Hunt the Falcon

Chapter Seventeen

They landed at an airstrip on the governor of Chihuahua’s ranch a few miles south of Ciudad Juárez. Jim Randal, a young man with a bland, round face, met them wearing a Teflon vest under his tan safari shirt and surrounded by four armed guards. “Welcome to the most violent city in the world,” he said.

Crocker had heard horror stories about mass decapitations and the hundreds of women who went missing only to turn up dead and mutilated. Randal explained that since 2006 something like eleven thousand people had been killed in the city of a million as rival drug gangs fought for control of one of the most lucrative routes, a direct line to the U.S. black market for marijuana, cocaine, and meth.

Crocker’s own brother had once been a cocaine addict, and Crocker had seen drugs ravage the lives of countless friends and other members of his family. He’d also participated in the so-called War on Drugs in countries like Colombia, Panama, and Bolivia, destroying coke labs in the jungle and helping arrest financiers and traffickers. To him it wasn’t a war but an epidemic. The cure, he thought, lay in helping stem the desire for drugs, educating young people about the dangers of addiction, and providing treatment to users.

Their black SUV stopped at a house with a high white metal gate. Two of the armed Mexican guards got out and rang the buzzer. “Why are we stopping here?” Crocker asked.

“My boss wants to brief you,” Randal answered.

“Who’s your boss?”

“Lyle Nesmith. A brilliant analyst and tactician.”

“We didn’t come here to meet people.”

A maid wearing a white apron ushered them through a cool stucco house to a patio with flowering plants and a fountain. A buffet of enchiladas, fajitas, and tamales had been laid out on a long tiled table. A waiter asked what they wanted to drink.

Crocker was losing patience. “Where’s Nesmith?”

“He’s upstairs on a call,” Randal answered with a confident grin. “He’s coming.”

Twenty minutes later the agent-in-charge greeted them, a short, fit, bald man with a graying goatee and round rimless glasses. “You missed them,” Nesmith said as he and Crocker sat down across from one another at one of the round metal tables.

“Missed who?” Crocker asked, almost spitting out the food in his mouth.

“The Iranians. I just learned that the Toyota Corolla they were driving tried to cross the border at the Ysleta International Bridge.”

“What?” Crocker rose to his feet.

“Don’t worry, they were turned away by U.S. immigration agents who noticed that none of their names matched the name on the car’s registration.”

“Why weren’t they detained?” Crocker asked.

Nesmith calmly adjusted his glasses. “There was some sort of miscommunication between D.C. and here,” he said. “The ICE agents had the Iranian names on their detention list, not the Venezuelan names on their new passports.”

Crocker wanted to punch something. “What?”

“Calm down. I’ve got people out looking for them now. We’ll find them.”

“How long ago did this happen?” Crocker asked. “I mean, exactly when did they try to cross the border?”

Nesmith looked at his silver Rolex. “Roughly an hour ago.”

“Fuck!” Crocker crossed to the far corner of the yard. Looking up at the broken glass on top of the high wall, he wondered what to do now and whom to call.

He was joined by Mancini and Tré. The latter said, “A samurai master once said: True patience means bearing the unbearable. If that helps.”

Mancini added, “And abused patience turns into fury.”

Crocker spent the time playing fetch with Nesmith’s two black German shepherds-strong, sure-footed, beautiful dogs. An hour passed, during which the table on the patio was cleared and the blue sky clouded over.

Crocker saw Nesmith emerge from the house and walk toward him with Randal by his side. “See what they want,” he said, turning to Mancini.

Mancini crossed the yard, spoke to Nesmith, and returned. With his arms crossed against his chest, he said, “They found the silver Corolla.”

“Where?”

“Parked outside a motel in the southeast part of town.”

Crocker: “Are the three Iranians registered there?”

“Nesmith says they are.”

“Let’s go.”

He wanted no part of Nesmith, Randal, or the four armed guards, except that he and his men needed weapons, hats, fake beards and mustaches. He also needed Randal to serve as their driver, since they didn’t know their way around.

Nesmith argued that a raid like the one they were about to launch required clearances from the local police and backup, but Crocker insisted on keeping the circle small.

They set out midafternoon in a taxi they had rented for the day with Randal at the wheel, talking a mile a minute, informing them that they were entering an extremely dangerous part of town that was run by a branch of the powerful Mexican drug cartel Los Zetas.

“I don’t give a fuck about any drug cartel,” Crocker retorted. “Press on.”

“You don’t understand how pervasive their influence is,” Randal explained. “I’m talking everyone from beggars on the street to the Presidential Palace and everything in between. You see that old lady out there selling tortillas? She’s probably one of their informers. As soon as we pass, she’ll report on us. We’re going to get stopped and questioned. You’ll see.”

“Shut up and drive.”

Los Anillos Motel was an L-shaped dive at the end of a block lined with small assembly plants and warehouses. It looked like the kind of place where people came to hide or slit their wrists. There were a half dozen vehicles parked in the lot out front. One was a silver Corolla.

“That’s it,” Mancini said.

Crocker, with his mustache dyed black and the brim of a straw hat pulled low over his forehead, got out with a 9mm Glock tucked under his black T-shirt. He looked around, stretched, then walked to the end of the motel, strolled past a little Pemex gas station, and circled around back.

On his return he leaned in the driver’s window and spoke to Randal in a low voice. “Go to the desk and find out what room they’re in. Call me on the radio. I want you to stay in the office and make sure the person there doesn’t warn whoever might be in the room. As soon as you see us crash through the front door, hurry back to the car and start the engine.”

“Okay. I got it. I understand. What are you guys gonna do?”

“Go. Now!”

“First I’ve got to call Nesmith.”

“You do and I’ll beat your head in,” Crocker said matter-of-factly.

Randal nodded, got out, and walked stiffly to the motel office. A few minutes later his voice came over the walkie-talkie held by Mancini in the backseat. “Room eleven.”

“Let’s deploy,” Crocker said.

Mancini, wearing a New York Mets cap pulled down so low that only his dark eyes and thickly bearded face showed, waited for Crocker to again circle to the back. He counted three minutes on his watch, then rapped hard on the red door. No one answered. Ten seconds later he heard Crocker crash through the rear window.

Mancini kicked in the door and hurried in with Tré behind him. The only person they found was Crocker, holding his Glock and vigorously shaking his head. He mouthed the words “No one’s here.”

The three men moved fast, checking the closets, bathroom, under the unmade double beds. They found no suitcases, only dirty towels, and a discarded newspaper and two empty water bottles in the trash. Crocker thought he saw an impression on the cover of a Spanish-language magazine on a night table near the phone. He stuck it in his back pocket and said, “Let’s get out of here.”

They were back on the carretera in minutes. Randal thought they were being followed by a white van. Crocker watched it through the dust-covered side mirror and saw a woman at the wheel and a baby in a child seat behind her.

“We’re clear,” he said. “Keep driving.”

Randal steered them to a six-story apartment building on a street behind the U.S. Consulate, pulled into the underground garage, and closed the iron gate.

“That was close,” he said, getting out.

Crocker: “No it wasn’t.”

Upstairs, in the third-floor apartment that was their temporary base, Crocker used the old pencil-and-white-paper trick to lift an impression off the magazine cover. It was a name, “Cucho Valdez,” and a number, “7862.”

Randal didn’t know what the number meant, but said the name belonged to a smuggler associated with the drug cartels who ran a silver and curio stall in the Mercado Juárez, on Avenida 16 de Septiembre in the center of town.

“Let’s go talk to him.”

They piled back into the taxi and slowly nosed through rush hour traffic to the city center.

“What’s the significance of the sixteenth of September?” Crocker asked.

“It’s the day Mexico celebrates its independence from Spain,” Randal answered.

Mancini, who seemed knowledgeable about practically anything having to do with history, geography, weapons, foreign cultures, and technology, added, “It’s actually the day Father Miguel Hidalgo rallied people to march on Mexico City. Kind of like our Fourth of July, which was the day the Declaration of Independence was signed, even though United States sovereignty wasn’t formally recognized until the Treaty of Paris, ratified after the Revolutionary War.”

“Then what’s up with Cinco de Mayo, May fifth?” Tré asked.

“Cinco de Mayo commemorates the day in 1862 when Mexico defeated the French Army in the Battle of Pueblo,” Mancini answered.

“What were the French doing here in the first place?” Tré wanted to know.

“Ostensibly to collect on debts owed to France, but really they used that as an excuse to try to establish a pro-French government that would extend France’s interests through Central America.”

They parked in a lot across from a large two-story cement structure with a big red Coca-Cola sign on top. Randal handed a beggar kid a twenty-peso note to watch the car. Then he led the way into the building and a phantasmagoria of colors and smells-wildly colored blankets, wrestlers’ masks, ceramic dolls, saints, red chilies, cheeses, silver trays. Rag-clad kids and cripples crowded around them and pleaded for dollars.

Randal shooed the beggars away and pushed through narrow aisles jammed with tourists and Mexicans. Crocker and his men followed.

“You want beautiful earrings for your señorita?” a young woman asked.

“You want the best Mexican sombrero decorated with real silver for good luck?” asked a boy with two missing front teeth.

“No, gracias.”

“You want a statue of Quetzalcoatl to put in your house?” asked an old lady with long gray braids.

“What would I want that for?” Tré asked back.

“To keep out evil spirits.”

Randal turned left into a stall that offered ponchos, jackets, and sweaters out front. A teenage girl with a large mole above her lip asked in English how she could be of help.

“We’re looking for Cucho Valdez,” Randal said.

“Cucho is inside eating lunch.”

They had to lower their heads to get past vividly colored papier-mâché gourds, piñatas, and leather saddles. The walls were lined with display cases filled with silver coffee services, cups, trays, and jewelry. Cucho sat behind a glass counter that held carved silver lighters and antique pistols, chewing on a chicken leg.

He was a man of about thirty with dark skin, high cheekbones, and black hair that hung to his shoulders. Almost pretty in a rough-hewn way with sad, hangdog eyes. Seeing the four strangers, he said, “I love doing business with Americans.”

Randal asked, “Is there somewhere we can talk to you in private?”

“Why? You guys looking for something special?”

Crocker leaned forward and said, “We’re real estate investors from Canada hoping to do a deal with three Venezuelans. They told us that you could tell us where to find them.”

Cucho didn’t even blink. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and asked, “You dudes with the DEA?”

“No. Not at all,” Randal answered.

“Sorry. I don’t know any Venezuelans. Valdez is a common name here, and a lot of people are called Cucho. People call me that because they think I look depressed. But I’m not depressed, it’s just the way my eyes are formed. I can’t help it. I’m actually a very happy person. You’ve probably got me confused with someone else.” He wiped his hands on a piece of newspaper, picked up a lime-colored cell phone from the glass counter, and punched some numbers.

Randal said, “We’re friends of the governor.”

Cucho didn’t seem to care.

“Who are you calling?” Crocker asked.

“Randy Simmons. He works with the DEA,” Cucho answered.

“Why?”

“Maybe he can help you.”

Tré, without any prompting, removed a Glock from his waistband, pressed the barrel against Cucho’s forehead, and said, “Put the phone away.”

Cucho stuck the phone in his shirt pocket and started to stand.

“Where do you think you’re going?” said Tré. “Hold it right there.”

“Okay,” Cucho said, stopping in midcrouch with his hands raised over his head. “What’s the problem here? I told you before, you got the wrong man.”

Tré, grinning: “There isn’t a problem, except that you’re acting weird.”

When Cucho stepped back, Crocker swung around behind the counter and grabbed him in a headlock. Tré vaulted the counter, gun still drawn. The three men stood in the crowded dark space.

Tré: “What do we do now?”

Crocker saw Randal on the other side of the counter, blocking the girl with the mole above her lip, who was trying to push past him. Pointing to a roll of tape on a shelf behind the counter, he said to Tré, “Wrap some of that over his mouth, then use it to secure his wrists and ankles.”

That accomplished, the two of them wrapped Cucho in a Mexican blanket that covered his entire body head to toes. “Toss me the keys to the vehicle,” Crocker said to Randal.

“Why? What are you going to do with him?” was his nervous response.

“You and Manny stay with the girl and keep her quiet. Offer her money if you think that’ll work, then meet us at the car in three minutes.”

“But-”

Crocker and Tré hoisted Cucho onto their shoulders and exited out the back of the stall to a loading dock, down eight stairs to an area filled with assorted-sized trucks, to the street. They walked to the end of the block, turned left, and entered the parking lot.

Crocker used a key to open the car, loaded Cucho into the trunk, got in, and started the engine. The kid they had paid to watch the car was nowhere in sight.

Two minutes later Crocker spotted Randal and Mancini leaving the market. As Mancini climbed in back, Crocker started the engine.

Randal, halfway in and sweating profusely, shouted, “We can’t do this!”

Crocker: “Why not?”

Randal: “Taking a man like this is illegal.”

“Either get in or stay out,” Crocker barked.

Randal got in, shut the door, and asked, “What are you planning to do with him?”

“Take him somewhere where we can beat the living shit out of him and find out what he knows about those Iranians,” Crocker said, steering out of the lot.

Randal leaned over the backseat and shouted, “No! I won’t allow it! You’re not authorized!”

Crocker reached back with his left arm, grabbed Randal’s jaw, and shoved him back so hard his head slammed against the rear seat. “Shut up and listen!”

He turned the car onto a main avenue and wove through traffic with no idea which direction he was headed. “Which way is out of town?” he asked.

“Keep going straight ahead, but-”

Off to his right he saw a stadium-like structure surrounded by a large parking lot. “What’s that?” he asked.

Mancini: “Looks like a bullring.”

The structure was completely dark except for a few lights at the front. Crocker turned into the deserted lot, drove to the rear of the bullring, and cut the engine.

“Help me get him out,” he said, stepping out into the building’s shadow.

“You can’t treat an innocent man like this,” Randal protested. “It’s completely unacceptable.”

“Are you kidding, man? No way he’s innocent,” Tré shot back.

The sky was turning dark blue, and the stench of animals and death hung around them. Crocker got in Randal’s face and said, “Stay in the car if you don’t want to be a part of this. Walk away and a hail a cab!”

Randal shook his head but said nothing. He stood with his hands on his hips and watched Crocker and Tré pull Cucho out of the trunk, unwrap the blanket, and stand him up against the brick wall of the bullring. Mancini grabbed a six-inch hunting knife from a nylon sheath strapped to his ankle and held it up to Cucho’s throat. He said, “Drug and people traffickers are the scum of the earth.”

“Mr. Valdez, this is what we’re gonna do,” Crocker offered calmly. “After we remove the tape from your mouth, I’m going to ask you a question. If you don’t answer to my satisfaction, I’m going to tell my friend here to cut off one of your fingers. Then, since I’m a nice guy, I’m going to give you one more chance. You’ll be writhing in pain then and about to pass out. I’ll ask you the same question. If you don’t answer fully and truthfully that time, I’m going to tell him to slice your balls off. You’re going to be in an unimaginable amount of hurt then. So I’ll take mercy on you and cut your throat.”

Terror filled Cucho’s eyes. The clouds behind them had turned dark red.

Mancini sliced through the tape around Cucho’s ankles, grabbed one of his hands, and held the knife ready. Then he nodded to Tré, who ripped the tape off Cucho’s mouth and covered it with his hand.

“Ready?” Crocker asked.

Cucho nodded. Tears were already welling in his eyes.

“Three men who claimed to be Venezuelan contacted you today. What did they want?” Crocker asked.

Cucho moved his head as if he was ready to talk. Crocker pointed to Tré, who removed his hand from Cucho’s mouth.

Tré said, “Boss, I don’t think Cucho is a guy.”

“What?”

“Check the neck. No Adam’s apple.”

Tré was right. The loose clothes, the insolent attitude, the rough but pretty face. They all pointed to the same conclusion.

Crocker said, “I don’t care what the fuck you are, I’ll still tear you apart.”

Cucho took a deep breath, coughed, and said, “Okay…Three men did contact me. I didn’t ask where they were from. They had money, cash, and said they were looking for a way to cross into the U.S.”

“They wanted to be smuggled in illegally?” Crocker asked.

“Yes.”

“What did you tell them?”

“I told them I couldn’t help them.”

Crocker looked at her and said, “You’re a stubborn bitch, aren’t you?” He didn’t expect an answer. Turning to Tré, he instructed, “I’ll hold her hand against the wall, you tie something over her mouth.” Then, to Mancini: “Ready?”

Cucho thrashed her head from side to side: “No, don’t cut me! I told them-I told them I couldn’t do it myself, but I sent them to someone I know. A man who has a tunnel.”

“Who is this man, and where can we find him?” Crocker asked urgently.

“His name is Ruiz. I’ll draw you a map.”

“Fuck the map. You’re taking us to him. Now.”

An off-kilter half moon shone like a cruel smile in the sky. Cucho sat in back, between Mancini and Tré, with Randal next to Crocker up front. Her desperation seemed to grow as they wound through residential streets to a wider industrial road lined with warehouses and businesses.

Mancini said, “Two cannibals are talking. One says to the other, ‘I don’t like my mother-in-law.’ The other one says, ‘Then try the noodles.’ ”

Tré chuckled. “Where do you come up with this stuff?”

Mancini had more. “What’s gray and comes in quarts?”

“What?”

“An elephant.”

Tré laughed hard, then, turning to Cucho, said, “It ain’t funny. I can’t help laughing, but it really ain’t funny at all. You into men or women?”

Cucho: “None of your business.”

“Focus,” Crocker said from the front seat.

“Not to worry, chief. I’m sharp as a razor blade.”

Cucho directed them off the road to a decaying parking lot with several stores at one end. She pointed to the building on the far left. “That’s it.”

“That’s what?”

“The tunnel I told you about is located inside that building.”

In the dim yellow streetlights Crocker saw a one-story tan-colored cement building with green trim. The white neon sign overhead read “Mercado Ruiz.” As he watched, a big girl with braids chained a row of battered shopping carts together out front. The place looked like it was closed for the night.

Tré said with a sigh, “Fucking dead end, if you ask me. Let’s kick her ass.”

Cucho pointed to the rugged landscape behind the building and said, “I’m telling the truth. You see the U.S. is over there, past those hills.”

“What time were the Venezuelans planning to cross?” Crocker asked.

“Probably after the market is closed for business. After dark.”

Crocker looked at his watch. It was a few minutes past 1900. He asked, “Where does the tunnel start?”

“Inside the market.”

“Where?”

Tré, like an echo: “Yeah, where? Be specific!”

“I can’t be specific. I’ve never been inside. I don’t shop there.”

Crocker started the engine. Without turning on the headlights, they slowly circled around the building. Parked behind the Mercado Ruiz was a panel truck. Men were moving bags from the truck to inside the market.

Turning to Mancini, he said, “Take a radio with you and watch the front. Alert us if anyone enters.”

“Roger, boss.”

“Tré, you wait here. I’m going to check the dock.”

He got out, stretched, and walked casually past the truck, where he saw two men in dirty T-shirts hauling bags of what looked like flour or maize into the market. He proceeded to the end of the building and stopped. Just as he was about to circle around to the front, he saw the taxi headlights flash twice.

He hurried back to the car and asked, “What’s up?”

Tré reported, “Manny said four dudes just got out of an SUV and entered.”

“Tell him to stay out front until he hears from us.”

“Sure thing.”

Looking at Cucho sitting in the back, Crocker asked Tré, “You bring the tape with you?”

“Affirmative, chief.”

“Tape her mouth, wrists, and ankles, then leave her on the floor.”

“My pleasure.”

Randal elected to stay behind. Crocker figured he’d probably call Nesmith and tell him what was going on. Not that it mattered. They didn’t have time to stop him now.

He led the way purposefully across the rear lot, past the truck to the loading dock where the two workers were stacking bags against a wall. Crocker hoisted one of the sacks on his shoulder and climbed a set of concrete steps to a storage area with rows of cardboard boxes. Behind him, Tré carried another sack.

Crocker’s senses were on high alert. To his right he saw an office. Light spilled out the open door onto the stained concrete floor, and he heard men talking inside.

He motioned to Tré to wait behind the boxes, then took three steps toward the office door. A mustached guard holding a submachine gun stepped out. He waved the gun in front of Crocker’s face. “Quién es?”

“Paco,” Crocker grunted.

“No aquí. Afuera!” (Not here. Outside!)

Crocker nodded and stumbled, pretending to be drunk.

Two men leaned out of the office and looked his way. One appeared to be Middle Eastern. The other held two Doberman pinschers on metal chain leashes. The dogs bared their teeth and growled at him. The stocky man holding them pulled the dogs back, and the two men walked down a hallway and out of sight. Crocker felt a chill shoot up his spine.

He wanted to go after the two men, but the guard with the Uzi stood in his way. Instead of searching him, the guard called over his shoulder, turned, and hurried after the others. Crocker was about to drop his sack and follow when a fourth man, shorter, older, and wearing a blue apron, emerged from inside. Seeing Crocker, he waved his arms and cursed in Spanish.

Crocker didn’t understand everything, but knew he was being called an idiot and a drunk, and was being told to leave the bag at the loading dock. When he didn’t move, the man took a walkie-talkie from his apron and started to lift it to his mouth.

Crocker had just decided to drop the bag and charge when he saw Tré spring from behind the man and grab him in a headlock. The walkie-talkie clattered across the concrete floor. Tré covered the man’s mouth with his free hand.

“Drag him into the office,” Crocker whispered, picking up the walkie-talkie and hearing men speaking urgently in Spanish. Inside, in one of the desk drawers, he found twine and a rag, which they used to gag him, bind his wrists and ankles, and tie him to a chair.

“Ready?” Crocker whispered.

“I’m cool.”

“Follow me.”

He led the way down the dark hallway and entered a large storage room stacked with boxes. At the far end was another door that he opened carefully to reveal a room filled with white fluorescent light. Some sort of generator or large refrigeration unit occupied the left side of the room. The rest of it was filled with mops, brooms, buckets, ladders, and other supplies.

From his vantage point, Crocker couldn’t see past the generator. But he heard a door creak open, then two men laughing. He and Tré crouched behind the generator, and Crocker flashed hand signals to indicate that he’d take out the first man.

The dogs picked up their scent and started barking. One of the Dobermans poked his sleek head around the side of the big machine and lunged, snapping at Crocker’s wrist and missing, but locking its jaw around the pistol in his hand. Still, Crocker managed to squeeze off two rounds, one of which tore into the lead man’s thigh.

As the man’s screams reverberated in the small room, Crocker sprung into his midsection and slammed his body against the opposite wall. The man went down, and the dogs attacked the back of Crocker’s legs. The pain was immediate and intense, causing his muscles to clench.

He tried kicking them off, and to his left, glimpsed Tré wrestling a submachine gun away from the mustached guard, who was bleeding from his nose. Crocker reached around, grabbed hold of one of the dogs by the head, ripped it away from his thigh, and flung the dog into the wall. He heard ribs snap and the thud the animal made when it hit the floor.

It stopped moving, but all kinds of alarms were screaming in his head because the second Doberman had its teeth deep into the flesh around his left ankle. He tried to pivot to his right, but the leash was wrapped around his right foot, which was partially pinned by the fallen man. Crocker lost his balance and fell, and the Doberman was immediately on top of him, lunging for his throat.

Teeth in his face, hot dog saliva dripping onto him, he grabbed its ear with his right hand and pulled back. The dog squealed and snapped its teeth at Crocker’s wrist.

He quickly pulled his hand away, then tried to get hold of the dog’s neck, but the dog sunk its incisors into his forearm and hit a nerve, causing massive pain that he felt all the way up his arm into his neck.

Crocker was losing the battle and trying to feel for his fallen pistol with his left hand. All he found on the floor was blood, teeth, a leash. Lunging, he grabbed hold of the dog’s right paw and yanked it back violently until he heard the bone snap. The Doberman yelped and bore down harder. Then two shots popped, and rounds passed through the dog’s chest with a spray of blood.

He pushed the muscular body to one side. Tré helped him up.

“Fuck.”

“Can you walk, chief?”

His hands were covered with blood and shaking. The back of both legs screamed in agony. “I’ll do my best.”

He hobbled over to the guard’s submachine gun and the Glock he’d lost, which were lying together on the floor. Cordite burned his nostrils. Blood dripped down the back of his leg into his sneakers. The pain was horrible, but he’d been through worse.

Tré ran ahead as he limped to keep up, past the guard’s body that still twitched on the floor, through the door, down four steps to a room with a cot in it. On the other side of the bed, near a door to a little bathroom, Crocker saw a square hole in the floor and a metal cover that was open and leaning against the wall.

“We need to find a light before we go down,” Tré said.

“No time!”

“Dark places freak me out.”

Crocker felt his way down the rough concrete steps that descended about twenty feet. He couldn’t see shit until he reached the bottom. Starting about six feet in front of him, he saw a string of bare bulbs that partially lit the tunnel. The bulbs were connected to an orange cord and spaced roughly ten feet apart.

“Ask and you shall receive,” he whispered to Tré.

“This is better.”

The tunnel was about five feet high and four feet wide, reinforced in some places with wooden planks and cinder blocks. Two steel rails had been spiked into the compressed dirt floor. The air was stale and smelled of salt and sulfur.

“You see anyone?” Tré whispered behind him.

“Not yet.”

He moved as fast as he could, given that he had to crouch and the muscles in his legs were knotted up and damaged. Seeing a dark shape ahead, he stopped and focused. The shape turned and moved closer. He saw the flash of a weapon discharging in the distance and hit the ground. Rounds sailed over their heads and embedded themselves in the dirt.

As both men readied their guns to return fire, the lights went out.

“Sorry, Tré,” Crocker whispered.

“Bum luck.”

The two SEALs felt along the side walls, being careful not to trip over the rails. Crocker pushed himself as hard as he could, despite the warnings in his head to slow down.

Dirt got into his eye, and he stopped. Wiping it away with his wrist, he saw a white light wash the tunnel ahead. Tré grabbed his shoulder. Kneeling on the dirt floor, Crocker aimed the Uzi and squeezed off a long salvo. A yelp of pain echoed back.

“I think you got one,” Tré whispered.

Crocker: “You run ahead. You’re faster!”

Tré bolted. Crocker used every ounce of energy and focus he had left in him to follow. More shots whizzed past. He stumbled, fell, got up, and resumed limping. Tré returned fire. He heard muffled shouting.

The light source was now only a few feet ahead, creating ghoulish shadows that shifted and danced against the walls. Men were grappling on the floor, and then a large shadow rose and hurried down the tunnel. Crocker pushed himself to catch up and saw a dead man lying on his side still holding a flashlight, his dark eyes staring into space.

Stepping over a pool of blood that was seeping into the earth, he felt his way along the wall. Each gunshot ahead produced another little rush of adrenaline. His hearing was hypersensitive and he was running on fumes, growing weaker from the pain and loss of blood.

He heard men grunting in English and Farsi, and recognized Tré’s voice exclaiming “Motherfucker!” Then came the sound of a knife slicing into flesh and cartilage. A groan. Someone rose slowly in the dark. He saw the glint of a knife in one hand, a pistol in the other. Stopping, he held his breath as his heart beat a tight pattern in his chest.

“Chief?”

“Tré.”

“Two of ’em down. One more to go.”

As Tré continued forward, Crocker wanted to utter some congratulation or encouragement, but the words wouldn’t come out. He leaned against the wall and tried to will his body forward. More gunshots echoed. Then he saw a white flash and heard the thud of something louder. The walls shook; wooden planks and dirt fell from the ceiling.

He covered his head with his hands as debris showered over him. Just when he thought he was going to be buried, it stopped. But he was trapped, cut off, blinded, and having trouble breathing. Dirt and dust clogged his mouth and nostrils.

He pulled off his shirt and tied it over his nose and mouth. Then he got up onto his hands and knees and clawed his way up a mound of dirt. A plank fell and hit his back. He pushed it aside, then felt for an opening. Finding a fist-sized hole, he burrowed his hand through, then dug around it furiously until the ends of his fingers were starting to bleed.

When the hole was three feet wide, he managed to get his left shoulder through, and pushed and squirmed until he got stuck. So he took a deep breath, pulled out, and dug some more. This time he paused a moment to gather his strength, inserted his head and shoulder, then wiggled through to the other side and rolled down the pile of rocks and dirt to the floor of the tunnel.

Crocker still had trouble breathing because the air was clogged with dust, and he was covered with scratches and dirt. Through the mist he saw a diffused light and heard a groan.

He wasn’t aware that he was moving until he stumbled over something and caught himself before he fell.

Then suddenly he was wrestling with a man who was quick and wiry, and had hot pungent breath. The man dug his nails into Crocker’s biceps while reaching for something with his other hand. On the ground Crocker saw the outline of a knife in the murk. The shape reminded him of the KA-BAR he’d been given on graduation from BUD/S, with a seven-inch blade made of 1095 steel. But that one had a SEAL trident engraved on one side and the name of a SEAL who had died in combat on the other. The one he saw now had an aluminum grip instead of a leather one.

He heard Tré moaning and caught a glimpse of him beyond the man, holding his right shoulder.

He saw a gleam in his adversary’s eye as his fingers tightened around the hunting knife. His face was covered with thick black whiskers. His bared teeth were long and uneven.

Crocker thrust his head forward and bit into the man’s neck. He responded by smashing Crocker on the side of the head with his fist. His other hand still held the knife, which now flashed in the tight space. Before he had a chance to thrust it into Crocker’s flesh, Crocker drove the heel of his hand into the man’s Adam’s apple once, twice, a third time, until he crushed the man’s windpipe. His assailant emitted a last cry before going limp.

“I think we did it, Tré. I think we stopped them.”

He repeated the words in his head like a mantra as he dragged Tré forward another hundred yards, then slung him onto his shoulder and climbed a set of concrete steps. His head hit something metal that stunned him briefly. It felt like a door. He pushed, swung it open, stuck his head through. Breathing hard and blinking, he saw what looked like an office with two metal desks and a potted ficus tree by the window.

He lifted Tré through the opening, sat him down in one of the brown leather chairs, and flipped on a halogen desk lamp. The room seemed to contain nothing personal, not even a calendar or a framed photo, just a travel poster for Vail, Colorado, on the wall. In the top drawer of one of the desks he found a manila envelope. Inside the envelope he found nine credit cards, four driver’s licenses, a map, and a set of keys.

Crocker used the little energy he had left to pick up one of the phones and dial the number he had committed to memory. A woman’s voice answered. “Yes?”

“This is 34266. I need an immediate ERS.”

“Hold on while I trace your location.”

“Okay,” she said thirty seconds later. “Hang up.”

Minutes later, tires screeched outside and car doors slammed. He unlocked the door to admit two big men with short hair, drawn pistols, and bulletproof vests under their suit jackets. One of them had a marine corps logo and “Semper fidelis” tattooed on his neck.

“34266?” the man asked.

“Yeah. Nice tat.”

Crocker noted his reflection in the window and was reminded of a rescued miner, covered from head to toe with dirt, bleeding from his hands and one shoulder.

The men carried Tré. He felt fresh air on his face and saw yellow streetlights and the outlines of glass buildings.

“Where the hell are we?” he asked as he was being helped into a black SUV.

“You’re in an office park, sir, in El Paso, Texas.”