

“
OK. I am at home so I’ll be in the Department soon.”

“
What time do you plan to be here?” she asked.

“
That’s the last thing I damn well need,” said Lombardo, “is a damned secretary busting my balls. Tell your boss, Miss Whoever-you-are, that since the damned Department has not been able to find the money to give me a decent car, I have to use taxis to get around, and since I have no idea how long it will take me to find one, I have no damned idea what time I will be there.”

“
Well, try to be here as soon as possible,” she said and hung up.

“
Stupid bitch,” said Lombardo to the dead connection.

When Lombardo got to the Department, he went straight to the Director’s secretary’s desk. She was talking to a young, newly hired investigations officer. “Probably came with the new boss,” said Lombardo, and then he said to the girl, “Listen…”

The secretary turned to Lombardo and said, “Just a minute, please.”

Lombardo turned to the young man and said, “You, beat it!”

The boy was so startled he walked away without a word.

“
Captain Lombardo,” the girl started to complain.

But Lombardo interrupted her, “Listen to me, Minerva,” he had noted the name plate on her desk. “I already have one boss, I don’t need two. You don’t tell me what to do, when to come here, or how to get here, understand?”

She started to speak again, but Lombardo in a cold rage now said loudly, “Understand?”

People in other desks turned to see what the trouble was.

“
I am blocking your phone number,” continued Lombardo while holding up his cell phone, “you have no permission to call me at any time for any reason. If your boss wants me, tell him to call me from his phone.”

The door to the Director’s office opened. He saw that his secretary was nearly in tears and that Lombardo was standing in silent rage looking at her as if he were going to beat her senseless with his cell phone.

“
Captain Lombardo,” said the Director, “please come into my office.”

As soon as Lombardo closed the door, the Director started to speak,
“Captain, you can’t go around…”

“
I don’t need some girl calling me to tell me I’m late for school,” said Lombardo. “With all due respect, Director, if you need to talk to me you can call me yourself.”

“
And I don’t need a second-grade investigator telling me how to run my office,” said the Director just as firmly. Lombardo had to respect that the man wasn’t easily cowered.

Lombardo saw that the De
lgado case file was on the Director’s desk. The Director sat down and without asking Lombardo to do the same he began,

“
I got a phone call this morning…”

“
From Guadalajara?” interrupted Lombardo insinuating that the call had been from the DEA.

“
…from the acting Governor, Mr. Nepamuseno Gomez Cruz. He wants me to review the Delgado case in view of the fact that the former Dean of the University, Filiberto Herrera, sent in his resignation and left the country. Governor Gomez thinks that there might be a
connection between the death of Victor Delgado and the sudden departure of the Dean. Additionally, there will be fraud charges filed against the former Dean, because a subsequent audit has discovered irregularities in the University’s accounts.”

“
They always find them after the fact,” said Lombardo.

The Director ignored the remark
and continued. “It seems to me,” he said opening the case file, “that the report you filed is, how shall I put it, incomplete.”

“
What makes you think that?”

“
Look, Lombardo, let’s stop the bullshit. I also got another call telling me that the persons you want to find in Guadalajara are DEA agents, and that you’ve been getting help from the Gulf Cartel people in tracking them down.”

“
I get my information from whatever source is available. The man owed me a favor so I called him on it.”

“
Owed you a favor or gave you the information as a favor—a favor you’re going to have to pay back!”

“
Oh, do you think I’m on the Cartel’s payroll? Director, that would be unheard of in this Department.”

“
Lombardo, I know you think I’m some political flunky just minding the store before the elections and that a new Governor will appoint the
real
head of this Department, but I know more about what’s been going on here than you believe, and I mean to do a good job while I
am
here. Now, as I said, let’s stop the bullshit or I will not only not sign the authorization for you to go to Guadalajara, I will take you off the case, put you under review for insubordination and hiding case evidence, then I will fire your ass and put you in a cell next to your Cartel buddy.”

The Director took Lombardo’s report out of the case file and put it on the desk. “Now, take this piece of crap back and write a
real
report with all of the facts we know about the case and all of the evidence you have gathered. Understood?”

Lombardo took the piece of paper, tore it up, and tossed it into the waste basket. “All right,” he said, “you want no bullshit, I don’t either.”

Lombardo sat down and lit a Delicado. “Don’t tell me you got a call from that puppet they’re now calling interim Governor. It was from your DEA friends and they want to know how much evidence I have against them.”

The Director said nothing but stared coldly at Lombardo.

“
They also want to know if I have certain information which would not only incriminate them but would also open up a sewer full of shit about what has been going on in this country.”

“
What are you talking about?”

“
I am talking about two groups of powerful, high-level people who are fighting each other, who will go to any lengths, even murder, to achieve their goals. I am talking about a group of people who want to legalize drugs, much to the Cartels’ joy, and another that wants to stop them and is so rabid about it that it foams at the mouth. I don’t know for sure which side you are on but I can make a pretty good guess.”

“
Which side are you on, Lombardo?”

“
I’m on Victor Delgado’s side. I am on the side of a little guy who gets killed and everyone wants to just brush his case into that sewer you guys have built for the purpose. Well, you can tell your DEA friends that they can’t come into my territory, crap all over the place, and then get away with it clean.”

“
What do you want, Lombardo? What’s in it for you out of all of this?”

“
What do I want? I want those three murdering bastards in jail, that’s what I want. And I don’t give a damn who they are or what they are; I want their asses in a cell with a twenty-year sentence pinned to their balls.”

The Director thought for a few seconds and then said, “Look, these are very dangerous times. As they say, ‘the devil is loose.’ This could be very dangerous for you or anybody who helps you.”

“
I’m an old man by today’s standards, Director. I’ve been a cop for 30 years. A bullet in the head doesn’t scare me; in fact, they would do me a great favor—put an end to my misery. But, here are the facts,
sir
. I have a CD, with copies, that would go to a lot of people if something were to happen to me. Oh, the national newspapers and that magazine,
Progreso
, would have a field day with this stuff. But I don’t give a rat’s ass about that so I am willing to make a deal.”

“
What sort of a deal?” The Director’s eyes narrowed like a cat’s eyes narrow when it has a bird within grasp.

“
You sign that authorization so I can go to Guadalajara and I will give you all the dirt on the former Governor and the Dean. I know your party wants to thrash the ruling party in the next election and that this would be some pretty good ammunition for them. And, don’t tell me that that would not earn you boy scout honors, because you know and I know that your party is just a step away from grabbing power and this will help a lot toward that end.”

“
OK, so I authorize for you to go to Guadalajara with full powers and expenses—then what?”

“
Then I go to Guadalajara and cut another deal—with the head man, the gringo who sent the three men down here. You won’t be blamed for anything that happens after that because it will be up to him to save his government the embarrassment this case would cause, never mind the damage he would inflict on your party, which he has been funding for quite some time.”