All fincas have at least one escape route. This ranch had a tunnel leading out from behind the hot water tank in the basement that went all the way behind the mountain and into the wash. The other end opened up by a crop of prickly pear on the riverbank and under a camo net, shielded by nopales and tarbush. There was a black, bulletproof truck, tank full and ready to go the distance.
Remembering my manners, I stopped and waited for Luisa and the rest before approaching the house. There, on the long wraparound porch out front, was Evelyn, waving at us like an old frontier wife. Her greying hair was pulled back in braids and she wore a long peasant dress.
“Welcome,” she said, clapping her hands together. She had to be excited that she had company for once. Living out here must be lonely, though the solitude was one of the reasons I liked it so much. Having an entourage around you twenty-four seven was exhausting and I wondered if I could ever truly be on my own without someone watching me, whether for my own protection or otherwise.
“You must be Luisa,” she said to Luisa as she came forward, holding out her hand in politeness. Evelyn pulled her into a tight hug, and I had to chuckle at that. Evelyn was round and fluffy, like a stuffed pancake, and about sixty-four, though she looked much older. Nothing aged you as much as grief. Even now I was seeing more silver hairs at my temples and a line between my brows that hadn’t been there before.
“The place looks great,” I said to Evelyn respectfully. “I can tell we are in good hands.”
She beamed at that, ever grateful to me, and then to my relief she took Luisa and started giving her a tour of the sprawling ranch house. Luisa didn’t need to be a part of what would happen next.
After they’d gone, I looked to Borrero and Morales. “Show me to the federale.” I glanced at Esteban and said, “You should get yourself settled.”
He raised a brow but didn’t say anything to that. Esteban wasn’t new to the interrogation process, but still, I felt better not having him there.
I followed Borerro and Morales, with Diego behind me as always, down the hall and stairs to the basement. It was clean, dark, and cool down here, with a metal chair in the middle of the room and rope coiled underneath it. Two other chairs were stacked in the corner beside a sink and a storage chest. There was an arsenal of depravity in that chest; I had spent a full day here last time picking out the best means of torture and filling it up just so.
The closet that contained the hot water tank looked like any other, complete with a mop and bucket — crucial for washing away the blood — and you could barely fit inside it. But Borrero squeezed past the heater and pushed at the bricks on the wall behind it. A hidden door opened with a groan, the grating sound of bricks grinding against each other, and soon he disappeared.
We followed him — Diego grunting because his stomach could barely squeeze past the heater — and then we were in a long, dirt tunnel that stretched straight out for a few yards before curling around to the left. Faint lights lined the ceiling, and in the middle of the tunnel was Evaristo, hands and feet bound, tied with a metal leash to a chair. He had a ball-gag in his mouth, and his head was slumped over, his eyes closed.
In person he looked a lot younger than I had thought. Maybe everyone looked a bit younger when they had their eyes closed. Innocent, almost, though I knew the boy-man couldn’t be where he was with the federales and still maintain his innocence. They might have been fighting on the other side, but they were still capable of being as twisted and immoral as the cartels were. At least we had a code of conduct. They pretended they had one and called it justice.
Beside Evaristo on the ground were two buckets of water and a large metal toolbox. I wondered what my sicarios had selected for me and what they’d already used themselves.
As Diego closed the brick wall behind us, I went over to Evaristo and looked him over closely. One of his eyes and the corresponding cheekbone was black and blue, and there was a trail of dried blood beneath his nose. His dark hair was matted down, maybe with sweat, maybe with blood. Other than that though, he didn’t look half bad.
“He got a little frisky when we first took him,” Morales explained. “I roughed him up a bit, knocked him out.”
“He’s been out ever since?”
He shook his head and puffed on his cigarette, the smoke wafting down the tunnel, trying to find fresh air. “He came to but we put him back under. The more disoriented he is, the better. It’s been a few hours though since we last gave him a hit, so I’m sure you can wake him and get him talking.”
I was sure about the first part but not the second.
Before I did anything to wake him, I crouched down and inspected the tool box. At the top was a small battery pack and rod. It was the typical narco route for interrogations, but it was a staple because it worked so damn well.
I picked it up then nodded at Borrero and the bucket.
“Wake him.”