I gave him a blank stare.
Vega took it from there, using his huge hands in surprisingly graceful gestures to frame the points he was making. “Santiago Mondragón is the head of a powerful cartel, operating for the most part out of Hermosillo, Mexico, in the state of Sonora. Carlos Rodriguez also operates out of Sonora. Rodriguez wields a good deal of power in the area just south of the border along Coronado County, but we understand that he’d like to extend his power. That’s where he bumps heads with Santiago Mondragón.”
“We thought your Peter Bisonette might be involved in the drug trade that we know Rodriguez conducts here in the States,” Sprangers said. “But we’re beginning to believe there’s something else going on.”
“Like what?”
“We’re hoping you might enlighten us,” Vega said.
“That’s what you followed me up here for?”
“The Santa Margaritas are part of the historic Oro Rico Mining District,” Sprangers said. “They’re honeycombed with old excavations. We suspect that Rodriguez has used these abandoned mines to hide his drugs. He might also be using them to hide someone he’s kidnapped. Your wife, for example. The blood that was found at Robert Wieman’s ranch house was not your wife’s blood. We’re not sure whose blood it is, but we think she might have been taken as a pawn in this power struggle between Rodriguez and Mondragón. Same with her son.”
They didn’t seem to realize Peter’s true part in all this, and I was not about to enlighten them.
“If you’re right,” I said, “that means Rainy is still alive somewhere. That’s wonderful news. But if it’s true, why haven’t I been contacted by Rodriguez?”
“That she’s your wife means nothing to him. If there’s communication taking place, it’s probably between Rodriguez and Mondragón.”
“Why don’t you talk to Mondragón?”
“If we could, we would,” Vega said, unconsciously clenching one of his hands into a fist as big as a sledgehammer head.
“What do you want from me?”
“We need answers, and you’re the only visible lead we have,” Sprangers said.
“Which is why you’ve been tracking me?”
“You wore a badge once,” Sprangers said. “What would you do if you were me?”
I studied the four men. They stood together, their backs to the storm still raging in the distance. The lightning, white in the black clouds, gave them an occasional halo.
“Border Patrol. DEA. What about you?” I said to the two men who hadn’t yet spoken a word. “FBI? State cops?” I turned to Sprangers. “You’re all part of some kind of multiagency task force?”
“It’s a big enemy we’re fighting,” Sprangers said. “Their crimes cut across all kinds of jurisdictions.”
“I wish I could help you fellas, I really do. But . . .” I gave them only a shrug.
“That’s the way it is?” Sprangers said. “In that case, you’ll be coming with us.”
“Where?”
“Back to Cadiz for some more questioning.”
“If I refuse?”
“That’s not an option, O’Connor.”
I was half a mile from Peter. If I led them to him, and if he had, indeed, killed someone, I had no idea what the legal consequences might be. I also wasn’t absolutely convinced that I should trust any of these men. Still lingering out there was the question of who’d leaked to Rodriguez the location of the Lulabelle. Mondragón might have been right when he told me that anyone can be bought. And the one piece of advice everyone had so far given me ran in a loop through my head: In Coronado County, trust no one.
“One more thing maybe you should know,” Sprangers said. “Your pilot friend, Robert Wieman? Somebody beat him up last night.”
“Who?”
“He couldn’t say.” He nodded toward my bandaged face. “Maybe the same people did that to you.”
“Where is he?”
“The hospital in Sierra Vista. He’s in pretty bad shape. You probably want to see him, and you can. Just as soon as we’ve had a good long talk. So, what’ll it be?”
The storm was distant but still battering the sky above the land called Desolation.
“Back to Cadiz,” I said.
CHAPTER 26
* * *
In an interview room in the Coronado County Law Enforcement Center, they worked me over with their questioning. Sprangers and Vega did all the heavy lifting. Deputy Crockett was there, too, although he said almost nothing. He’d taken off his tan cowboy hat, the one with the colorfully beaded band, and I saw that his hair was jet black. I figured he was another member of the task force, maybe representing the local jurisdiction, and maybe a part of it because of his Native heritage—Apache? Tohono O’odham?—and the unique perspective that might offer. God only knew who else might have been watching from the other side of the mirror on the wall. It was clear they thought Rainy had been kidnapped, although they didn’t have an explanation for all the blood at the site where they believed she’d been snatched. They thought the same thing had happened to Peter. Their working assumption was that Rodriguez was using both Rainy and Peter as leverage in some kind of power play against Santiago Mondragón. I didn’t disabuse them of the notion. Mostly, I played dumb. About my face, I told them that I’d cut myself shaving. Which was probably a line I’d picked up from a Humphrey Bogart movie.
“You and your friend Bob Wieman flew over the Santa Margaritas yesterday. Shortly after that, in the same general area, one of our agents was attacked.” Sprangers leaned toward me across the bare table. “Coincidence?”
“I don’t have another explanation,” I said.
“Tell me you weren’t up there looking for your wife or her son.”
“Believe whatever you want to believe. It’s a free country.”
“Has Rodriguez or his people contacted you?”
“No.”
“No? They didn’t give you that shave?” Vega said. He’d been pacing the little room like a caged animal with a great deal of pent-up energy.
“A lot on my mind these days,” I said. “My hand’s a little unsteady.”
“If Rodriguez has your wife and her son, why lean on you? What can you give him?”
“No one’s leaning on me.”
“Are you some sort of intermediary?”
“I’m some sort of nothing.”
“Then maybe you have something they want,” Sprangers said.
“What could that possibly be?”
Sprangers glanced at Vega, who stopped his pacing. Vega gave a nod of approval.
Sprangers said, “We know that Carlos Rodriguez has been moving a significant amount of drugs through Arizona. We believe that he’s been caching them somewhere this side of the border until he ships them out. Maybe he’s been using one of the old mines as a storage depot. We thought it might be in Coronado County, there are so many of them here. But maybe it’s in the Santa Margaritas. And just maybe your Peter Bisonette knows where that is.”