Chapter 48 Just in Time
Just in Time
Some people lose their temper when they are angry.
These people allow their anger to simply take over, and it begins making decisions on their behalf. That means they can be dangerous, even violent, but at the same time predictable and easy to manipulate.
Osvaldo Salazar was not that kind of person.
When he became angry, which happened only rarely, an icy calm would settle in his chest as on the surface of a frozen lake, giving him an extraordinary clarity of mind. This, of course, made him an even more dangerous adversary than usual.
And at that moment, Osvaldo Salazar was very angry.
Everything had seemed under control. The money had been in their hands, and they’d been well set to get away from the island—only for everything to flip in an instant.
He’d been forced to leave the money behind and scuttle back to the beach with his tail between his legs, one of his men wounded, and his pride crushed.
Only to learn that, although the sensible move, it had actually been totally unnecessary.
The two trembling teenagers now trailing along behind him had revealed the truth.
It had been two men, three at most, who had put them to flight.
A couple of nickel-and-dime lighthouse keepers armed with hunting rifles had made Osvaldo Salazar, the Scorpion of Cali himself, flee.
If anyone ever found out about it, the stain on his honor would be irreparable.
Fury and shame came flooding in, but he managed to keep them locked under the ice sheet.
To make things worse, Chuco, the skipper, had vanished along with the speedboat’s keys. All they’d found was a pile of trampled cigarette butts and a half-empty beer bottle. The ground of the island had seemingly opened up and swallowed him whole.
The gunmen behind Osvaldo maintained a wary silence. They knew not to bother him at such moments.
Osvaldo raised his pistol and fired two shots into the air, the sudden burst of noise echoing off the facade of the lighthouse before ebbing away.
“You in there!” he cried. “Show yourselves!”
There was no response. Nor was he surprised. But at least they knew he was there.
“Python.” Osvaldo turned to his lieutenant. “Is the package ready?”
“Nearly, chief.” Python took off his bulky backpack. “Nearly there.”
One of the principal reasons Osvaldo had survived so long in his chosen field was his ability to adapt to changing circumstances.
As they’d been making their way up to the lighthouse, he’d spotted a small, corrugated shed in a roadside field, inside which someone had left a couple of sacks of ammonium nitrate—fertilizer, for when the land came to be plowed.
The interesting thing about ammonium nitrate is that, when combined with a few other ingredients, it can easily be converted into a powerful explosive known as ANFO—ammonium nitrate and fuel oil.
It had long been a go-to bomb component for terrorists all around the world.
Osvaldo himself had made car bombs with the stuff in Colombia during the widespread violence there during the late 1990s.
So, as he watched Python carefully dousing the fertilizer with some gasoline from a can they’d taken from the speedboat, he allowed himself a momentary sense of satisfaction. He might yet come out on top.
Python finished mixing and carefully inserted one end of the improvised detonator—a long copper wire—into the top of the backpack. He connected the other end to a battery—only one of the terminals, though. The second that circuit was closed, the devastating bomb would blow.
“All done, chief.”
“Now it just needs placing,” Osvaldo said, nodding to the front door of the lighthouse. “Go on, off you go.”
“Me?”
“That shit must weigh like a hundred pounds! You’re the strongest. Come on, man up, off you go!”
Python sighed but made no further protest. It meant crossing a considerable stretch of open ground with a hundred pounds of high explosives on his back, but ultimately, that was his job.
He might not be a man of many scruples, but his bravery was beyond question.
Without giving it too much thought, he slung the backpack over one shoulder and set off at a run.
To his relief, he made it to the door unscathed. He propped the backpack against the door and, having paid out the electric cable, dashed back to the ditch in which the others were now bunkered.
“Good work.” Osvaldo patted Python on the shoulder as he handed over the battery. “Let’s give them a final warning before we ring the doorbell.”
Osvaldo got up and walked to the center of the open ground in front of the lighthouse. He was totally exposed but at the same time felt strangely calm and alert.
“Listen up! We’ve just laid enough explosives to blow the door all the way to Pontevedra! You’ve got two minutes to come out with the money.”
Once again, absolute silence was the only response.
“We can still do this the easy way,” he said. “Give me the money, and I’ll let you live. If you make us come in there, we won’t be going easy on you.”
His words sounded muffled through the wooden planks boarding up the windows. In Pazos’s room, Roberto and Antía exchanged an apprehensive look.
“What do we do?” she said.
“Hand over the money.” Roberto shook his head. “We have no choice.”
“Fuck that,” gasped Ibaibarriaga, growing paler by the minute. “We’re safe in here. They can’t get in.”
“Didn’t you hear?” Roberto turned to him. “They’re about to blow the door. Then, if the blast doesn’t kill us, they’ll finish us off in no time. We have to give them the money!”
“Besides,” Antía added, nodding to Ibaibarriaga’s wound, “that blood isn’t slowing down. You’re in need of urgent medical attention, or you’re done for.”
“You can patch me up.” Ibaibarriaga was bathed in sweat, but there was still a gleam in his eye. “Like you did Pazos.”
“He’s dead,” Antía said quietly. “He went just now.”
“Dead?”
“I’m not a doctor, and I don’t have the right things!” she exploded. “If you don’t want to end up like Pazos, we have to settle this thing.”
Ibaibarriaga cast an incredulous glance at Pazos’s lifeless body. A guttural wail of grief rose from deep in his throat.
“Where’s the money?” Roberto said.
“In my room, under the bed,” Ibaibarriaga whimpered. His eyes were growing dim.
“I’m going to get it.”
“Roberto, wait!” Antía grabbed his arm, but before she could say any more, a shrill beeping struck up. They both looked over at Ibaibarriaga, who was struggling to unzip his jacket.
“What’s that?”
“It’s the security cameras at the front gate. They’ve picked up some movement. Someone’s coming.” He held out a device reminiscent of a large cell phone. A black-and-white image showed a large group of people surging through the front gates at that very moment.
“Thank goodness,” sighed Roberto. “Just in time.”
Antía looked over his shoulder and gasped in surprise. “No way!”
“There you have it.” Roberto gave a relieved smile. “The Docampos and Freires side by side. The Colombians didn’t see this coming.”
“Helena and Tristán,” Antía said. “They’re here for them.”
“The families might not be the best of friends,” Roberto said, “but there’s one thing they hate even more: an outsider who’s dumb enough to make a common enemy of himself. They’re actually very closely knit. And right now, they seem pretty pissed.”
“You knew this was going to happen!” Antía marveled. “This was part of your plan!”
“It wasn’t so hard to foresee.” Roberto shrugged. “I’ve seen it plenty of times in rural societies: They have their differences, but when the chips are down, they pull together. Ons isn’t so different from the rest of the world, after all.”
“So what next?”
“You stay with Ibaibarriaga,” he said, hobbling toward the front door. “And when I give you the word, tell Diego to bring the money out to me.”
“What are you going to do?”
Roberto smiled at her, as it struck him this might be the last time he ever set eyes on her. But he kept that to himself.
“I’m going to talk movies with Osvaldo,” he said. “I hope he’s into cinema.”
And without another word, he turned and went down the hallway.