The sun was rising and Iwata was back in the desert. After renting a Toyota 4Runner and collecting the gun from Mingo, he had left Los Angeles and driven through the night. The road this far out was old, its cracked yellow centre lines running far into the horizon. On either side, there was nothing more than empty, benign scenery. But Iwata saw the desert differently now, like looking at a calm sea and knowing it could swallow you whole.
Following the coordinates Mara had given him, Iwata turned off-road and rumbled into the desert in low gear. He didn’t know what he was driving into, answers or a trap – though Mara had promised him the truth, both seemed equally plausible.
A few miles later Iwata came to a small stream. There was a figure lying next to the water. Getting out of the truck, Iwata looked around then knelt down to examine the body. The man had been young, probably no more than twenty, wearing camouflage clothes and an LA Dodgers hat that had fallen off. No belongings, nothing to identify him.
There were two bullet holes. The first was much larger, clean through the shoulder blade. The second was at the nape of the neck, a black, powdery, circular, burning stain around the wound.
Iwata stood and surveyed the land. He saw tyre tracks that led down from a hillock to the east, then carried on south past the body.
‘They shot you from up there … With something high-powered …’ He swept his finger along the tracks and stopped at the stream. ‘Then came down to finish you off.’
Iwata thought about the two men with the white truck that had attacked his own group. Were they responsible for this body also? And if so, why? Familia Cabral snipers protecting their trafficking routes? Bandits? Border vigilantes ‘defending’ their country?
Iwata got back into the 4Runner and tapped the wheel. Mara had given him specific coordinates, and the tyre tracks that ran past the body seemed to be heading in the same direction.
A quarter of an hour later he stopped again. He had arrived at a small scrub forest too dense to drive through. The sound of the engine sent a volt of vultures screeching up into the air. Iwata got out and checked his location against the coordinates. He was close.
Gun in hand, Iwata fought his way through the branches and came to a clearing awash with colour. Bright T-shirts, jeans, orphaned shoes and hundreds of empty bottles: Sunkist, grape soda, Squirt, Jarritos, Tamarindo Sol, Coca-Cola, Pepsi. But between the foliage the most prominent colour was red. Blood. Bodies. Spent shells glinting gold in the sunlight. Now there was the smell; somehow it was cold, an unholy mix of putrid meat and shit.
Covering his face, Iwata stepped deeper into the scrub. There was a sound, strange and restless. It became a loud roaring, like a freeway. In the next clearing he saw a mass of black flies buzzing angrily around the massacre – open wounds, open mouths, open eyes. The bodies had all fallen face forward, hands at their sides. The backpacks had been heaped in a corner, pockets hanging open. Money had been taken.
In the madness, Iwata realized he recognized some of the victims from the migrant refuge. They were all wearing the wristbands according to blood type that had been given out by the medical team. All of them were the same colour – red.
Iwata forced his vomit back down and staggered back to the 4Runner. He checked the coordinates Mara had given him again. This was the place. She had promised him the truth, yet he had found only death. Perhaps she would explain at the meeting place.
The Cactus Café turned out to be a dusty little roadside diner with a neon sign that declared it open twenty-four hours a day. A sandwich board outside had been adorned in colourful chalk flowers and a phrase in cursive:
THERE IS NO O’ODHAM WORD FOR WALL
Iwata parked in the lot. Getting out, he squinted up at the sun. The midday heat was brutal. In the little phone box at the back of the gas station, he found the number for the local police department and called anonymously. He reported multiple homicides in a shrub forest, gave the coordinates and hung up.
Iwata turned towards the diner, looking for Mara already. He was early but she was unpredictable. He almost missed the white Ford Raptor with the green stripe. But there it was. It was instantly familiar, gleaming white in the sunlight. This was the vehicle he had seen up on the hill the other night, the one belonging to the snipers. What Iwata had not seen was the blue eagle symbol and the words beneath it:
BORDER PATROL
Glancing around, Iwata circled the truck. The registration plate had the seal of the Department of Homeland Security. Crouching down, he saw the dirt on the tyres was fresh, the same rich orange as on his own. On tiptoes, he peered into the bed of the truck. Inside, there were spent shell casings. Blood smudges.
‘Shit.’
Iwata chewed his lips for a moment. Mara had promised the truth. She had not said she would meet him. First, she had given the coordinates. Second, the diner. Was she saying the first led directly to the second?
Iwata approached the diner and peered through the window. He pretended to read the menu board as he scanned the room. The place was busy: families, workers at lunch. Mara was nowhere to be seen. At the back there were two men in dark green Border Patrol uniforms. The larger one was blond, blue-eyed and large-chinned. The patch on his shirt read: COUSINS. The smaller man had dark hair, his eyes hidden behind aviators. He was ignoring his partner as he tugged on a thin moustache. His patch read: ORTEGA.
Iwata slunk out of view. There’s blood and bullets in their truck and they stop for cherry pie and ice tea? It all felt off. Still, Iwata had seen their faces now. He knew their vehicle. It was just a question of waiting.
Iwata watched Ortega and Cousins for six hours. They drank coffee, smoked and checked out the waitresses. They obviously weren’t there for each other’s company. Iwata figured they were waiting for something or someone. He floated the idea they were waiting for Mara.
At 4 p.m., however, the smaller man got a call. They hurried to the truck and screeched out of the lot, hitting the freeway at speed. Iwata followed. The rented 4Runner was generic and these men weren’t the sort to be checking behind them.
They drove north for half an hour until they made a turning.
Iwata overshot, gave it two miles then turned around. He took the same turning as the border-patrol truck. It was a small, uphill road without any kind of signage. At first dusty and full of holes, after half a mile the tarmac suddenly became liquorice-smooth as it dipped downwards.
Out of nowhere, a town appeared. It was in a desert basin unseen from the freeway, wedged in between mountains. The town-limits sign had no slogan, no motto, no information beyond its founding year of 2010 and a population of just a few hundred. It read:
HUXLEY, ARIZONA