Saint Death (7 page)

The evening had gone just about as Zack had expected. They'd walked up resort row towards the end before catching a cab, since Dave in his paranoia of being targeted for his money didn't want anyone to know where they were staying. Dave had struck up a polite if overly friendly conversation with an older couple from Detroit down for their honeymoon, then talked them into splitting cab fare over to the main part of town. They'd ended up settling on street tacos after all, at a bustling place filled with gringos. Local merchants wandered around the crowded tables, pitching their wares to largely disinterested tourists while a drunk old man with an acoustic guitar serenaded couples loudly and off key in Spanish. Dave and Zack got lucky enough to score a table near the street with a bird's eye view of the plaza.

While they ate, a skinny Mexican guy in his late twenties tried desperately to sell them a sack of weed but Zack just kept telling him no. When it became clear that they weren't going to budge the man then switched to asking for a small donation to help feed his family. Moved by the man's sad tale of needing heart surgery for his youngest son Zack reached into his pocket for a few pesos but Dave stopped him with a stern look. Eventually the man went on to harass another group of college kids at the end of the Taqueria's patio.

“What was that about?” Zack complained. “I was just going to give him a couple pesos to help him out.”

“He doesn't have a sick kid,” Dave said matter-of-factly.

“Probably not,” Zack admitted, “but that doesn't mean he's not suffering. What would a few pesos hurt? I've seen you waste more on drinks for strangers.”

“It's a set up,” Dave said with a knowing smile. “I read about it online while you were napping.”

“On what?” Zack asked flippantly. “Scams are us dot com?”

“There's a site some Americans who live down here put up to warn visitors,” Dave said, folding up a
carne asada
taco and shoving the whole thing noisily into his mouth as he spoke. “I got to thinking about what Oscar had said and decided to see what other kinds of scams there were. The last thing I want is to spend more time in jail being harassed by Mexican cops for a payout. This was one of the main ones the site warned about.”

“Go on,” Zack said, his eyes watching as the anxious dealer accosted a longhaired surfer with a bad sunburn. The kid shook his head back and forth before reaching into his trunks and handing him a hundred peso bill just to go away.

“First he tries to sell you drugs,” Dave said with a snort. “That's an open and shut way for them to make a fast buck off of you. If you don't buy up they begin begging for a donation, anything to help them out, but it's just part of the sting. The sign to move in is the exchange of money, which the police will say was him paying for drugs.”

“That's insane,” Zack argued. “Besides when they stop and search him they will see he's clean. What good is shaking him down then?”

“Ah but that's the trick! He won't be,” Dave said with a twinkle in his eyes. “They will pull him into their vehicle to search him on suspicion of buying drugs and they'll put a bag of pills or an eight ball of cocaine right in his pocket then pull it out in front of him. One guy said they had a paper sack already in the police cruiser with a full brick of heroin they said was his. That's when they start shaking you down for some good old American greenbacks!”

“Come on man,” Zack laughed, “You're just being paranoid again. I mean how do they even know? Is the guy that just tried to sell us weed going to then rat out his customers to the police?”

“He doesn't have to,” Zack said, reaching over and taking one of Zack's tacos, an al pastor with grilled pineapple on top of it. “They're already working together before he comes out to sell for the night. That's who gave him the weed no doubt. Somewhere nearby in the crowd is an undercover watching the whole time. There. The guy in the black hat. Look but don't let him know you're looking.”

Zack turned to see a man in a black coat and hat watching them from across the street. The man was standing with a newspaper open but not bothering to read it. On the cover were images of cut up bodies and lurid headlines about growing cartel violence. He locked eyes with Zack, who casually looked around as if he were taking in the scenery rather than singling him out. When he looked back again the man was intently watching the longhaired surfer again, who was receiving a wealth of praise and compliments from the man he'd just helped.

“The web site said they wait for the dealer to wander off before moving in,” Dave explained. Zack looked back over to see the man stuffing the hundred peso bill into his pocket and walking away. He glanced across the way to the man in the black hat, who was now excitedly talking on a cell phone. A moment later a police car pulled up and stopped next to the patio. Two officers got out and surrounded the surprised surfer kid, dragging him to the car and forcing him inside. The man with the black hat calmly walked over and got in the back with him.

“And so it begins,” Dave said, turning back to Zack, whose mouth was hanging open in shock at what he'd seen.

“That's insane,” Zack said. “We've got to help him. He didn't do anything wrong.” He started to get up but the look on Dave's face made him freeze in his tracks.

“There's nothing we can do for him man,” Dave said. “If anything we'd just make it worse. This is their world and we're just passing through it. To them we're all just a paycheck waiting to be tripped up and extorted. Trust me the police are the last people I'd go to for help down here.”

“Which means if something goes wrong,” Zack said, “we're on our own?”

“Pretty much,” Dave said, finishing off Zack's last taco now that he'd lost his appetite. “Luckily most real trouble is easy to avoid if you know what to look for.”

“Like over eager dealers?” Zack asked earnestly.

“Exactly,” Dave said, standing up and leaving his pile of trash on the table. “So tell me my dear old friend, how are you feeling now that you've gotten a couple tacos in you?”

“Good as new,” Zack smiled weakly.

“Excellent,” Dave said, turning his arms towards the long street already bustling with young college kids starting to party and get loud as they made their way in and out of the seemingly endless procession of local bars. “Adventure awaits us!”

Dave sauntered across the road towards the first bar where five girls in bikini tops and short skirts were lined up to get inside, his eyes glassed over like a kid in a candy store.

Zack cast one last look at the surfer in the police cruiser, who had his head down and was now crying. He felt a stab of guilt in his heart as he forced himself to look away. “Dave's right,” he mumbled to himself. “All we can do is make it worse.”

They spent the rest of the night in a blur of clubs, going from one to the next as Dave tried his best pick-up lines on group after group of increasingly disinterested coeds. When he failed to get the reaction he was looking for he decided he'd been going about things all wrong. “These girls aren't buying the standard spiel,” he said, a desperate look in his eyes. “It's market saturation. There's just too many options down here.”

“What can you do?” Zack slapped his friend on the back in a show of sympathy, but Dave wasn't placated by the gesture.

“We've got to change the odds,” Dave said, a lightbulb going off over his head. “We've got to set ourselves apart from the rest of the crowd and I know just how.”

Dave stormed out of the club and Zack followed in his wake. He crossed the street and headed down to one of the more upscale clubs with a long line of well-dressed guests waiting to get in. The bouncer looked annoyed as Dave strode purposefully towards the front of velvet ropes.

“We're at capacity,” the bouncer said sternly, heading off Dave before he began.

“That's okay,” Dave said, holding up a hundred dollar bill. “We have a reservation.”

“We don't take reservations,” the bouncer sneered.

“Then make an exception,” Dave said, adding another hundred. The bouncer hesitated a moment before pocketing the bills. He lifted the rope and ushered Dave and Zack through without another word. Once they were in he let out a loud, distinctive whistle.

A moment later Angel came out of a building across the street and made his way over to him. “
Que pedo güey?
”

“I think I just found what you were looking for earlier,” the bouncer said. “I've got a couple working girls already inside. They should be easy enough to spot, if you don't know them already.”

“And your cut?” Angel asked.

“Just pay the girls,” the bouncer said. “I'll get it out of them.”

“Can they keep their mouths shut?” Angel fixed a deadly glare at him.

“My girls don't say shit to no one,” the bouncer swore. “If they do you have my word I'll cut them up myself and send you their eye teeth.”

“Gracias,” Angel said before slipping into the club.

“
De nada,”
the bouncer replied, closing the ropes behind him and smiling as he turned back to the growing line of eager American kids waiting to get inside. “Easiest money I've made in a long time,” he chuckled to himself.

Inside the party raged as two DJ's dueled it out while a bevy of bikini clad beauties gyrated in a foam pit, their lithe bodies wriggling to the music as green laser lights strafed them from high above. Dave wasted no time locating a waitress who set them up at a private booth with bottle service. She poured them both shots of tequila before winking at Zack and walking away, her hips swerving lusciously from side to side as she went. Dave made a big show of watching her go, then let out a long wolf whistle.

“Did you see the ass on that one?” Dave asked rhetorically. “Sweet baby Jesus! Now that's what I call an onion, because it brings a tear to the eye just to look at. Get it?”

“You're so clever,” Zack said derisively. “I'd say don't quit your day job but we both know you don't have one.”

“She sure was into you,” Dave said, ignoring the petty jab. “Did you see the way she was looking at you? Dear Lord. Like you were a steak fucking dinner and she'd been stranded on a desert island starving her whole life. Why don't women ever look at me like that?”

“I thought you didn't want to call attention to yourself,” Zack said as he lifted the shot and slammed it back.

“Under normal circumstances I don't but desperate times call for desperate measures,” Dave crooned, pouring him a fresh shot. “Besides, what good is having all the money in the world if you can't use it to impress hot chicks?”

They proceeded to get good and trashed over the next hour, but Dave never got any closer to landing any of the girls he set his sights on. He tried buying some of them drinks but gave up when the vast majority of girls refused to take an alcoholic beverage from an obviously horny male stranger with questionable motives.

Can you blame them,
thought Zack.

When the attempt to win the ladies over with free booze failed, Dave began introducing himself to girls on the dance floor as a secret agent in training with the CIA. He told them it was a matter of national security that they come to our reserved VIP booth and party with us. Some laughed at his bold approach but most of them simply ignored his advances, pulling together on the dance floor and closing him out, like a school of fish forming a bait ball to keep away predators.

“It's hopeless,” Dave said, rejoining his friend at the booth. Zack, who had spent the better part of the night polishing off the bottle of silver Patron on the table, served them up another round.

“That's okay buddy,” Zack consoled him, a warm feeling spreading through him as he slammed down a new shot. “You tried. There's always tomorrow. We live to play another day.”

“How many of those have you had tonight?” Dave asked in amazement.

“I kinda lost count,” Zack admitted. “Just trying to get your money's worth.”

“Or trying to forget about Lily,” Dave prodded, but Zack made a loud farting noise with his mouth. He winked at Dave.

“Lily who?” Zack replied sarcastically.

“All right man! That's the spirit,” Dave roared. “And since you've got your head on straight now I think you might like to know that hot Delta Nu from the plane has been staring at you from the bar for the last ten minutes.”

Zack turned and looked. Dave was right. She was staring right at them. Their eyes locked and she smiled and waved, giving him an open invitation to join her.

“Well?” Dave said encouragingly. “What are you waiting for? She's waving you over! Go on man!”

“Here goes nothing,” Zack slurred, clumsily getting to his feet and heading in her direction.

“You've got this,” Dave shouted over the music. “Just play it cool.”

Zack drunkenly weaved through a crowd of people, bumping into a busy waitress as he jumped out to reach the bar and knocking her tray full of drinks to the floor in a sickening clatter. She yelled at him in Spanish until he pointed back to Dave and told her to put it all on their tab. The Delta Nu, who was now in a short black dress with her hair slicked back and held in place with an orchid hair clip, laughed as he pulled himself up the bar.

“I like to make an entrance,” he joked, feeling more than a little embarrassed.

“I see that,” she giggled, barely able to contain herself. “First the airport incident and now this. You sure know how to cause a scene.”