“Ex-wife,” Silas barked. “Most definitely ex.”
Esperanza laughed at this. To Becca, the sound was something akin to bones rattling in a wooden box.
“This is your wife?” she asked.
“Ex. She’s my ex-wife,” he said. “Don’t let her get into your head. You’ll never get that mess untangled if you do. Trust me.”
“And she’s here. Right now. Where our suspect is supposed to be?” Becca felt a growl of irritation rumbling up from her gut, but she suppressed it. Either this guy was more involved in Andrea Alvarez’s murder than he claimed or he was trying to sabotage her investigation.
“I know what you’re thinking,” he said.
“I don’t think you do.”
“It’s not like that. Before you start accusing me of tipping her off to this Garcia bloke, think again. I haven’t seen or spoken to Essie in nearly seventy-five years. In Berlin.”
“Seventy-fi…” She stopped and looked at the beautiful Latina woman standing just three feet away from them. Surely, she would correct him. Surely, this woman, who obviously knew Silas, would shed some light on his delusion.
“Oh, you’ve always had such a horrible memory, Ankou,” Esperanza said, clucking her tongue at him like a disapproving school teacher. “It wasn’t Berlin. It was in Belize. And it was forty-eight years ago.” Her eyes narrowed. “You took one of mine at the time, if you remember.”
You’ve got to be kidding me, Becca thought. She’s as crazy as Silas! Neither of the two could have been older than their mid-thirties. No way they could have been in Belize forty-eight years ago. Unless…No, Becca. Don’t you even start down that road.
“Now wait just a minute,” Silas said, stepping toward the woman and pointing his non-gun-finger at her. “Sergio Nasgucci was not one of yours. There is no yours or mine. Once someone’s ticket is up, that’s it. Neither of us have any control of that…no matter what you’ve convinced your devotees to believe.”
“Devotees?” Becca was losing control of the situation in a bad way.
“Yeah,” Silas said, pointing to the hideous skeleton statue in the center of the room. “That’s not me. That’s her.”
“Her?”
“Yes. Allow me to introduce the two of you,” he said. “Chief Becca Cole, meet her Glorious Highness of the Narco drug cartels themselves, Nuestra Señora de la Santa Muerte. Or, simply Santa Muerte, if you like. The cartels revere her. Worship her even. They believe she’ll keep them from harm at the hands of police officers such as yourself.” He looked at the woman and gestured to Becca. “Honey Bumpkin, meet Becca Cole. She’s a cop. A good one, by all accounts. And together, we’re investigating the death of a woman found on the beach in Summer Haven. An unscheduled death, I might add. And one of your devotees has been named as a suspect. We’re here to talk to him.”
He squared off against her, his eyes flashing in a silent challenge against the woman. For her part, Esperanza didn’t back down.
“So, an unscheduled death, eh?” She grinned at him. Her smile was cruel, nothing like Silas’s usual cheeriness at all. “So, it’s true. I’d heard you were losing your edge.”
“Are you going to introduce us to your stooge or what?”
Yep. I’m definitely losing control.
Fortunately, it seemed that Silas Mot—or as Lady Death called him, Ankou—had recovered from the surprise appearance of his ex and was back on track. And from the sound of things, it all went back to what he’d told her in her office. People were dying and he had no idea why. Esperanza seemed pleased with the turn of events, which put her up a notch or two on Becca’s own suspect list.
“Why should I?” Esperanza asked. “He worships me. Far more than you ever did, mi esposa. Why shouldn’t I just have the both of you killed now where you stand?”
Several guns cocked from the shadowy corners of the room. In response, Becca swept her own gun around, searching for targets. A large man holding a pump shotgun stood just inside the doorway from which they’d entered the chamber. Two more appeared from another door at the back. Both appeared to be holding H&K MP5 submachine guns.
“Oh, come on, Essie,” Silas said. “You know they can’t hurt me.”
The woman shrugged. “Can’t they? I’m not so sure.”
Silas edged closer to her. “Don’t try me, Esperanza. You won’t win.”
The Latina woman shrugged. “Even if they can’t harm you, they can definitely hurt your new girlfriend here.” She nodded at Becca.
“First of all, I’m not his girlfriend,” Becca said. She wasn’t certain who to point her gun at first, so she opted for Esperanza’s head instead. If these gangbangers really did worship the woman as some type of death goddess, maybe they’d think twice about attacking if she could get hurt. “If they kill us, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement and every agency in northeast Florida will be down on your gang faster than you can blink.”
Silas glanced around, his eyes tracking each of the newcomers like a predator about to pounce.
“Esperanza, call them off,” he said. “No one here has to die tonight.”
“How would you know? Aren’t you losing a grip on your kingdom, Ankou?”
“Not by a long shot.” He spun around, whipped out his ridiculous finger gun, and pointed it at the shotgun-wielding thug near the entrance to the foyer. “Bang,” he whispered, bringing his thumb down.
The man dropped and fell into convulsions before gasping for one last breath and going still. His gun clattered to the floor. A split second later, the two goons with the MP5s gargled gasping breaths and fell to the floor along with their companion.
Esperanza screamed.
“No!” She ran over to the shotgun-wielding man, crouched down, and scooped up his head into her lap. “They’re mine, Ankou! They’re all mine.” She stroked the man’s shaved head with delicate fingers. “Bring them back.” She looked up at Silas. Tears ran down her cheeks. “Please.”
Becca couldn’t believe what she was seeing. Silas had simply pointed at the man and he collapsed. The others too. They had died right in front of her. The way it all went down was just as she imagined a Grim Reaper would be able to do.
No. Get your head out of that rabbit hole. It’s obviously a trick.
But in her gut, the seasoned police officer knew it wasn’t. The inability of Larry, one of her rookies, to properly handcuff the man. His disappearance from his secured holding cell. And now this. It was true. Silas Mot really was Death.
“Why should I?” Silas’s good-natured attitude was completely absent now and had been replaced by cold, but calculated fury. “They’d simply try to kill Chief Cole again and I can’t have that.”
“No! I swear it. Bring them back and I’ll offer both of you safe passage while you’re here.”
“That’s what I wanted to hear,” Silas said. “And you will also take us to Garcia without any more games?”
The woman nodded.
His face still deathly solemn, he walked over to the shotgun man, bent down, and touched his forehead. The man jolted upright at his touch, gasping and coughing for breath. The others were revived as well, though they still lay motionless on the floor as if in shock from their experience.
“As I told you, Essie…there was no need for anyone to die this afternoon. Returning their lives was of no consequence to my station.” Silas stood and reached out a hand to her. When she took it, he helped her to her feet. The gunman laid his head back down on the concrete floor and continued to heave for breath. “Still, they won’t be exactly mobile for several hours more, I’d say.”
Then, Silas turned to look at Becca.
“You’re…you’re…” She couldn’t quite form the words.
His bright smile returned. “I told you,” he said before popping another piece of candy into his mouth. “Now, how about we have that meeting with the Santero, Jacinto Garcia.”