CHAPTER 1

The SUVs and mid-size rentals in the parking lot on the U.S. side of the border belonged to the last of the revelers still staggering around Tijuana, looking for one more open tittie bar along Avenida Revolución.

Discarded newspapers, empty beer cans, and shattered wine bottles littered the lot’s broken asphalt surface with its faded yellow lines and dingy overhead lights. A steady breeze blew dust and candy wrappers up against a chain-link fence that separated the lot from the mud and tarpaper hovels that passed for a housing project.

The woman in the black Escalade cruised up to the booth at the entrance to the lot, the Oakland Raiders cap she’d purchased in a sporting goods store in La Jolla earlier that day pulled low over her face. A sleepy-looking Mexican in a tattered Eisenhower jacket handed her a metered ticket that read 2:06 a.m. and stamped with the date.

Gracias, the woman said.

De nada. The attendant answered without taking his eyes off the soccer match on the small black-and-white television suspended from the booth’s ceiling.

She cruised the lot for a few minutes, checking out the surveillance cameras on the light poles before deciding to park in the darkness between two large RVs. She got out, stood for a minute to stretch her legs and tug gently at the crotch of her leather pants. She was starting to get that feeling again, the dampness between her thighs with its sweet, musty predictability that came on nights like this. It was a feeling that had scared and surprised her the first time it happened. Now she looked forward to it.

This time the pleasant dampness had started to build when the border came into sight. She smiled to herself, knowing it would keep building until she was finished with what she came to do. Then it would subside, leaving her satisfied in some ways and wanting in other, much different ways.

She locked the car and pulled the hat down lower over her face so the surveillance cameras couldn’t get a clear look at her. Emerging from the shadows of the two behemoth Winnebagos, she headed south across the lot toward the rundown concrete block building with the sign that read Public Toilet.

A rat scurried in the papers along the fence. A car alarm blared somewhere in the distance. Vermin and honking horns. This was Tijuana, she thought, what else could she expect?

The wide sidewalk leading to the revolving gate that appropriately marked the porous border was empty on the U.S. side. Her thick-soled shoes sounded like sledgehammers on the concrete walk. Three hours earlier, the same walk had been filled with horny servicemen, drunken salesmen, and tourists in search of cheap trinkets and what passed for authentic Mexican food.

Once over the bridge to the Mexican side, her pace quickened. She was all business now, no time for the last of the children selling Chiclets, no sympathy for the one-eyed man sleeping against the light pole holding a paper cup, and no pesos for the legless woman who had no place to go and nothing left to do but beg spare change from her perch on an orange crate.

The wind turned suddenly colder, sending hamburger wrappers, and paper cups spinning in tiny whirlwinds along the street that dead-ended at the border crossing. The air tasted of grease, stale beer, and urine. The black Lincoln Town Car, with Baja plates, waiting at the curb, looked out of place amid the dirt and trash. She got in the passenger side and nodded to the driver.

How are we on time? she asked.

The driver had the massive chest and narrow waist of a bodybuilder. Wrap-around, dark glasses perched on the top of his head held thick, blond hair back from a tan, slightly feminine face. He wore jeans, cowboy boots, and a lightweight sport coat over a tan T-shirt.

He’s just closing up.

Perfect.

They wouldn’t talk again. There was no need. They communicated in ways that didn’t require words, ways that made sure the jobs they were given were completed in an easy and efficient manner. Tonight would be no different. Everything would go smoothly, the same way it always did. Besides, this was Tijuana. What could possibly go wrong in a city with no rules?

As the car moved through the empty streets, she kept the window rolled up as a barrier against the odor of mildew and garbage that would move in and take up residence like it did everywhere else in the city.

To her, Tijuana was nothing more than a cesspool of ten-dollar blowjobs, donkey shows, and second-rate dentists; a dark carnival where bar girls earned a few bucks each night rubbing their tits in the faces of Americans drunk on cheap tequila and over-priced cerveza. It and all the other border towns were the same: lint traps for what oozed from the bottom of the United States. It had always been that way. It would never change.

All the more reason to get this job done, she thought, and wait for dawn when she would start her trip south along the east coast of the Sea of Cortez. Fifty miles from the border, America’s corruption of Mexico dissipated like a receding rash. The farther south, the more of real Mexico started to emerge, the Mexico she loved.

The drug cartels had made life harder in some cities, especially those along the border. It didn’t bother her, though. In fact, efforts to stop the cartels just made her life all that much easier by focusing attention on the drug lords rather than the business that had made her rich. The drug trade existed to feed one American appetite. She existed to serve one much different.

Leaning her head back against the seat, she focused her thoughts on what lay ahead. The clean, fresh smells of central Mexico, the scents of sage, hyacinth, and bougainvillea, of mole sauces, carne asada, and warm tortillas. Thinking about it brought her peace of mind, but never for very long. Maybe she had become too addicted to the men she was sent to see. Too addicted to the feeling between her legs each time she had the chance to kill one of them.

Too addicted to Raul Barrego, the man who sent her on these missions.

Looking out the car window at the array of cut-rate stores selling furniture, appliances, electronics, and clothes; at the drunks either passed out in doorways or pissing in the gutters, she promised herself never to set foot in Tijuana again. Nothing good happens here, she thought, so why come back?

How much farther? she said without looking over at the driver.

A few more blocks. He checked his watch. We’re right on time.

She went back to staring out the window, this time thinking about Barrego. How old is he now? she wondered. With him, it was hard to tell. Barrego was more Spanish than Mexican, more patron than el jefe. His skin the color of creamed coffee, his longish hair perfectly parted. The last time she saw him was two weeks earlier aboard his yacht. He was wearing sandals, faded jeans, and a polo shirt, smelling of expensive cologne and sipping 15-year-old tequila from his own distillery. Mexico’s Ralph Lauren.

She tried to guess how much he was worth. Not that it mattered. He probably didn’t even know himself or didn’t care. But she did. Without him and his money, she’d still be living in Chiapas, a brood mare to some field hand who thought ten pesos a day was a living wage.

Working for Barrego had taught her that wealth was wasted on the rich. Only those who knew what it was to be poor could appreciate what it was to have money. Knowing the difference made her stronger than the fools Barrego sent her to see.

The first mission, as she came to call them, was a man named Diego something. She didn’t remember his last name, only that he was a soft-drink distributor from Chihuahua, who’d paid Barrego twenty thousand dollars for the right to take her virginity. He was a clumsy, cruel man, smelling of chilies and garlic, who grunted his way to climax then slapped her over and over again because she didn’t act grateful enough for his efforts.

Years later, when Diego attempted to cheat Barrego on a land deal, he became her first mission. She found him home alone one night and slit his throat while staring into his eyes. Recognition crossed his face as life ebbed from his fat body. She didn’t charge Barrego for that one, but doubled the price for the next two.

How many after that, she wondered? Twenty? Maybe more. It didn’t matter. All she cared about was the money and that she killed more men than she’d slept with.

We’re here, the driver said.

He turned right onto Avenida Revolución, and then left onto one of the calles, side streets. The nightclub sat halfway down the block, wedged between a small tienda and a panadería that would open in another two hours to sell bocadillos and empanadas to men on their way to work.

A half-case of empty Victoria beer bottles propped open the nightclub door. Two young women, in short skirts and too much lipstick, stood out front smoking cigarettes. They eyed the Lincoln like it was made of gold and filled with passengers sporting Rolexes and pockets full of diamonds.

The driver stopped the car across the street. I’ll take care of them.

She stayed in the car, watching the hookers greet the driver with smiles and wet lips. After a few seconds of talk, the two women scurried off up the street. Spiked heels scraped hurriedly against rough cobblestones. They disappeared around the corner without looking back.

She steeled herself for what lay ahead, both tonight’s job and another waiting for her when she got home. Barrego had called her earlier in the day to tell her about it.

Pantera, he’d said.

She hated that name, Pantera, panther. Her real name was Maria. Why couldn’t he just call her that?

Barrego had said something about a periodista, a journalist, from Portland, Oregon, who had been in Zihuatanejo for the last month on vacation. The mention of Portland had bothered her. Maybe it was just a coincidence, but she hated coincidences. There were too many people from Portland in Mexico these days, people who either knew too much about Barrego’s business or wanted to find out.

She got out the little notebook she kept in her pocket and stared at the name Barrego had given her: John Standard.

Hopefully, he was more exciting than his name, she thought. Then again, what does it matter? All men were the same: children who didn’t know what it was to be a real man. Still, reporters made her nervous. Barrego had always avoided them, which made sense given the business he was in. So, why change now? What made this John Standard different from other reporters? Did he want her to kill him, or was it something else? It didn’t matter. It all paid the same. She closed the notebook and put it away. She would find out sooner or later.

As soon as the driver got back in the car, she pulled the .357 out from under the seat and slipped it into the front of her leather pants. The cool steel against her lower stomach felt good, comforting, even erotic.

Silencer? she said. The driver answered with a shrug. I’ll improvise.

The neon sign over the nightclub door read El Loco Grande, The Big Crazy. A few hours earlier, it had probably been full of muff-diving Marines from Coronado who endured inflated drink prices for the right to humiliate the women who rubbed their crotches while begging to sell them sex in the bathroom.

As she crossed the street, a rat the size of a small dog jumped out of a storm drain, scurried down the gutter, and darted into an alley towards an overturned garbage can.

Tijuana, she muttered to herself. I swear this is the last time.

Stepping inside, she kicked the case of empties out of the way to let the door swing shut with a soft thump. Inside was typical Tijuana cheap: Spanish pop tunes pulsing from huge speakers hanging from the ceiling, a single spotlight striking a mirrored ball over a raised dance floor, spots of light crawling along the black walls like iridescent cockroaches.

Disco may be dead everywhere else, she thought, but it flourished in the sleaze of Tijuana.

The only customer was a drunken sailor in a booth to the left of the door. He sat staring at the ceiling with half-open eyes while the head of a young Mexican girl bobbed up and down in his lap. Her dress rode high up her hips, exposing a small ass and black thong panties.

The woman grabbed the girl by the hair and pulled her to her feet. She looked as drunk as her customer, eyes unfocused, lipstick smeared. But not too drunk to understand orders to get out. She tugged her dress back down around her thighs, fumbled under the table for a small, cheap purse, and staggered out the door after grabbing a handful of loose bills off the table.

The sailor raised his head in lame protest then passed out while slurring obscenities.

The man she was looking for was behind the bar, counting stacks of bills, U.S. dollars and Mexican pesos. He punched furiously at a cheap calculator, heavy brows knitted in concentration. A tropical shirt was stretched tight over a huge stomach, his dark complexion purple in the dim light. Reflections from the disco ball danced across shiny, black hair pulled back into a ponytail.

Hola, Hector, the woman in the baseball hat said. Creo que tenemos que hablar.

The man behind the bar looked up, took one step back as his face tensed into a mask of guilt. She had seen Hector only once before, but he knew who she was: Pantera, the emissary of the man who paid him more money than he earned running a Tijuana tittie bar.

Senorita, of course we can talk. It is good to see you, Hector said. It has been a long time. Vamos a beber para celebrar. ¿Tequila, si? As Hector spoke, he reached behind him for something on the back bar.

Don’t. She brought out the .357.

Hector straightened up. ¿Qué?

How much did she pay you?

"¿Quién?

Hector. Hector. Teníamos un trato. It was a good deal. You were paid well for what we asked you to do. You were a fool to betray us and for what? ¿Una mamada? A fuck on top of the bar? ¿Dinero? Did you think he wouldn’t find out? Did you think he wouldn’t send me?

Hector’s face went two shades paler.

She moved to her left, sidestepping her way around the end of the bar, one eye on the fat Mexican. Hector backed up. The bar curved at the opposite end. No way out. She was blocking the only exit. Still, Hector kept moving away.

Senorita, por favor, I can explain.

Demasiado tarde. You told her everything, didn’t you? That’s why she’s in Mexico. Looking around. Asking questions. Showing pictures. You told her about them, didn’t you? Told her how it all works. Told her who you work for.

Un momento. Please, I can explain I tell you. Hector’s eyes were huge, a chameleon on crank.

Lo siento, Hector.

Hector’s lips quivered. He turned, but there was no way out except over the bar. She was on him immediately. His feet were off the floor when she grabbed him by the ponytail, snapping his head back, exposing his throat, stretching his three chins into one.

I can’t tell you what an inconvenience this is. Her mouth was next to his ear. Now I have to find someone else to help us. Do you have any idea how long that takes? How hard it is to find someone capable? Our needs are very special. Usted ha cometido un gran error. Hector tried to nod, but couldn’t. Pantera’s grip was too tight. But Senor Barrego would rather be inconvenienced than betrayed.

Hector’s belly was pressed into the top of the bar, his butt soft against her thighs.

Please, senorita. The plea sounded like a choking parrot.

Sorry, amigo. We gave you a sweetheart deal. The money would never end, but you got greedy. Muy goloso.

I can explain, I tell you.

The familiar wetness ran hot down the inside of her legs. She was close to that sweet release she’d never achieved with any of her lovers, male or female. With a single lunge, she forced the barrel of the gun as far up Hector’s ass as she could, tearing the thin fabric of his slacks. Hector’s eyes bulged. The scream that started somewhere deep emerged stillborn.

She thought of the old men who had grunted and groaned on top of her. Men like Hector, only richer, who thought their wrinkled bodies and half-hardness brought her pleasure. She shoved the gun another inch into Hector’s intestines.

Hasta la vista, Hector.

Two shots tore through his body. Blood sprayed on the wall in front of him. The cheeks of Hector’s butt the perfect silencer.

As Hector’s body went limp, a shudder ran through Pantera’s body. A low moan escaped her lips. She backed down the bar, stopped, eyes closed, head back, trying to enjoy every second of the feeling. When it passed, she grabbed a bottle of tequila from the back bar, took a long drink, and left.

At the door, she tossed the gun in the booth with the passed-out sailor and walked away thinking, Now, who’s this John Standard guy?

CHAPTER 2

Hot. Sticky. Eight a.m. Zihuatanejo, Mexico.

John Standard had spent the night in a hammock on a plank-decked veranda off the small kitchen. A thin sheet was all he needed for a blanket. A few insect bites were better than the oppressive, claustrophobic heat under the mosquito netting. Plus, he could wake up to the soft breeze that came off the bay, staring up through the overhanging trees at the patches of pale, blue sky and thin, white clouds.

Besides, the hammock made the nightmares less vivid.

Standard turned his head to look out at the bright blue waters of Zihuatanejo Bay. The morning sun had just hit the mouth of the bay the same way it had every day for the last month. Soon it would shine on the bay itself, and on the dun-colored beach visible through the trees in front of the veranda. The gentle waves made scallop shapes along the half-mile of beach called Playa la Ropa, with its restaurants, small hotels, and private homes. Tourists, out early to beat the heat, walked along the water line, some with dogs, others with just their thoughts.

The magpie jays that came down from the hills each morning moved noisily along the tops of the trees, toward the beach. They traveled in packs like street gangs looking for someone to rob. Finding no one, they settled on harassing the harmless red-butted squirrels that lived in the jungle canopy. Later came the parrots that squawked and darted through the trees, willing to be heard, but not seen.

Then it was quiet again. A large, white butterfly zigzagged through the trees, looking like a piece of tissue paper batted around by an erratic breeze. With the jays gone, the squirrels came out again to jump from limb to limb, as if on some important and mysterious mission.

Soon the yachts from the large marina to the north in Ixtapa would show up to anchor off Playa la Ropa. They came mostly to hang out all day, bobbing on the gentle swells that worked their way in from the ocean. Occasionally one of the yacht’s occupants would board a small motorboat, come ashore for a long lunch at one of the beachfront restaurants, followed by a siesta under the colorful paraguas, umbrellas.

Mostly, though, the wealthy boat people kept their distance. Playa la Ropa was a local beach used by working-class Mexicans on their days off and Americans who sought a cheaper solitude from the raucous, high-priced resort hotels with their swim-up bars and drinks served in salt-rimmed glasses or garnished with cherries and wedges of fresh pineapple. Way too pedestrian for the yacht crowd.

Standard threw off the sheet, letting the breeze dance across his bare skin and running his hands across his chest. He fingered the now-familiar jagged scar that ran from armpit to armpit. While the rest of his body had turned a dark brown, the scar had remained fish-belly white. For the scar to fade away would be too much to ask. The same could be said for the memory of how it got there and the nightmares that came with it.

Swinging out of the hammock and heading for the open-air shower, Standard stood under the tepid water for a few minutes, washing away the thin film of sweat that had become a constant companion. Not bothering to dry off, he walked back out onto the veranda to stand naked against the bamboo railing and let the breeze provide a few minutes of coolness.

Pulling on a pair of shorts, he made coffee and drank it at the small table in the kitchen. Down the beach, the first parasail rose slowly above the thatched-roofed hotel at the sand’s far end. Another dope on a rope, he thought. Soon, the banana boats and jet skis would appear. A sailboat would pull into the bay to anchor off the beach, while another would leave to work its way north.

This day would be like all the others. Coffee in the kitchen followed by breakfast at the beachfront Tortuga Café, a day in the sun, Coronas and margaritas, the climb back up the hill to the house in the afternoon for a siesta. After that, it might be a night in town. It might not. Another day further removed from how he got the scar on his chest and why he was in Mexico.

Perfect.

Into a second cup of coffee, Standard surveyed the crude elegance of the house. The kitchen and veranda occupied the first level. Up three concrete steps were the living room, bathroom, and a closet with an iron door and a heavy lock. Up one more level was the loft bedroom with its net-encased queen-size bed, small table, and bookshelves lined with paperbacks soggy and bloated by the humidity. A network of tile and thatched roofs covered each level. Straw mats covered the concrete floors. Giant bamboo and madrone trees shaded the veranda with its weathered wood floor.

The house had no walls, which meant that, during the day, he had a two hundred seventy-degree view of beach, ocean, bay, and jungle. In the distance was the sprawling city of Zihuatanejo. It lay on the northern edge of the bay and spread up into the hills beyond. At night, the darkness became his walls, an outdoor amphitheater with an endless symphony of insect sounds and things without legs crawling through dry leaves.

It was the ideal place to forget Portland, Oregon, dead girls, and a deranged killer.

From the kitchen table, Standard could look fifty yards downhill at the tile roof and back adobe wall of Emma Parrish’s house. It was a more spacious version of his own, nestled among large boulders and bougainvillea.

Emma, he yelled. Coffee’s on.

When she didn’t answer, Standard remembered that she’d said something about going to Mexico City on business for a couple of days. Then again, maybe she wasn’t going after all. That would be Emma.

Pouring the last of the coffee, he thought about going into town for more food, beer, and tequila. The two-mile ride on the rickety open-air bus filled with locals always broke up the sweet and sweaty monotony of days on the beach. The blue sky meant the temperature would start climbing toward the high eighties, now that the sun had cleared the ridgeline behind the house. Go now while it’s still cool, he thought. Waiting until later meant enduring a sweaty walk through busy city streets.

Tomorrow, he thought. Maybe it will be cooler tomorrow.

He finished the coffee and fought the urge for a cigarette. He’d quit a month earlier, on the day he arrived. The next day, he took up jogging on the beach three nights a week right after sunset between when the sunbathers went home and before the dinner crowd showed up. At first, he could do little more than a few hundred yards. Lately, it was the whole beach, a half mile up and a half mile back. If that wasn’t enough exercise, there was always Emma.

Standard had always been amazed at the generosity of women, but none had ever amazed him more than her.

They had been on something of a collision course since the day he showed up on her doorstep, fresh off the plane, sweaty, tired, and looking for a place to live. No sooner had he asked the taxi driver about a nice place to stay than he told him about a beautiful woman with a house in the jungle overlooking the beach.

Sounds fine, Standard said, intrigued by the jungle, beaches, and a beautiful woman. Show me.

He walked through the gate and up the hill to the house just as she stepped out of the open-air shower off the kitchen. She dried herself with a colorful beach towel, barely noticing Standard watching her from the front steps. Her skin was burned a deep brown everywhere but around her hips and breasts.

You don’t look like a pervert, so you must need a place to stay, she’d said, wrapping herself in the towel so it covered everything but her legs and shoulders. How long?

I’m not sure. A couple of months, maybe more.

My name is Emma Parrish, she said, shaking her hair and sending drops of water onto the red-tile floor. Five hundred a month. She searched his face for a reaction. U.S. Still want to see it?

Sure.

It’s up the hill. I’ll show it to you, but I need to get dressed first, she’d said, slipping into a sundress and a pair of loose-fitting sandals while Standard waited, wondering why she bothered. By the way, you have a name?

John. John Standard.

She led him through the house, out a back gate, and up the hill to the house behind hers.

The maid comes three days a week, although I’m never sure which three it is. Everything works, but sometimes the hot water goes out. Let me know. I have a handyman who comes around every few days to fix things.

Standard wandered through the kitchen, living room, and loft bedroom. After twelve hours in airports and on airplanes, he felt ready for anything that meant he could take a nap. This’ll be fine. Can I give you two months’ rent and see what happens after that?

Works for me.

Tired as he was, that first night had been tough. He was not used to sleeping under mosquito netting that acted as a target for dive-bombing insects that didn’t look, sound, or act familiar. Then there were the noises coming out of the jungle. It was well after midnight before he fell asleep and nearly noon before he woke up.

Crawling out of bed, he’d rummaged around in the 1950s-era refrigerator and found a bag of fresh-ground coffee in the freezer. The coffee maker sat on the hardwood counter, next to the blender. He made a pot with water pumped out of a ten-gallon plastic bottle on the floor next to the refrigerator. When he saw Emma Parrish on the back porch of her house, he asked her to join him.

I’ll be right there, she yelled up.

The same ritual had gone on for two weeks, even though most mornings, particularly after she’d spent the evening in town, she acted like she didn’t want him around. On one of the days that she did, he asked her to dinner.

Why not? she’d said.

That night they had drinks at her house before taking a taxi into town to a restaurant called Mango’s, where Emma