The Repairman- The Complete Box Set Page 15

  She walks to Pax and then to me, hugging us both. "You guys be safe."

  Then she and Skip are out the door and will take Pax's Jag, as he and I have a few items to transfer from the Vette to the Jeep, and a few more things to move up from the office basement.

  It's our plan to take both the Vette and the CJ7. The Vette will be parked somewhere out of the line of fire and act as a back up. Pax's CJ is real off-road-ready, with Maxxis Trepador Extreme off road tires, a short block blown Chevy V-8 that makes it fly like a scalded ass ape, its own built in compressor for emergency tire inflation, and even a welder in case something breaks out in the back country. She sports a Warn winch that could pick her up in the air if there was something to hang her from.

  After they leave and we get the CJ7 loaded, it's time for an inventory. Pax has maps and aerials printed from Google Earth and thinks he knows the place—an abandoned mine only three miles from the interchange where exchange is to take place—and I think it's most likely the place Beltran Corrado will get sent to hell by his employers. But that's yet to be seen.

  If he's not sent to hell by his employer we are more than willing to punch his ticket.

  We all have side arms with multiple clips; my new Heckler & Koch is fully automatic as are the two AR 15's. We have enough rounds to dispatch all five hundred of the supposed Oxiteca cartel members, but I don't expect more than a dozen or so to be at hand. Pax will again set up with the sniper rifle, only this one is semi-auto and he should be able to put lots of rounds very accurately, day or night, downrange—and he's good as gold to fifteen hundred yards—before he has to reach for the AR 15. We have a pair of night vision goggles for Skip and me and Pax will have the night vision scope on the SASS. In addition I was able to save the Sightmark Ghost Hunter night vision scope and it'll fit on the AR 15's rails, although I'd like to have time to sight it in.

  In addition to our cell phones we'll each have a hand held Motorola radio, just in case there's no cell service.

  The odds could be very bad, but our equipment and our knowledge of what's coming down, and where, should even them up.

  With luck, and if goes as planned, we'll have them shooting at each other and not knowing we're even in the neighborhood.

  There's one glitch in our plan, and that's if Beltran does go alone to meet Jefe Grande. We can't get them shooting at each other if one of them merely puts a .44 mag to the other's head and dispatches him. Pax and I discuss the problem, and he suggests we have the world's most inane and unnoticeable human posted somewhere near the bodega to see if and when Beltran and his soldiers depart.

  He calls Rosie, the receptionist, and offers her the day off and a way to pick up an easy five hundred bucks. Who'd suspect chubby rosy-cheeked Rosie, who looks as innocent as a three year old, of anything? He invites her over to his apartment to get her assignment, to caution her about getting anywhere close to the bodega, and to give her a good pair of binoculars.

  She's as excited as a kid in a candy store, and I take some time to build on Pax's lecture, finally advising her that the last lady who crossed the boys she'll be watching lost her head. This sobers Rosie and I'm finally convinced she'll be as cautious, or even more cautious than need be.

  She's to hang out near the bodega, dressed as close to bag lady as she can manage—she rebels at the thought of scrubbing off her eighth inch thick eye shadow—no closer than a half-block, from ten A.M. until four thirty P.M., which is the absolute latest they could leave and make Vidal Junction in time for the seven P.M. meet. Of course if Beltran leaves with a couple of carloads of his soldiers, she can quit for the day…after she calls us and reports the kind and number of vehicles and number of guys.

  She's a little disappointed that we don't invite her to stay and party. We excuse her when Skip returns from the airport, saying we have a big day ahead and have to get our rest…then, ready as we can be, we play three handed gin rummy until eleven. I do badly as I'm still nursing a bad headache. I hope I don't have a slight concussion.

  Tomorrow should be an interesting day.

  24

  In order to avoid looking like some paramilitary anti-government group, we put on orange hunting vests over our desert camouflage jump suits and orange hunters' bill caps; our gear is hidden in duffle bags, taking up half the back seat and loaded on a trailer hitch rack behind the spare in the rear. If stopped by a CHP the story is we're heading into the desert to varmint call for coyotes…which isn't all that far wrong.

  It's a hundred and sixty miles from Vegas to Vidal Junction, through the scenic cities of Searchlight and Needles, both places vying for the title of where the earth would be given an enema if God thought it necessary.

  We sleep late then decide to head for Sam's Town on the way out of town for brunch, for a go at their breakfast buffet. If you like to eat cheap Vegas is the place, so long as you head for the clubs frequented by the locals and not those full of Japanese or Chinese tourists or Arab Sheiks.

  It's my habit to eat light when I have a mission facing me, but Pax and Skip are just the opposite, they always eat like it's the prisoner's last meal. I finally have to drag Skip away from his third trip back to the buffet. It's obvious his nose being shut down doesn't interfere with his appetite.

  Pax drives the Jeep and I follow in the Vette. Skip flops in the back of the Jeep and puts one duffle bag up front in the passenger seat. Still, he's crosswise, with one duffle behind his broad back, one leg looped over a pair of bags in the adjoining seat, and the other jammed into the narrow leg room. His orange bill cap is pulled low over his eyes. Like Pax, he can sleep anywhere and is soon serenading Pax with snores rivaling iMax theaters where you don't just see the movie you feel it in your bones. He's probably even louder as he can't breath through his nose and not only snores but also snorts and wheezes. Pax complains to me on the cell phone, but I laugh reminding him that he said he wanted the company…little did he know. He dials the Sirius to a rock station and tries to out-loud Skip, but it's a futile effort. I, on the other hand, enjoy some soothing John Coltrane, avant-garde-for-the-time, jazz on the ride down.

  We're leaving way early as Pax has determined, after studying almost two year's worth of emails between Calexico and the bodega, that an abandoned talc mine almost three miles north of Vidal Junction and a mile to the west of the highway is the normal meeting place for the cartel boys. There are no street view elevations of the mine buildings, but the aerial shows lots of equipment, some of it most likely multi-story, a hundred acre pit, and a couple of outbuildings. Pax has printed out some info particular to this mine. It's been closed since it was discovered that too much asbestos was being encountered with the talc, and its separation was becoming uneconomic. If the topography is correct there's a hill near the pit where a three or four hundred yard SASS hidey-hole can be set up, presuming there's cover of some kind.

  I'm sorry to note that Sunset is not until seven-forty-four so it should just be getting dark by the time Jefe Grande and Corrado finish their supper and head for the meet. Since we have night vision, I'd rather it be a starlit night for this operation, but one can't have everything.

  We head straight to the Vidal Café for a cup of coffee when we arrive at the Junction, after driving past the inspection station and through both service stations, one of which is a small truck stop, backed by a ramshackle motel, all of which is adjacent to the café. We arrive just after one P.M. so most of the local lunch crowd is gone. There's only one other couple with a baby in a high chair in the place. We sit at the counter, as it will give us more time with the waitress, who probably knows everybody and everything happening in the tiny berg.

  She eyes me carefully. "What happened to your head?"

  I smile, and use the same excuse. "You shouldn't raise up quick when you're working under the car. Stupid is what happened."

  Then she turns to Skip, "And you look like you did three rounds with Ali."

  He snorts, "Ali wouldn't have had a chance."

  She lau
ghs. "You boys hunting?" she asks, wiping the counter in front of us. A strand of dirty blonde hair hangs across her eyes, giving her a harried appearance. Her eyes are deep set and lined with wrinkles, but her bright red lipstick demonstrates an attempt to stay young. And her pinstriped dress is immaculate, even after serving lunch. Makes me wonder how much of a crowd she might have had.

  I wink at her and offer, "Just for old wiley coyote. Looks like there might be some quail hunting around here, come the season."

  "And lots of chuckers in the hills to the west, and over by the Colorado, if you're man enough to run up and down the hills. But most of what we get are fishermen heading for Parker, over on the river. Y'all want coffee?"

  "Yes, ma'am. This is tough country."

  "Yep, but great sunsets," she says.

  Pax and I order peach pie, and Skip, of course, is ready for a double burger, fries, and a milk shake. Which is fine, as it gives me more time to pick her brain. She tells us that the mine has been closed for years, that the place is a junk heap and they don't bother with a watchman, that a single highway patrolman, Andy Williston, works the beat and spends a lot of time at the inspection station, and that business is only so so unless the Marines from Twenty Nine Palms, ninety miles to the west, are doing maneuvers in the area…then business picks up considerably. I was never stationed at Twenty Nine Palms but know it's an Air Ground Support training base. It's ninety miles to the west from the Junction, so only helps biz if they're doing desert maneuvers on the Bureau of Land Management ground, which makes up most of the California desert.

  I wish there were a way to listen in on the scheduled supper conversation between Jefe and Beltran, but there are a dozen booths and tables, so no way to know where they might hole up. And I didn't bring the equipment.

  We decide it's time to check out the talc mine. The truck stop has a few groceries so we wander through and pick up a case of bottled water and some candy bars and split them up.

  I'm pleased to discover that there are several two-track roads coming and going from the mine and surrounding the pit, which is a half-mile long and circular. It has a concentric road leading to its bottom almost a hundred feet below, but the road is covered with slides in several places and looks impassable, even for the CJ7. The equipment, including a six story cyclone or some kind of separating or storage tower with a stairway all the way to the top on one side and a ladder enclosed in metal webbing on the other, and three buildings with blown out windows lie on the north side of the pit. Beyond it is a hill, fairly well populated with sage and greasewood and spotted with Joshua trees, rising almost as high as the pit is deep, and on the other side of the hill at its base is an arroyo lined with smoke trees and tamarisk—a perfect place to hide the Vette as the arroyo bottom is as hard as a paved Las Vegas boulevard. We park the Jeep just over the crest of the hill, out of sight of the complex. There's also a hill of equal height on the far side of the pit, but it's almost a half mile away and why make the shot distance any farther than necessary, besides, on the far side of it is another plain and there's no place to hide a car over there.

  We find a couple of Joshua trees just below the crest of the hill that are only four feet apart, with a downed Joshua in front, and it's perfect cover for the SASS. My range finder says it's four hundred forty yards, a perfect quarter mile, to the center of the building complex. Easy range for Pax and the SASS, and within easy cruising range of the Quadcopter. We find a nice flat spot to base the flying machine, and get it in place.

  And almost as good news is a ravine that begins just below the hidey-hole and runs to the bottom of the hill, dying out only twenty-five feet or so above the flat containing the buildings and mine equipment, and it's covered with sage, greasewood, and lined with a few small smoketrees.

  Our base set up, we head down the ravine, checking the cover, then recon the buildings. Corrugated metal walls and roofs, the largest is a storage building—half it's roof has been hooked by salvagers or blown away by a hell of a storm—with some kind of a grease pit at one end for maintaining equipment, the next is an office building but the windows are all smashed by vandals, the walls kicked full of holes, and the bathroom sans toilet and sink. The smallest of the buildings is a forty by sixty foot storage building with a dock for loading and unloading—part of its roof is missing as well. The building complex is fenced separate from the pit, but the fence on both, six feet high razor wire topped cyclone, is down in several spots. I set one of the half-pound packages of plastic at the front gate, one at a rear gate, one under the loading dock, and one near the front door of the office building. I wish I had another for the large garage building but the four will have to do. We pile rocks, broken bottles, and scrap metal—all of which is in abundance all over the complex—on each of the improvised explosive devices, IED's, just to add a little shrapnel to the mix.

  I've loaded the four phone numbers into my cell.

  And now all we can do is wait.

  25

  It's a little warm, particularly in camouflage, combat boots, battle rattle belt. Needless to say we've shed the orange vests and bill caps. We nap in the shade of Joshua's in our hidey-hole until four P.M. when Pax's phone brings us all around.

  He answers, listens a moment, then says, "Thanks, you're a jewel, now get home." He turns to us. "Beltran doesn't take orders very well…doesn't look like he's coming alone as instructed. There are three carloads of soldiers, twelve guys, who left the bodega a couple of minutes ago, and they had lots of long packages they loaded in the trunks."

  I can't help but smile, although we probably should be packing up and beating a trail the hell out of here. I'm sure Jefe will show up with as least as many soldiers. Things are going to get real interesting.

  Pax gets up and stretches, then suggests, "Beltran has never seen me, but he has seen both of you guys. I think I should head in and wait until I see old white eye arrive, then take up a position as close as I can get and see if I can eavesdrop."

  I'm dubious. "We don't know if he's seen you or not. He knows a lot about me, and he may have tied me to you. I think it's a risk, and doesn't much matter what goes down there.

  Thank God it's cooling down. We've knocked down a Gatorade and a candy bar when Pax looks at his phone. "It's almost six thirty, I'm going."

  "Wait," I say, seeing dust in the distance. We study it until three vehicles, one four door Dodge, two four door Caddies, all dark colored, all with heavily tinted windows, come into sight and roar up to the building complex. The occupants unload, park the Dodge and one of the Caddies out of sight in the shop building, as its sliding door still functions, then they parlay for a few minutes. Through the SASS scope I can see Beltran talking and pointing, and soon the soldiers are spreading out and taking up positions all around. I watch as Beltran sticks a small firearm in his boot and another in the belt at his back, under a loose shirt. He's got the hint that something is wrong, even though he has no idea what. Probably Jefe telling him to "come alone" set him off. He gets into the remaining Caddie and drives off, leaving a trail of dust behind.

  Pax is patient for five or six minutes and then begins to back toward the top of the hill. "I'm going," he says, and slips over the top of the hill toward the Jeep. He's only out of sight for a heartbeat, and then comes running back.

  "What?" I ask.

  "Another bunch of guys came in another way and are setting up a half mile down toward the highway. Who the fuck would they be?" he asks, a little out of breath.

  I have to laugh. "Got to be Jefe's boys, coming to make sure the boss man is in control, and probably to watch what happens to someone who steals from the cartel. How many of them?"

  "Didn't wait to count, but at least eight or ten. Two black trucks and a big dark Ford Explorer or something like it. I'm heading out. I'll go west cross country, follow the ravine, and stay out of their sight."

  "Don't get your tit in a wringer."

  "No way." Then he is again gone over the hill.

  We wat
ch for a while, and are not surprised to see a black Ford Explorer and one of the trucks rolling through the gate. Suddenly all the guys in the first bunch, who've been milling around, duck out of sight. Several find spots in the buildings. One of them sprints up the tower stairway, carrying a scoped rifle, and takes up a position near the top. He hunkers down and huddles up as near the tank as he can get. He may just get a lesson about how a real sniper works.

  This is going to get real interesting.

  It becomes very quiet in the complex below. I can't imagine that the two groups of cartel soldiers have yet to discover one another, but it's possible, in fact probable, as there's been no shooting. Of course, without the bosses there they could be shooting the bull and having a smoke together—old buddies reunited.

  It's fifteen minutes of watchful waiting before my phone vibrates in my pocket. I check the number and see it's Pax.

  "Wha's up?" I whisper.

  "Looks like old home week between this Jefe cat and our buddy Beltran. Not a cross word yet. Of course Jefe hasn't discovered the guy hiding in the back of Beltran's Caddy."

  "Same here, I think Jefe's boys arrived, but not a cross word between the two groups below. I don't know if one knows the other is there. How long before the big bosses head this way?"

  "They've got their supper and a cervesa and aren't slow eaters, so I'm heading out of here pretty quick."

  "Okay. I'm leaving Skip on the SASS; I'm heading down the ravine. I'll hold up about a hundred yards from the bottom, plus or minus as I'll find a spot with good cover and visual, and get set up…but I want you on the SASS. Keep Skip there to watch your six. And you both can cover me if I need to hotfoot it back up the hill."