St. Kilda Consulting 2 - The Wrong Hostage by Elizabeth Lowell

Author:Elizabeth Lowell
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2006-06-06T22:00:00+00:00

TIJUANA

SUNDAY, 9:27 P.M.

35

“YOU WORK FOR HECTOR Rivas Osuna?” Faroe asked calmly.

One of the men snapped on a flashlight. “Sí, señor. Manos up, por favor.”

Faroe held his hands up and his arms out.

The guard frisked him with quick, neutral efficiency.

“Very polite, these two,” Faroe said to Grace. “Show them your arms.”

Grace stood in a hip-shot pose while the Mexican ran his flashlight over her costume.

“Satisfied?” she asked sweetly.

The guard’s mustache twitched in what could have been a smile or a sneer.

A pair of black utility vehicles roared up the street. With his flashlight the guard gestured toward the lead vehicle, a Cadillac Escalade.

“¿Qué pasa?” Faroe said sharply. “Hector is meeting us at the track.”

“Hector, he change his min’ mucho,” the guard said in the Spanglish of the border. “Get in.”

Faroe looked at Grace. “You don’t have to risk this. Go back to the hotel.”

Without a word she walked toward the Escalade in a skirt so tight he didn’t see how she breathed, much less moved. He opened the vehicle’s back door, put his hand on her leather-clad butt, and gave her a boost up into the Escalade.

Heavily smoked windows made the interior dark. Grace settled into the middle bench seat. An instant later she realized there was someone on the jump seat behind her. She could smell him, a mixture of sweat, hair oil, and gun oil. When she turned to look, light from the street gleamed faintly on the barrel of the assault rifle that lay across his lap.

“Don’t worry about him,” Faroe said. “He just suffers from testicular insufficiency.”

“You recognize the symptoms, right?”

“In others.”

The guard with the flashlight shoved his pistol into his belt and climbed into the front passenger seat. “Andale.”

The driver bulled his way back into traffic. Behind them brakes screamed and horns shouted. The driver of the Escalade stuck his arm out the window and pumped up and down, the Mexican version of a raised middle finger.

“In Tijuana, working for Hector Rivas means never having to say ‘Excuse me,’” Faroe said.

“You’re enjoying this,” she muttered.

“It’s like a hockey game. You don’t have to wonder where you stand.”

“Lane feels the same about soccer, especially the games at All Saints.”

“If he learned that, his time in Mexico wasn’t wasted.”

“But it goes against everything I’ve tried to teach him,” she said.

“So does Hector. Guess who has the best chance of surviving?”

Mouth flat, Grace watched the nightscape flash by. The driver passed a police patrol car like it was painted on the street. The officers looked sideways, then straight ahead.

“Like Washington, D.C., where Secret Service Suburbans and FBI vehicles have immunity from traffic laws,” she said.

“Down here, the boys have immunity from everything.”

“Where are we going?” she asked, straining to see road signs.

“¿A dónde vamos?” he said to the guard in the passenger seat.

“Señor Rivas.”

“Now you know as much as I do,” Faroe said to Grace.

“I doubt it.”

“If this is like every dope deal I’ve ever seen, we’ll ride around for an hour while these dudes make sure we aren’t being followed.

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