Revenge of the Assassin

The shorter of the two hastily stabbed at his cell phone and muttered into it, “We should be on top of him, but when we made the turn, he disappeared.”

“Could he have entered one of the buildings? Maybe he lives there.”

“Anything’s possible. What do you want us to do?”

“Keep walking and see if you can spot him on the far street. Worst case, if you can’t, watch the buildings for a light going on in one of the windows. He couldn’t have gotten too far, so either he ducked into one of the buildings or he ran for it. I think we can assume he spotted you. Get moving. No need for subtlety now,” the shoelace tier instructed. “I’m right behind you, maybe forty-five seconds. Move.”

They increased their speed to a near jog. As they passed the construction site, a shadow burst from the depths and hurtled past them.

The first man clutched his midsection in disbelief, as though he could hold his organs in with his hands now that his stomach had been slit open, sliced below his ribcage through the abdominal wall. He crumpled as his intestines spilled out onto the sidewalk in a wet puddle. His partner collapsed simultaneously, dropping the stun gun to the ground, the femoral artery at the top of his leg severed, the outpouring of blood causing an immediate drop in blood pressure. He quivered as he feebly pushed against the gash in his thigh, consciousness fading almost instantly as his life seeped from him.

El Rey kicked the stun gun into the darkness and then silently moved back into the bowels of the gutted building, carefully avoiding the blood that his interaction with the first two had created. He listened for footsteps and was rewarded by the clumping of shoes approaching from around the corner, which stopped, as anticipated, in front of the two dying men. He slid out of the far side of the building and circled back soundlessly on his pursuer.

The man never saw him coming. The next thing he knew, a bloody straight razor was at his throat, millimeters from severing his carotid.

An eerily calm voice whispered in his ear, tender as a lover, “Who are you?”

The man swallowed and allowed his body to go slack, signaling submission to his assailant.

“Please. Don’t kill me. I’m here from Don Aranas. He sent us to bring you back. He needs your help.”

Aranas? The name instantly caused a flood of images. The head of the Sinaloa cartel was as legendary as he was elusive. He was as much of a ghost as El Rey and had defied decades of concerted manhunts to bring him to justice. El Rey had never met him, but he’d performed hits for his syndicate, taking sanctions against the Gulf and Juarez cartels. He’d delivered flawlessly on the contracts, and Aranas had always been punctual in payment. But how…?

“I need more than that. How did you find me? You have five seconds to convince me not to slit your throat.”

“There was an inquiry through Interpol from the Argentine secret service. One of Aranas’ contacts in the Federales alerted him, and we traced the origin to a man in Mendoza. A man who was found murdered this morning. Our sources in the police department here gave us the list of possible suspects. You were one of the names.”

“How did you know it was me?” El Rey whispered.

“We didn’t. I have five other men in town — now that these two have been taken out of the game. They’re watching other targets.”

“That doesn’t explain how you knew I was your likeliest objective.”

“You don’t look that much different than your photo, if you know what to look for. It’s a good disguise, but nothing’s foolproof. You should know that.”

El Rey felt the man’s pockets for weapons. He had a pistol — a Remington 1911 R1.45 caliber, no silencer. El Rey took it and removed the razor from his neck, pausing to wipe the blade on the man’s jacket.

“Turn around. Slowly. Face me, and then back into the construction site so we can have some privacy. Don’t make a sound or you’re dead. We don’t have a lot of time, so do exactly as I say.”

The man did as instructed, raising his hands over his head and moving into the shadows. El Rey trained the gun on him, the barrel steady, almost casual.

“What does Aranas want with me? Why search halfway around the world for someone who has gone out of his way to disappear?”

“Aranas has an offer for you — a job. He was insistent. Money is no object to him, and he wants the best.”

“I’ve retired.”

“I don’t think so. With all due respect, if Aranas wants you that badly, it’s time to come out of retirement just this once. You know the power he wields. Don Aranas is not a man to refuse. I mean no disrespect in telling you this.”

El Rey thought about it. This was a very strange situation, and not at all what he’d envisioned. He’d been expecting almost anything, but not a job offer. He regarded the man, who was clearly extremely tough. This was a man who had faced death many times, you could tell. He was afraid of El Rey killing him, but he was also resigned to it, if that was how the night would end. Better dead than to let down his master. El Rey knew the kind. He gestured with his weapon.

“I’ll consider it. Give me a phone number to call, and when I’m ready, I will get in touch,” El Rey instructed.

“My orders were to have you accompany me. We have a Gulfstream V waiting at the airport that can hit Mexico without refueling. I urge you to reconsider.”

“I don’t care what your orders were. I am retired. If I decide to meet with Don Aranas, it’s out of respect for his position, not because of any orders. Give me a number, and if I decide to, I will call and arrange a meeting within a week. It will be just the two of us. Nobody else. And the price will be very high. Twenty million U.S.. There will be no negotiation. That’s what it will take to bring me out of retirement if I choose to do so. If I decide not to, I won’t call, and you can tell Don Aranas that I have respectfully declined.” El Rey motioned with the gun. “You are still alive for one reason. I want you to take that message back to him. If you’re unwilling to, say so, and I can arrange for you to join your men in the gutter.”

The man nodded and then slowly reached into his jacket pocket for a pen and a scrap of paper — a parking stub. He watched El Rey studying him, and then, after considering it for a few moments, scrawled a number on the back of the ticket. He replaced the pen in his jacket and then held the slip out to El Rey.

“Place it on the ground and then turn around and walk out of here. Keep walking until you get to the main street and then cross into the park. Walk to the far side, and from there, do whatever you want. But be assured of one thing. If I ever see you, or any of your men, again, I will kill you like a dog, without hesitation. Nothing personal. You know how it is,” El Rey said, speaking softly, as was his custom.

The man nodded. “I’ll take him the message.”

He bent down and placed the parking ticket on the ground and then turned as instructed. El Rey slammed him in the base of the neck with the heavy steel pistol, and he tumbled to the ground. Picking up the stub, he calculated that the man would be out for at least fifteen minutes — plenty of time to get to his apartment, grab his gear, and disappear forever.

When the man came to, he was being shaken awake by a uniformed police officer. A blue glow flickered on the street from the roof lights of the squad cars. A harsh glare illuminated the building’s battered facade from the headlights of the four gathered cars. A huddle of cops stood outside by the two corpses, which had been covered with a tarp. El Rey was gone.

He told the police that he’d been assaulted and mugged, and that the last thing he remembered was being told to move into the building. He knew nothing about the two dead men — perhaps they’d happened along and tried to help him. He didn’t know. He’d been unconscious throughout whatever had happened and vaguely remembered a pair of large men, rough-looking, perhaps homeless — he struggled to give as good a description as he could muster, but it was all blurry and had happened so fast.