Scott bailed off the flatcar first. They were on the north side of Nuevo Laredo, and the train was lumbering through a curve at about twenty-five miles an hour. Scott jumped to-ward the outside of the turn so the engineer wouldn't see him. Despite what Benny had said, he still had trouble be-lieving that the engineer didn't care at all who got on and off his train.
Scott tucked and rolled as best he could, clinched his teeth, and wrapped his arms around his head, but the ground was hard-packed dirt and rocks and it hurt. When he finished rolling, Scott looked up just in time to see Benny leap off the train. She hit hard and for a minute he was afraid she'd broken her neck. Then he saw her moving.
Scott stood up and his knee almost gave out. He'd wrenched it when he hit the ground. He tried to walk it off, but it still hurt. When Benny stood up, she had grass and dirt stuck to her face and in her hair. Scott laughed.
She glared at him. "What?"
"I like your camouflage."
She brushed off her face and ran her fingers through her thick black hair. Then she said something in Spanish and aimed her middle finger at him. He didn't need a translation.
Scott watched the train rumble and clank its way down the tracks. "I still can't believe no one stopped us at the bor-der."
"Your government doesn't care what goes into Mexico," she said. "Only what comes out."
"What about your government?"
"They don't care either way. As long as they get paid."
Scott glanced around. "Which way?"
She pointed south and they started walking. Scott's knee still hurt. "How far to the market?" he asked.
"Two or three miles."
"Any taxis out here?"
"No," she said.
They kept walking.
* * * *
It turned out they only had to walk a mile before Scott was able to flag down a taxi. They rode the rest of the way in a hot, dusty Toyota with no AC and Mariachi music blar-ing from an old portable cassette player wedged between the dashboard and the windshield.
The Zaragoza Mercado was a sprawling open-air market: a hodgepodge of tents, stalls, and trailers, jammed together to form a crosshatch of narrow, twisting aisles, all teeming with shoppers. At the edge of the market, Scott saw an old man with skin like dried leather unloading crates of vegeta-bles from a donkey cart.
Benny smiled when she saw the market. It was clear she had fond memories of this place. Scott hated to interrupt them. But duty called. "Where are you supposed to meet them?" he asked.
"There was a stall." She pointed a hesitant finger. "That way. I think. Where tío used to buy me cookies."
"You think it's still there?"
"That was a long time ago," Benny said. "But even if it's not there anymore, tío and Rosalita will be close by."
They entered the mercado and walked past dozens of vendors hawking leather goods, clothes, hats, dishes, tools, furniture, meat and fish, fresh produce, natural remedies to a variety of ailments, including impotence and infertility, beer, and tequila. Lots of tequila. Somewhere in the middle of the market, Benny hesitated at the intersection of a pair of me-andering aisles. She glanced back and forth.
"What's wrong?" Scott asked.
"I'm not sure which..."
A steady throb, like a distant drumbeat, reached Scott's ears, but the market pressed in so close on all sides that he couldn't tell from which direction the sound came. He stepped into the middle of the intersection and scanned what he could see of the sky. Then he saw it. Half a mile out to his right, a Black Hawk helicopter at a thousand feet and flying straight toward them.
Benny saw it too. "How did they find us?"
Scott took Benny's hand and turned down the aisle that ran perpendicular to the direction of the helicopter. And froze. Ahead of them, he caught a glimpse of a black Chev-rolet Suburban cruising the outer edge of the market. They had already been boxed in. There was nowhere they could run and not be seen by either the men in the helicopter or in the Suburban. But if they couldn't run, maybe they could walk. Maybe they could get lost in the crowd.
They strolled down another aisle, careful not to outpace the other shoppers. Soon they passed an old man with a table full of hats for sale. Scott dropped an American twenty on the table and picked up a traditional Mexican straw sombre-ro, with a conical crown and a wide brim that curved upward at the edge. He put the hat on while they walked.
The helicopter was behind them, getting louder and closer. They reached a wide aisle that ran through the center of the market. It was more of a service lane and wide enough for a car or a small truck. They turned right and kept moving, still maintaining a leisurely pace. Fifty yards later, an identical service lane crossed the one they were on. The intersection formed a small circular plaza in the center of the market. Food vendors ringed the plaza.
Straight ahead, at the far end of the service lane, Scott saw another black Suburban turn into the market, heading toward them and accelerating. The lane was barely wide enough for the big American SUV, and people jumped out of its way. Several women screamed and some of the bolder men threw things at the Suburban.
Scott angled Benny toward a nearby bench.
"You want to sit down?" Benny said, surprised. "Now?"
He took a seat and pulled her close beside him, close enough so that her face was under the brim of his sombrero.
* * * *
Marcus stood in the open side doorway of the Black Hawk, hanging onto a nylon strap with one hand and press-ing a pair of Canon 12x36 image-stabilization binoculars against his eyes with the other, scanning the Zaragoza Mer-cado for his targets. He could see the two Chevy Suburbans prowling the market, each leaving a throng of angry people in its wake.
"Have you found them yet," Jones barked into Marcus's headset.
"Still looking," Marcus said.
"For fuck's sake," Jones said, "how hard can it be to find one goddamned American in a market full of Mexi-cans?"
"Harder than you might think, especially from a thou-sand feet," Marcus said. "If you can do better, you're wel-come to come up here and take over." He knew he was go-ing to catch hell from Gavin for the crack, but he didn't care. He was sick of that CIA pogue.
"At ease with that," Gavin cut in. "Stick to the mis-sion."
"What is the mission?" Marcus asked. "Are we here for a pickup or a cancellation?"