“Can I talk to my aunt?”
“Who’s this?” Again, Carlson was a surly bastard. Who pissed in his Cheerios? Did he have to be a prick to a teenager who was worried about his aunt?
“That’s Rafael Azua, he’s Suzanne Azua’s nephew. He wants to know if she’s okay. Is she?” Asher bit out the question.
“Look, we don’t have time for that. She’s going to make it. We need to coordinate—”
“This is Eden. Your aunt is resting. This is Rafa, right?”
“Yes, Señora. She’s really going to be all right?” There was a tremble in his voice.
“I promise you, she will be fine. I would worry if she were burning up with fever, but she’s not.”
Instead of answering her, the kid’s head shot up and he looked at Asher with wide eyes. What the hell is that about? The kid should be happy his aunt is fine. What’s going on here?
Asher decided to step in. “Eden, we have a few ideas on how we’re going to get into the bank without alerting Maduro’s men.”
“What are your plans?” Carlson demanded to know.
“They’re fluid right now. Currently, we’re trying to get a take on the number of people that Maduro has surrounding the bank.”
“I have that number,” Eden said. “Or I should say, Angelo Torres does. He is the lead guard here at the bank.” Asher really liked her delivery. She was cool as a cucumber. Now if he could just find a way to talk to her without Carlson around.
Rafa covered the mouthpiece of the satellite phone and gave Asher a determined look. “There is something wrong. Señora York used the code word.”
“What?”
“She used my aunt’s emergency code word. She said burning. Our family was supposed to use that word if any of us ever got into trouble. Like a robber came into the house or something.”
Ah. Must be why he looked so upset. But was he right? Asher thought through Eden’s sentence. There was really no reason for her to have said burning up with fever. But if the kid was right, then she knew things were hinky on her end, and Halleluiah for that! Now, to somehow use it to their advantage.
Maybe….
“How much juice on the phone you’re using?” Asher quickly asked.
“I’m at forty-two percent,” Carlson answered.
“Do you have a charger?”
“No,” the man reluctantly admitted.
“We’re going to need some back-up phones to communicate from. I’m going to give you this number, and someone needs to go and see which phones have the capability to dial out to this number. Then bring all of those phones into wherever you are.”
“I’ll also check desks to see if any of the bank employees left behind chargers,” Eden volunteered. “It’ll take more than a minute though.”
“This is important. Take as long as you need,” Asher responded. Please God, say that there’s a family code word, and she understood what I was saying. He needed to talk to her away from Carlson.
“Okay, I’m going to go see what I can find,” Eden said.
“Yeah, yeah, do whatever,” Carlson bellowed. “Meanwhile, this guy can fill me in on what kind of plan him and his team have come up with.”
“No. First, Torres is going to tell me what he found out about the number of men who are surrounding the bank,” Ash answered.
A new voice spoke up. “There are five jeeps with long-range mounted machine guns. From what my man could see, there are at least three men with RPGs. Our reinforced gate couldn’t withstand two grenade shots at the same spot. But I don’t think the secret police would want to risk that. It would mean that within minutes, the entire city would know that the secret police were mounting an all-out assault on the bank. Maduro would have to come up with quite the story to explain away why he approved that.”
Shit. RPGs, long-range machine guns. We are so fucked.
Asher looked over at Leo and Kane—they looked as grim as he felt.
“What the hell are you going to do about this?” Carlson demanded.
“Excuse me, what was the other gentleman’s name? Was that Senor Torres?” Asher asked calmly.
“Yes, I am Angelo Torres. I manage the guards here at night. I have worked at Banco de la Gente for the last seventeen years,” he said proudly. “Señorita York has explained things to me, but I still do not understand how you Americans are going to help us.”
“That makes two of us,” Carlson spat out. “Thorne, you heard the man, there’s an army out there. What in the hell are you planning?”
“Torres, is that all your man told you?”
“No, there is more. The good news is that we are the tallest building for blocks, but there are snipers on other nearby low buildings that are targeting our courtyard. We don’t have anyone there for the time being, but one of the safety precautions when this building was built, is that there is at least a six-foot perimeter between the building and the gate.”
“We have the specs, Angelo. But even with the six feet, there are some angles that are going to be almost impossible for Maduro’s men to get off a shot, aren’t there?” Leo asked.
Asher nodded. Leo was seeing things exactly right as they looked at the blueprints up on Rafa’s screen. Especially at the corners—there wasn’t a chance in hell that Maduro’s snipers could make that shot.
“You’re right,” Torres finally spoke up. “I need to get up on our roof and check things out myself. Then I’ll be able to give you positions of the jeeps and snipers.”
“That would be perfect. How soon do you think you could have that for us? Can you draw us a map?” Asher
