Greasing the Piñata (5 page)

Chapter Eleven

Sally whisked the tea into a green froth and contemplated death.

Four cups were arranged carefully in front of her. The first two were for her parents, dead these many years. The third was for Cape, a man she called friend, though never to his face. Serving the tea this way—as if her parents and Cape were there—was the closest Sally ever came to prayer.

Her eyes tracked the circular rhythms of her hand as she let her mind go blank. Her thoughts drifted, as always, to her childhood. Though it had not been a happy time, her formative years were full of rich memories.

Sally was orphaned when she was five. After her parents were murdered she was taken from Tokyo to Hong Kong, where she was enrolled in a school for girls. The school was highly competitive and very exclusive. Many girls never made it to graduation—some were expelled and sent home, others were transferred to smaller schools throughout Hong Kong. Some chose a different path from Sally, but a surprising number were crippled or killed before they were old enough to make that choice. The instructors were very strict.

The school was run by the Triads, the largest criminal syndicate in the world, the power behind China’s underground economy since the time of the Ming emperors. As China flirted with capitalism and the communists looked the other way, the power of the Triads surged. Their organization became a dragon with many heads, its claws sunk into every port, every business, and every politician in the middle kingdom. And the heart of the great dragon was Hong Kong.

To protect their interests, the Triads molded their own weapons from the clay of young minds. The process had been perfected over centuries of practice. The girls were kept in close quarters under tremendous pressure, forged into weapons in a furnace of betrayal.

Sally was their star pupil.

She could speak half a dozen languages with no trace of an accent, disguise herself as any nationality, or disappear into the shadows in less time than it takes to blink. She was proficient with weapons that had not been used for centuries—weapons easily concealed that were almost impossible to trace.

The basic principal behind the training was simple—direct young minds down a path before they found their own moral compass. But Sally’s parents had given her more than green eyes and lustrous black hair, or a laugh that sounded like a bark. They imprinted their love so deep within her that she never lost her sense of self, even after they were dead and buried. Sally conformed to the school’s training regimen but would never submit to anyone’s will except her own. So when the Triads decided to betray her, Sally showed them what a good student she had become.

As she stirred the tea, images of passion and pain flashed before her mind’s eye.

Standing on a pole with a sword in her hand, men running toward her with sharp spears and cruel smiles…a bow in her hand, the arrow notched and pointing at a bird in flight…a man’s body spinning like a leaf, plummeting twenty stories to the street below…her first kiss, the burn of the other girl’s lips against her own…her fingers slick with blood, uncertain whose blood it was, knowing there would be more…

Sally left Hong Kong and never looked back, leaving behind a wake of bodies cut directly from the heart of the dragon. The Triads knew better than to try and follow her to America, so an uneasy truce existed as long as each party left the other alone.

Buddhists believe you are not the same person today that you were yesterday or will be tomorrow. This means you always have a choice, never bound by your past, and a better path can begin with each step you take. Opening her eyes, Sally wanted to believe all this but knew she never would. Like the metal in a Japanese sword—folded hundreds of times to strengthen the blade—her past was at the heart of every cell, trapped in every strand of hair, and flowing within her veins.

And though Death had been her companion for many years, Sally had no regrets.

She stopped stirring and continued the ritual, pouring tea carefully into the other cups before pouring her own. Though she didn’t know why, Sally could always sense when Cape needed her help. As she drank her tea, she wondered if he would live long enough to ask for it again.

Chapter Twelve

“It is called a
candirú
fish.”

Garcia was on his knees, gesturing at the fish with a penlight.

“They look mean,” said Cape.

“They are more feared than the piranha, my friend, and for good reason.” Garcia stood but kept his eyes on the bowl. “They don’t always kill you, but you wish you were dead.”

“Why?” Cape squinted at the near invisible fish as they darted back and forth.

“They are parasites,” said Garcia. “Sometimes called the toothpick fish, very common in the Amazon. They are attracted to warmth. If someone is bathing in a river, the
candirú
will swim into any available orifice and lodge itself there.”

“What do you mean,
lodge
?”

Garcia pointed toward the nearest fish. “See that spine on its back—the flared head? It might swim up your ass and gets stuck there, until someone can attempt a cure.”

“At least there’s a cure.” Cape sounded nonchalant but had inched backward from the toilet.

Garcia frowned. “A native cure requires two plants used in combination—they are shoved into your ass to kill and then dissolve the fish. But in most cases the victim gets infected, goes into shock and dies. It is very painful, but it could be much worse.”

“It gets worse?” Cape retreated another step until his back was against the tiled wall.

Garcia nodded. “As I said, the fish is attracted to warmth, and as you can see,
candirú
are excellent swimmers. So if one swims up your ass, you are lucky—at least you have a fighting chance.”

Cape tried to imagine having a spiny fish up his ass and feeling lucky. He gave up almost immediately as Garcia continued his narrative.

“Say you were taking a piss, as you had planned.”

“It was more of an urge than a plan,” said Cape. “But let’s say that I did decide to piss on the fish—so what?”

“The toothpick fish has been known to follow the urine stream right into the tiny opening in a man’s penis—you can see how small the fish are. They can actually swim
up
while you are pissing
down
, going upstream into your body as you relieve yourself. That is why fishermen on the river will piss against the gunwale of the boat, never directly into the water. Do you understand what I am saying?”

Cape understood but it took him a moment to comprehend. He tried to visualize the fish swimming
up, up, up
and then flinched involuntarily. Garcia watched him and nodded.

“
Sí
,” said Garcia. “You would be writhing on the floor in agony.”

Cape was a sufficiently confident guy to admit having a short but substantive list of things he was deathly afraid of—
being eaten by a shark, crashing in an airplane, being turned into a flesh-eating zombie by a failed government experiment
—but standing there in a bathroom in Mexico, watching fish swim around in a toilet, he had found a new one that jumped to the top of the list.

“Can I flush now?” he asked.

“Why not?” Garcia leaned forward and did the honors. Both men watched as the tiny fish spun, slowly at first and then faster and faster, caught in the inescapable cyclone of an industrial toilet. “It would be impossible to trace where the fish came from.”

“How come you know so much about these toothpick fish?”

Garcia shrugged. “I am addicted to the Discovery Channel—did you see Shark Week?”

“Of course,” said Cape. “But I must have missed the special on
penis predators
.”

“I cannot remember the name of the show, but that was not it.”

“You said these fish came from the Amazon.”

“In theory, yes, but they have been known to swim upriver, into tributaries.”

“We’re in Mexico, Garcia.”

“Where anything can happen.”

“That’s what the woman at the front desk told me,” said Cape. “Is that the slogan for the Mexico Tourism Board?”

Garcia checked the refilled bowl to make sure it was empty, then turned to face Cape. “I am merely saying—”

“—you’re saying that someone put the fish in my toilet,” said Cape. “To scare me.”

“Did it work?”

“Fuck, yes.”

“But why try to scare you away if your case is closed?”

“Maybe it’s not,” said Cape. “What did you find at the morgue?”

The two men moved into the bedroom. Cape sat on the edge of the bed as Garcia took the seat in front of the narrow desk. It might have been the change in lighting, from the bright fluorescents of the bathroom to the indirect lighting of the floor lamps, but Garcia suddenly looked very tired, dark circles appearing under his eyes. Cape wondered briefly if the tequila had slowed him down, too.

“I was not there very long,” said Garcia.

“But you saw the bodies.”

Garcia looked away before answering. “Two men died, of that I am certain. But the bodies are still being…” He hesitated, searching for the right word. “Reconstructed. There were different parts, not so easy to tell where they belonged.”

“How many parts?”

“Enough to convince me that the bodies they belonged to are dead. Male torso, late-to-middle age. Part of an arm, no hand. A section of abdomen, right
here
—” He patted his right side. “And a leg, reasonably intact.”

“Right or left?” As soon as Cape heard the second body wasn’t complete he felt a pale flicker of optimism but sensed it would be extinguished as soon as Garcia spoke again.

Garcia smiled knowingly. “Right.”

“The Senator and his son, Danny, they had matching tattoos.” He grabbed his right ankle with his left hand. “Right here.”

“A tiger.” Garcia said it as a statement, not a question.

Cape ran his fingers through his hair and exhaled slowly. He felt nauseous. “They both went to Princeton. Danny dropped out—was expelled—but got the tattoo his freshman year.”

“Hardly DNA evidence,” said Garcia. “I will give you a full report—”

“It’s them,” Cape took a deep breath. “What are the odds, right? You see a lot of matching father and son tattoos come through here?”

Garcia remained silent. After a long moment, Cape let his gaze drift around the room, back toward the bathroom.

“Which raises the question, Garcia, that you raised before.”

“Why come after you now?”

“Exactly,” said Cape. “Maybe they didn’t want any loose ends—kill those two off, then get me out of the way. Problem solved.”

“But why take the risk, if surely your investigation has come to an end?”

Cape shifted his gaze toward Garcia and nodded when their eyes met, as if he had just come to a decision. “Maybe they knew I’d try to find out who killed the Senator and his son. That I’d stay in Mexico until I found out the truth.”

Garcia furrowed his brow. “Have you spoken to your client?”

“Not yet.”

“Then how can you know that will be her decision?”

“It’s not her decision,” said Cape. “It’s mine.”

Garcia gestured toward the bathroom. “I think it will be dangerous.”

“I’ll be careful,” said Cape, knowing he would be anything but. “And I’ll have someone watching my back—besides you, of course.”

“What do you mean?”

Cape smiled. “I’m going to call in reinforcements.”

Chapter Thirteen

“That’s a new one,” said Sally. “Even for me.”

“Knew you’d be impressed.” The connection was bad, so Cape stuck a finger in his left ear as he pressed the earpiece to his right.

“I’ve used snakes before, and the Triad leaders always had a thing for scorpions.” The energy in Sally’s voice came through despite the static on the line. “And spiders, of course—spiders are great, if you can get them to stay put long enough to bite someone. But a fish that attacks your
wiener
? That’s fantastic—you have to give them points for originality.”

“How’d you like to visit Mexico?”

“Is it nice this time of year?”

“It’s exciting,” said Cape. “Anything can happen.”

“Think I read that in a brochure once—who’s paying?”

“Maybe my client, if I still have one,” said Cape. “Maybe me. Does it matter?”

“I like to know who I’m working for.”

“I’m hiring you to protect my wiener,” said Cape. “Good enough?”

“You might be better off without it.”

“Is that a yes or a no?”

“It’s not the most worthy cause,” said Sally, “but not a lost cause, either.”

“I’ll take that as a
yes
.”

“How do you want me to pack?”

It wasn’t an idle question. Though it wasn’t exactly a code, Cape and Sally shared a common language that solved the problem of sayings things in public or over the phone that might get them arrested. Cape thought about it for a minute and then made a decision.

“Bring the heavy bag.”

Chapter Fourteen

The shower felt good, as showers always do. Cape stood directly under the spray, rolling his head back and forth to work out the kinks in his neck. He had checked the drain twice before turning on the water, getting down on his hands and knees to make sure there weren’t any fish, spiders, or sea cucumbers waiting in ambush.

A jackhammer was moving across his frontal lobe and exiting through his eye sockets. He wanted to blame the headache on tequila but knew the adrenaline rush from his close encounter with the fish had sobered him. He was stressed, a condition unlikely to get any better until he talked to his client, and that would have to wait until morning.

The last time they’d talked, Cape had asked her why she stopped talking to her father. Her answers were curt but spoke volumes.

“What’s the point?” she said. “He’s a politician.”

“He’s your father.”

“Is your father alive, Cape?”

“No.”

“You’re lucky.”

Standing under the dull roar of the shower spray, Cape wondered how lucky she would feel after his call.

After Rebecca left his office that day, he’d spent the rest of the afternoon online. Tapping a keyboard wasn’t as romantic an image for a private investigator as pounding the pavement, but Cape needed to know where he was headed. After several hours of searches he knew a lot more about Senator Jim Dobbins but precious little about his son.

Dobbins looked to be a typical politician—actually he looked better than that, but Rebecca’s instincts had been good. Cape liked politicians about as much as an intestinal parasite and often couldn’t tell the difference. He’d been a reporter for too long, seen too much corruption, and heard far too much rhetoric from men patting you on the back with one hand while their other hand was picking your pocket.

But even Cape had to admit that Dobbins had a talent for getting things done.

After graduating from law school at Stanford, Dobbins worked in the public defender’s office before running for city councilman. He won and became a fixture in both city and state politics—working fund-raisers, overseeing voter registration drives, grabbing photo ops with the party elite.

Dobbins made his name with urban renewal. One article credited him with drafting a controversial referendum to transform an older, industrial part of San Francisco into residential lofts and office space. In a city where
gentrification
was an ugly word, critics claimed the program destroyed the historical integrity of the district, while supporters said it revitalized a neighborhood that had become economically extinct.

Cape thought both sides had a point. The neighborhood in question bore no resemblance to the charming, sepia-toned photographs from the turn of the century—its character had been bulldozed away. But before the developers, the neighborhood had become a war zone where rival gangs fought over the local drug trade. Most voters decided to make the character of the neighborhood the last casualty in that war. The bill passed by a two percent margin, money poured in with the concrete and glass, and less than nine months later Jim Dobbins was elected to the state legislature.

Then he turned green. An easy political decision in California. The Governor had made the environment his top priority, from state-sponsored recycling programs in schools to switching to single-ply toilet paper at the capitol building. Voters cheered and politicians up and down the state went from kissing babies to hugging trees.

Dobbins bought a hybrid car, and made the front page of the paper as he drove it to Sacramento to meet with the Governor.

Dobbins put the squeeze on businesses to reduce their carbon footprint. His message was simple and direct: cut waste, recycle, or sponsor environmental programs unless you want to end up in court. He engineered tax breaks for the companies that complied, went after the ones that refused with an almost religious zeal. As a state senator he had the latitude to cover a lot of territory, working with local coffee houses and major corporations. Every new program meant a picture in the paper, Dobbins’ arm around the shoulders of a smiling shopkeeper or beleaguered executive.

Then suddenly the press dried up.

As Cape read through the articles chronologically, it looked like Dobbins dropped below the radar almost nine months ago. No more pictures in the paper, rarely quoted in any articles, never on any of the political talk shows. His profile shrank over the next several months until the man himself disappeared only two weeks ago, resigning from the state senate with no more explanation than a brief hand-written note.

The news didn’t get much attention because that very same day the Lieutenant Governor admitted to using treasury funds to pay for underage male prostitutes, which came as a shock to both his wife and the Governor. Just another day in California politics, but the scandal overshadowed Dobbins’ resignation. He held a cursory news conference and received a few column inches inside the fold of the local papers.

And then he vanished altogether.
Poof.

Cape tried the usual tricks and databases used for skip-tracing, but the senator had dropped off the grid. Not easy even if you’re trying, damn near impossible if you’re not.

So Cape turned his attention to the son but nearly came up empty. Danny wasn’t a public figure, so a Google search didn’t yield the volume of pages tagged with his father’s name. Cape found one article that listed the contents of the weekly police blotter from several months ago. Danny got picked up for possession.

No follow-up stories, no other arrests that Cape could find. He made a mental note to conduct a more thorough background check later. For a senator’s son, Danny should have had a slightly higher profile.

But maybe Danny wasn’t a phantom, just a guy who made a dumb mistake. If Rebecca’s attitude about their father was any indication, Cape couldn’t blame Danny for wanting to steer clear of the gossip columns.

It took a few phone calls, one favor, and access to a database of marginal legality to trace Danny to Mexico. Credit cards and cell phones were better than a blood trail. If he’d gone native or switched to cash, Cape would never have gotten that far without help.

The notion of help made him think of Rebecca. He knew she wanted to find her brother and suspected she wanted to see her father again, more than she might admit. But family members rarely told Cape what he needed to know, even when they wanted to help. Relatives saw the person they wanted to see instead of the person as they really were. Blinded by love or hate, or some combination of the two. Too close to the situation.

At the thought of getting close to Rebecca, he took a step out of the shower spray, turned the handle to
cold
, then ducked under the water and gritted his teeth. He stood there a long time, willing his testicles to retreat somewhere inside his body. The last thing he needed was a puerile fantasy about his client. Rebecca was more than a little attractive and desperately needed his help—his very own formula for disaster.

Cape once read that the definition of an addiction was something you knew was unhealthy but which you kept doing anyway. He turned off the water and stood there shivering, forcing himself to remember the last woman he’d tried to save.

It didn’t take long, because she’d dumped him the day he’d met Rebecca.

Cape had finished reading up on the Senator and was about to shut down his computer when the email popped up. It was late in San Francisco, even later in New York where the email originated. It lacked punctuation, like all her notes, which gave it a strangely dispassionate tone that delivered the message like a punch to the gut.

Cape tried to call but her cell phone was off. He tried again to no avail, resisted the urge to hurl the phone across the room.

What kind of woman dumps a guy over email? Answer: a modern one. She liked confrontation about as much as he liked going to the dentist. The note made Cape feel like a hopeless romantic. It must’ve taken all of two minutes to write and underscored the difference in their ages. Though less than ten years younger, she came from a completely different generation when it came to communication. If she wanted to reach out and touch someone, she sent a text message. He was an anachronism with an undying passion for complete sentences.

Take good care.
Sounded like something a dentist might say, and Cape wondered briefly how long she’d been seeing someone else. Not that it mattered. He read the note again, surprised she didn’t remind him to floss.

He’d always hated dentists; now he knew why.

Taking a deep breath, he stepped out of the shower and wrapped a towel around his waist. He paused to give himself a look in the mirror.

“You’re hopeless,” he said.

The private detective with the broken heart—how original. Too bad I’m not a divorced ex-cop with a tragic past, married to a hooker with a heart of gold. Maybe I should develop a drinking problem, become a loner, get a big dog or ornery cat.

The thing that really pissed him off was that he wasn’t the least bit surprised. Cape shook his head in disgust and made a cursory effort to dry off before pulling open the bathroom door.

The first thing he noticed was music coming from the bedroom. He wondered if housekeeping had let themselves in, turned on the radio. Mexico was downright romantic, even when you were sleeping alone. Maybe things were looking up and he’d find a chocolate on his pillow.

Before he stepped into the bedroom Cape caught a reflection of a pair of legs in the mirror over the dresser. Definitely male legs, crossed at the knee, covered by gray slacks. The idea of hiding in the bathroom flashed across his mind but Cape let his own momentum carry him across the threshold, curiosity driving him forward.

“It’s about fucking time.”

The man sitting on the bed sounded more pissed than he looked. His mouth was turned at the corners, more of a double sneer than a smile. He had olive skin, wavy hair, narrow brown eyes, and an enormous nose. Jimmy Durante and Barbara Streisand had nothing on this guy—he was Cyrano de Bergerac in a suit. “We were thinkin’ we’d have to drag your ass right out of the shower.”

“We?” Cape stepped further into the room. Sitting at the desk beyond the bed was a skinny Latino with slick hair and a thick mustache. He looked bored, but his right hand rested comfortably in his jacket pocket.

Cape adjusted his towel and studied his uninvited guests. It was eighty degrees outside and both of these guys were wearing suits. He ruled out cops right away. Mustache’s socks didn’t match, and cops tended to knock. So did hotel security.

Federales?

Cape moved toward the closet. “You boys have me at a disadvantage in the wardrobe department.” He slowly opened the sliding door. “Mind if I get dressed?”

“Looking for this?” Cyrano reached behind the pillow and came up with Cape’s gun. The pistol painstakingly smuggled into Mexico. The one he had left in the closet, hanging in the shoulder holster—the empty holster he was now clutching in his left hand.

“We’re not amateurs, so don’t do anything stupid.” Cyrano’s nasal voice cut through the air as Mustache shifted in his seat and slowly removed his hand from his jacket pocket. From where Cape was standing it looked like Mustache favored a Glock nine-millimeter.

“Did you actually think we wouldn’t case the room?” Cyrano stood and took a step toward Cape, closing the gap but keeping his distance.

Cape turned and reached into the closet, felt around for a pair of pants. “You always this defensive?”

“Fuck you,” said Cyrano, clearly pissed he was talking to Cape’s back. “I mean, what do we look like to you?”

Cape shrugged. “Dentists,” he said over his shoulder. “You look like dentists to me.”