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“Siegfried, come in,” he said, and motioned him inside with a flick of his pale, thin hand. “You’ll be pleased to hear the news I’ve received about Roger Gordian.”
Back at Salazar’s palatial house by the sea, Lathrop was enjoying himself tremendously.
Facing Lucio across the room, watching his expression go in stages from astonishment to acceptance to resentful anger, he couldn’t have said whether the greater kick came from a regard for his own expert connivance or the reaction it had instigated.
Six of one, he thought.
He sat looking out at the breathtaking view of the sea and waited for Lucio to digest what he’d been told.
“Okay,” Lucio said at length. “Help me be sure I’ve got this right. A step at a time. Because you threw me for a loop here, and a whole lot depends on me not misunderstanding you.”
Lathrop nodded.
“First off, you’re saying absolutely Felix is dead. You’re sure there’s no mixup it’s him they found in that car trunk.”
“Couldn’t be surer,” Lathrop said, pokerfaced.
“Now, second, you can confirm it was Enrique who killed him-”
“Ordered him killed,” Lathrop corrected.
“Ordered his own nephew killed. Because Felix was holding out on the profits from the load he swiped from me.”
“It’s a little more involved,” Lathrop said. “Everybody tolerates some skimming. But Felix was greedy. Claimed he was the one who did the tunnel boost, took
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the risks, and deserved to keep every cent of the lings. Bragging about it to anybody who could warm stool next to him. And that was only the last straw, was running hustles left and right, and it was com- i knowledge he was on the pipe. Getting crazier and zier. Becoming a major embarrassment.” Lucio shrugged. “Was me looking to burn the com- stition, steal their goods, I wouldn’t have trusted the with the job. But say I’m Enrique, and I do, and i hear he’s spending my percentage. Being family, I : to him direct. Let him know he’s making a big mis: and better get on track.”
rique did that plenty of times. He called Felix in : week to give him one more chance. And instead of gizing to Enrique, offering him a percentage of the from the hijack, Felix told him to shove his griev-
where the sun doesn’t shine.” ^-Stupid,” Lucio said and shook his head.
“Yeah.” S*Took cajones, though.”
“Yeah. But dumb and ballsy can be a bad combina-
**
^Lucio was thoughtful.
“Let’s get to the next step,” he said, shifting his large on his wine-colored sofa cushions. “Enrique de; enough is enough. Sees the kid isn’t afraid of him. he can’t be disciplined. So he’s gotta go. That on mark?”
‘ Lathrop nodded. “Lousy position,” Salazar said. “Felix being his
ew.”
“Which is the reason he’s been claiming it was your aily that had Felix scrubbed,” Lathrop said. “Like I
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told you before, Enrique’s story to his sister is that the Magi of Tijuana held a conference across the border about how to handle the problem of the tunnel boost. According to him, you’d already planned the hit to make an example of Felix but wanted a vote of confidence from your brothers before moving ahead.”
Lucio seemed affronted.
‘That don’t even make sense,” he said. “I want the kid taken out, I’m gonna be damn sure his body disappears permanent. The way Felix was living, it could’ve been weeks before anybody figured he wasn’t off on some fucking jag.”
Lathrop looked out the window, appreciating the expansive view of the sea without end.
“Enrique’s head of the family,” he said. “His sister admires him. She believes what he tells her.”
“But I’d have to be tonto, an idiot, to order a dump job that leaves Felix in a car in his own place of business.”
“She’s not in the life. She probably doesn’t know how things work. Or if she does, she could be too overcome with grief to think that clearly about it. All I can say is he convinced her you’re responsible, and now she’s demanding that he retaliate.”
Lucio was shaking his head again.
“This would be funny, if it wasn’t so incredible,” he said. “Enrique has Felix steal my shit. Kill my people. Then they have a falling out over revenue from the hijack. Enrique does Felix, fingers me to his sister as a scapegoat. She tells him I have to die for whacking her son. Next, I get a phone call from Enrique, who says he wants to meet. Work out our problems. And I agree to it. Figuring maybe he’s realized he made a mistake and
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ats to offer reparations. But his real purpose is to do now.” He thumbed his chest. “I’m going about my ^ng, not stepping on anybody’s toes, and Enrique’s try- to make me a victim twice over.” Lathrop looked at him. The yarn was quite a nifty tie twister.
“This isn’t just about Enrique satisfying his sister,” he ; as a finishing touch. “You have to remember where how this started. The tunnel job was a message. He slutely means to shove you out of California and 3ws he has El Tio’s fist behind him. Felix was a mar- when he was alive, and now that he’s dead, Ens’s still using him as a prop for his act.” Lucio scowled with contempt. “El Tfo,” he said. “Everything’s disorder since he’s
into the picture. Fucking disorder.” Lathrop said nothing.
|l,ucio sat there sucking his front teeth for a while, he leaned forward on the couch, Lathrop was I to notice the back of the cushion underneath him high off the springs from his ample weight. “You got anything else?” ^That’s it.”
Lucio sucked his teeth some more. “All right, Lathrop. You’re the best. And you can lint on this tip being worth a nice bonus,” he said. “As as how it goes between me and Enrique, we’ll see luch of us is the fucking idiot two nights from now at
park.”
Lathrop nodded.
It did indeed promise to be an interesting showdown, he fully looked forward to being ringside.
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“It is interesting how we measure our accomplishments,” DeVane said. “I have many successes behind me, and envision more to come. Widespread ventures that yield abundant rewards. Yet the satisfaction I feel at this moment cannot be reckoned. A single person downed. A problem resolved. I hadn’t realized Roger Gordian had gotten quite that deeply under my skin.”
Kuhl sat across the desk from him in silence. Behind DeVane, slightly to the left of his chair, was one of the few windows in the entire building, a fixed pane of oneway multilaminate glass able to absorb the impact of a bomb blast or high-powered sniper fire. Perfectly square and soundproof, it somehow imparted a greater sense of separateness from the outlying woodlands than would have been presented by a solid wall. Kuhl saw deer tracks in the snow running toward the white-frocked forest spruces and understood the wild longing of the confined predator to lunge against the glass wall of a zoo or aquarium exhibit, a pull older than anything that could be devised to suppress it. And DeVane didn’t fool him. His mannered behavior was embroidery. A wrap he wore as neatly as his expensive suits, and to deliberate effect. But he, too, knew the impulse to strike and taste blood.
“Gordian’s condition,” Kuhl said. “Were you told of it?”
“He remains among the hospital’s general population, which means we can infer that he’s still in the early stage,” DeVane said. “But the symptoms will progress quickly enough.”
Kuhl was without expression.
“I propose that our backups be put in full readiness,” he said.
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fDeVane smiled, his lips flitting back from his small, Wte teeth.
“Your exactitude is always appreciated,” he said. jfcs, I agree, let’s surely be prepared for anything.” f’There was a brief pause. Then DeVane gestured to- the computer station against the wall to his right, i glowing display filled with rows of unopened Email ?es.
; come the trigger orders, even as we sit here,” I said. “Multiples in some cases. To no surprise, our : friend has informed me that he’s found a deep of capital. As have many of his neighbors in the It’s enthralling, the eagerness of my clients, in the noisy public arenas. Those in solitude. : who fear differences of ethnicity and morphology, ey want greater prestige, greater wealth, a world re- lioned under their influence. Or they seek to inflict internal damage upon mankind, spread the stains I dead loves and passions. Hardly a person to whom made my offer isn’t groping. And three days from v, they’ll all have the opportunity to chop away at other.” Another flit of a smile. “We’re in the ey, Siegfried. And I have faith that humanity will us in it to stay.” f?Kuhl peered through the thick synthetic glass at a