Edge of Battle

CHAPTER 9

THE FEDERAL DISTRICT, MEXICO CITY,

MEXICO

LATER THAT DAY

“My fellow citizens of Mexico, I bid you peace and happiness,” the broadcast began. “My name is Ernesto Fuerza, but you know me by my nom de guerre, Comandante Veracruz. This message is being relayed to you through the broadcast studios of TV Azteca in Mexico City, courtesy of the owners and general manager of this station. I realize that they may be under some considerable danger from the government by allowing me to broadcast this message, but they have graciously given their consent to do so as long as possible, and I applaud their courage.”

Fuerza shifted slightly, lowered his head, and touched the bandages covering the left side of his face, as if trying to ward off a sudden shiver of pain. He still wore his sunglasses and the bandanna on his head, but he was not wearing the bandanna normally covering his face, revealing a longer goatee than normal and a considerable darkening of the right side of his face as if caused by exposure to fire or intense heat. He wore desert camouflage fatigues similar to the U.S. Army’s standard day desert battle dress uniform, a tan undershirt, a tan web belt with a sidearm, and even a pouch resembling a carrier for night vision goggles or a gas mask.

“Exactly what we have feared for so long has come true,” he said after a momentary pause. The pause was only a few seconds, but it spoke volumes on his condition—and it was of course all carefully caught on tape. “As a result of the warlike stance of the government of the United States and yesterday’s public call for armed aggression against the Mexican people by American right-wing radio personality Bob O’Rourke, a hideous and bloodthirsty crime was committed. Today, in the early morning hours, a California National Guard soldier brutally attacked and sexually assaulted a Mexican woman in the desert east of the illegal border patrol base known as Rampart One. This action was obviously in retaliation for the accidental downing of an American helicopter yesterday.

“As of this moment, the Americans have not released the woman or have even acknowledged that this crime took place,” Fuerza went on. “However, we have obtained radio scanner recordings of the incident that I will play for you now.” The recording was very short…and remarkably clear. “The Border Patrol agents use what are called ‘ten codes’ to confuse and disguise their messages, but fortunately they also publish the meanings of these codes on the Internet, which anyone can look up,” Fuerza explained. “A code ‘ten-one-oh-six’ is an officer involved in an incident; a ‘signal three-five’ is a rape or sexual assault; and a ‘foxtrot-one-one’ means providing assistance to an outside agency. The Americans cannot hide their crimes any longer—they have admitted their guilt with their own lips. You can obviously discern the disgust and horror of the Border Patrol agent’s voice as he reports what he has seen.

“To my fellow Mexicans all around the world, but especially those living and working in the United States of America, I say to you today, this must not be allowed to stand,” Fuerza went on. “That poor woman, raped by American soldiers in the desert, was simply trying to go to her place of work, where she probably earns less than a fourth of what other workers earn simply because she is undocumented. She did not deserve to be attacked like this. She deserved respect, a decent wage, and protections guaranteed to any other person living in the United States, protections that are a God-given right as well as guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States.

“I call on every Mexican person in the United States who is working without documentation to leave your place of work right now. Yes, you have heard me correctly: I want you to leave your place of work immediately. Why give the Americans the fruits of your labor and then be treated no better than a cheap whore? Why slave fourteen to eighteen hours a day in their fields for pennies, and then be afraid for your lives and your family’s welfare every other hour of the day?

“I understand that you are afraid of deportation and losing your jobs, but I am here to tell you, my brothers and sisters, that when enough of you abandon the fields, workplaces, homes, and slums of America, and ordinary Americans must pick up your tools and clean their own homes and pick their own crops, the Americans will beg for you to return. America has stood on your backs long enough—it is time for them to realize exactly how important you are to their economy and their way of life.

“I know you will be in fear of retribution for your act of defiance. Many spiteful Americans will lash out at you just because they are powerless to do anything about what you will do. You must protect yourself and your family at all times. Do not fight with the government authorities or police, but use every means at your disposal to defend yourself from vigilantes, criminals, and angry citizens.

“Soon, the authorities will be unable to handle the sheer vastness of your numbers. They will not be able to merely pile you into a bus and drive you across the border; you will not be inhumanely ‘processed’ as before because there will be too many for them to handle. But more important, they will soon learn that their economy, their industry, and their way of life cannot continue without you. They will soon realize that the best way to deal with the loss of your valuable labor is to formulate a fair foreign worker policy that guarantees you all legal rights, a fair wage, education and health care for your children, and eventually citizenship for those who desire it. Not only will they be unable to stop you—they will be unable to deal with you, except as the valuable, indispensable, vital human beings you are. They will quickly realize that their only recourse will be to offer you more than what you receive now. It will certainly not be more than you deserve.

“I promise you, the Mexican government will do everything it can possibly do to guarantee your safety while you are in the United States, and will make you as secure and comfortable as possible upon your return to Mexico. I ask that you report to the nearest futbol stadium upon your return to Mexico. There, the Ministry of Internal Affairs will take down your personal information, conduct a medical examination, arrange for temporary shelter for transportation home.

“My friends and fellow Mexicans, I know you chose to leave your homeland to try to find a better life for yourselves and your family—that is the way of all hardworking Mexicans,” Fuerza said. “But after over a hundred years of hard work and struggle, is your life any better now than it was for your father or grandfather? Hispanics make up the majority of residents in California, but do we have any more rights than we did as mere aliens, migrants, or Chicanos? Our lives have not changed because we are treated the same as our forefathers were treated decades ago: at best as underpaid workers who should feel privileged to be allowed to work like virtual slaves; at worst as criminal trespassers who should be rounded up like cattle and dumped back across the border, no matter how hard we work.

“My brothers and sisters, I do not know what will happen to us when you leave your place of work and try to make your way back to Mexico,” Fuerza concluded. “But what I do know is that if we do nothing as a people to correct the injustices against us, our lot in life will never change. I want something better for my children and my future than to live in perpetual servitude to an ungrateful, uncaring, and increasingly hostile nation such as the United States of America has become. We cannot wait any longer for the Anglo politicians to act. We have the power to do something; we always have had it. Our labor has value, real value, not what the greedy slave labor capitalists give us. It is time the people of the United States of America realize this.

“I will continue to monitor both our government and the American government and media and report to you the progress we make during this historic movement, and I will do everything I can to make this transition as safe and as hopeful as possible. There will be sacrifice, let there be no doubt. But your sacrifice will be rewarded with a better life for you and a better future for your children. God bless the people, and God bless the United Mexican States.”

A few minutes after checking that the message had been successfully uplinked to TV Azteca studios in Mexico City, Fuerza sat silently, cueing up the digital recording of his message almost to the beginning. As he did so, he heard a commotion outside, and he unfastened the holster’s safety catch, but did not get up. Moments later a security guard opened the door to the office…

…and behind him walked the president of Mexico, Carmen Maravilloso. The president stopped dead in her tracks, shocked and surprised at what she saw—so shocked that she did not even notice Ministry of Internal Affairs deputy minister José Elvarez and two of his men already inside the room, all carrying small submachine guns under their suit jackets, along with a tall, large, imposing man in a long black leather overcoat, boots, and sunglasses seated in a corner of the office. Once inside, two agents departed while Elvarez stayed inside the office and guarded the door.

“You!” she exclaimed. She was so shocked at seeing the infamous Comandante Veracruz before her that she hardly noticed herself being led into the room, the door closed and locked behind her. Her voice was not angry or upset, just surprised—in fact, rather pleasantly surprised. She heard herself say, “I have wanted to meet you for some time, señor, but it is not yet safe for you. What are you doing here?”

“Issuing more instructions to the faithful patriots of Mexico, Madam President,” Fuerza said. He started the recording and let her listen to it; when he saw that she was getting ready to explode with indignation and anger, he stopped the tape. “You agree with my sentiments, do you not, Madam President?”

“You have no right to speak for the government, señor,” Maravilloso said worriedly. “What kind of plan is this? Tell our people to just leave? Thousands, perhaps millions of people will be homeless and penniless. They will be targets of racists and xenophobes, not to mention the American immigration authorities, who will round up and detain everyone heading south.”

“I am hoping that is exactly what they try to do,” Fuerza said. “They will quickly be overwhelmed and will commence mass deportations…”

“Which we will then have to absorb,” Maravilloso said. “Once they are no longer America’s problem, the issue will evaporate.”

“Except for the thousands of American employers, farmers, and households who will be screaming for the return of their cheap laborers,” Fuerza said. “Trust me, Madam President: the American government will be calling you in no time, wishing to issue a joint statement promising immigration simplification, a relaxation of immigrant worker rules, greatly increased allocations of work visas, better pay for immigrant workers, and a host of other reforms.”

“You sound very well informed and very sure of yourself—for a drug and weapon smuggler,” Maravilloso said. She stepped closer to Fuerza, studying him carefully. “Who are you really, señor?” she asked. “Obviously you wear a disguise, and I would even guess that you are not injured and your bandages are part of your disguise.”

Fuerza stood and approached the president. She did not want to show any fear, but she glanced over to be sure the men of the Political Police were nearby and ready to protect her. “You are indeed a very beautiful woman, Madam President,” he said.

“Gracias, Comandante,” she responded. She looked deeply into Fuerza’s uncovered eye, shaking from both fear and delight at the same time. “I…I think you are a great man, a true inspiration to the people of Mexico. But your words are dangerous, señor. Won’t you consider changing that recording?”

“I can deny you nothing, Madam President…”

“Carmen. Please call me Carmen, señor.”

“Carmen. Your name is as beautiful and as powerful as the woman herself.” He stepped closer. His first touch was electrifying, but his kiss was a million-volt charge running up and down her spine. The fear was still there, but his passion, his fire, was like a narcotic, rushing through her…

And then she froze, opened her eyes, and saw Fuerza smiling at her, and he saw the realization dawn in her eyes—she knew that she had willingly fallen into a trap she had suspected was there all along. Her lips curled into a snarl, her eyes blazed with white-hot anger, and her fingers became claws, tearing away at the bandages covering his face.

“This is why I love you so much, Carmen,” Minister of Internal Affairs Felix Díaz said, grasping her wrists. “You are so fiery, so passionate—and so damned predictable.” He pushed her away roughly, right into the arms of two Political Police Sombras agents behind her, who held her arms tightly. Díaz removed his bandanna and started to undo the bandages on his face. “You made it so easy for me to execute my plan.”

“I knew it, Díaz,” she snapped, struggling to regain her composure and regain the upper hand here. “I always knew it! You were too nice to be a politician, and I was too blind or too stupid to notice.”

“You were too busy posing for Paris Match and People magazine and screwing me on your desk, Carmen.”

“Bastard!” She jerked her arms free of the agents holding her, then reached down to her wristwatch and pressed the hidden alert button on the back.

“The alarm works, Carmen,” Díaz said casually, “but only my men are stationed outside—and do not forget that it is my men that protect the Federal District. No one will respond here unless I authorize it.”

“Puto!” Maravilloso screamed. “I suspected from the day we first met that you were not just some milquetoast rich boy with delusions of grandeur. I should have seen through the disguise long ago.” She looked around the room, hoping that one of the agents would come to her rescue, but knowing that was never going to happen. Her attention was drawn to a man in a seat in the corner, watching all that transpired with an amused smile on his face. “Who is that man?”

“Perdón mis maneras pobres, Madam Presidente,” the man said, standing and bowing slightly. “Mi nombre es Coronel Yegor Viktorvich Zakharov.”

“Zakharov!” Maravilloso exclaimed. “My God…Díaz, you are working with Colonel Yegor Zakharov, the world’s number one most-wanted criminal? There are a dozen countries that would throw you in prison for twenty years just for being associated with him!” She glared at him in total confusion. “Is he the puppet master, pulling all the strings in this marionette show of yours?”

“I have my own agenda, Madam President, and I guarantee you, it does not include anything concerning the government of Mexico,” Yegor Zakharov said. “I need ‘Comandante Veracruz’ and the Sombras in order to complete my mission in the United States. Once both our objectives are reached, with all of our mutual assurances, I will be out of your lives forever.” Zakharov stepped closer to Maravilloso and removed his sunglasses, letting her see his empty eye socket for the first time. He ran a hand across her cheek, then down her neck to her breasts and belly. “You truly are beautiful, Madam President.”

“Screw you, pija,” Maravilloso spat, slapping Zakharov’s hand away. “You don’t scare me with this boogeyman act of yours. I know lots of Mexican grandmothers with more horrifying faces than yours.” She turned to Díaz, hoping—no, praying—that every second she could delay the inevitable meant one more chance for her to survive. “What is the meaning of all this, Felix? Who are you? Are you the lapdog of a Russian terrorist, or are you the true Mexican revolutionary patriot I had always wanted ‘Comandante Veracruz’ to be?”

“I am the patriot who just heard the president of Mexico agree to kiss the ass of the American president and allow an army of imperialist assassins to come into our country,” Díaz said. “I had hoped the fire still burned in your belly, but it clearly has gone out. It is time to start the insurgency, the real revolution. It is time for the Mexican people to come out of the shadows and take their rightful place in society. It is time for the rights and welfare of hardworking Mexicans to be part of our foreign policy, not work in opposition to it. I hoped that you and I could lead this fight together, but like all the others, you sold out. You never truly believed that the people of Mexico could be anything else but third-rate citizens of a third-rate nation. The revolution means nothing to you.”

“Then teach me, Felix,” Maravilloso said softly, earnestly. “I am a woman and an entertainer. I do not have your vision. But I love you, and I have always thought you would make a great president. I wished for nothing except to be by your side, as your adviser as well as your lover.” She stepped closer to him, then placed her hands on his chest. “Take me, Felix,” she implored, looking deeply into his eyes, pressing herself against him. “Take my hand, take my heart, take my soul. I am ready to believe you. Tell me your vision for our country, and I will use all my powers to help you achieve it.”

Felix Díaz nodded, closed his eyes, and placed his hands in hers, holding her closely. “Very well, Carmen. This is my vision, my love.”

That was the last thing she would ever hear, except for the sudden roaring in her ears and the sound of her own muffled screams as the towel soaked with ketamine, a fast-acting veterinary anesthetic used to euthanize animals, was pressed over her nose and mouth. In seconds Maravilloso lost control of her voluntary muscles, so she was unable to struggle with José Elvarez, her assailant; in less than thirty seconds she was unconscious; and in less than a minute she was dead.

“Too bad she had to be eliminated—she was an extraordinarily beautiful woman,” Yegor Zakharov said idly as he watched four Sombras carry the body out of the office. “I trust you have a foolproof cover story prepared for her untimely death?”

“I have been working for months to plant incriminating evidence in her homes, her prior places of employment, her ex-husband’s and parents’ home, and her office,” Diaz said. “An investigation would eventually turn up enough long-standing corroborating evidence to make even General Alberto Rojas believe she did away with herself with a drug overdose. Distraught and under pressure from the disasters on the border, plus her earlier transgressions such as looting the treasury and establishing foreign bank accounts, she overdosed on heroin. Her medical records even hint at a possible heroin addiction when she was on TV. There is evidence of payoffs to a jealous homosexual lover for any really dedicated investigative journalists to discover. The ketamine will dissolve in less than an hour—there will be no trace of it to discover if there is an autopsy.”

“It seems you have done your homework, Díaz—I hope you know what you’re doing,” Zakharov said. “What about the rest of the Council of Government?”

“I get reports every half hour on their exact whereabouts,” Díaz said. “I have already targeted a few for elimination, such as General Rojas, if they become troublesome. I am not too concerned with the others. They care about their jobs, pensions, and girlfriends more than who is running the government. They have their escape plans ready.”

“I congratulate you, sir—it appears to be a fairly well-organized coup,” Zakharov said. “I thank you for rescuing me, but I must depart immediately. I have unfinished business in the United States.”

“With the robot and the American officer?” Díaz asked. “Have you been able to figure out how the thing works?”

“It responds to voice commands—that is all I know,” Zakharov admitted. “But there must be a way that a new user can employ the device without extensive training.”

“So you must convince Richter to reprogram the device to allow anyone to pilot it? Do you think that will be difficult?”

“Richter is a U.S. Army officer, but he was trained as an engineer, not a field combat officer,” Zakharov said. “My guess is that he will crack fairly easily under interrogation. But I will probably use drugs anyway to speed the process. Once we have control of the robot, he can be eliminated.”

“The Ministry of Internal Affairs has an extensive medical facility and interrogation centers set up to do exactly as you wish,” Díaz said. “We can transfer him here and begin immediately.”

“I prefer to do my own interrogation, Díaz.”

“Of course. But why not enjoy some Mexican hospitality for a while, polkovnik?”

“My mission is still incomplete.”

“Your mysterious task in Amarillo, Texas?” Zakharov said nothing, but looked suspiciously at Díaz. “There are not many military-significant targets in that part of Texas, Colonel, so I have taken the liberty of having my operations staff draw up some general plans for an assault on some of the facilities they believe would make useful targets.” Now Zakharov looked plainly worried—he didn’t like outsiders horning in on his operations. “If you tell me your specific objective, I can arrange to have well-trained, well-equipped, and experienced scouts, intelligence agents, workers on the inside, and saboteurs in place well in time for you, your men, and the robot to begin your operation.”

“I can handle all that myself, Díaz,” Zakharov said. “Our original deal was to get my men and me to Amarillo. If you can get us there immediately with Richter and the robot, our business will be completed and you can carry on with your plan to take over the government.”

“But you agreed to help train my men and provide security for…”

“That deal is terminated, Díaz,” Zakharov said. “You are on the threshold of taking control of the entire Mexican government. You don’t need me anymore.”

“Alliances and loyalties change at the drop of a hat around here, Colonel. I need someone who will fight for me, not for the highest bidder. And with you in control of the robot, our power will be unquestioned.” Zakharov was unmoved by that argument. “I’ll double your pay and pay double that for use of the robot, plus another one hundred thousand dollars to sign with me for just sixty days.”

“Not interested, Díaz.”

“Thirty days, then, and I’ll pay two hundred and fifty thousand dollars as a bonus.”

“Not interested.”

A flash of anger flashed across Díaz’s face, and for a moment Zakharov was certain he was going to explode and order his men to try something; instead, Díaz smiled confidently. “Then I have an interesting tidbit of information to pass along in exchange for one more operation by your men inside the United States for me.”

“I know now why your information is always so accurate, ‘Comandante Minister,’” Zakharov acknowledged. “What this time?”

“I did some checking on one of your friends, the lovely Dr. Ariadna Vega.”

“So?”

“As it so happens, Colonel, she is an illegal émigré from Mexico.”

“What?”

“I found her Mexican birth certificate and those of her parents,” Díaz said. “Her father is a university engineering professor in southern California; her mother works in her husband’s office. They are all illegals, overstaying the father’s educational visa obtained over thirty years ago to attend the University of Southern California. She obtained false birth records that allowed her to be accepted into classified government research programs.”

“So not only illegal—but criminal?” Zakharov exclaimed. “How perfect! How ironic…the deputy commander of America’s military task force charged with border security to be from a family of illegal aliens? I would like to pay a visit to Dr. Vega’s family.”

“Now who is taking chances here, tovarisch polkovnik?”

“You worry about yourself and forget about me, Veracruz…Fuerza…Díaz, whatever the hell your name is now,” Zakharov warned.

“Very well, Colonel,” Díaz said, smiling casually. “You shall have support from the Internal Affairs Ministry to get you back to the United States together with your men and equipment.”

“Gracias, Díaz,” Zakharov said. “But I warn you: if I even sniff the faintest whiff of a double-cross, you will be the next illegal immigrant casualty–turned buzzard food rotting in the California desert.”

It wasn’t until Zakharov was escorted out by Díaz’s Sombras that Díaz’s deputy, José Elvarez, fastened the holster strap over his pistol at his side and buttoned his suit jacket again. “The quicker we get rid of him, the better I’ll feel, sir,” he said.

“I as well, José,” Díaz said. “But not before we get our hands on that robot he stole. That thing could be more valuable than any mercenary army he could ever raise in a lifetime.”

“Then why do we not simply eliminate him right now and take his prisoner and that machine?” Elvarez asked. “His men are good, and their security is strong, but they cannot withstand an attack by the entire ministry.”

“Because he has one more important function to serve for us, and then we will let the Americans deal with him,” Díaz said. “I need to know precisely when he begins to move against Vega’s family. It might be right away.”

“Do you believe he will risk discovery by going after the family, sir?”

“He is obsessed with revenge so strong that it overrides any common sense or tactical advantage the man possesses—almost to the point where he might forget this suicide plan in Amarillo, Texas,” Díaz said. “We need to be close to him in case he asks us for our help in Texas. But he really wants revenge on the ones who defeated him the first time. He’ll do it, I’m positive—and we need to be ready when he does.”

SUMMERLIN, NEAR LAS VEGAS, NEVADA

EARLY THE NEXT MORNING

“Did you hear Veracruz’s last message, Bob?” Fand Kent said excitedly.

“Yes, of course I heard it,” Bob O’Rourke said on his cellular phone as he took a sip of coffee in the kitchen of his five-thousand-square-foot luxury home in an exclusive gated community west of Las Vegas. “So what? It’s just another one of his rantings.”

“I don’t think so, Bob. This one was broadcast live all over the world on Mexico’s largest radio network, streamed live on the Internet, and broadcast by shortwave—it wasn’t secretly taped and delivered anonymously to a few news outlets like the other messages. I think the government is somehow supporting Veracruz now. What if folks start to do what he tells them to do?”

“What—leave here and start heading back toward Mexico?” he asked incredulously. “First of all, if they want to leave, fine—it’ll save us the trouble and expense of deporting them. But they won’t leave. As much as they may not like living the life of an illegal alien, that life is a million times better than life in Mexico. Wages are ten times higher here than in Mexico, even for undocumented aliens, and that’s if they can find a job down there. Here there’s work, and if they keep their noses clean and stay out of trouble, they can have a good life. Heck, some states give them every benefit and entitlement citizens receive—they have everything but citizenship. They get all the perks but none of the responsibilities.”

“I’m not talking about all that, Bob. I’m talking about what might happen if the people do listen to Veracruz and start leaving,” Kent argued. “Latest numbers are that there are almost two hundred thousand illegals in Clark County alone. If half of those are of working age, and only ten percent of them do what Veracruz says, that’s ten thousand workers walking off the job! What do you think that would do to Las Vegas?”

“Granted, it would be inconvenient and chaotic right off,” O’Rourke said dismissively, “but eventually the system would adjust. The casinos, restaurants, and hotels would immediately start hiring; wages would go up to attract more workers; things would eventually return to normal—except the prices, of course, which would stay high after folks got accustomed to paying them.”

“Do you really think everything would just go back to normal? I think…”

“Listen, Fand, we can discuss all this at the station, when I can take some notes and we can get our facts and figures carefully researched,” O’Rourke interrupted, finishing his coffee and grabbing his car keys. “I gotta talk to Lana and tell her to do the shopping after she gets done cleaning, and my tux is still at the cleaners; she has to pick it up before the Friday night fund-raiser thing. Talk at you later.”

O’Rourke was taking his cowboy hat, leather jacket, and sunglasses out of the closet when he heard the sound of something metallic hit the front door. He immediately unlocked and whipped the door open…to find his housekeeper, Lana—he didn’t even know her last name—walking quickly down the front sidewalk toward her Dodge Durango SUV. He looked down at his doorstep and saw a bundle of keys lying on his doormat. “Lana?” She didn’t respond. “Lana! Hey, I’m talking to you! ¿Cómo está usted hoy?” That was just about the only Spanish he knew except for Otra cerveza, por favor. “It’s time to go to work.” Lana turned, clutching her purse protectively in front of her, but said nothing, looking down at the ground in front of her. “What’s going on? Why are my house keys lying here?”

“I am leaving you now, Mr. O’Rourke.”

“Leaving? What for?”

“I am no longer welcome in this country. I go back to Mexico.”

“What do you mean, ‘not welcome’? You have a good job, a nice car, a place to live.” Actually he didn’t know where or how she lived, but he figured with all the money he was paying her, she had to live somewhere decent. “You’re not leaving because that Veracruz guy told you to leave, are you?”

“We leave because we are not welcome,” she repeated. O’Rourke looked past Lana and saw that her Durango was filled with women, and the rear cargo area crammed with luggage. “We go back to Mexico until America wants us to return.”

“Now wait a minute…that’s nonsense,” O’Rourke stammered. He trotted down the walkway toward Lana’s SUV. “Don’t believe that militant propaganda crap Veracruz is feeding you people. He wants to stir things up for his own reasons. He doesn’t know you people and doesn’t care about you one bit.”

“No. We go.”

“Wait a minute!” O’Rourke said, raising his voice perhaps a bit louder than he intended. “You can’t just leave! I’ve got a whole list of stuff for you to do today.” Lana ignored him. He lunged at her, grasping her left arm. She twisted her arm free with ease. “Listen, you, if you leave without thirty days’ notice, I’m not paying you for last week.” She kept on walking. He didn’t see one of the other ladies step out of the SUV. “I’m going to have that Durango repossessed. You still owe me four grand on it, after I was nice enough to lend you the money at below-market interest rates!”

“No…!”

“You’d better stay!” O’Rourke shouted. “You’ve still got my garage door opener…wait, you’ve got to tell me where to pick up the damned dry cleaning! I just paid for an entire year’s membership for you and your husband at Costco, you ungrateful bitch…!”

Suddenly he heard a woman shout, “¡Déjela en paz, cagon!” The woman who had gotten out of the Durango hit O’Rourke right in the face with a long, full shot of pepper spray. He went down to his knees, completely blinded and disoriented. The women got into the Durango and sped away.

O’Rourke found himself on his hands and knees on his front lawn trying but failing to blink away the pain and burning. He finally half-crawled, half-stumbled back inside his house, found his way back into his kitchen, and directed cold water from his sink sprayer onto his face for several minutes. It took almost fifteen minutes before he could see again. He almost contaminated himself again trying to take off his jacket, but finally he managed to change clothes. He dialed his office as soon as he was ready to go again. “Fand…”

“Bob! Where are you?”

“Still at home. You wouldn’t believe it—that crazy bitch housekeeper of mine left, and one of her friends shot me with pepper spray! I think it was the Lewis’s housekeeper! I just barely…!”

“Bob, whatever you do, stay home,” Fand said. “A couple of the cars in the front lot just got spray-painted, and there’s a large group of people on the street. Looks like they’re going to picket the station! There are cops and TV trucks everywhere! It’s not safe.”

He heard her talking, but only the words “TV trucks” got his attention. “Well, what the hell is going on, Fand? You’re a reporter—tell me what’s happening.”

“I think it’s that Veracruz radio message, Bob.” She didn’t mention the bombastic radio show he gave earlier, in effect telling all of America to start hunting down Mexicans. “I think the Mexicans are leaving, and they’re going to stage protests and demonstrations on the way out.”

“What do you mean, ‘leaving’?” But he knew exactly what she meant—had in fact seen it with his own eyes, in front of his own home. “Never mind. I’ll be there right away. Keep me advised if anything else happens.” Fand started to warn him again, but he hung up before she could finish.

O’Rourke was heading out the door, but thinking about Fand’s last warning made him stop, then head upstairs to the safe built into the nightstand next to the massive oak sleigh bed in his bedroom. There was no combination lock to the safe—instead, he pressed a code into a recessed rubberized keypad on top of the safe, and the heavy steel door popped open with ease, revealing several handguns in ready-to-draw position.

One cool thing about living in the great state of Nevada was how easy it was to get a concealed weapon permit: one day in mildly boring classes watching videotapes, listening to lectures, and seeing a few demonstrations; a half-day in an indoor shooting range; an hour or so getting photographed, fingerprinted, and filling out forms for a background check; and then a couple hours actually shopping for a suitable gun, ammunition, and accessories like holsters, cleaning equipment, and car safes. Three months later, he was proudly carrying a pearl-handled .45 caliber Smith & Wesson automatic in a shoulder rig, very aware of the fact that most everyone could see the bulge in his jacket and knew he was packing heat.

He had learned in his semiprivate concealed-carry classes that you couldn’t carry a gun everywhere in Nevada—most casinos didn’t allow it, although he had written permission from most of the casino managers to do so; most government offices like the DMV didn’t allow guns inside, although he avoided all such offices as much as possible; guns within the Las Vegas city limits had to be unloaded (and even he couldn’t get a permit from the chief of police to get around that one); and concealed weapons in Clark County could be loaded but couldn’t have a round in the chamber. But he pretty much ignored those few restrictions. O’Rourke believed in the old saying: “Better to be judged by twelve than carried by six.” If he was going to be the target of a kidnapping or robbery, he was going to fight.

Like one of his TV heroes, Sonny Crockett from Miami Vice, O’Rourke preferred a brown leather shoulder holster for his .45, even though he proved over and over in his concealed firearm permit classes that the big .45 was the clunkiest and most unwieldy weapon to carry concealed, and he barely qualified with it on the range because of its heft and recoil force. But the instructor said it had plenty of “stopping power,” unlike the nine-millimeters, the .380, and the .38 calibers. “Stopping power”—O’Rourke liked that notion. The .45 was heavy, hard to hold, hard to take care of, bulky, and dug into his ribs all the time, but it had “stopping power”—and wasn’t that why one carried a piece in the first place?

O’Rourke climbed into his big Ford Excursion SUV and headed to the radio studio, located about thirty minutes away on the other side of Las Vegas in Henderson. He quickly saw more evidence that something big was underway even before he left the carefully manicured lawns of his exclusive gated subdivision west of The Strip in Las Vegas. Garbage cans once full of leaves and grass clippings were strewn around the sidewalks and streets; service trucks were parked haphazardly in front of driveways and in the middle of intersections; and there were security vehicles racing up and down the streets. At the front gate, a long line of Hispanic men and women were filing out on foot, throwing ID cards and keys at the gatehouse. It was a confusing, scary, surrealistic scene: a woman was pleading with a departing Hispanic nanny, while two crying children wailed in the minivan behind her; not far away another man was shouting at a group of Hispanics about something, and the Hispanics shouted epithets in Spanish in return.

The scene was repeated many times as he drove down Route 215 toward where the highway became the southern bypass freeway around the city—long lines of Hispanics walking down both sides of the street, getting longer and longer by the moment, while either law enforcement or cars followed them with either angry, sad, or confused white citizens in them, words being exchanged through rolled-down windows.

His phone rang. “Bob, it’s nuts down here,” Fand warned once more. “Where are you?”

“Almost on the freeway—where else?”

“You see anything happening out there?”

“Lots of Hispanics on the street heading toward the freeway too, but…”

“You may not want to take North Pecos, Bob,” Fand said. “Traffic is really backed up—there are masses of people everywhere pouring onto the streets. Stay on the freeway to Windsong and try Pebble Road.”

He didn’t usually take anyone’s driving advice, but after the traffic on the freeway began getting heavier and heavier as he approached the Green Valley area, he decided to heed her advice. From the freeway he could see his usual exit, North Pecos Road, was backed up for about a half-mile, with police lights and sirens evident, so he was thankful for Fand’s warning. But the east side of the Green Valley hotel and resort area was no better. This was complete insanity: just what were these people trying to accomplish here?

O’Rourke exited on Windsong Road and then, frustrated by the backed-up northbound traffic, exited at the entrance to a private residential golf club. He was instantly recognized by the gate guard, which he fully expected, and asked for directions. The guard was more than overjoyed to get into an electric golf cart and escort him to the western side of the complex to Pebble Road, just a few blocks from his office complex.

When he reached the wide intersection across from his office building, he saw huge clusters of Hispanics crowding the intersections on all four corners—they didn’t seem violent, just loud—and their numbers, which seemed to grow by the minute, made them seem more intimidating. It took six light cycles to get through the largest group of people near the Green Valley Resort.

Another cell phone call: “Bob…?”

“I’m almost at the studio, Fand,” he said. “I don’t think I’ll have any trouble getting in. Looks like things are clearing out.” But as he approached the studio, located in a new office complex overlooking Green Valley, it was clear that Fand was not exaggerating and that things were not clearing out. A crowd of about two hundred people, mostly Hispanic but with a good number of non-Hispanics mixed in, chanted and shouted in front of the office building’s entrance, carrying picket signs and creating a loud din with a variety of noisemakers. There was a thin circle of police officers surrounding the crowd, and across the street were several TV station satellite trucks—O’Rourke recognized every local news station and a couple from as far away as Los Angeles and Phoenix.

He briefly considered going around back and parking in the fenced-off secure employee parking area, but there were only a dozen VIP parking areas in front, and his was one of them—he was not going to be denied the coveted spot. Besides, if he sneaked in the back way, none of these reporters and cameramen would know he was here—they might assume he was just going to play a prerecorded or repeat broadcast, and that would show he was afraid. Nuts to that. He headed for the entrance, which was obscured by protesters and a few police officers, trusting the sheer size of his big SUV would cause the protesters to let him pass.

He was stopped immediately by a City of Henderson police officer, wearing a motorcycle officer’s hard helmet, leather gloves, and knee-high black leather boots, plus a bulletproof vest under his uniform shirt. “Hello, Mr. O’Rourke. I wouldn’t recommend parking in front today, sir. The crowd’s testy and getting bigger by the minute.”

“I can see that, Sergeant,” O’Rourke said loudly. “If it’s not safe out here, I suggest you do something about that.”

It was obvious that the officer didn’t like being told what to do by a civilian, even a famous one. He leaned forward, putting his face closer to O’Rourke’s. “We’re in the process of clearing this crowd, sir,” he said, spitting out the word “sir” for emphasis, “but in the meantime, so you won’t be delayed in getting inside, I strongly recommend you park somewhere else. Better yet, consider doing your broadcast from somewhere else entirely today. Sir.”

“I’m not leaving just because of these…these nutcases,” O’Rourke said indignantly. “This is private property. Unless these people were invited here by the building owners—which I seriously doubt, because I am one of them—they are trespassing.”

“We’re trying to avoid an impromptu protest turning into a serious incident here, Mr. O’Rourke,” the officer said. “The sooner I can get this situation under control, the faster things will return to normal.”

“How do you propose to do that, Sergeant?”

“Once we identify the organizers, talk to them, and try to find out how long they plan on being out here…”

“You plan on talking to them all afternoon?”

“No, sir. But talking first gives me an opportunity to collect intelligence data, plan a response, and start moving our men and equipment to this location, Mr. O’Rourke. It takes time to decide which crowd control forces to bring in—more officers, mounted units, full riot control, or SWAT—and then get them moving out here. My job is to talk with the organizers, provide an initial assessment of the situation, and make a recommendation to the special operations commander. That’s what I was trying to do before you showed up. The more time we can buy without letting the situation get worse, the better these things usually turn out. But if you insist on proceeding into that crowd with your vehicle, it could very easily escalate this situation into violence…”

“So let me get this straight, Sergeant: I’m escalating ‘this situation into violence’ by trying to park in my own parking space, while these trespassers are just exercising their constitutional rights of free speech and freedom of assembly? Is that how you want me to characterize this situation on my show this morning, Sergeant”—he read the officer’s brass nameplate on his uniform—“Wilcox, is it?”

“Mr. O’Rourke, you know as well as I do that these protesters are probably here because of your—shall we say bombastic statements on the air yesterday,” Wilcox said. “Don’t play innocent with me, sir, by claiming you don’t understand that the crowd is here because this is where you broadcast your show from; that your actual presence here is riling them up even more; and that you are insisting on parking right in the middle of the protesters in order to take advantage of this dangerous situation and get your face on TV.”

“I resent that implication, Wilcox…!”

“Mr. O’Rourke, I can order you to back this thing up and move, for your own safety…”

“Sergeant, I’m not going to run and hide like a damned coward. If you think this situation is unsafe, I think you should do everything in your power to make it safe. If you don’t, I, the people of Henderson and Las Vegas, and my listeners all around the world will hold you and your department responsible.

“In the meantime, I’m going to work. You can arrest me in front of all these TV cameras, so the only peaceful individual out here at the moment will be the one in handcuffs. But if you do, I guarantee you’ll make yourself an enemy to all law-abiding citizens of this country. Or you can do your job and protect me while I go into my building. Take your pick.”

The officer took a deep, exasperated breath and affixed the nationally syndicated radio host with a dead stare, quickly thinking about his options. Finally he looked over the Excursion’s large hood and said to the officer on the other side, “Paul, get the crowd back and let Mr. O’Rourke’s vehicle pass. Then form up and let’s get him inside the building.” The other officer hesitated for a moment, silently asking if that was a good idea, and then faced the crowd head-on, arms outstretched, trying to cut the line of demonstrators in half and move his half off to the side of the driveway. A couple more officers were called in to help. The crowd kept on shouting, but they seemed satisfied to be led back by the police.

It didn’t take long for the media to notice what was happening, and soon they were surrounded by reporters and cameramen. “Bob! Mr. O’Rourke!” one well-known female correspondent for a cable TV news channel shouted. He didn’t look in her direction until she called him “Mr. O’Rourke.” “What are you going to do?”

O’Rourke rolled the window of his big SUV down, revved the engine, then put it into gear. “I’m going to work, that’s what I’m doing.”

“Will the police do anything to help you?”

“We’ll see, won’t we?” he replied, loud enough for Wilcox and the other officers to hear him. “It’s totally up to them. They can protect me, or they can stand by and watch a law-abiding citizen of the United States be assaulted and threatened with bodily harm right in front of them.”

“Do you feel any sense of responsibility for this demonstration outside your studios today?”

“Responsibility? I have nothing to do with any of this!” he shouted from inside his car. “If you don’t want to blame the actual people who are out here disrupting free movement in this place of business, blame that Comandante Veracruz character for inciting the crowd like this! He’s the one who should be thrown in jail for organizing this! I’m not going to be inconvenienced because some gangster from a corrupt third-world banana republic wants his name on the news!”

“Do you think it’s wise to drive in there like that, Mr. O’Rourke? Don’t you think it’s dangerous?”

“I trust the Henderson Police Department to maintain order,” O’Rourke said. “If they can’t do it, the mayor needs to call in the Highway Patrol or even the National Guard to help restore order.”

The police found it relatively easy to move the crowd aside, probably because the protesters quickly noticed that they would have O’Rourke’s vehicle surrounded once it got inside the private parking lot. O’Rourke’s car was hit repeatedly by rocks, bottles, empty cans, and picket signs. He laid on the horn several times to try to move the protesters away. He had to rev the engine several times and creep forward slowly to avoid running anyone over, but soon he was in his parking spot, surrounded by two police officers.

O’Rourke got out of his car and stood on the steel running board of his Excursion, making sure he would stay above the cameramen so he wouldn’t look any shorter on TV, and he surveyed the crowd as calmly as he could. The TV reporters were being jostled a bit, sandwiched in between the crowds behind them and the police in front. Many in the crowd wanted to get on TV just as badly as Bob O’Rourke, while others wanted to get within spitting or yelling range of the famous radio personality. So far the protesters were obeying police instructions and staying behind the invisible line projecting from their outstretched arms. A stray banana peel sailed past O’Rourke’s head—he tried to pretend it didn’t bother him.

“Mr. O’Rourke,” one of the female reporters asked, thrusting her microphone up toward him, “are you determined to go to your studio and do your morning broadcast as usual, despite this demonstration?”

“This is not a ‘demonstration’—this is a near-riot, bordering on complete anarchy!” O’Rourke shouted. “But I am not going to be scared away by a bunch of rabble-rousers! I’ve got a job to do.”

“Don’t you think you should talk to the organizers of this rally?”

“You call this a ‘rally’? I wouldn’t dignify this insane act of criminal trespass, assault, hate crime, intimidation, and conspiracy as a ‘rally.’ And I do my talking on the air, for the rest of the free world to hear—and that’s what I intend to do right now. If you want to hear what I think of these hatemongers, listen to my show, The Bottom Line, on your local radio, satellite radio, or on the Internet. Excuse me, but I have work to do.”

He hated jumping off the tall running board, but there was no way else to get inside. Fortunately few in the crowd around them were taller than he was, and the protesters created such confusion that he hoped no one would notice how short he really was. Wilcox and two other motorcycle patrol officers began clearing a path for him toward the office building, using nothing but their gloved hands to carefully but firmly push the crowd back as he approached the short set of stairs leading up to the semicircular drive and main entranceway. O’Rourke could see several workers at the entrance and waved to them. Just fifty feet more, he thought, and I’ll be free and clear…

But as he reached the drive, the crowd suddenly seemed to surge forward. Both police officers on either side of O’Rourke were squeezed against him, and he pushed them away toward the crowd. The push seemed to anger many of the protesters, who pushed back even harder. A can bounced off one officer’s helmet; a raw egg hit O’Rourke on the shoulder. Forty feet more…

The crowd started to chant, “RA-CIST! RA-CIST! RACIST!” Before long, the chanting turned to shouting, and then to screaming, and soon the words had changed to “¡CA-GU-E-TAS! ¡CA-GU-E-TAS!” which O’Rourke knew meant one of two things in Spanish—“little child” or “coward.”

“Hey, why don’t you just keep on walking home to Mexico or wherever you came from!” O’Rourke shouted in return. “We don’t want you! We don’t need you! Come back like real people and not burglars!”

More eggs and vegetables were thrown at him. “Mr. O’Rourke,” Wilcox shouted behind him as he led the way toward the studios, “I’m ordering you right now to shut up. You want to address the crowd—do it on your radio show. Now is not the time!” O’Rourke swallowed nervously and fell quiet. Thirty feet…

Suddenly from his left, a large brown malt liquor bottle flew over the crowd, hitting another Henderson police officer squarely on his left temple at full force, and he went down. The protesters surged forward once more, now close enough to grasp O’Rourke’s jacket, pull off his cowboy hat, and spin him around. Now O’Rourke couldn’t see which way to go. Several sets of hands were grabbing him, threatening to rip his jacket right off his back, threatening to…

The gun! He had almost forgotten about the pistol in his shoulder holster! Even now he felt little dark fingers reaching for his weapon. If he let anyone grab that gun, there would be a bloodbath—he, then the cops, would certainly be the first ones to die…

He didn’t actually remember doing so, but before he knew it, the big .45 was in his hand. He raised it up over his head and pulled the trigger, startled that it seemed to require hardly any effort at all to do so—and equally surprised that the second, third, and fourth pulls required even less. The crowd jerked down and away as if pulled by innumerable invisible ropes from behind. Women and men alike screamed hysterically. Most of the crowd turned and bolted away, trampling those too slow to get out of the way.

Except for two persons lying on the driveway, the path suddenly seemed to open up in front of him as if two giant hands had parted the crowd, and O’Rourke ran for his office building. Witnesses standing on the steps and in the lobby ran for cover when they saw O’Rourke with the smoking gun still in his fist heading for them. He ran inside the front doors, his thin chest heaving. “My…God, they…they tried to kill me!” he panted. He couldn’t control his breathing, and he leaned forward, hands on his knees, trying to catch his…

“Police! Freeze! Drop the gun, now!” he heard. He didn’t think they were talking to him, but someone else behind him in the crowd with a gun, so he stayed bent over until he was finally able to…

Wilcox and another Henderson Police Department officer tackled O’Rourke from behind, running at full force. O’Rourke’s face was mashed into the tile floor, his arms pinned painfully behind his back, and the gun wrenched out of his right hand by breaking his index finger.

“This is Mike One-Seven, inside the Green Valley Business Plaza, shots fired, one suspect in custody—it’s fucking Bob O’Rourke,” Wilcox said into his shoulder-mounted radio microphone after he and the other officer wrestled the gun out of O’Rourke’s hand, twisted his arms behind him, and handcuffed his wrists together. “I’m declaring a code ten-ninety-nine at this location, approximately two hundred individuals. I want them cleared out now before someone else decides to bring a gun out here. Over.”