Thirteen Million Dollar Pop

36

Dwyer had invested his entire day in his stakeout and was completely knackered after nearly thirty-six hours straight awake and on the job. He also found himself someplace he didn’t often visit, which was at the limits of his patience. With the telephone number he’d gotten from the La Pasion boys, Dwyer had been able to use a reverse directory program on the laptop back in his room. It was a bit sloppy of Banco to have ended up trackable by landline, but he must’ve figured he needed comms in his hide, and he’d know that a mobile would have to be turned off and the battery removed to make sure he wasn’t traceable by that. In the end, it had taken him a hell of a good deal of work to uncover the address, 1701 Wilmette Avenue, and find the building. This told him that Banco hadn’t completely abandoned his fieldcraft. He was still being careful. The lime green stucco apartment house wasn’t a half bad hidey-hole either, out of the way and nondescript as it was. Now though, sitting outside wasn’t yielding any more answers for Dwyer, and he didn’t expect he’d be lucky ducky enough to catch Banco leaving or coming. It was time to go in.

The building was poorly secured, and earlier in the day, he’d found a way inside. As far as he could tell, there were no security cameras on the doors, nor was there a video feed on the front door buzzer that might have been run through a backup recording system. The ground floor of the building had a long front-to-back hallway with a steel door in the rear that had been wedged open, probably to allow for a cross breeze, and the only thing stopping entry was a locked wire mesh gate. Dwyer had gripped the cheap knob and given it a good yank, and it had popped right open.

He’d gone upstairs to the second floor and looked at the door to 2G but couldn’t figure a way through without blasting it off its hinges, and that wasn’t going to be conducive to a conversation once he was inside. So he’d retired to the rented car to give it a think. After a few hours, once darkness had descended, Dwyer had finally picked up his mobile and dialed.

“Si?” Banco answered, as if he’d been woken.

“I’m here. Outside,” Dwyer said. “Let’s talk.”

“The door will be open,” Banco said after a long pause, and rang off.

Dwyer didn’t bother with getting buzzed in but instead popped the cheap gate once again, this time with a handkerchief in his hand, which he also used to turn the knob to Banco’s door.

He entered the small, sparsely furnished apartment and saw Banco, sick and pale, propped in a bed with soiled coverings, backed up against the wall in a corner away from the windows; and one whiff told him Banco was suffering gunshot sepsis. The cheap curtains allowed enough streetlight in for Dwyer to see there was an assault rifle pointed at him. Banco’s gaze seemed firm and his grip steady enough that it discouraged Dwyer from rushing him and grabbing the barrel and ripping the gun away.

“Que pasa, ’migo?” Dwyer said.

“You found me,” Banco said, shifting a bit, in apparent great pain.

“Sure.”

“How are Benito and Boli?” Banco asked.

Dwyer understood he meant the men from La Pasion.

“Fine,” he said.

“They told you where I was?” Banco asked. Dwyer didn’t respond, just shrugged. “Because they didn’t know …”

“The number was enough. I paid them for it,” Dwyer said.

“I called them back a few times, couldn’t reach them,” Banco said.

“Probably out partyin’,” Dwyer tossed. He moved closer and noticed piles of gauze bandages and white cotton undershirts and rags stained red and yellow with blood and pus on the floor at the foot of the bed.

“Let me see what you got?” Dwyer said, taking another step closer. Banco tipped the barrel of the gun up toward Dwyer’s chest, stopping him, but flipped back the bedsheets and lifted away a wet, bloody bandage, revealing a hit in the meat of his flank just above his hip bone.

“Goddamn in and out. But still …” Banco said.

Dwyer went near the wall of the small kitchenette and flicked the light switch. A fluorescent kicked on in three stages and threw enough light for him to see the black entry point the width of a pencil. Banco leaned forward and Dwyer saw where it had come out, that hole the diameter of a two pence piece. Red splotches and streaks surrounded the wound, which oozed a thick and foul green.

“That’s close enough,” Banco said, leveling the assault rifle at Dwyer more directly. He recognized it now. It was an H amp;K 33, of German make, the rifle of the Salvadoran army, and Banco’s old service weapon.

“What in fuck’s name happened, Banco?” Dwyer asked.

Banco shrugged. “I got the call. I went to the location. Just like the plan. I set it up-the elevator, the lights, the car-and I waited. I opened up on ’em and was walking him down to finish. But the fucking car was armored … and he had this guy with him-”

“You knew he’d have a man with him,” Dwyer said, doing his best to tamp down his anger.

“Well, this motherfucker wasn’t the one I expected. And he was good. Or lucky,” Banco said with disgust, gesturing at his wound.

“What type of guy?”

“Big. And tall. Dark hair, dark suit, mustache,” Banco said and it made Dwyer wonder for a moment before he refocused.

“What about your backup shooter?” Dwyer asked.

Banco just shook his head.

“You didn’t use a backup shooter?” Dwyer was shocked. A three-man team was minimum industry standard. “Are you fucking retarded or something, man? At least the bloody driver should have been a backup …” Dwyer tailed off when he caught the look in Banco’s black eyes.

“Fucking ’ell, you went in solo?” Dwyer asked, equal parts incredulity and disgust. “Why?”

“I needed the money, man,” Banco said simply.

“You were paid fifty K, with another fifty coming at the finish.”

“There’s no work. I couldn’t afford a split. It’s been two years since I’ve had any job worth shit. I needed all of it.”

“And look at you fucking now,” Dwyer said, his fury leaking out. “I thought you were a bloody professional.”

Short money, the root of all botch-ups, he seethed to himself.

“Help me get well, and we’ll go finish this thing together,” Banco said.

“I don’t know about the second part there, Braveheart.” Dwyer shook his head. “The target’s all buttoned up now …”

A look of fear came over Banco as he realized what his failure meant. The two men stared at each other. Dwyer had been on ops down in Salvador with Banco. They’d been on bivouac together, a thirty-day stint, in shit jungle doing nasty things. That kind of time created a bond. He’d directed Banco’s fire, and Banco took orders and responded under pressure. That, and because he was familiar with the city, were why Dwyer thought to use him.

But now … but now …

“Just so you know, Waddy,” he said, “I have some things in place if anything happens to me. Information you don’t want getting out.”

Dwyer stared at Banco. He didn’t particularly believe him. The guy had been no-bullshit, ex-army when he’d met him a dozen years ago. But he couldn’t be sure one way or the other whether Banco had put some insurance in place, so he played along.

“If anything happens to you? You’ve got one foot in the boat and it’s ready to cross the river, man …” Dwyer said.

“You’ve got to help me,” Banco said. The fear he’d been doing a good job keeping out of his voice made itself heard for the first time.

Dwyer acted like it affected him. “What do you think you need?”

“Sterile dressings. An IV drip of lactated Ringer’s solution. Or at least saline. Plasma expander if you can get it. And antibiotics-cephalosporin or even penicillin. Dilaudid or Percocet for the pain.”

“Fucking ’ell, anything else?”

“Find me a doctor who’ll fix me without talking.”

“That could take a while, being it’s the first time I’ve been in this shite burg.”

“I’ll be here waiting.”

Dwyer wasn’t going to be able to get a thing for Banco at this hour, short of robbing a bloody hospital. He fetched Banco a cup of water from the kitchen-he thought it was a nice touch-and took a last glance back and left, closing the door behind him.