| |
It was the bottom of the seventh. The Braves were trailing by one but had set the table with runners on second and third and had a switch hitter on deck.
Ped and Patricia were in their regular spot at Sun Trust Park, in the Chairman’s Seats behind home plate, surrounded by serial second-guessers.
The pitcher sent down a salad, easily read, and the home crowd rose in concert as the ball sailed into Chophouse Terrace.
It took longer than usual to reach the parking lot, as Ped was besieged by hand-shakers, back-slappers, selfie whores. All captured by the crew from Netflix, who were tailing the candidate for a day-in-the life doco.
They’d filmed him at the headquarters of his drug foundation in downtown Atlanta, on the giant slide at Piedmont Park with his grandson, enjoying a cup of joe with the mayor, signing books at Barnes and Noble.
The set-piece interview was in the living room at home, which had been dressed beyond recognition by a décor consultant hired by his press secretary. Sofas had been repositioned, the Fernando Botero paintings replaced with politically proper landscapes, the floor-to-ceiling shelves with books Ped would never read.
Pre-arranged questions covered his childhood in Atlanta and bilingual upbringing, thanks to his Colombian mother who immigrated in 1949 to escape La Violencia – the civil war ignited by the assassination of a Presidential candidate.
After law school at the University of Georgia in Athens, Ped’s fluent Spanish landed him a job at Weir and Stone, a boutique firm in New York that handled the international affairs of a large Colombian coffee producer.
By the time he married Patricia in 1986, he was making regular visits to Eje Cafetero – Colombia’s coffee triangle – in the steep-sloped valleys between Medellin and Cali.
Warring cocaine cartels made Colombia one of the most violent nations on the planet at the time, but Ped never felt threatened because of his growing friendship with Jiménez, head of security for the coffee company.
‘And when did you realize Mr. Jiménez was also head of security for the Rosario drug cartel?’
‘Not till much later, near the end. Should I have picked up on it sooner? Probably, if I’d asked the right questions. But I was extranjero – a foreigner, just visiting Colombia a few days a month. I’ve never used that as an excuse for what I did. Just an explanation for why it took me so darn long to piece it all together.’
‘And when you did?’
‘That’s when I started making bad decisions.’
‘This was when, 1994?’
‘Exactly right. I had my doubts before, but it wasn’t until a trip to Tumaco – that’s a port city in the south of Colombia – when Jiménez introduced me to the Lopez brothers. You had to be living in another galaxy not to know Felipe and Àngel Lopez were the kingpins of the Rosario cartel.’
‘Yet you continued your work there.’
‘Worse than that. I helped the cartel launder millions, knowing darn well where the money was coming from.’
‘What made you give yourself up in the end?’
‘A documentary. I was sitting in this room, on that sofa, watching TV with Patricia – who by the way had no clue what I was up to in Colombia. Our daughter was sleeping in the room next door. The documentary laid it all bare, the unimaginable harm cocaine was inflicting on American kids. Brutally graphic.’
‘Like a lightbulb moment?’
‘Your words, not mine. It took over a year of those blinding lights in my face before I mustered the courage to come clean with the DEA.’
‘You got eight years?’
‘Ten. They let me out after eight for good behavior.’
‘And your friend Jiménez, who handed himself in at the same time, didn’t spend a day in jail. That must have rubbed you the wrong way.’
‘Not exactly. His testimony didn’t just take down the Lopez brothers. It brought down a whole bunch of corrupt politicians, judges, police...’
‘But no time inside?’
‘Listen, I haven’t laid eyes on Jiménez since the very day the two of us strolled into that DEA office in Miami. I did my time. He went deep into witness protection and has been off the radar ever since. But here’s the kicker: I’ve heard that even after all these years, he’s still sittin’ high on the hit lists of at least three cartels. I wouldn't want to be caught dead in his shoes, that’s for sure.’
‘So, you served your time, wrote the book, set up the foundation, and here you are running for President...’
‘You make it sound easy. Believe me, it’s been a grueling journey. Sitting in that cell over at Hays State Prison, it hit me like a ton of bricks I was the luckiest guy on this planet. I had an incredible wife who stuck by me when Lawd knows most women woulda bolted. A beautiful daughter. Most importantly, a second chance, a shot at making amends. Which is why I’ve dedicated the rest of my life to fighting this drug nightmare.’
The interviewer looked at her notes.
‘How do you respond to those who say you’re a hypocrite for calling for the death penalty for traffickers, given your... history?’
‘They’ve got a valid point, no doubt about it. I’m tellin’ folks that if someone today does what I did back in my wild days they deserve the harshest consequences. A vein for a vein. I get how some folks might see that as the pot callin’ the skillet black. But here’s the thing: if, on that day I was introduced to the Lopez brothers, I knew I could end up facing the needle just for breathin’ the same air as them, I’da been outta there so fast you wouldn’t have caught me for dust. And that’s the unvarnished truth.’
‘Straight up?’
‘You betya.’
The interviewer smiled.
‘Let’s finish up with those words Mr. Garland. Several political analysts and marketing and brand experts are describing the term Straight Up – the way you used it as the title for the book that launched the foundation and made you a household name, and now as the slogan defining your campaign – as a masterstroke. You refuse to run negative ads on your opponent, don’t use artificial intelligence, polling or focus groups, don’t give press conferences, don’t use a teleprompter, you speak unscripted... You’ve turned this nomination campaign into a referendum on... honesty.’
‘Well, first off I reckon those so-called experts of yours need to step out of that D.C. bubble, get a breath of fresh air. They’re spending too much time up each other’s ass – behinds. Ain’t nothin’ masterful about the truth. I sure as heck don’t need a swarm of overpaid folks in backrooms, or bean counters dictating what I think, what I say or wear, how to hold my tongue. I tell ’em straight up how it is. If folks agree, Lawd willin’ an’ the creek don’t rise, they might just cast their vote my way. If they figure I’m all hat and no cattle they won’t, and I can’t say I blame ‘em. It’s a free country.’
*****
Bec’s head was pounding as she spilled from the pressure cooker of the Lxxy Club onto the more manageable chaos of Jalan Legian, the strip dissecting Kuta’s most popular nightspots. She and Jay had navigated through clubs with names like Bounty and Sky Garden that hinted at some botanic paradise rather than the mind-numbing musical anarchy and laser light mayhem chased by cheap booze and drugs.
As someone with such a tenuous grip on her demons, Bec struggled to understand why people with nothing to escape would deliberately dance on the cliff edge of emotional chaos.
Paddy’s Pub, where they’d started their search for clues, had the least claim to innocence, thanks to a suicide bomber who walked into the nightclub in 2002 and detonated his backpack. Two hundred people died in that blast and another over the road seconds later, not that you’d know it from the slackness of the security. Jay got light friskings from bouncers outside two of the clubs. Bec and the contents of her handbag sailed through with high-fives.
They had a half hour before their rendezvous with a liaison officer from America’s Drug Enforcement Administration, so grabbed a roadside table at the Mini Restaurant. The one-way procession of cars and motorbikes bordered on gentle after the blasting bass of the clubs, where meaningful conversation was impossible.
Bec ordered a blue margarita – the color Aristotle was chilling in the off-the-shoulder navy dress of a tourist, a stack of surfboards carried on the dreadlocked head of a Balinese beach rat, the lapis lazuli earrings of a petite maître d’ hustling the sidewalk outside the restaurant.
Mentioning Charlie Scott or showing his photo had got them nowhere. Ditto Gusti Suardika. Jay reckoned a Canadian woman flashed recognition but clammed up.
‘No-one wants to be associated with drug users, even dead ones.’
Bec nodded. ‘His death got a lot of coverage here. No shortage of rumors on social media.’
The drinks arrived. The cocktail of blue curacao, tequila and lime juice almost took her head off.
‘One thing I’m surprised about though is the lack of solicitation. You know, for drugs. I thought this place was crawling... Why are you smiling?’
‘I’ve been offered hash, ecstasy, cocaine, a hand-job and something called shabu, which I think is ice.’
‘When? Where?’
‘Cab driver outside the Mini Mart, a security guy while he was padding me down, assuming you’re only interested in the drugs. See that Indonesian guy leaning against the tree outside Surfer Girl, black bag over his shoulder? He’s a seller.’
Bec wasn’t sure if she should be annoyed or elated.
‘Clearly, I don’t look like a buyer. Unlike you!’
Jay held up his Bintang bottle. ‘What can I say?’
Bec took another sip of the cocktail, catching a clump of salt to tone down the bitterness of the lime. The sidewalks were heaving with tank tops, body piercings, wide-eyed teens in beach gear trying to look older, ageing hippies with beer bellies and shaved heads trying to look younger, pale East Europeans just looking stern, with sunglasses perched redundantly on their heads.
An inebriated hen’s party in Union Jack singlets pedaled by on a Bali-beer cycle contraption for the second time, past a Muslim woman peering out from the safety of her burka. Someone was butchering Sweet Caroline in a karaoke bar, drowning out the metallic gongs of a gamelan orchestra rehearsing a few doors down.
Evan Henley, the American drug liaison officer, was where he said he’d be at midnight – upstairs at the Bounty under one of the giant parachutes hanging from the ceiling like shimmering jellyfish. The corner table he’d chosen was marginally quieter than the dance floor, which was teeming with bikini tops, bare chests, hair tossing and air guitaring through a haze of cigarette smoke and blue neon.
There was only one spare seat at the table, so Jay excused himself to try his luck with the bar staff.
Bec realized recording the interview would be pointless, which was presumably why Henley chose this venue to meet. The American had to work alongside officers from the Bali division of Indonesia’s National Narcotics Agency.
‘The Government in Jakarta talks tough on drugs,’ he said. ‘They parade arrested tourists in orange jumpsuits and shackles for the TV cameras, even execute the occasional foreigner. But they give the narcotics agency jack-squat to police a coastline almost three times the size of the US.’
Cheers and whistles greeted the DJ’s introduction of the next song – Living Next Door to Alice. Henley had to wait for the noise to subside.
‘Money means everything on this island. If you’ve got it, you do what you want. The drug lords have obscene wealth and pay the police to look the other way. They control the gangs. The gangs run the distribution networks, the dealers, even the prisons...’
Cause for twenty-four years I’ve been living next door to Alice was the cue for dozens of voices chanting Alice? Who the fuck is Alice?’
Henley leaned further across the table. ‘Corruption’s uncontrollable. The cops know all the dealers, and vice versa. Scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours. How else do you explain why Indonesia’s the biggest drugs market in Asia when the authorities supposedly have orders to shoot dealers and traffickers on sight?’
Bec could see Jay talking to a blond guy in a Bintang singlet beside a large golden birdcage writhing with teenagers. She had to shout across the table to be heard.
‘What can you tell me about the cocaine scene here? How easy is it to get, where does it come from?’
Henley took another sip of his soda, surveyed the nearby tables before answering.
‘Gotta be honest with you here, Ms. Corelli. Cocaine’s yesterday’s news. The real story, the hot story in Bali and the rest of Southeast Asia for that matter, is synthetics. Methamphetamine, ketamine. The meth market alone has ballooned to more than sixty billion dollars a year...’
‘That may be so Mr. Henley, but...’
‘... while the markets for cocaine and heroin have contracted to the point where we’ve had to transition our limited resources to the fight against synthetics.’
‘I hear you Mr. Henley, but our interest here is solely in cocaine, specifically the batch of cocaine that found its way into the bloodstream of...’
‘Let me level with you Ms. Corelli. Sad as it is what happened to your boy Charlie Scott, he’s one grain of sand on a beach. A mighty big beach. You want to waste your time on a single grain, I wish you luck. There’s not much more I can do to help you.’
*****
Mike felt the chill wind off the Atlantic through his down anorak, so could only imagine how cold it must be in the water, even with a wetsuit and hood. He’d taken an early A train from Manhattan to Beach 92nd Street, hoping to catch Charlie Scott’s friend Harvey on his own.
He focused the binoculars on a group of hooded surfers one-hundred-fifty feet or so from the shore, finally recognizing the face that avoided eye contact with him the night before. The kid was pretty good but wiped out a second time and decided to give up. Mike watched him walk along the beach, board balancing on his head, towards the Rockaway Surf Club. He intercepted him as he was putting the board into one of the tall lockers behind the clubrooms.
‘How ya holdin’ up, Harvey?’
The kid did a double-take, and for a moment Mike thought he was going to bolt.
‘Can’t talk to you man,’ he wheezed, scanning the beach. ‘My mom. She’s an attorney. I’ll be, like, grounded forever.’
‘She’ll never know Harvey, I promise. Mr. Scott tells me you and Charlie were tight.’
The kid covered his eyes with his hands, took a couple of deep breaths. When his hands slid down to his mouth, Mike could see he was crying.
‘I’m sorry about what happened in Bali, Harvey. Can’t imagine what you’re going through. But I gotta tell ya, kid, the story I’m working on is not about you. Or your friends Ryan and James. We’re doing this for Charlie, and Charlie’s dad.’
Harvey sniffed, wiped his nose on the sleeve of his wetsuit.
‘Mr. Scott’s solid, a stand-up guy.’
‘And we’re working on this for him Harvey. I’m not sure how much you’ve been told, but Mr. Scott has asked us to follow the trail of the drug Charlie took that night. All the way to its source, to the head of whatever scumbag organization is behind the trafficking. That’s why we need to know where you guys got the coke. So we can head off on our trail. And leave you and Charlie’s parents and sister alone.’
Harvey took another deep breath, then told his story.
Charlie bought the coke off a Balinese guy they met at Padang Padang, and who ended up staying at the resort in Ubud with them. He used the name Lompok. Harvey knew nothing about a Gusti. It was Lompok’s motorbike that Charlie rode to the beach. The coke was pure high-end stuff only Charlie could afford. And it had a name. NuNu. Short for Nube Nueve, which was Spanish for cloud nine.
‘And where can we find this Lompok?’
‘He hangs out at the beaches, working the coast from Uluwatu to Tanah Lot.’
*****
Uluwatu, at the south-western tip of Bali’s Bukit Peninsula, is a magnet for two reasons. The 11th century Hindu temple on the clifftop reels in the tourists, especially for the traditional Kecak dance performances at sunset. Two hundred and thirty feet below the temple lie some of the world’s most legendary surf breaks, powered by monster Southern Ocean swells and south-east trade winds.
Jay and Bec, armed with the names Lompok and NuNu, had begun the day below the temple and made their way north along the coast, through Suluban, Padang Padang, Bingin and Dreamland. After lunch at a restaurant in Jimbaran, they skirted the airport to try their luck at the party beaches of Kuta and Legian.
They got a half-break when Jay spotted a deal going down beside the tourist information booth over the road from the Jayakarta Hotel. He parked the bike beside a fruit vendor and followed the beach boy with dreads through the split gateway onto the crowded beach. He sat in one of the hundreds of loungers lined in front of the cafes, lit a cigarette.
Jay took off his t-shirt, handed it to Bec.
‘I’ll meet you back at the bike.’
He pulled the brim of his cap lower, wandered over and parked himself in the lounger beside Dreads. A waiter appeared, and Jay ordered a Bintang. He kicked off his jandals, stretched out in the sun, closed his eyes, and waited.
Not for long.
Question three, after where are you from and where are you staying, was are you looking?
‘Depends. Looking for what?’
‘Anything and everything. Ecstasy, meth, dope, mushrooms, girls, boys.’
‘I’m more a coke sort of guy.’
‘Definitely doable man. One gram, two gram?’
Jay sat up, swinging his legs over the side of the chair to face Dreads. He glanced around, lowered his voice.
‘A friend was telling me about some special blow he tried called NuNu. Scored it from a Balinese dude. Name of Lompok.’
There was a hint of recognition, before the eyes narrowed in suspicion, and the guy stood to leave.
‘Can’t help you man.’
Jay let him go. He slipped a 20,000-rupiah note under the bottle to pay for the beer and, keeping one eye on Dreads, went back to the bike.
They watched him hail a cab outside the Quicksilver Surf Academy, then followed him on the bike, north through Seminyak and Kerobokan, then back to the coast at Canggu. Dreads got out and walked into the Island Beach Bar.
Jay parked the bike and walked past the Batu Balong Temple onto the beach. Bali had loads of picture postcard places – this wasn’t one of them. Mangy dogs roamed, sniffing at discarded polystyrene cups, plastic bags, coconut shells, candy wrappers, spilt offerings. The faded beach umbrellas looked tired. Even the sand here was a lethargic gray.
Not that it put off the surfers. Boards were stacked like coffins for rent. The sea speckled with hundreds of dots waiting for a wave. A tourist was standing on a surfboard on the sand, holding his arms out as an instructor gave him the lowdown.
Jay spotted Dreads head between two beach shacks. Fingering the zip tie in his pocket, he followed the young man into a shed used for waxing and repairing surfboards. The guy turned, realized his escape route was blocked, braced to fight. Jay stepped closer, lifting the zip tie to his mouth and biting it. The confusion, the momentary slackening of muscles, was all Jay needed.
He attacked one wrist with his left hand, stepping to the side and driving up with his right to drag him off balance, bend the wrist into a lock. Dreads yelped, but before he could react, Jay spun him around, yanked the other arm back and slipped the zip tie over his wrists.
He gradually increased the pressure on the arm until he had his answer: The Nyalahutan resort in Kuta.
Jay stuffed a wetsuit hood in Dreads’ mouth, secured it with surfboard repair tape, then kicked out his legs, dragged him across the concrete floor, tied him to the post holding up the roof.
*****
Rodrigo Montoya surfaced and stroked slowly to the edge of the pool. Far below, beyond the beach and the rolling waves, the Indian Ocean spread to the horizon like a giant blue rug flecked with greens and blacks. He turned, leaned back, stretched his elbows over the side, letting the sun simmer into his shoulders.
He took in the view past the loungers and umbrellas, across the lawn to the arched entranceway over the path leading to the house. Putra appeared on the steps. The bracts on the yellow bougainvillea above the mayordomo’s head were outshining the blues and reds, threatening the equilibrium. Montoya made a mental note to mention it to the gardener.
Putra paused at the entranceway.
‘Call for you, bos.’
‘Who is it?’
‘Meneer Agung. Say it urgent.’
Putra insisted on using the old Dutch colonial honorific when referring to the leader of Kaluraha gang, and anyone else he disapproved of.
‘Tell him I’ll call back in five.’
Putra pressed his palms together in an exaggerated Sembah salute and retreated up the path.
Montoya hauled himself from the pool, pulled on a robe and lit a cigarette, taking several puffs before heading inside to make the call from the study on the second floor.
Agung reported that a New Zealand tourist and American journalist had been asking questions about Lompok and NuNu.
‘And one of my guys in Canggu told them where Lompok lives.’
‘Why would the dungu do that?’
‘To stop the New Zealand bajingan breaking his arm.’
It was almost unheard of for anyone in their right mind to threaten a member of the Kaluraha gang, although a tourist might not realize who or what he was dealing with. Even more concerning to Montoya was the reference to New Zealand.
