Robert Browne - Down Among the Dead Men

“So what’s her condition now?”

“Last I heard, not so good. Once she was physically able, she was transferred to a traumatic brain injury facility in LA. The ex tells me the lucid periods are few and far between. She managed to give us a couple of names that we looked into, but we got nothing. Her doctor thinks they might be a product of the brain injury.”

“Jesus.”

“Tell me about it. The ex says she keeps calling him, thinking it’s ten months ago and that she’s still down in Playa Azul.”

“You’re kidding me.”

“According to him, she’s completely fucked.”

Pasternak lifted his cup, took another sip, then set it down and gave Vargas a hard stare.

“Okay, hotshot, now it’s your turn. Tell me about Juarez.”

Vargas reached into the satchel under the table, brought out the manila envelope, and handed it to Pasternak.

Pasternak said nothing as he pulled out the three photographs.

“She look familiar?” Vargas asked.

Pasternak was leafing through them now, staring at them with undisguised surprise. “What the hell is this?”

“I’ll tell you what it isn’t,” Vargas said. “It isn’t a Taco Bell parking lot.”

“I can see that. I assume this is in Juarez?”

“About a half hour or so south. Place called Dead Man’s Dunes.”

“And the woman with her?”

“A nun. There were four more found nearby and a fifth outside.”

It took Pasternak about two seconds to put it together.

“Holy…fucking…shit. The Casa de la Muerte murders?”

He’d said it fairly loud and several of the other customers turned and stared at him. But he either was oblivious or didn’t give a damn.

“I don’t fucking believe it. We got a couple bulletins on this, but nobody ever said anything about an American woman, let alone Crawford. Where’d you get these?”

“I’m afraid I can’t tell you that, but there’s a Chihuahua state police homicide investigator you might want to take a look into. Guy by the name of Rojas. He removed these photos and every other trace of Crawford from the official file.”

“Wait, wait, now,” Pasternak said. “Back up a bit. Start at the top.”

So Vargas did, telling him about the trip to Juarez and the tour of the Casa de la Muerte crime scene. About the Ainsworths letting it slip that there was an American woman named Angie, and about Rojas’s cover-up, including what Rojas had thought was a fatal shot to the head.

Vargas didn’t mention the ride in the trunk of his car or the executions at the egg ranch. No point in getting caught up in this thing as a material witness. Not right now, at least.

Pasternak would likely find out about it all himself-probably with Garcia’s help, once Operation Rojas kicked into gear-but Vargas planned to be long gone when that happened.

“You have anything in your files on a hit man with a half-burnt face?”

Pasternak shook his head. “I’m pretty sure I’d know if we did.”

“What about a religious cult called La Santa Muerte?”

“Doesn’t sound familiar.” Pasternak pointed to the photos. “They have something to do with this?”

“I can’t be sure, but it’s come up in conversation.”

“You wanna clue me in?”

“Apparently the cult is run by someone called El Santo,” Vargas said. “They’re into drug smuggling and God knows what else, and the guy with the burnt face seems to be their enforcer. I did a quick Internet search when I was down in Juarez and got zero hits. Which means they’re about as far under the radar as you can get.”

“And Juarez is so far out of our jurisdiction it might as well be Mars,” Pasternak said. “But since this is all directly connected to my case, it warrants a road trip, and I have a feeling the FBI’s gonna want to ride shotgun.”

“I have a feeling you’re right,” Vargas told him. “But all we’ve got so far is a rumored cover-up. We still don’t know how Elizabeth Crawford wound up in that house, surrounded by five dead nuns.”

“True, but what you’ve given me here puts me a step closer to closing an attempted-murder case, and if this fucker Rojas is as bent as you say he is, he’s going down.”

“You manage that one, you’ll make my source a happy man.”

Pasternak looked at the photos again. “I assume you’re gonna let me keep these?”

Vargas nodded. While he was at the Internet cafe, he’d paid a few extra pesos to use the scanner and transferred the images to his SD card.

Pasternak said, “I’ve gotta admit you managed to root out one helluva story.”

“That’s what I keep telling myself.”

“So what’s your next step?”

Vargas didn’t even have to think about it.

“California,” he said. “I’m headed back to California.”

Everyone kept telling her how remarkable her progress was, but Beth didn’t see it.

Physically, perhaps. Her motor skills had improved to the point that she could now walk unassisted for long periods of time, eat on her own, and even write passages in her journal-a journal Dr. Stanley had encouraged her to keep. But the inability to remember clearly was driving her mad.

That, to her mind (such as it was), was much more debilitating than not being able to clench a fist or stand without assistance. She’d gladly give up her mobility for a day free of confusion. A day in which both her long- and short-term memory were fully functioning, all synapses firing properly and glitch-free.

A day in which she stayed put. No more imaginary trips to the Mexican Riviera.

In these welcome moments of clarity, however, all she could think about was Jen. Those last few minutes Beth had spent with her sister didn’t seem to want to leave her alone.

Lunch. Fight. Bathroom break.

Gone.

And far from being a figment of Beth’s imagination, Rafael and Marta Santiago had been very real. Just because the cruise line had no record of them didn’t mean they weren’t there. Maybe they were stowaways. Maybe they had signed on under fake names, using false identification. It certainly wouldn’t be the first time that had happened.

And the fact that there wasn’t a record of them led Beth to believe that they had, indeed, been somehow involved in what had happened to Jen.

And to her.

In one of her brief, uncomfortable phone conversations with Peter, he’d told her that the FBI and the Albuquerque police were now convinced that the two didn’t exist. But Beth didn’t care what they said; she knew in her gut that these weren’t false memories.

No White House dinners or grizzly bears for her, thank you.

“You ready for your walk now, Elizabeth?”

It annoyed her that everyone around here called her Elizabeth. At first she had accepted it. They were simply reading the name off of a chart. But she was pretty sure that she had finally told them that most people called her Beth.

This was not, she decided, a particularly friendly place. Everyone was nice enough, sure, but they were just people doing their jobs, smiling professional smiles, offering professional sympathies and encouragement.

She’d done enough of that in her own job to know when it was happening to her.

But the people here always treated you as if you were a child. That they were the ones who knew best, no questions asked. A little pat on the head when you forgot your words or a face or a name.

Isn’t she cute?

She’ll do better next time.

But they couldn’t even remember Beth’s name. So who was the one with the brain damage?

“Did you hear me, Elizabeth? Time for your walk.”

Ever since Beth had learned not to rely on her wheelchair, her physical therapist had been taking her for regular walks. Not far. Just out to the courtyard and around the field, a small stretch of land bordered by trees and a chain-link fence.