Russell Blake - Night of the Assassin

It was one of the few places in Mexico where Armand Altamar could let his hair down and relax. He wasn’t at war with anyone for the time being so he had little to fear. Things were prospering under his iron rule and everyone was making a ton of money since he’d taken over most of Don Miguel’s duties. He’d had to give up some of the meth and heroin traffic to Diego up north, and had to cut in Aranas, the head of the Sinaloa cartel, for a fifteen percent larger slice of his cocaine traffic; but even so, business had grown to the point where he didn’t even feel the dilution – he was pocketing fifty million dollars a month, on a bad one.

Not so bad for a forty year old ex-enforcer who had come up from the streets, fighting tooth and nail for anything he ever got. He’d been born in one of Culiacan’s worst barrios, a desperate den of poverty and filth that few walked away from. Now he was running things after someone had taken out the Don. It was like a dream come true and he was making the most of it. Every weekend, he would hire one of the most popular Banda groups in Sinaloa to play for his de facto private party at his bar. Every friend he had would attend, as well as some of the most beautiful examples of Mexican femininity in the country – all to pay homage to him and celebrate his success.

Not that winning the spoils had been easy, by any means. For a few months after the Don had passed on to his just reward, Culiacan had been a death zone. Five or six different factions fought it out for his turf. The only way Altamar had emerged victorious was through a combination of epic brutality, stealth, deceit and, surprisingly, a willingness to compromise with his rivals. After several of his competitors had been found beheaded, along with their entire families – including newborn babies, aged relatives and even household pets – the notion of doing a deal to end the madness had been appealing to even the most battle-hardened contenders. And so a cautious truce had gone into effect. The killing stopped, prosperity returned and everyone went back to doing what they were supposed to do: making money – a lot of money. Maybe not as much as if one man ran it all, as Don Miguel had, but, then again, more than anyone could spend in a hundred lifetimes, just the same.

Altamar had introduced the idea that you had to be alive to spend it, and had been utterly ruthless in driving home the point that, unless you cooperated and stepped out of the way, your life wasn’t worth anything. Over four hundred and seventy people had lost their lives in the two months following the Don ’s passing, at least according to the official count. The actual number was more like double that, many left rotting in hidden fields for the carrion birds to pick apart, or buried in shallow graves. One particularly brutal week, the rivers had been chocked with bodies floating down from the marijuana fields. It finally got to the point where even those accustomed to incredible violence and brutality had been through enough, and so they worked out a truce.

He’d proved his point. If you crossed him, you, your family, your servants and their families would all be slaughtered without a second’s hesitation. It had been a stunningly effective campaign. By its short but bloody end, he was in charge of a coalition of former rivals – who were all still alive to spend their money. True, he’d made lifelong enemies due to his tactics, but he wasn’t worried. Nobody dared move against him. The price of even the slightest thing going wrong was the extermination of everyone you knew, of everything you held precious. The stakes were just too high, so he settled into his position of power with confidence, while always sleeping with one eye open.

His entourage were the most dangerous and violent killers in the region; he made a huge point of advertising that fact. They were men who drank baby blood for breakfast and killed priests over coffee. By cultivating the reputation as the devil walking the earth, he’d climbed to the pinnacle of his world; the view from up top was better than he’d ever expected. He had his pick of the most gorgeous young women, he was literally awash with cash and every comfort and toy he desired. He was feared and revered for his ruthlessness and his absolute power. It was as close as you could get to being a demigod.

And it was good.

Tonight, he’d been drinking tequila with his cousins, who were never far away from his side. He surrounded himself with family and made sure they also wanted for nothing. Blood was their bond, he’d repeat over and over when drunk. Altamar made sure that they understood he was a hundred percent loyal to his family, and he expected nothing else in return but the same. The threat was as clear as the reward. Stick with Altamar, and you would live a happy and prosperous life. Get it into your head to betray him and he’d erase you from the earth.

The combination of carrot and stick was highly effective.

Inside the club, the air was thick with a haze of cigarette and marijuana smoke. The police avoided the building like it was radioactive, so there were no rules when within its four walls, the interior of which were covered with cowboy regalia. Lassos, bridles, photos of prize bulls and horses, horseshoes. Myriad related paraphernalia adorned every inch of the place, giving it an air of a themed junk shop. Booths ringed both of the longer sides of the room, which featured an elaborate stage on one end and a long wooden bar on the opposite. Girls in cowboy hats and microscopic jean shorts or mini skirts and cowboy boots weaved their way between the small circular tables that cluttered half the floor – the remainder of which was left to the many dancers. The fifteen-piece band barely fitted on the stage but neither the musicians nor the celebrants seemed to mind as the caterwauling of the dissonant horn section battled with the strident tenor of the singer, who was belting out a song begging apology for a series of indiscretions with other women; because this time, he’d be faithful due to having changed. Straw was scattered about the floor in an effort to create a more authentically rustic experience. The overall tone of the establishment was a rowdy rural roadhouse, albeit fifteen minutes from the edge of a cosmopolitan city of over a million in population.

Most of the men wore jeans or slacks with cowboy boots and hats; their female companions wore little but smiles, their modesty cloaked by strategically-donned tops that barely contained their charms, with shorts or pants that looked like they’d been sprayed on. Many of the girls were in their late teens to early twenties -with a fair mix of professionals and those looking to find a generous narcotraficante sugar daddy. It was a playground for men who lived at breakneck speed, for whom the light of tomorrow was not guaranteed, and who denied themselves nothing.

Outside the building, four discreetly-armed men loitered a few feet from the entrance, providing the obligatory muscle should anyone be so foolhardy as to interrupt the fiesta with unpleasantness. They were in their mid-twenties, with a palpable air of menace and dispositions that indicated their willingness to kill you just as readily as bum a smoke. Two were ex-marines, the other two survivors of a lifetime on the street – the four of them had tallied between themselves at least ten times their number in killings.

The area around the club was dense brush that had been cleared to create the mammoth dirt parking lot. A custom-built neon sign atop a metal column blinked the image of a highly-stylized devil wearing a cowboy hat and leering suggestively at new arrivals, its oscillating illumination lending a carnival air to the tightly parked cars. Occasionally, another vehicle would pull off the main road and brave the hundred yards to the club, headlights briefly shining on the front of the establishment before finding a spot among the rest of the patrons.