The Ninth Day Read online

  “You must be Tico,” Emma said.

  Tico looked around at the assembled group of them. He spit on the ground and jerked his chin at Carlos. “I know those guys, but who the hell are you two?”

  “That’s Oswald Kroger.” Emma pointed at Oz. “And I’m Emma Caldridge. I’m a chemist. I need to use your lab.”

  Tico raised an eyebrow. He turned his head to acknowledge Carlos. “Cerveza?” he said.

  Carlos smiled a broad, tobacco-stained smile. “Si.” Tico snapped his fingers, and the woman behind him trotted up. Like a dog to its master.

  “Get them a couple of beers.” The woman scuttled off back into the trailer, slamming the crooked screen door behind her. She reemerged with two Coronas in hand. She kept her eyes down as she delivered the beers. Bleeding sores covered her arms. Oz gazed at them as she walked by.

  “You see those sores? They look just like Serena’s.” Oz spoke to Emma in a voice low enough for only her to hear.

  “They’re not, though,” Emma said, keeping her voice just as low. “Those are called ‘crank bugs.’ They’re from her body trying to release the meth toxins from her system through her skin.”

  Oz grimaced. “That’s awful.”

  Emma nodded. Oz had it right. Meth was awful.

  Tico took a drink of the beer that the blonde handed him. “You need one?” Tico said to Oz.

  “I need two.” Oz pointed at Emma. “One is for her.”

  Tico spit again. “I don’t waste my beers on women.” Oz’s eyes narrowed, and she saw him reach into his pocket where he kept his knife, his angular face even more arresting in his anger. It was like watching Beauty and the Beast face off, except Emma had no time for it. She held up her hand to stop him. Oz subsided a bit, but still looked ready to kill. Emma ignored Tico and headed to the end of the first trailer. The smell grew stronger as she approached it.

  “Hey!” Tico said. “Where the hell are you going?”

  Emma kept walking away.

  “I said where the hell are you going?” Emma was pleased to hear that Tico was pissed off. She kept moving.

  “I don’t waste my breath on assholes,” she called behind her.

  “You stay away from my goddamned lab,” Tico was bellowing now.

  Emma stopped at the corner of the trailer. From that angle she could see more rows of plastic liter soda bottles filled with cooking meth. Coolers lined the ground, containing more. Behind them was another, smaller trailer. A sign featuring a skull and crossbones in red and black was tacked on the door, and under it the words, “Keep Out.” Next to the trailer sat a gleaming, tricked-out Harley Davidson motorcycle. Black saddlebags hung from behind the seat. The symbol 1% was embroidered in gold on the side of one. She glanced at Tico.

  “I told you, I’m a chemist. I need your lab. LaValle’s men brought me here to use it. And it’s a good thing, too, because you can’t make meth for shit. You used too much ammonia. Damn bottles are going to blow.”

  “How the hell do you know?” Tico said.

  “I can smell it. Too much of it. And let me guess, instead of red phosphorus you used hypophosphorous acid.”

  She heard Tico inhale, confirming her suspicion. Hypophosphorous acid was an extremely dangerous acid that worked as a substitute for red phosphorus, but was so volatile that the slightest mistake in temperature, or capping the cooking bottle too tightly, would cause it to blow. Emma figured Tico got the substitute cheaper than the regular ingredients, and took the risk to save cash.

  “I ain’t worried. Lots of guys use hypophosphorous acid. This is my second batch with it and so far it’s been fine. Should’ve switched sooner.”

  She resumed walking toward the second trailer. The smell grew even more noxious as she approached. She veered away from the picnic table set up and went straight for the lab. God, this is depressing, she thought. That Serena’s life hung on the fortunes of a two-bit meth lab that wasn’t a lab at all, but just a broken-down trailer in the middle of the mountains was unconscionable. Whether Serena deserved her fate or not, no one should die by being eaten alive.

  She opened the lab’s door and gazed inside. The interior smelled like cleaning fluid, alcohol, and rotten eggs. Tico must have been cooking inside as well. Emma moved in farther. The trailer was a long rectangle, with a galley kitchen to her left and a small eating area to the right of that. A pile of decongestants of every brand and description were stacked in one corner of the counter next to a blender. Empty mason jars filled the opposite counter, along with a pile of lithium batteries. A pair of pliers lay next to the batteries. Oz stepped in behind her. He gazed around, and his eyes fell on the various ingredients piled on the counters.

  “I know they use decongestants. But batteries?”

  Emma nodded. “They take them apart and pull the silver lithium strip out of the middle. The pseudoephedrine in the decongestant tablets”—Emma pointed to the pile—“is ground into a powder, added to an accelerant, or precursor, such as drain cleaner, and the lithium strips punch up the chemical reaction.”

  “Batteries, pliers, and a blender. This is a joke,” Oz said.

  Emma sighed. The trailer contained everything needed to cook meth, but nothing that even resembled equipment that stocked an actual lab.

  She moved closer to the sink. Portions of the Formica showed rings of dust and dirt, as if something had been there but was removed. She walked to the refrigerator and opened it. Two small propane tanks sat on the refrigerator’s main shelf. More meth ingredients. She stepped out of the trailer and into the clearing, with Oz behind her. Tico stood next to the cycle.

  “That’s not a lab at all,” Emma said.

  Tico bristled. “I had to pawn most of the equipment to pay some debts. La Valle wants it, he can still get it back. My month isn’t up at the pawn shop. They haven’t sold it yet.”

  Oz gave a low whistle and walked toward the motorcycle.

  “What the hell you whistling at, pretty boy?” Tico said, a sneer in his voice. Oz didn’t seem to hear him. He just stared at the cycle.

  “I didn’t see this before. Damn, that’s a great bike,” Oz said.

  Tico stopped cold. After a moment of confusion, where he didn’t seem to know how to feel about Oz’s change of subject, a look of pride entered his eyes. He puffed up his chest. Emma noted that even then, his belly loomed huge over his pants.

  “That bike’s been all over the country and back. Not a scratch on her.”

  Oz stopped a few feet away from the bike, off to the right. “How old?”

  “Ten years.”

  The skinny blonde appeared with two beers in her hand. She handed one to Oz, before passing behind Tico and offering the second to Emma.

  Tico frowned. “I didn’t say she could have one.”

  The girl froze in her tracks, with the beer extended to Emma.

  Oz frowned at Tico. “But I did.”

  The girl gave Oz a sidelong look. Emma took the bottle from her.

  “Uncap those liter bottles very carefully,” Emma said to Tico. “If you’re going to use the ‘shake and bake’ method, then you have to keep them cold. The sun’s going to warm them enough to cause the chemicals inside to detonate.” She took a gulp of the beer. It tasted crisp, but did little to quench Emma’s thirst or quell her growing hunger. Emma watched the skinny blonde step back, her eyes wide. She resumed playing with her hair, staring at Emma.

  Tico leaned toward her. “I don’t waste beer on women, and I don’t take orders from them either. If you wasn’t sent by La Valle, I’d have killed you when you first opened your mouth.”

  Emma took another drink from the bottle. “Then I guess Oz and I will be moving on. I don’t want to be around when your yard explodes.”

  Tico snorted. “It ain’t gonna explode. I been making meth for five years, and never once lost a batch.”

  “Every one of those is going to combust.” She took another large gulp and started back to the front yard. Out of the corner of her eye
she saw Oz take one last look at the cycle before he, too, began to make his way back to the Escalade.

  “Hey, pretty boy,” Tico said.

  Oz stopped walking. He spun on his heel and leveled a stare at the man.

  “You call me ‘pretty boy’ one more time and you’re not going to like what happens.”

  Tico put his arms out in a placating gesture. “All right, relax. I didn’t mean nothin’ by it. Carlos told me that she”—Tico pointed at Emma—“is a hostage. If that’s so, why don’t you leave her here? I’ll handle the ransom, everything. We’ll cut out La Valle. I’ll give you, Carlos, and Mono forty percent of what I collect.” Emma was truly surprised that Tico had such duplicity in him.

  “You really want to take on the biggest cartel leader in Ciudad Juarez?” she said to Tico. “Do you think that’s wise?”

  Tico pointed a finger at her. “You keep out of this.”

  Oz shook his head. “Forget it.”

  Tico took a step closer. “Why not?”

  “Why not? I’ll tell you why not. La Valle will come and kill us all, that’s why not. You think you can beat him at his own game, good luck.”

  Tico pointed at the 1% symbol on his saddlebags. “You know what that means?” Oz put his hands on his hips, but said nothing. “It means that I’m a lieutenant in the Black Eagles. The Hell’s Angels and Outlaws can’t lick our boots.” Oz just kept moving around the trailer. Both he and Emma stepped onto the front lawn. Tico followed them. “You see those bikes?” He pointed to the four tricked-out motorcycles parked in front of the other trailers, all Harleys, and all gleaming. Saddlebags on the back of each bore the crest of an eagle crisscrossed with two pistols. “La Valle comes at us, my crew will protect me. Come on. We all stand to make some money. I’ll give you her,” he pointed at the blonde.

  Oz snorted in disbelief. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

  Tico shook his head. “I’ll even throw in a case of beer.”

  Emma laughed. Her response caused Tico to frown. She supposed she shouldn’t goad the moron, but the ridiculousness of the conversation invited derision.

  “I guess women are worth some beer after all,” she said to Oz, who didn’t smile. He continued to look at Tico with an incredulous expression on his face.

  “Are you brain-dead? You act like you can just offer someone up like that,” Oz said.

  Tico shrugged and pointed at the blonde. “She’ll do what I say. She’ll go with you.” The blonde got a hopeful look on her face, which cut Emma to the core. The girl viewed herself as chattel.

  Oz pointed at Emma. “She’ll kill you in your sleep. And that would be after she killed me for even thinking about it.” He stalked past Emma. “Let’s get out of here. This guy’s crazy.”

  Two men stepped out of the front door of the second trailer. One bald, wearing black combat boots, jeans, a gray tee shirt, tattoos running up his neck to his chin, and a studded wristband as a bracelet, smoked a cigarette. The second man was small and wiry, with ropey arms and a bandanna wrapped around his head. He held a beer in his hand. The two men’s eyes locked on Emma, and the one with the bandanna raised an eyebrow. He spotted Mono leaning by the ambulance.

  “Looks like you’ve traded up, Mono,” he said.

  Mono shook his head. “She’s cargo.” He jerked a thumb at the Escalade. “We’ve got twenty in the back for you. You want ’em?”

  The wiry man nodded. “If it’s good.”

  Mono snorted. “The best Mexico has to offer.” He pronounced “Mexico” like “Mehico.” The wiry man shrugged.

  “We’ll test it, like we always do.” He jerked his chin at Emma. “Come on inside.”

  “You carry the shipment in?” Mono said.

  The second man, who up until this point hadn’t said a word, started toward the Escalade. Emma felt her nerves stretch as he approached the car.

  “You got any gardening gloves? Maybe you get them before you start unloading,” she said.

  The man stopped and looked at her in surprise. “Why? To protect my soft hands?”

  Mono chuckled in an unconvincing manner and waved the gun at her. “You stay quiet.”

  The man kept going. He swung open the back door and reached inside. Emma couldn’t watch anymore. She started to the trailer, moving past the tattooed man, who still stood in the doorway.

  The house was dark and oppressively hot, even though the windows were open. A fitful breeze blew the curtains around, but did little to lower the temperature. A tattered couch shoved against a far wall dominated the living room, and a ring-stained coffee table held two bongs, one filled with sludge water. Emma could see a portion of the kitchen. Stacks of pizza boxes were on the floor, along with several beer carriers, each holding empty bottles. The entire house smelled like stale beer and old cigarette smoke.

  The two men entered, each holding a brick of the shipment. Mono walked in behind them. He held his gun, but no bricks.

  The wiry man settled onto the couch and prepared a bong using the brick. The second man tossed his onto the cocktail table before joining his buddy on the couch. The wiry man packed the bong in no time and held it to his lips as he lit it. Emma heard him inhale.

  “I need some fresh air,” she said. She spun around and moved past Mono, who watched the two men smoke with a knowing look on his face. She hit the screen door and pushed it open. It slammed shut behind her with a sound like a gunshot. She looked around at the dilapidated trailers and littered lawn and hoped that not all of rural America had become so worn down, so sad.

  The screen door gave a second report and she looked over to see Oz coming toward her, with Mono at his heels.

  “Let’s go,” Mono said. “Fast.” He jogged toward the Escalade, and some of his urgency transmitted to Emma.

  “What’s going on?”

  “They’re smoking the sick leaves,” Mono said. “We got to get out of here now.” When he saw Emma and Oz staring at him, he became impatient. “Come on! We don’t have much time. Get the hell out of here. Fast. Before they realize they’re dying.”

  “They have nine days,” Oz said.

  Mono shook his head. “Not these guys. When they smoke the bad leaves it goes fast. We’ve got to get out of here.”

  The screen door slammed. One of the men staggered out onto the lawn. Blood poured from his eyes, nose, and mouth. He took an unsteady step toward them. He fell to his knees and landed on his face in the grass. He twitched once, and stilled. Emma saw the second man stumble out of the house. He, too, was covered in blood.

  “Jesus,” Oz said.

  “Go! Now,” Mono yelled.

  Before Emma could respond, the first bottles on the picnic tables between the trailers exploded.

  Emma felt the heat and force of the blast, which knocked her backward onto the ground. She hit the dirt, and lost her breath. Oz fell next to her.

  More bottles exploded, followed in rapid succession by the others. One by one Emma heard the stash in the backyard begin to combust. Tico gave a guttural scream, which was followed by a high-pitched one from the blonde. Emma scrambled into a crouch and grabbed Oz’s arm. She hauled him upward as the next group of bottles exploded, creating a large fireball that belched into the air. She started running toward the cars and nearly ran into Carlos, who appeared from around the corner. Flying bits of metal, rocks, and dirt hit the back of Emma’s head.

  Carlos yelled at her in Spanish. She didn’t know the words, but she understood his intent. She ran right behind him as they sprinted to the vehicles. Carlos veered off toward the ambulance. More explosions rocked the area. Flames spewed up from the lab. Oz threw open the door to the Escalade’s driver side. Emma ran to the passenger door. Mono crawled into the back.

  Oz started the car and hit the gas. He pointed down the dirt road away from the trailers. Explosions triggered behind them, filling the air with sound. Emma craned her neck to see. Flames engulfed the lab, creating black smoke that billowed into the sky.

  Oz
gunned the Escalade, keeping it close to the ambulance, which filled the road in front of them. No one spoke for several minutes.

  “There goes Serena’s chance,” Oz said.

  Emma gazed out the window, watching scrub brush and twisted cactus flash by. Mono remained silent in the back, his ever-present rifle by his side and a gun on his belt. Emma was still trying to wrap her head around what she had seen. Oz was quiet, brooding.

  “Guess they’ll never steal from La Valle again,” Mono said. After a moment, Emma heard him chuckle.

  Chapter 20

  Banner lurched toward the ringing cell phone, reaching it before Sumner could. The display showed that Stromeyer was calling.

  “Tell me some good news,” Banner said.

  “Good? No. Weird? Yes. I just received a call from some investigator with the Mexican army. Seems that they found a Range Rover that contained a piece of paper in the glove compartment with both our cell-phone numbers written on it.” Banner switched the phone to speaker and placed it on the desk so that Sumner could hear.

  “Whose car was it?”

  “It was registered to a woman named Luisa Perez. She was a veterinarian.”

  “Did she say who gave her the numbers?”

  “Unfortunately, no. She’s dead. They found her body inside a compound owned by one Eduardo La Valle.” Sumner groaned. “I know, I didn’t like that either.”

  Sumner leaned toward the cell phone to speak to Stromeyer. “But I thought the GPS transmission was coming from Ciudad. La Valle’s compound is one hundred and fifty miles south of there.”

  “Perhaps Caldridge made it out of Ciudad.”

  “You said they found this woman’s body. What happened at the compound?”

  “The army raided it early this morning. La Valle’s men put up a fight, and a whole group of cartel dealers died. Apparently the Mexican army had a tip about a cartel gathering there, and they planned the raid to coincide with it. Half the partygoers died before they knew what hit them. Sumner, would you recognize Caldridge’s handwriting?”