Russell Blake - Revenge of the Assassin

And make no mistake. Antonio was a predator. Of that, Gustavo was sure.

Once home, he turned on his computer and began downloading the thousands of photos and rap sheets his network had come up with through Interpol. It would be a painstaking and potentially fruitless chore, but he was infinitely patient and loved a project. And there was a point of stubborn pride in the equation. Gustavo’s nose was never wrong.

Now, it was a matter of discovering where and what young Antonio was running from, and then they could have an altogether different discussion than one revolving around chess. Which Antonio had beaten Gustavo at today, yet again, for the seventeenth straight time since they’d begun their irregular matches.

Gustavo was more than intrigued.

The files finally loaded, he began paging through the photos.

At three in the morning he came across one that stopped him. There were striking similarities, and yet the face was different.

He made a few notes and resolved to make a call in the morning to get some more information. Gustavo wrote down the sparse details on the file and yawned, beyond tired. He’d do a web search for more tomorrow. For now, he was beat.

If Antonio was the man described in the bulletin, he might be just what the doctor ordered for messy contingencies, as his subordinates grew bolder and deferred to Gustavo less and less over the years. It could never hurt to have a pit bull on a chain.

Especially one that loved the taste of blood.

Captain Romero Cruz walked with a slight limp to the kitchen, hurriedly buttoning his Federal Police shirt. A plate of eggs and chorizo sat steaming on the small dining room table, a cup of coffee at its side. He sat down, and Dinah, glowing as ever in a fitted dress and colorful purple blouse, emerged from the attached laundry room and placed her hands on his shoulders, leaning in and kissing his cheek. She was stunning, as always, with wavy black hair and huge eyes and a face that was beautiful in a non-traditional way.

“You’re going to be late, my love,” she warned playfully.

“They have to wait for me. I’m the boss,” Cruz responded, swallowing a forkful of eggs before grabbing her arm and pulling her closer to him. He kissed her neck and, with a minor adjustment, her lips.

“Good eggs,” Dinah said, pulling away and moving to the counter, where a glass of orange juice waited for her with a much smaller plate holding two pieces of toast.

This had been their regular routine since she’d begun staying at Cruz’s modest new rental condo, courtesy of the Federales . Ever since he’d been kidnapped by the head of the Sinaloa cartel, he’d been under twenty-four hour armed surveillance, and likely would remain so until he left his position with the police. Cruz was the head of Mexico City’s anti-cartel task force, which effectively made him the head of the national effort as well, given that DF, as Mexico City was called by the locals, was the largest city in Mexico, containing thirty percent of the nation’s population. He’d also developed somewhat of a reputation after a near miss assassination attempt on the last president was foiled by his team’s actions, which accounted for why he still had the job now that a new administration had taken office for its six year stint at running the country.

Usually, when an administration changed, the key positions went to new blood as payback for favors, but Cruz’s position was too critical to play politics with. Or alternatively, and more likely, nobody else wanted the job of tackling the most powerful and rich narcotics trafficking groups in the world. It was a position that wasn’t great for extended life expectancy, and Cruz believed that he was still heading the group because there wasn’t anyone foolhardy enough to take it. During his tenure, Cruz’s wife and child had been kidnapped and brutally murdered, he’d been shot in a bloody ambush that nearly cost him his life, he’d been kidnapped by the most powerful cartel kingpin in the world, and his life had been threatened by virtually every organized crime syndicate in Mexico.

This was a world where the most prominent people in the ongoing war against the cartels had a suspicious habit of crashing in aircraft accidents, or getting gunned down in heated assaults, so being the poster boy for the government’s push to eradicate narco-trafficking was slightly below lion tamer or Russian roulette gambler in terms of safety.

Cruz was used to it. He’d long ago reconciled himself to the idea that he would live as long as he lived, but that he’d do everything in his power to bring the groups that had butchered his family to justice in the meantime. He was brutally effective, and though his methods were controversial, nobody argued with the results.

And he was the only one willing to strap on a bull’s-eye every day and go into the office, wondering if today was the day a bomb or a sniper snuffed out his existence. That ensured a certain job security, if that phrase could be used to describe the circumstances in which he lived on a daily basis.

Dinah and Cruz had become an item following his recuperation from the shooting, and she’d taken to staying with him most nights for the last few months, going so far as to move in two large suitcases full of clothes. Cruz had mixed feelings about the situation at first because of the constant threat of danger surrounding him, but Dinah had shrugged it off.

“You have the best protection in the world ensuring you don’t even trip on a crack in the sidewalk. This is probably the safest building in all of Mexico,” she’d reasoned.

It was hard to argue, and truthfully, Cruz didn’t want to do so with any real enthusiasm. This was the first time he’d had a female companion since his wife had been torn from him, and it felt good. Nothing could ever replace his lost family, but if healing was possible, he’d done so, and had resolved to move forward and focus on the future, after having spent years dwelling on the past. Every two months, the department rented a new condo for him, in a different building in a different area of town; his possessions appeared at the new address as if by magic. It wasn’t an ideal situation, but it was the one that was keeping him alive, and so both he and Dinah had reluctantly grown accustomed to the disruptive grind.

Cruz admired Dinah’s curves while she stood in the kitchen, wolfing down her breakfast as she rushed to be at her job on time. She was a teacher, and she couldn’t be ten minutes late for work like Cruz could. The class wouldn’t wait, and it was policy that everyone had to be on campus fifteen minutes before school started. At the rate she was going, she wasn’t going to make it. It would be a miracle if she could get across town before the opening bell.

Cruz slurped his coffee and then rose from the table, his breakfast only half done. He approached Dinah and put his arms around her waist, nuzzling her neck as she finished her juice.

“Do you know what today is?” he asked.

“Monday. Now I have to run, Corazon . I’m already way too late.”

“It is indeed Monday, but no, I was thinking more that it’s been exactly six months since you began staying with me,” Cruz nudged.

“ Ah . Has it? It really only seems like yesterday…”

Cruz fumbled with his shirt pocket and extracted a small black velvet box, moving it over her shoulders and positioning it on the counter next to her plate.

“Wha…what’s this?” Dinah asked in a whisper, suddenly serious.

“Go ahead. Open it.”

Dinah reached forward with trembling hands and pried the small case open. Inside sat a platinum band with a solitary one carat diamond. Dinah drew in a sharp intake of breath, and lifting the box, turned to face Cruz, who still held her waist, smiling.