Lethal Expedition (Short Story) by James M. Tabor Page B

Mexican hideaways. A Bell JetRanger helicopter had plucked the guest from remote Oaxacan mountains and flown him two hours to this little Xanadu in the jungle. Peacocks strolled golf-green lawns, and dog-sized lizards called tegus glittered like chunks of gold in sun-washed ponds. Beautiful women strolled, sipping drinks, languid and graceful as browsing deer and naked as Eve in the Garden.
    Villanueva was a Mexican of Mayan descent, short and fat, with skin the color of muddy water and a pencil mustache over pendulous lips. He led the Salvados drug cartel in Mexico, controlling all cocaine and methamphetamine trade north of Acapulco, commerce worth billions. His was also the most vicious cartel. Just last week, as his guest knew, masked Salvados had deposited a secretary of national security—minus his hands and feet but still alive, more or less—on the steps of Mexico’s Supreme Court building.
    He and his visitor reclined on green lounges beside a swimming pool the size of four tennis courts. Most other pools the guest had seen were painted a cool, soothing blue. This one was dark red, and its water looked like blood.
    The guest raised his glass of golden tequila. “We are forever in your debt.”
    “I will consider the debt paid in full when you put my gift to good use, Dr. Ely.”
    “It’ll be done. We work together for a common goal,” Kurt Ely said.
    “The elimination of that infernal whore.” Villanueva spat.
    “Exactly.”
    “When interests join, God smiles. Like the junction of roads. A thing of great power.”
    Villanueva puffed his Havana oscuro, looked reflective, shook his head. “Your President Laning’s reward. Very stupid. Ten million dollars made me a lot of new enemies overnight. Some are dead already, but many more are lining up.”
    ***
    The mention of death made Ely uncomfortable. Three months earlier, he had nearly gotten chopped up here himself. Looking for aquifer evidence, he had stumbled onto one of Villanueva’s secret cocaine factories. Only his passport kept the
cocaínas
from feeding him, alive, to their watchdogs as they did his three porters. Americans, they had learned, could be worth decent money, so they smacked his head with a rifle butt and delivered him to Villanueva.
    He awoke naked and lashed, spread-eagled, to a massive butcher block made from thick pine timbers and tree-trunk legs. He was in a big, dim, building filled with crates and sacks. It reeked like a slaughterhouse and was as hot as a sauna, though none of the four men surrounding him was sweating. Three he recognized as captors. The fourth was a short, fat man with skin the color of mud and grotesque lips. He was wearing a long, black rubber apron and black rubber gloves. Beside him, on another table, Ely saw tools: ax, hatchet, hacksaw, clawhammer, pliers, propane blowtorch, and an orange Stihl chain saw.
    “Habla usted español?”
the aproned man asked.
    “Solamente poquito.”
    “A little, eh? We do English. I examined your documents. Your name means nothing. And you are not DEA or CIA. Why were you sneaking around my facility?”
    “I wasn’t. I’m a scientist doing fieldwork. Please! It’s true.” Ely was about to cry and lose control of his bladder; it was a toss-up which would occur first.
    The small man picked up a red-handled hatchet and approached. Ely saw that its head was caked with dried blood and tissue. “What kind of scientist are you?”
    “Hydrogeologist. I look for water.” Ely’s chin was trembling. His head rang from the blow with the rifle, and his muscles were screaming from being stretched tightly on the tabletop.
    “Do you know who
I
am?” The man waved his hatchet like a conductor’s baton, the blade an inch from Ely’s eyes.
    “No.”
    “I am Hector Villanueva.”
    “Oh
God
.” Despite himself, Ely said this out loud.
    “So you
do
know who I am?”
    “I know who Hector Villanueva is.”
    “And how would you know that?”
    “It’s on TV and in the newspapers