Savages

of going to the IT people and getting it to go viral—old-school leadership technique meets modern marketing—and it has been an effective tool.

But the Zetas are expensive—cash on the barrelhead and their own drug turf as payment—so Elena has to acquire more territory just to stay even.

And El Azul has allies of his own.

The Sinaloa Cartel, perhaps now the most powerful in the country, adding money, soldiers, and political clout to Azul’s rebellion. Putting yet more pressure on Elena to acquire more territory, make more money to hire more men, purchase more weapons, buy more political protection. Government officials have to be paid, police and army bribed … money, money, and always more money … so she has to expand.

But the only place left to go is north.

El Norte.

Thank God she had the foresight to send Lado up there, what is it now, eight years ago? To quietly prepare the ground, recruit soldiers, infiltrate turf. So when she decided it was time for the Baja Cartel to take over the drug trade in California, Lado was established and ready.

Azul, of course, had followed suit—it was the obvious move—but so far Lado has him outmanned, outgunned, and outprepared up there.

It was Lado who decapitated the seven men.

Lado who will oversee the new marijuana market.

But now these two Yanquis want to play games?

She can’t afford their foolishness. She’s at war, she needs the income. It’s a life-and-death matter for her.

Don’t let yourself think that they won’t kill a woman. They have—she’s seen the photos, the women with their mouths duct-taped, their hands tied behind their backs, always stripped, often raped first.

Men teach you how to treat them.

72

“‘Fuck you’?” she asks now. “He said that? In those words?”

Chinga te?

She talks to Alex and Jaime over the phone.

“I’m afraid so,” Alex says reluctantly.

“‘Fuck you’ ultimately means ‘Fuck me.’”

Alex isn’t going near that. He has a pretty dulce life going in California and he doesn’t want to see it messed up with a drug war. They can keep that shit back in Mexico for all Alex cares. So he tries to make peace.

“They did agree to get out of the market immediately and totally,” he says.

Elena La Reina isn’t buying. “We didn’t make them an offer to which we expected a counteroffer. We made a demand, with which we expected compliance. If we allow them to think that they can negotiate with us, sooner or later that will cause problems.”

“Still, if they are willing to abandon the field—”

“It sets a bad example,” Elena continues. “If we let these two negotiate with us, talk to us like that, other entities will think that they are free to do the same.”

And she’s concerned about these two Americans—the one, they tell him, is a smart, sophisticated, reasonable businessman, who has no stomach for bloodshed. The other is an uncouth, foul-mouthed barbarian who seems to relish violence.

In short, a savage.

73

Of course, most Americans are.

Savages.

And this is what most Americans don’t understand—that most upper- to middle-crust Mexicans think that Americans are uncivilized, unsophisticated, uncultured, rambunctious rustics who just got on a lucky streak back in the 1840s and rode it to steal half of Mexico.

Mexico is basically Europe laid over Aztec culture laid over Indian culture, but aristocratic Mexicans think of themselves as Europeans and the Americans as …

Well, Americans.

And the Yanquis can joke all they want about Mexican gardeners and field workers and illegal immigrants but what they don’t get is that Mexicans think about those people as Indians and look down on them, too.

This is Mexico’s dirty secret: the darker your skin, the lower your status. Which sort of reminds you of … of …

Uhhhh …

Anyway, lighter-skinned Mexicans look down their noses at darker-skinned Mexicans, but not as much as they look down on Americans.

(Black Americans? Fucking forget it.)

Yeah, okay, so Elena thinks that this “Chon” is an animale, but a dangerous animale. The “Ben” has his uses, but refuses to use them. In any case, she cannot brook their disobedience.

“So do you want them killed?” Alex asks.

Elena thinks it over and her answer is

Not yet.

74

Not yet.

Because a Dead Ben couldn’t cultivate the excellent herb that produces so much potential profit. And a Live Ben would never do that if they kill his friend Chon. And this Chon, if past is prologue, has certain uses of his own.

So, wasteful to kill them.

Besides, it is better that these two be seen by the rest of the world to obey.

So—

INT. ELENA’S OFFICE – DAY

ELENA

What we need to do is force him to come work for us on our stated terms.

ALEX

How are we going to do that?

ELENA

(smiling cryptically)

I’ll make him an offer he can’t refuse.

75

Yeah, it’s a goddamn shame that Elena is allergic to feline dander, because it would be great to have a cat on her lap at that moment, but in reality she wouldn’t fuck up an expensive dress with all that cat hair anyway.