Getting away with such an escape plan required a certain level of thoroughness. She had to make sure that all the wet spots she’d tracked into the boat were dried up. So after using a towel to dry her hair, she walked around and mopped up any other traces of moisture on the wooden floor.
They had left after their search, none the wiser their target was only inches away.
She wiped off a few extra pieces of mattress foam from her clothing and skin.She moved over to the window and peeked around the curtain. As she’d suspected, the police were gone. They could always double back, but that was doubtful. At least for now.
The smart play would be to wait for dark, but that was a good ten hours away, and doing so would put her further behind in the race for the Bellini. She considered the idea of stealing the boat; however,that had the potential to draw more attention. She decided to give it a few hours, which wasn’t exactly optimal, but there were things she could do in the meantime to make it less of a waste.
She checked the messages on her phone but hadn’t received anything from her friend as yet.He was a world-class hacker based in London. The guy could dig up information on almost anyone, and she made sure his existence was kept secret from her employer.
The screen displayed zero new messages.
She wasn’t surprised. Finding anything on such a person would take a little time. She’d only been hiding for the last thirty minutes or so. Whoever the other thief was, she’d done a good job of remaining anonymous. That would change soon.
Allyson found a seat on the little couch in the corner of the living room and opened her web browser. While she waited on a response from her hacker friend, she could do a little investigative work of her own.
Her fingers flew across the digital keyboard, and when they were done, she tapped the search button.
The screen flicked for a second then brought up a list of links relating to Francisco Espinoza. Some of the first results were from Mexican news outlets. One was a report on charges that had been dropped in a murder case. There were side stories about governmental corruption and bribery that had occurred during the case, but nothing substantial was ever found. What had been found were the headless bodies of the prosecution, naked on a street in Guadalajara.
Such executions were commonplace in some of the larger Mexican cities such as Juarez and Guadalajara, though they were uncommon in the nation’s capital. The drug cartels chose those measures of execution because they thought it terrified anyone thinking about interfering with their affairs. Allyson thought it barbaric and primitive. Sure, she’d killed people in gruesome ways; the recent execution of the Russian woman came to mind first. But that was out of necessity, not to make a statement. She needed information out of the woman, information Zaragova seemed intent on not releasing. At least that’s how she justified it. The more she thought about it, the more Allyson realized that killing, whatever the reason, was the ultimate means of self-preservation.
She’d never really thought of it that way before, and the epiphany made her pause.
A moment later, she was back to researching Espinoza. The biography on him was scattered at best; however, several sources seemed to point to the same upbringing, past, and present.
Francisco Espinoza was born in a small town on the Mexican Pacific Coast. His father was killed in the drug war when he was little, a casualty of a rivalry that had been going on for decades despite not being involved with the narcotics trade. By the time he was fifteen, Francisco had already committed murder and several other crimes, one of which was running drugs between cities. At the age of twenty-two, he’d killed more than a dozen people and had climbed the ranks of one of the most powerful cartels in the region. By the time he was thirty, Francisco was second in command and had a reputation for being one of the most ruthless men in the country.
It only made sense that he tried to cover up his sins by showing the other corrupt people of the world how hospitable he could be; thus the invitation to Monique van der Wahl to attend a party at his home.
Allyson wondered what demons she must have hiding in the basement to be associated with someone like him.
She went back to reading the history on Espinoza and found that he took over the cartel when its head died from a heart attack at sixty-one. Fairly young but not out of the question for someone who probably didn’t eat well, likely didn’t exercise, and definitely didn’t live a healthy lifestyle. Still, whenever that sort of thing happened, she always assumed there was some kind of foul play at work.
Espinoza took over the cartel at forty-two and had been in charge ever since. He was fiercely loyal to those who worked under him and only rarely, according to the bio, killed one of his own. But by the very nature of the underworld, sometimes it had to happen — especially to someone who was dishonest or running off at the mouth too much. Such is the honor among thieves!
All of this happened right under the nose of a corrupt Mexican government.
Allyson couldn’t ignore the irony. The Internet knew this guy was a villain of the first order, but for some reason, he was running free, living in his posh mountainside mansion.
Espinoza’s home was a veritable palace. She wasn’t sure of the square footage, but it had to be in the neighborhood of twenty thousand. She flipped through the different images, apparently taken from helicopters, and noted the enormous infinity pool perched on the side of a cliff. Small outcroppings of trees dotted the rocky terrain around the house. The home itself looked as if it were created from an old Spanish mission. Two bell towers guarded each side of a wide iron gate leading into a rectangular courtyard. A circular fountain with a stone sculpture of a woman stood in the center.
For a few more minutes, Allyson continued her search for information about Espinoza and his home. It seemed, however, she’d exhausted most of what was readily available to the public.
She sighed and lowered the hand holding the phone for a moment. Waiting was something Allyson hated doing. She could when necessary, but in this instance it was difficult to know what to do. She flitted into the little bathroom and found a rubber band. Her hair was still wet even though she’d towel dried it earlier. A few quick flicks of her wrists and hands had her hair up into a tight bun. A girl walking around with wet hair might draw attention, and that was something she wanted to avoid.
An idea popped into her head.
Stepping lightly, she walked over to the window and peeked out. A crowd of people still loitered around the area in the park near where the officer had been shot, but the ambulances and most of the police had fanned out, covering a broader area in their search for the shooter. Allyson moved around to the front of the boat and looked out the window. The police had secured the other boat and tied it to the canal’s edge a hundred yards away, just before the waterway disappeared around a curve.
Plenty of space for what she had planned.
She padded back to the control console and searched for a key in all the usual places but found nothing. In her line of work, Allyson had learned many useful tricks when it came to vehicles. One of them was how to hotwire a car. She’d never tried it with a boat, much less a houseboat.
It had to be somewhat similar.
She rummaged through the drawers until she found a utility drawer under the sink that contained a red toolbox. She opened the lid and sifted through the wrenches, a hammer, pliers, and other tools until she found a flathead screwdriver.
It only took her four minutes to remove the screws securing the metal ignition panel. She set down the tool and unscrewed the ignition wire housing with her fingers. It was on fairly tight and took a little more effort than expected, but eventually it came loose. She found the two wires she was looking for and separated them from the others. She spun around on her knees and grabbed the needle-nose pliers. A moment later, she’d carefully stripped away the wire coating and exposed the copper.