Latitude Zero (34 page)

“Gamblers Anonymous. I know. I started to work with them,” he said. “And I told Sports Xplor I was done consulting for them, done fixing races. But I’d signed contracts. My hands were tied. And I’d already invested so much of my own money in the business. I could lose it all if I didn’t follow through and at least complete the PAC Tour plan.” He held out his hand toward the bike. “You’re a person of conscience, Tessa,” he said. “And integrity. I know your type. We went to the same school. Somewhere, deep down, we’re not so different, are we? Help me out. Help me get out of this situation and turn my life around, and I’ll make sure the Sports Xplor agents never bother you girls again.”

“No,” I said.

“No?” he repeated. “Is that your final answer?”

“It is. I can’t let the wrong people take the fall for your bad decisions.”

“Tessa! Now!” Mari shouted at me, grabbing her bike. And she rushed for the door.

I followed, yanking the bike out of Preston’s hands. Preston ran after us through the warehouse, to the door. Our cleats clattered on the cement floor, and Preston’s business loafers slapped close behind.

“Is there a problem here?” Wilson asked, staring at us in confusion as Mari and I burst out of the building.

Mari slammed the door shut, and we both threw all our weight against it to hold it tight.

“Yes! Call the Embassy! Tell them Juan Carlos’s murderer is in here!” Mari shouted. Santiago ran up to us with the key and turned the lock tight, locking Preston Lane inside the warehouse.

“I don’t understand what this is all about,” Wilson said. “Santiago? What is going on?”

“Preston Lane is extremely dangerous,” I said. “And he’s not alone. Those people in the Ford Explorers over there? They are working with him. They’re part of a sports gambling and racketeering ring. And he’s laundering the profits here in Ecuador. Some of them through Vuelta.”

Wilson pressed one hand to his chest. “Gambling! Money washing? What is all this you are telling me?”

“Sports Xplor,
Papi
,” said Santiago. “We’ll explain more later. But Preston Lane is part of it. Trust me. He’s in the inner circle.”

Mari hopped on the Diablo bike and pedaled to the edge of the parking lot. I followed, trotting on foot, pushing Juan Carlos’s cash-stuffed bike. “Tessa! What are you doing?” called Mari. “You have to ride the bike!”

“Ride the bike. Yeah. Okay. I can do that.”

“Hurry! You can do this!”

“Right. Okay. I can do this.” I tried to coach myself, to urge myself on. My throat was dry. My breath came fast.

Mari looked right and left, and all over the lot, to find the easy way out. “I think we can turn a sharp right and get out on the other side of this lot. That will take us to Avenida Colón, and it’s almost all downhill to the starting line from there.” She flung one leg over the Diablo bike and prepared to push off.

“Downhill?” I couldn’t even get my leg over the frame of Juan Carlos’s Cadence. “What if this bike falls apart? The frame is totally compromised. I’m riding on cash, not carbon.”

“Avoid potholes and rocks. Find the smoothest road you can. And listen to the bike. If you hear any weird creaking sounds, get off.”

“Right.
Weird
creaking sounds. As opposed to the perfectly normal ones?” I muttered.

“Ready?” Mari said. “Let’s roll.”

Just before I turned, I caught the shocked and dismayed looks on the faces of Hugo and the Ruiz kids, who probably thought we were thieves. But there was no time now to explain.

“Go faster!” Mari urged me as one of the Ford Explorers backed out of its parking space.

We exited the lot and headed down the street.

I looked down at my churning pedals. My legs, strong and healthy. My tires skimming over the pavement. And I grinned. I was riding again!

In the distance I could see a swath of green amid the buildings. El Parque Metropolitano. The starting line for the race.

I prayed that our bikes would hold up. Did I hear creaking sounds? I couldn’t even tell, as traffic was whooshing by us. I followed Mari off the sidewalk, which was cracked and bumpy, and into the smoother street. I felt the heat of the cars on my legs.

A traffic light at a busy intersection forced us to stop abruptly. A moped purred behind us. And then I choked. Everything went dim around me as something—a hand—grabbed my throat, and then yanked the necklace off of it. I heard something snap and prayed it wasn’t a bone.

No. It was the chain.

The light turned green, and the moped driver zoomed off, clutching the gold necklace. As the driver turned the corner to a side street, and I choked and gasped, trying to catch my breath, I could see long red hair streaming out beneath a helmet. Balboa! My God. She’d yanked the chain right off my neck. Someone in one of those parked cars at the container unload must have seen Santiago checking for the flash drive. If they’d watched us with binoculars—or even without—they would have seen something was up with that necklace.

“What are we going to do?” Mari cried out.

Car horns blared at us. We had to move. But where? Go straight to the starting line and the authorities with only the cash-filled bike? Or get the drive—all our supporting evidence—back from Balboa?

“You distract the spies,” I decided. “Pretend like you have another flash drive. I’ll go after Balboa. Without the flash drive, we can’t prove anything about Preston.”

And with that, I turned left, in pursuit.

58

BALBOA HADN’T
gotten far; I could still hear the
putputput
of her motor. She’d made a tactical error taking that congested street. And on the bike, I was free to weave among the cars, and even hop up onto the sidewalk to try to catch up with her faster. I swerved around a street food vendor, a flower stand, and two piles of bricks. I dodged a boy carrying a huge mesh bag of soccer balls for sale. A trio of children with shoe-shine kits.
A triciclo
towing a trailer of ice cream. A group of lost Japanese tourists studying maps.

I picked up speed, as if drafting a slipstream. My legs felt so strong. Like they were part of the bike.

And then the moped came into view. It was stopped at a red light at an intersection, three blocks from where Balboa had turned on to the side street.

I wove between the waiting cars and rode up closer to her, staying just out of her line of vision. I could see the necklace chain wound around one hand. If I could only reach out and grab it. But her hand held fast to the moped handlebar.

I could poke her. Startle her. Get her to drop it.

I reached forward.

Then she saw me in one of his rearview mirrors. The light turned green and she gunned it.

Our race was on again.

I followed her for three more blocks, and then she turned down a different side street. A narrower one. With cobblestones. We were on the edge of the Old Town.

I held on tight, bouncing over the cobblestones on my dizzying descent. I didn’t know how long any road bike could hold up on these cobblestones, let alone a damaged one.

I prayed that the hollowed-out bike frame would hold. I pictured the carbon tubes healthy, those threads inside thrumming with power and life. I imagined those frame joints firm, the bonds that held them secure. Juan Carlos had been a person with integrity. And even though he’d only ridden this bike once, to take it from Preston Lane’s car where he’d swiped it to the hiding place in the woods, I imagined his integrity seeping into the frame and holding it all together.

At one point my wheels left the pavement. I closed my eyes, sure I was heading for a major wipeout.
I’m sorry. I tried,
I said to Juan Carlos in my head.

You’re not done. You can catch him. Find your own ride.

Then I landed! I opened my eyes. I kept on riding, following that moped taillight as it turned down alley after alley, between crumbling Colonial buildings with wrought-iron balconies, deeper into a neighborhood, leading me into a labyrinth.

Was she trying to lead me? Or lose me?

And what was that sound behind me?

I glanced behind, several times, like someone in a bicycle race.

Six people on bikes were following me. Leading the pack was Pizarro. They were after the bike I was riding now. The bike with all the cash. We’d locked Preston Lane up for now, but I realized that he would still have his cell phone. He could still place orders from there, mobilizing his troops, and no doubt he had put them on our trail.

I looked ahead. The alley let out to a street where a black Ford Explorer was parked. And waiting. As I neared it, unable to stop myself on the downhill, I saw a tinted window roll down, and Darwin’s head look out. The sun glanced off his sunglasses. “Need a lift?” he called out.

I glanced behind once more. Pizarro and his peloton were gaining on me. They all had two-way radios clipped to their ears, like pro cyclists. I was headed into a trap. With no hope of getting that flash drive back. I cursed myself for not having sent that email to Bianca Slade last night. Even without any attachments as proof of what we knew, at least she’d know something was up.

I turned down another alley at the last possible moment, and the peloton shot past me. This alley was so narrow I could barely get through it. And at the end, I skidded to a stop and looked down. It had let me out at the top of a staircase, where there was no fence or guardrail. If I’d kept going, I would have plummeted down to the roof of the building ten feet below. Unless I’d missed it and tumbled down the stone steps. This was urban downhill riding, for which I had no training at all.

At the bottom of the long staircase was the plaza where el Ratón had ridden his victory lap. Now it was fairly quiet, with so many people heading to the bike races. I saw some
indígena
families with blankets spread out, selling crafts. Street artists. Tourists sitting by the fountain and children playing at its base. An old man feeding a flock of pigeons, which suddenly startled at something, flew up in a cloud, and dispersed over the church.

I got off the bike and slung it over my shoulder. I’d hoof it down those stairs. If I could get to the plaza, I could find the main drag, Amazonas, and make my way back to the race starting line. I checked my watch. Fifteen minutes. I was cutting it close.

But I still didn’t have the necklace. Should I go back and look for Balboa’s moped? And risk facing the bicycling spies? Or bumping into Darwin in his car?

Exhaustion, nerves, everything suddenly hit me. And I had a huge stitch in my side. I massaged it and tried to catch my breath while I figured out what to do next.

Then I heard a
put-put-put
sound behind me. A moped. I turned and saw Balboa barreling toward me, her expression changing from startled to triumphant in an instant. She pulled up beside me with a squealing of brakes.

59

I GLANCED
at Balboa’s hands and her pockets, frisking her with my eyes. No obvious weapons bulged or poked out. But I already knew this girl was capable of doing horrible things for which she didn’t need to be armed.

She looked different. Awful. Her fair skin glistened with sweat. Her cheeks were scorched pink from the harsh equatorial sun. “Great running into you here,” she said. “I’m so glad I don’t have to run you off the road. I kind of hate doing that.”

I looked for the gold necklace around her hand, where I’d last seen it. It wasn’t there. “I was following you,” I said. “Give me back my necklace. I know you have it.”

“I don’t have it. I gave it to one of my colleagues,” she said. “And now, yes, I’m following you. So I guess we’ve come full circle. I’ll trade you that bike for this moped, and I’ll be on my way.”

She turned off the moped, hopped off it, and walked it toward me, fast, forcing me to the very edge of that platform before I could sidestep and get out of the way. If she took one more step, or pushed me, I’d go right over.

She put a hand on Juan Carlos’s bike. “I got an instant promotion for nabbing that flash drive. I’m working in collections now. I have orders to take this bike back.” Her words sounded forceful and tough, but her face betrayed her. She wasn’t happy about this job.

The expression Kristen had used when she fired me from
KidVision
suddenly floated back into my head.

A chain is only as strong as its weakest link
.

I’d found that weak link in Preston Lane’s network. Balboa. If I could earn her trust and get her talking, I could get the flash drive necklace back. And I could still get that bike to the starting line, where hopefully Ecuadorian media, Ecuadorian government officials, and embassy bigwigs, plus a large police presence, were all assembled and waiting.

I held the bike. I stood my ground. “You could leave your job, you know,” I said. “It doesn’t sound so great. You could definitely use your talents for something better.”

“I can’t quit. Darwin will never let me.”

“Then sabotage your own job. Screw up and get yourself fired.”

That hesitation gave me room to maneuver. Not much, but just enough. She seemed to be willing to listen. I kept talking. “I know what it’s like to get sick of a job,” I said. “Like
KidVision
. It’s funny. Looking back? I feel like maybe I even rode bandit on that charity ride on purpose, to sabotage my own job. I felt so much pressure to be this perfect person, always chirpy, always setting a good example for others. I didn’t even know what that meant. I’d never thought deeply about it. I just felt like my life was no longer my own, like GBCN and my producer owned me or something. So I think I might have made that stupid decision as a way to get out. I didn’t know how to finish that job and start something new.”

Balboa nodded, scratching her neck, apparently thinking about what I’d just said.

And exposing a gold chain in the process. A gold chain tucked under her turtleneck sweater.

She’d lied to me. She did have the necklace.

So close. So close. I could rip it off Balboa’s neck. I could push her down the hill. I could take the flash drive and the bike and run like hell down those stairs.

If I was that kind of person.

But I wasn’t. There had to be some other path.

And I knew Balboa, for all the bravado of her explorer code name, was really just somebody lost.

“I hate this job,” she said quietly.

I nodded sympathetically but said nothing, trying to gain her trust.

“It was fun at first, smuggling cash,” she admitted. “I loved all the travel. Great pay and bonuses. College tuition bills paid. My family never had a lot of money. I thought I had it made, when Darwin met me at a spring break party in Florida and gave me my first assignment. And it was fun to work with these Sports Xplor agents. A lot of them really knew about sports—he’d recruited them from fantasy sports gaming sites—and it was exciting. In the early days, anyway.”

I could see how tempting that job would be to someone in her situation. But it didn’t excuse her role in this criminal organization.

“You can still get off this ride,” I said. “It’s not too late. Come with me to talk to the embassy people. Report Darwin and Pizarro. The FBI will go easier on you if you tell them the truth about Sports Xplor and its connection to Darwin, Pizarro, and Preston Lane.”

She shook her head. “I’m too scared. Darwin knows everything about me. He knows about something bad I did to pay a college bill freshman year. That’s the way he has power over his employees. He never has to pull a gun. He just lights up information and makes it explode. He can wreck a reputation with the push of a button. He can make sure I never find a real job.”

“Balboa,” I said, “what’s your real name?”

She looked up. Her eyes glistened. “Bridget,” she whispered.

“Bridget. Listen to me. Do you understand what Preston has been trying to cover up, with Darwin’s help? What project you’re helping him with? He’s hiding a whole lot of illegal activities, including running this offshore betting business and fixing bike races. And you know he’s really the one behind Juan Carlos’s death, don’t you?”

Balboa looked down. “I try not to think about the details too much. But yeah.”

“Meanwhile, two innocent people back home are people of interest in this case: Dylan Holcomb and Jake Collier. They’re both just decent people, trying to live their lives.” I thought for a moment. Was Jake a decent person? He had his faults and flaws, like anyone, and I didn’t need him in my life. But he was innocent of the crimes and didn’t need this cloud of suspicion following him around forever. “More race fixes are being planned, on an even larger scale,” I went on. “More money will get laundered through charities and other businesses here. And cycling is going to get corrupted all over again with this scheme. You could do a lot of good, for a lot of people, by just explaining how you got dragged into this. By fingering Darwin and Preston. And by handing over that flash drive so I can take it to the people who can go after these creeps.”

Bridget’s fingers played at the gold chain, twisting it around and around as she thought.

Putputputputput.

A moped sound drew closer.

Bridget wheeled around to see who was emerging from the alley. Darwin, on a moped. Followed by Pizarro and the other five cyclists from the shadowy Team Xplor.

“Agent Balboa!” Darwin called out. “What are you doing? You were not supposed to go after the bike until you handed off the necklace!”

Balboa clutched the necklace tighter.

“You didn’t want to hand it over to them, did you,” I said, locking eyes with her. “You’ve already gone against his orders once. You can do it again.”

“This isn’t funny, Agent Balboa,” said Darwin. “Move away from the scene and get the flash drive away from that girl. We’ll handle the bike.”

“Bridget,” I coaxed. “You don’t need these guys anymore. Stand up for the right thing. And find your own ride.”

The moped and the cyclists inched closer. Darwin revved the engine. Now both Bridget and I stood at the very edge of the platform. Bridget teetered. I grabbed her arm to keep her from falling.

“Agent Balboa!” Pizarro inched his bike forward. “Do I have to cut that necklace off you?”

“Stop calling me Balboa! I hate that name! I’m done with that name!” Bridget tore off the necklace, breaking the chain. She held it in both hands for a moment. “You want this? Go chase it yourselves!” And she hurled it over the edge.

“No!” Darwin shouted as he lunged for it and missed.

No!
I wailed inside.

Pizarro and the other cyclists leaped off their bikes, and they all looked over the edge, trying to spot it on the rooftop below and figure out the best way down.

Bridget took my hand and slipped something into it. It was the flash drive. She’d thrown only the chain, to distract them.

“I’ll hold these guys off you as long as I can. I think I can buy you a good lead. Now go, Tessa. Go. Ride like the wind.”

/////

I DIDN’T
waste any time. I shouldered Juan Carlos’s bike and ran down those stone steps. I slipped twice in my bike shoes, and skinned my arm, but I got up again and kept going. At the bottom, I put the flash drive in my pocket and rode as fast as I could toward El Parque Metropolitano.

Toward the starting line of the race.

Toward the finish line of this nightmare.

Toward the starting line of the rest of my life.

I heard cheering as I neared it. I almost imagined it was for me. But the race had started. I was riding against the stream. Colorful pelotons shot past me. Including Team Cadence-EcuaBar in white and green. The Ecuadorian team followed close to their wheels, a streak of red, yellow, and blue.

I gritted my teeth and pedaled on, ignoring police who cautioned me to keep away from the barricades. Spectators scattered out of my way. Pigeons, too.

“Tessa! Over here!”

“Slow down! Slow down!”

I looked up and saw Mari and Santiago waving. Gesturing me to veer right, to a set of bleachers roped off with red ribbon. Diplomat and other government cars were parked just behind them. Police cars, too.

“You did it, Tessa! You did it! Stop!” Mari shouted.

I plowed right through the red ribbon setting off the VIP area, my arms raised up in a victory V.