Crossing the Line by Clinton McKinzie

Author:Clinton McKinzie
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
ISBN: 9780440334934
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2004-04-26T16:00:00+00:00

But the question still remained: How to get Roberto word that it was time for him to head out, purportedly to climb?

While we discussed options, Tom fast-forwarded through the surveillance tape that had self-recorded while we were visiting the judge. It showed a few of the prostitutes splashing—with swimsuits on this time—in the pool. They cleared out when Hidalgo came out to do his morning laps. A little later they were escorted in a caravan of cars back to the airstrip beyond the hill and the plane took off. Apparently a night and a day’s debauchery was all Hidalgo would allow himself and his men.

Roberto was visible for what the camera’s timer showed as almost an hour. He wasn’t with the others, though, around the pool or taking the girls to the airstrip. He was out of their sight, hidden by a wing of the house. He walked halfway up the hillside to boulder around on a shelf of rock there.

One of the young bangers had followed him at a distance with an automatic rifle over his shoulder. He watched Roberto cruise the rock for a while, gaping, and doubtless wondering why anyone would fool around like that ten to twenty feet off the ground. Then he sat down, apparently bored. It was obvious, though, that he’d been told to watch Roberto, as he didn’t go back to the house until my brother was finished.

It sent a clear message: Roberto was an honored guest, allowed to sleep in Hidalgo’s wing of the house, but either Hidalgo himself or his security chiefs wanted him watched. So he was a prisoner, too.

“You Burns boys certainly have a thing for rocks,” Mary said.

“It’s all they’ve got in their heads,” Tom said, managing to be almost witty.

“It’s training,” I told them. “It makes you strong and confident. So that you can do the same moves hundreds of feet off the deck.”

I took the controller from Tom and reversed the tape. I watched my brother walk backward past the guard without a glance or a word. I slowed it, watching him leap fifteen feet straight up onto the rock. I then watched him traversing the upper lip of the long shelf, torquing his fingertips and toes into tiny cracks.

“That’s how we’ll tell him,” I said, pointing at the screen. “We’ll just leave him a note. Right there, where no one else will find it.”

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