Without warning

Whatever remnant of order had prevailed until yesterday was gone and the madness she had been expecting was finally upon them. It was like moving through a city at war with itself. No, it was worse than that, because there were no sides, just a general eruption, a battle of all against all. Packs of young men fell on individuals caught out alone. Larger gangs fell on them in turn. There had been no uniformed police or city authorities visible for days, but even the sort of organised private muscle that had protected places like the marina and Acapulco Diamante were much less in evidence, either hunkered down behind high walls and barricades, or simply dissipated as men flaked away to protect their own immediate interests and families. Gunfire, thick oily smoke, occasional explosions and the mob sounds of fear and rage lay over the entire city.

Driving was a nightmare, with streets frequently choked and impassable. Only Shah’s handling of the all-terrain SUV had allowed them any headway through the worst of the snarls. At times he simply mounted the kerb and rolled through private homes to dodge some of the blockages. When the roads opened up, the former soldier drove fast and aggressively, twice knocking down small groups of men armed with improvised weapons who attempted to bar their passage along the Escenica carriageway as it ran through scrubland in the hills to the west of Revolcadero Beach. The thud of impact as the Toyota struck human flesh made her shudder and close her eyes. It was somehow much worse sitting passively in the seat beside Shah. The situation eased somewhat as they came down out of the hills and drove onto the long strip of dual laneway of the Costero de Las Palmas. Sprinklers still sprayed long arcs of recycled water over the empty, bright green golf courses to their left, and the beach-front resorts of Revolcadero on the right had not yet been touched by the violence that gripped the centre of Acapulco, but the evidence of accelerating collapse was everywhere. In the long lines of slow-moving cars piled high with personal goods. In the swarms of people sitting on the tarmac at the aeropuerto international, desperate for flights out, even though no aircraft remained there and none were flying in. And in the mob of seething, chanting American college students now laying siege to the gates of the Fairmont, where resort security led a grim effort to hold them at bay.

‘What the fuck?’ said Jules, as Shah slowed and pulled over to the side of the road, well away from the mob scene.

‘Spring break,’ Shah replied, by way of explanation. ‘Many students on cruise ships from America. Cheap cruises. Very ugly.’

‘That’s great. But what are they doing here?’

She could see some of Pieraro’s street toughs wielding canes and clubs to beat back the Americans, but many of the students seemed prepared to respond in kind. One group in particular had kitted themselves out with a mix of sporting equipment, protective gear and improvised weapons like baseball bats, and even one cricket bat that she could see. They appeared to work as a flying squad, charging from one spot to the next whenever the security men threatened more beatings and mayhem.

‘Bit of a fucking cock-up then, Sergeant Shah.’

‘A bit, Miss Julianne.’

He started the engine again and pulled back into the sluggish stream of traffic that rolled straight through the centre of the crowd.

‘Don’t stop,’ she ordered him. ‘I’ll see if I can get Miguel’s attention as we roll past.’

Shah crunched the stick into low gear. There was no moving any faster than a trot anyway, with the road and the dusty verge completely choked with foot traffic and hundreds of vehicles. Dozens of cars had stopped from want of gas and been pushed onto the verge, creating obstacles around which flowed the slow-moving mass of refugees. The exodus from the city poured through and past the huge knot of young Americans, who all seemed to be carrying expensive backpacks and luggage. More than a few were drunk. As Jules rolled down the window she was struck by the stench of so many people packed in closely together.

‘It’s bloody hopeless,’ she said after a few minutes. ‘I’ll have to go in on foot. Turn off up ahead, Mr Shah, and take the car down to the sand. It can run on sand, can’t it?’

The Gurkha nodded. ‘I shall wait by the cabanas directly out the back. I will not move until you come for me.’

Jules thought about taking the shotgun, but settled instead on a concealed pistol, which she carried in a holster on her hip under a long shirt. She was dressed in desert boots, khaki shorts and a white sea-cotton top, and didn’t look all that out of place in the young crowd. She waved off Shah and began to push her way forward. He was right. They were mostly young Americans, very obviously holidaying students. She supposed there had to be a few thousand of them in Acapulco at any time of year, but their numbers would probably swell during semester breaks. What the hell they were doing camped out in front of the Fairmont, she had no idea, but the deeper she moved into the crowd the uglier and more charged with menace the atmosphere grew, mostly thanks to the same street thugs they’d run into at the roadblock yesterday.

She recognised Pieraro’s second in charge, Roberto, the Colombian guy, standing atop a stone wall, looking splendid in black combat pants and a matching wife-beater. His eyes were hidden behind silver sunglasses and he was sporting some fabulous new bling, but there was no mistaking the brute arrogance and cruelty of the man. He seemed to be enjoying himself, sooling small packs of his men onto the gringos whenever they threatened to push too far into the complex – although his goons seemed less enthusiastic about tangling with the mob of drunken, fired-up college jocks who had armed themselves with the sporting kit. They were pretty evenly matched.

It was a wonder that gunplay hadn’t broken out, but then in contrast with the day before, Roberto’s men were all armed with clubs and axe handles. The pistols with which they’d manned the roadblock were nowhere in evidence. As Julianne elbowed and squeezed through the crush, she began to attend to the snatches of conversation she heard.

‘They’re picking us up here. Coast Guard or something…’

‘It’s the Marines, man – that’s what I heard.’

‘We’re going to Seattle.’

‘No way. It’s Sydney.’

Oh no, thought Jules. I have a very bad feeling about this.

She decided to skirt around the heart of the mob, pushing out towards the edges and finally getting free of them about a hundred metres further down the road near the resort’s tennis courts. Then, after cutting through a dense forest of artfully arranged palm trees, she looped around the rear of a large apartment complex and emerged near one of the half-dozen swimming pools. They were all deserted today, even the bars at the edge of the water, but over by the artificial lagoon, on the terrace of the Chula Vista restaurant, she found her passengers, their minder Pieraro, and his family. All fifteen of them.