24 Declassified: 03 - Trojan Horse by Marc Cerasini Page A

from his girth that Ray Dobyns didn’t like walking. All the way to Albino Street the man complained about his sore feet, the uneven pavement, the crowds, the heat, the exhaust fumes.
    The neighborhood surrounding the tavern and brothel called El Pequeños Pescados had decayed since the last time Tony had been to Tijuana. Perhaps in its heyday Albino Street had aspired to genuine middle class status, but things had obviously gone to seed. Now there were too many bars nestled between ramshackle storefront churches, fortune tellers in street stalls, pawnshops, liquor stores and check cashing businesses. There were also unmistakable signs of criminal activity—gang graffiti, street whores, pickpockets visible to those who knew how to spot them. A battered shell of a car, windows shattered, interior looted, sat next to a crumbling curb.
    Ray Dobyns described Number Five Albino Street as a warehouse, but it was obvious to Tony that the building had been an ice house in the 1940s and ’50s before it was converted to industrial use. The warehouse was a flat-roofed, windowless rectangle of dingy red brick. A three-story wooden clapboard tavern and inn had been built against the older brick structure sometime in the 1950s. Over the rough wooden porch that fronted the tavern, a faded billboard for Azteca beer and a neon Cuervo sign in the window were the only indication this place was more than another tenement. A battered Ford van was parked in front of the building, locked tight. No one was visible on the porch, or on either of the narrow wooden balconies fronting the second and third floors.
    “Do we go in?” Tony asked.
    Dobyns shook his head. “Listen, Navarro. I don’t want to blow this deal—I need the money bad. Let me go in first and check the place out. I’ve been here before. They know me. I’ll be back in five minutes or less. You can time me.”
    Tony considered the man’s plan. While he didn’t trust Dobyns, Tony knew the con man would gain nothing by double-crossing him. Above all, Dobyns loved money, and he seemed to be in desperate need of some right now.
    “Okay,” grunted Tony. “I’ll meet you right here in five minutes.”
    Dobyns waddled across the street, pushed through the wooden screen door and into the seedy tavern. Tony watched for a moment, then went into a tiny store and purchased a cold bottle of Jarritos. Sipping the sugary Mexican soda, he waited, glancing at his watch from time to time.
    Dobyns reappeared exactly five minutes later. But instead of crossing the street, he motioned to Tony from the porch.
    Tony chugged his drink, tossed the empty bottle into a garbage can and crossed the dusty street.
    “It’s Lesser, all right,” said Dobyns. “He’s upstairs on the third floor. He’s not even hiding. The bartender spilled when I slipped him an Andrew Jackson.”
    “Is he alone?”
    Dobyns nodded. “Come on. The faster you find him, the faster I get my money.”
    Tony hesitated. As tactical situations went, this whole set up stunk. He was heading into an unknown environment armed with only the Gerber Mark II serrated combat knife in his boot. On the other hand, Lesser was small potatoes and had no clue anyone from the U.S. government was looking for him, and he was not a violent felon. He was, in fact, a computer nerd. Plus Dobyns had nothing to gain and everything to lose if the deal fell apart.
    “Lead the way.”
    Dobyns grinned and pushed through the screen door.
    The interior was dim and nearly empty. Behind the bar, a squat bartender nodded at Dobyns, then went back to watching the jai alai match on the television above the bar. At a corner table far from the door, two middle-aged men were partying with two young prostitutes. The men were hang-dog drunk, the women clinging. Two more women sat in the corner, gossiping and polishing their nails. They looked up when the door opened, but when they saw Tony was with Dobyns, they returned to their conversation.
    “The stairs are