Do They Know I'm Running? Part 8

"You buy in, then you'll know what you need to know."

"This is bulls.h.i.t. You're winding me up. Buy in?" Buy in?"

Happy reminded himself this was all for his father. "How else you think this happens?"

"How much?"

"Thirty grand."

"You're out of your f.u.c.king mind."

"That's five jobs like the couple in Pinole today. For one and a half mil a year on the back end. Guaranteed."

"Nothing's guaranteed."

"You're not paying attention to what I'm telling you."

"You think I'm handing thirty large to you with nothing but-"

"You're not handing it to me."

"Who then?"

"You're wiring it to El Salvador. Once it gets there, my father and this other guy I mentioned? They get brought up across the border. Once that's done, you're in on the franchise."

"Okay, that's twice now you've mentioned this other guy. Who is he?"

Happy paused for the proper effect. "He's from the Middle East."

Vas...o...b..anched. "You saying what I think you're saying?"

"Once he's here, he vanishes, you have no more connection to him."

"And when he does whatever he's gonna do, and they connect all the dots and find out how he got across?"

"There's no way to tie you to it."

"You said I'm wiring money."

"From somewhere here in the Bay Area to San Salvador, happens a thousand times every day. You smurf it down in smaller amounts, use a fake name, or have everybody on the crew send a piece, fake names again, and we bribe the guy at the envio de dinero envio de dinero window. It gets picked up by someone on the other end, again a fake name, he vanishes on that end. Who knows where he goes, who he meets or what he does with the money? You got ghosts on both ends and they can't track one guy sneaking across the border regardless. Can't be done, no matter what they say. Meanwhile, once he's across and forgotten, you get rich." window. It gets picked up by someone on the other end, again a fake name, he vanishes on that end. Who knows where he goes, who he meets or what he does with the money? You got ghosts on both ends and they can't track one guy sneaking across the border regardless. Can't be done, no matter what they say. Meanwhile, once he's across and forgotten, you get rich."

Vasco seemed puzzled by it all and angry he had to work so hard figuring out the downsides. "You say this guy, this Arab, he's coming across with your old man? He does, they get caught, that ties the Arab to you. You're tied to me. I'm f.u.c.ked."

"They'll split up before they cross. Christ, use your head." Happy decided not to mention Roque's involvement and made a mental note to keep it a secret from here on out. "You think everybody's stupid but you?"

Vasco wasn't backing off. "You got somebody on the border, somebody you're bribing to get everybody across."

Happy shook his head. "Vasco, listen to me, it's not your problem."

"Like h.e.l.l it's not my problem. Some bent fed gets caught helping a terrorist across, you think they're not gonna f.u.c.k his a.s.s b.l.o.o.d.y till he coughs up every G.o.dd.a.m.n name he knows?"

"He won't know yours."

"Prove it."

"The guy who takes the money in San Salvador is like twenty links removed from anybody taking a cut at the border, and that's all cash, hand to hand."

Vasco's gaze drifted toward the window again, met his reflection in the gla.s.s. "How long you been sitting on this?"

"What do you mean?"

"How long you known about it?"

"You think I been shopping it around?"

"How long long?"

"The c.o.ke thing's been in the works for a while. Since I've been back I get texted every few days, progress reports, questions. Then my old man got popped and I said, Let's do it. Started putting a plan together, to bring him back and get this other thing rolling, the franchise. They added the curve, the Arab. Said the one depended on the other. I've got no say."

"And you chose me." Vasco didn't sound pleased or privileged. "Why?"

"You want me to go someplace else?"

"Answer the f.u.c.king question."

Happy told himself: Let him rant. It would make the prospect of getting the last laugh that much sweeter. "Just seemed wise, start with somebody I know."

"Not like we've ever been exactly tight, though. Am I right?"

"No, which is why I won't have a problem taking this someplace else, you turn it down."

"You're setting me up." Vasco cracked a sick smile, pointing his finger. "You're setting me up, c.o.c.ksucker."

Happy unb.u.t.toned his flannel, opened it. "Pat me down, you feel that way."

"I want nothing to do with no ragheads blowing up buildings."

"You're not seeing the whole picture. I take this elsewhere, you don't just lose the Colombian franchise. You gonna find yourself on the bottom looking up at whoever grabs it. Don't say I didn't warn you. Guy who steps forward gets to play kingpin this end of the bay. El mero mero El mero mero. Could be you. If so, you're the one who gets to collect taxes. n.o.body moves nothing without giving you a piece. You walk into any salvadoreno salvadoreno business you want, you tell them what they pay, you'll protect them from anybody else tries to move in, shake them down. You'll have the muscle to kick the business you want, you tell them what they pay, you'll protect them from anybody else tries to move in, shake them down. You'll have the muscle to kick the nortenos nortenos back into Sonoma, you'll run things up here. This anoints you. You turn your back on this, though, all that s.h.i.t rains down on you. You can ride or get ridden. Just the way it is. Meanwhile, you're already set up to launder the money through the business here, all the other s.h.i.t you got in play. That's one more advantage you've got over the compet.i.tion. They're just street hustlers. They can't take it to the next level." back into Sonoma, you'll run things up here. This anoints you. You turn your back on this, though, all that s.h.i.t rains down on you. You can ride or get ridden. Just the way it is. Meanwhile, you're already set up to launder the money through the business here, all the other s.h.i.t you got in play. That's one more advantage you've got over the compet.i.tion. They're just street hustlers. They can't take it to the next level."

Vasco's black eyes jittered back and forth as he thought it through. He was sick of being dictated to by the men working the mortgage scam, you could tell by the way he talked about it. They were no smarter than he was but there were angles to the thing he hadn't mastered yet, a degree of finesse he lacked. Sooner or later the moving racket would tap out and there was only so much copper wiring to steal and there were rumors the price was about to tank. Everybody was trying to get into ident.i.ty theft, computer scams, low risk, high reward, but that wasn't Vasco's realm. He'd come up through street dealing and takeovers, spent a few years inside himself, Santa Rita on a possession beef, Folsom for the armed robbery. He'd emerged from prison pledged to a cagier tack, conning the dupes, but he wasn't a natural. Basically, he was stuck, edging thirty, chasing around for his next good idea, tied to a crank-wh.o.r.e shrew and her demon child. If he didn't make a bold move soon he'd get eaten alive from above or betrayed from below.

"You say you and your old man, you work the port angle."

"Vasco, stop worrying and thank your luck."

"How much a piece you want for that? You haven't brought that up."

"I figure twenty points."

"Twenty f.u.c.king points?"

"The port's where the risk is. That's where they look the hardest."

"You just shaved three hundred grand off my one-point-five mil."

"Stop looking at the floor, look at the ceiling. Three mil's easy you work it right, first year alone, and that's just the c.o.ke run."

"Meaning what, six hundred grand for you, that right?"

"Add in the protection money, the taxes, the other rackets you got going? You can be in the s.h.i.t, you want. But you gotta step up."

Vasco turned away, glancing down into the truck yard. Puchi was hurling rocks at the crows perched on the telephone wires. Chato shadowboxed, the others looking on, cheering, mocking. "I say yes to this, G.o.do comes in."

Happy c.o.c.ked his head, as though he hadn't heard right. "Sorry?"

"G.o.do. He helps pay off this outrageous nut you're asking for."

"You seen him since he's been back?"

"I've heard."

"He's not good. I'm serious."

"Listen to me. I start seeing money like you're talking about moving through here? Gonna need to weapon up. G.o.do knows more about that than the rest of us put together. At least, if he doesn't, f.u.c.king jarheads aren't what they're cracked up to be."

"Vasco-"

"He can teach us things. Things we'll need to know, in case the nortenos nortenos don't pack off to Sonoma all peaceful." don't pack off to Sonoma all peaceful."

"Vasco, listen. I mean it, G.o.do's damaged, way more than you know. He can't remember d.i.c.k one moment to the next, his mind wanders, he makes s.h.i.t up-"

"Okay," Vasco cut in, leaning forward, his voice a whisper, "now it's time you listen to me, chero chero. G.o.do comes in, gives the boys some weapons training, some tactics for protection, you hear where I'm going. Or be my guest, shop this can of worms around. Because you know and I know that anybody who bites is going to b.i.t.c.h you down to five points at best, or just push you aside altogether, maybe worse, when the thing is up and running. Here, you got a history. n.o.body's gonna turn you out. But there's a price to that, right? G.o.do comes on board. This is not negotiable. I'm not so stupid I don't know you brought this here first because this is where you wanna be. I don't blame you. I'm grateful, matter of fact. And I'm not saying G.o.do steps up and pitches in somehow, helps us lean on anybody. Unless, of course, he's okay with that. But the guys respect him, he knows things we don't. So that's the way it is, or yeah, I'm gonna pa.s.s. And I'm not handing thirty grand to n.o.body till I meet a real live human being, not just you, who can vouch that this isn't a jar of smoke. The guy who owns this warehouse you talked about, maybe."

Happy suddenly found himself wondering what Vasco's stint in Folsom had been like, how many nights he'd suffered through the kind of thing the mareros mareros had inflicted amid the mayonnaise jars in the cell at Mariona. "I can try to arrange a meet. Probably not with the warehouse guy, not until you're in. But somebody." had inflicted amid the mayonnaise jars in the cell at Mariona. "I can try to arrange a meet. Probably not with the warehouse guy, not until you're in. But somebody."

"If this thing is real, you can make it happen."

"As for G.o.do-"

"You can make that happen too."

"I need some time to think about it."

Vasco lit another smoke with the end of his last. He was smiling. The smile said: Now who gets to ride, who gets ridden?

Happy said, "Problem is, we don't have have time." time."

"Your problem. Not mine. Not yet, anyway."

"If anything happens, to G.o.do I mean-"

"Like what?"

"He has a meltdown. He freaks out. He almost shot two agents during a raid at the trailer park."

"I heard." Vasco chuckled. "I like that, actually."

"You weren't there. Way it got told to me, it was f.u.c.king spooky."

"G.o.do scares people. I don't see the problem. Now what's it going to be?"

"Like I said, I need time."

Again, that smile. Stop worrying, it said. Thank your luck. "But, chero chero, you said it yourself. You don't have have time." time."

Happy pictured it then, Vasco face flat on the concrete floor, held down by the others, a rag stuffed in his mouth as one by one they took him, shamed him, made him their punk. "If anything happens to G.o.do, I hold you to account."

Vasco waved him off. He propped his boots on his desk, ankles crossed. "Since when are you two so close? Don't remember you guys having one good thing to say about each other."

Happy got up to go. Glancing back at the foul-smelling panda, he said, "Ever think of washing that thing? Can't be good for the girl, way it is."

Vasco looked at him like he'd just proposed the absurd. "What, you get your a.s.s deported to El Salvador, you come back an expert on kids?"

ROQUE HAD TO TELL HIMSELF: STOP STARING. IT WASN'T JUST the bruise-strange how, even with the plum-colored swelling and the gash across her cheek, the girl somehow remained stunning-or the fact that, from time to time, her uneasy eyes met his. She was a prisoner. Pity wouldn't free her.

He'd been in El Salvador a total of four hours, arriving at the airport in Comalapa before dawn. He'd skated through customs, not so much as a glance inside his knapsack, then ventured out into the soft green heat of daybreak outside the terminal-the sidewalk jammed with well-wishers greeting friends and relatives back from Gringolandia Gringolandia, cabbies hawking fares to the capital, touts with bullhorns steering grenchos grenchos to the psychedelic chicken buses headed for the smaller provincial towns. to the psychedelic chicken buses headed for the smaller provincial towns.

He stopped milling and chose a spot to wait against the terminal's dark wall of gla.s.s. In time, a droop-lidded cholo cholo, thin as a tomcat, edged his way through the crowd. He wore a T-shirt three sizes too large emblazoned with the Arizona Cardinals logo and the words "World Champions, Super Bowl XLIII."

The cholo cholo snagged Roque's arm. "You're the musician." His lips curled in a slack smile, as though both offering a compliment and slapping down a challenge. "Call me Sisco." snagged Roque's arm. "You're the musician." His lips curled in a slack smile, as though both offering a compliment and slapping down a challenge. "Call me Sisco."

He led the way out to a parking lot shaded by eucalyptus trees where a battered Volkswagen Golf waited, tapping out a drumbeat against his thighs as he sang under his breath, "Money for nothin' and your chicks for free." The singing brought on a coughing jag and when he went to cover his mouth Roque noticed the gang tats on his hands, a sinewy art nouveau X on one, three simple dots the other, the telltale thirteen.

"Met your uncle, by the way," he said once the cough was under control. "Nice old dude. Kinda quiet."

As though in tribute, he said little himself all the way to San Salvador, preferring instead to play the radio, a weak-signal pirate station featuring radical tracks the mainstream outlets wouldn't touch, hiking the volume when a favorite tune came on: Pescozada's "Anarquia," Mecate's "El Directo," a punk number by an outfit named Metamorffosis, a dark-wave track by a band called Wired.

Sprawling tracts of sugarcane and bananas vanished into the sunbaked distance. Here and there, women in long skirts and tight black braids pinned laundry up on the barbed wire surrounding their topple-down houses of wood and tin, packs of bone-thin children looking on. Dogs roamed freely, their road-kill quickly set upon by buzzards called zopilotes zopilotes. Meanwhile, bilingual billboards touting everything from Nine West fashion to the inescapable Whopper popped up over and over along the highway, to the point Roque sometimes wondered if he'd really left Gringolandia Gringolandia at all. at all.

Coming on noon, they arrived at a crabbed and decrepit barrio popular barrio popular named La Chacra on the a.s.s end of the capital. A grayish soup of dust and car exhaust fouled the air, along with the stench of fermenting trash. The Rio Acelhuate, which ran sluggishly through the barrio, was so thick with excrement and toxic waste its mud-brown surface had a purplish glaze. named La Chacra on the a.s.s end of the capital. A grayish soup of dust and car exhaust fouled the air, along with the stench of fermenting trash. The Rio Acelhuate, which ran sluggishly through the barrio, was so thick with excrement and toxic waste its mud-brown surface had a purplish glaze.

Sisco slowed to pa.s.s a barefoot urchin toddling down the broken pavement, trailing a brood of chickens. A three-story monolith of cinder block rose up at the end of the street, slathered with garish paint, tagged with Mara Salvatrucha graffiti. Sc.r.a.ps of laundry hung limp from rope clotheslines strung along the walkways while salvatruchos salvatruchos cl.u.s.tered on every stair, leaning over the railings, smoking blunts or Marlboros and staring down with suspicion, curiosity, indifference, hate. cl.u.s.tered on every stair, leaning over the railings, smoking blunts or Marlboros and staring down with suspicion, curiosity, indifference, hate.

Roque tried to picture his mother living in a place like this. Maybe she had before fleeing the war, not that anything would be accomplished if he found out one way or the other. He felt an odd lack of curiosity, being in the land of her birth. No matter what, the absence would remain. There was no secret charm or trick that would cure him. Besides, life wasn't something you cured. You lived it. Mariko taught him that much, before kicking him to the curb.