Edge of Battle (29 page)

“Thank you, Miss Cass. I am the point of contact for all matters dealing with TALON. Don’t hesitate to call if necessary.”

“Yes, Miss Director.”

“This is all confidential information, of course, Annette.”

“Of course.” The phone connection was broken…

…but another connection—a small listening device planted under the front edge of Cass’s desk, directly opposite of where Ochoa had been seated—was still very much alive.

B
AKERSFIELD
, C
ALIFORNIA
A
SHORT TIME LATER

The streetwalkers were so easy, especially the older ones who thought they knew how to handle their johns. Act macho and smooth during the initial exchange; change to acting indecisive and unsure during negotiations to reel the girl in; then act apprehensive and a little scared as each date began in the hotel room. A few drinks, some tense necking, some clumsy stripping and play-
acting to get the john hard, and then let her get on top and have the reins so she might think this was going to be an easy “wham-bang-thank-you-ma’am” date.

Then, when she was ready to wrap it up and leave—turn the tables, quickly and violently. Make her fear for her safety within seconds, and then her life within a minute or two. Delight in watching her transform from an experienced pro to a quivering, whimpering, begging child. Anything goes at that point—she was ready to accept anything, agree to do any perversity or act, as long as she believed she had a chance to survive and get out of that room alive and relatively unhurt.

They were usually gone in the wink of an eye when he was finished, and they didn’t stop for several blocks. They would notice that the money was fake then, but most wouldn’t have the courage to go back for it. A few had their pimps and enforcers go back to try to collect—that’s usually when he would pick up a new gun, maybe some nice jewelry, and some traveling cash before leaving that part of town, before the cops found the badly mutilated bodies he’d leave behind.

Yegor Zakharov had just finished one such encounter—his second of the evening—and was on his way back to the place he had left his car when his satellite phone rang. He read the decryption code on the display, looked up the unlock code on a card in his pocket, entered it, and waited until he heard the electronic chirps and beeps stop.
“¿Chto eto?”

“Tell me your men did not enjoy it, Colonel,” the voice of Ernesto Fuerza said.

“Fuck you. My men and I are not your wet-workers.”

“But they
did
enjoy it, no?”

“What do you want?”

“The Americans are putting a thousand National Guard troops per week out on the border over the next few months,” Fuerza said. “The Mexican government and the Hispanic community in America will explode long before that. The revolution is well underway, thanks to you.”

“I am happy for you,
zalupa
.”

“Within days the backlash will start,” Fuerza went on. “The editorials in the liberal newspapers will start to moan about the cost and the ugliness of armed troops on the peaceful borders; the human rights groups will be at fever pitch within a week, filing lawsuits and making their case on every TV show in the world to protect the immigrants and condemn the neofascist government; and Hispanic people from all over the world will start to fight, with the radicals and revolutionaries leading the fight, soon to be joined by the common people, and soon after that by the politicians, headline-grabbers, and even actors. The American government will be on its guilt-ridden, confused, beleaguered knees in no time.”

“What the fuck do you want?”

“To give you a reward, my friend. I have information that you might find very gratifying.”

“How much is it going to cost me?”

“Not a penny,
tovarisch
.”

“Another ambush, to be broadcast on the damned Internet?”

“You may do with the information as you wish, my friend—it is entirely up to you.”

“So? What is this reward?”

“I know exactly where your friend Major Jason Richter is right now, Colonel.”

“
What?
Where?”

“I knew you would be pleased,” Fuerza said. “He is searching for you in the migrant community of the Imperial Valley, just a few hours south of you, with a Border Patrol agent by the name of Purdy. It is just the two of them, and they are not being supported by anyone, especially not the U.S. attorney in San Diego who would certainly throw anyone from Task Force TALON in prison if she could. They appear to be out on their own—they are no longer part of Task Force TALON, Operation Rampart, or any other organization I can discern.” Fuerza gave him details of how and where they were to be spotted.

“This had better not be a setup, Fuerza,” Zakharov warned, “or I’ll spend the rest of my life hunting you down so I can take great pleasure in stripping the skin from your body, a bit at a time.”

“Call my satellite phone number at any time and ask me for assistance, Colonel,” Fuerza said. “I will be close by, and so will my men.”

“Then let us take them together, you and I.”

“I am not so foolish as to face this robot enemy of yours, Colonel—I will be happy to leave him all to you and those heavy weapons I sold to you,” Fuerza said. “My target is much more vulnerable: a survivor of our rendezvous near Blythe. I wish to keep him from talking to the authorities, so I will be in the same area looking for him.”

“I warn you again, Fuerza—you had better not double-cross me, or you had better pray that they kill me, because if you send me into a trap and I’m still alive afterward…”

“Do not worry, Colonel—I promise, this is not a setup,” Fuerza insisted. “I wish to do business with you again many times in the future. And as you undoubtedly know, there is a price on my head as well, almost as great as yours—I will certainly never be allowed to keep any reward money.”

N
ILAND
, C
ALIFORNIA
T
WO DAYS LATER

Maria Arevalo rose before daybreak every morning without the help of an alarm clock—the sound of trucks, buses, farm equipment, and sleepy men getting ready for another hard day at work was her only wake-up call. Careful not to disturb her three children, sleeping either in or around her bed, she tiptoed to the kitchen to put on a large pot of coffee and began making breakfast. Her husband had already left for the day’s work; the children could sleep in another couple hours before they had to get ready.

She lived in a two-room shack in a remote corner of a relatively small two-thousand-acre lettuce and cilantro farm near the town of Niland in the Imperial Valley of southern California, just east of the southern tip of the Salton Sea. During most of the growing season, Maria worked the fields with her husband, but in the summer she made meals for the thirty or so migrant farmworkers here. It was hard, exhausting work alone in the tiny kitchen, but she preferred it to being in the blazing sun all day with the others, doing “stoop labor.”

Breakfast was scrambled eggs with tomatoes, peppers, and scallions, potatoes, refried beans, beef and chicken tacos, gorditas, coffee, and water. Maria charged four dollars per man per day for breakfast and lunch; she gave 20 percent to the owner for the use of the shack, paid for the food, and kept the rest for herself and her family. The men ate well and it was easier, faster, cheaper, and safer than going home for meals; the owner and farm foreman liked it because the men stayed on the job site and they could keep an eye on them; and Maria liked it because she loved cooking and her only other option was to work in the fields herself.

By the time everything was cooked and loaded up into large pans for the trip out to the fields, it was time to get the children up and dressed. Fortunately Maria’s older daughter, at age eight and a half, was more than capable of helping her younger brother get ready, while Maria handled the infant daughter. At seven-thirty a small rickety bus arrived to take the boy to the community day care center, and a few minutes later the older daughter caught a station wagon filled with kids to go to summer school to brush up on her English and math before beginning second grade in the fall in the Imperial County public elementary school. The infant stayed with Maria; she tried to give her as much attention as possible, but unfortunately the baby stayed strapped into her car seat for most of the day, with a little battery-powered fan to help keep her cool and to keep pesky flies and mosquitoes away.

About that same time a forty-year-old milk delivery truck pulled up to the shack, and an older gentleman wearing the ever-
present green bib overalls and old crusty work boots greeted Maria.
“Buenos dias, señora. ¿Como esta?”

“You are late, old man,” she said irritably in Spanish.

“
Perdon
,” the man said. He stepped out of the truck along with a younger man in tattered jeans, two layers of faded flannel shirts, sunglasses, thick horn-rimmed glasses, and ratty sneakers and began loading up the food, urns of water and coffee, and cardboard boxes of clean place-ware.

Maria was irked that the younger man took so long adjusting the lids to the water urns, but finally everything was secure and tightly strapped down for the bumpy ride into the fields. “Let us be off.” Maria made sure the stove and oven were off, locked the door to the shack behind her, and climbed aboard the truck. She changed a diaper and fed the baby on the way to the fields.

Ten minutes after eight the truck rumbled to a stop on the side of the private dirt access road beside Highway 111, and Maria beeped the horn. The two men hurriedly set up two folding tables and started setting out the pans of food and the urns of coffee and water, with Maria busily behind them, stirring the pots and arranging everything just so. As they worked, the men started walking in from the lettuce field toward their waiting breakfast, wiping sweat from their faces and dirt from their hands—they had already been hard at work for hours, and everyone was ravenous. A few minutes later a worker on a tractor pulling a trailer full of boxes drove up, jumping off the tractor excitedly and chatting with the others in line as he waited for his turn.

The workers moved down the line quickly—the faster they got their food, the more time they had to rest. Maria and her helpers were constantly rearranging the pans and urns as the workers jostled their way through the line—the workers tried to help, but Maria’s helpers politely but firmly reset things themselves, greeting each one and wishing them a good day.

“Usted parece fuerte,”
one of the workers said to the young helper standing behind the urn of water as he helped himself to a cup of water.
“Usted debe estar fuera allí de ayudarnos.
” The helper
smiled and nodded. “
Venido. ¿Usted puede tomar mi lugar,
okay?” The helper only nodded again, keeping his eyes averted. The worker looked at him with some aggravation.
“¿O usted tiene gusto quizá de trabajar en la cocina como una mujer?”
The helper only nodded again, then headed back to the truck. “Hey.
¡Vete a hacer punetas, amaricado!
”

“Watch your language, José,” Maria scolded the worker. “Go back and sit with the lettuce if you want to swear.”

“Well, that asshole is just ignoring me,” the worker named José said. “What’s his problem?”

“Maybe you’re scaring him, you big bully,” Maria said playfully.

“Where do you find these
pendejos
, Maria?” Jose asked. The urn of water was almost empty, so José had to tip it forward to fill his cup.

“I will gladly hire anyone willing to put up with the likes of you, José. Now get out of here and finish your meal before you make him cry.”

“I would like to see him cry, Maria,” the worker said, laughing. The helper was just coming back from the truck with a full urn of water, carrying the heavy seven-gallon metal jug with both hands. “Maybe he would not do so well out in the field after all—looks like he can barely carry that jug. You need some help,
pedo?
”

The worker wasn’t paying attention to what he was doing, and as he tipped the urn farther and farther, the lid slipped off. The young helper noticed what was happening, and in a flash of motion dropped the urn of water he was carrying and lunged for the lid. But it was too late. The lid fell, but was prevented from hitting the table by some wires. José lifted the lid and examined it—and that’s when he noticed what looked like a tiny camera lens built into the lid.

“Hey! What’s this…?” The young helper snatched the lid out of José’s hand. José glared angrily at the helper—and then realized that he had
blue eyes,
something not often seen out in the fields. “Who the hell are
you?
”

“¿Problema, amigo?”
the older helper asked, stepping over to
the younger man and pushing him toward the delivery truck. “You, pick up that water and stop being so damned clumsy.” To the worker he said in Spanish, “Don’t worry about him, amigo. He is my wife’s cousin’s boy.” He tapped the side of his own head. “He is a little slow, you know what I mean?”

But as he spoke, he realized he recognized the worker named José…and at the same instant, José recognized him too. Paul Purdy closed his eyes, but it was too late. He could only mutter, “Oh, shit…” before the whole place erupted into sheer bedlam.

“Purdy…
puneta!
It’s Purdy!” José turned toward the others squatting next to the road eating.
“¡La Migra! ¡La Migra! ¡Inmigración!”
Workers scattered in all directions, dashing through the cilantro and lettuce fields as fast as they could.

“Smart move, Purdy—the men can spot a
federale
a mile away, especially if he has blue eyes,” Maria said with a smile and a shake of her head as she started to pack up her pans. “Why did you hire a gringo to go undercover with you in a migrant farm? Are you crazy?”

“I got the best help I could find, darlin’,” Border Patrol Agent Paul Purdy replied with a smile as he began to unzip his overalls.

“You know, I’m never going to be able to work in this part of the county again, Purdy—everyone will think I work with the
federales
now,” she said.