“Any idea who it might be? Your physical description could fit half the young men in Miami.”

“True. But fortunately our witness got a license plate number.”

“How did it come back?”

“This is where it gets interesting. It’s a guy named Felipe Broma. He works security for Mayor Mendoza.”

Vince suddenly understood why the detective wanted Alicia out of earshot. “You talked to Broma yet?”

“No.”

“How about the mayor?”

“Not yet.”

“What are you waiting for?”

There was silence on the line, then Barber said, “I’ve been a detective a long time. I listen to my instincts.”

“What are your instincts telling you?”

“There’s only one way to find out what’s really going on here. And talking to the mayor or his bodyguard is not the answer.”

“What are you suggesting?”

“I need to talk to Falcon,” said Barber. “Through you.”

Vince considered it. “Let me see if I can get him talking again. We’ll take it from there.”

“One other thing,” said Barber. “Not a word of this to the mayor’s daughter. Agreed?”

Vince wasn’t entirely sure what the detective had on his agenda, but he wasn’t hot on the idea of keeping secrets from Alicia-at least not without a more compelling explanation from Barber. “Like I say: I’ll see if I can get Falcon talking, and we’ll go from there.”

chapter 35

T hings were finally coming clearer to Falcon.

Even without electricity, enough sunlight seeped into the room to show the faces of all his prisoners. The girl in the bathtub was not the woman he’d originally thought she was, not the past he feared. She was just a girl without a name, like many others he’d known years earlier.

“I think she’s getting a fever,” said Natalia.

“Quiet!” shouted Falcon.

“You should really get her to a doctor,” said Theo.

Falcon glared and said, “I told you before, the doctor has already given his blessing.”

“What the hell doctor are you talking about? Are you a doctor?”

“Do I look like a doctor?”

“From my HMO? Absolutely.”

Falcon shot him an angry look. “I’ve met clowns like you before, always getting in their little jokes. The minute I let my guard down, you sneaky bastards go right for the gun.”

He glanced at the girl in the tub, then turned and started pacing across the room again. No food, no money, no necklace. Swyteck had told him that they had the necklace, but now it would be more difficult than ever to work out a delivery. The big-mouthed black guy had screwed up everything by telling the cops about the magic coat. Who in their right mind would come near the hotel room?

The girl in the tub groaned. Natalia said, “She’s definitely getting a fever.”

“She needs a doctor,” said Theo.

“Shut up!” he shouted, thrusting the gun toward Theo. “I’ve had it with you. Enough already!”

Falcon could feel the heat rising. It was as if someone had switched on the furnace, which he knew wasn’t possible. Or was it? The cops could have been pumping hot air through the AC ducts. They’d already turned off the water and the electricity, so why not turn the place into an oven? He crossed the room and pressed his hand to the vent. He felt nothing, save for the sweat that continued to run down his face. How people in Miami survived in these concrete boxes before air-conditioning was beyond him. There was something to be said for living in a car with the windows busted out. If you got cold, you put on a coat. When it turned hot, you took the coat off. Not this time, however. Not this coat.

The coat stayed on.

There was a whimper from the bathroom, then a sustained groan. Falcon knew the sound of pain, but he was impervious to it. That was not exactly true. Once upon a time, he had thought himself to be impervious to it. He’d failed to realize that every grunt, every groan, every shrill scream in the night had seeped right through the psychological walls that he’d built around his conscience. For years, he’d kept them locked in the basement, but they kept creeping up the stairs and knocking on the cellar door until the locks finally broke. The memories came flooding back to him. They were no longer his past. They had become his every waking hour-his past, present, and future.

“She needs a doctor,” he heard someone say, but it only confused him further. The present was mirroring the past. Or the past was coloring the present. His mind could no longer distinguish between the two, and he was suddenly returning to the basement, trapped with his memories.

“ARE YOU LOOKING for the Virgin?” asked El Oso.

The question had the intended effect. Prisoner 309, the young woman with child, was well acquainted with the horrors that had unfolded at the feet of the Virgin Mary. A gang rape before the statue of the Blessed Virgin was a particularly effective way of telling a subversive young woman just how far she had strayed from acceptable behavior.

El Oso acknowledged her fear by telling her not to worry. “The Virgin is not here,” he said, his voice laden with a perverse satisfaction. “There are no virgins left at la casa de la bruja.”

He pushed her forward, and they continued to the end of a long, dark hallway. Her belly was way out in front of her; she had to be due any day. El Oso stopped and unlocked the metal door. The moment it opened, a sharp scream pierced the darkness. It sounded like a woman, but El Oso knew it was a man. It was something the guards liked to tell jokes about, the way men could be made to scream like girls.

“Would you like to watch?” he said. They were standing outside the room, as yet unable to see inside. Party music was blaring from a radio, a tune strangely at odds with what was obviously going on in there.

The young woman shook her head.

“Are you sure you don’t want to see?” he said. “It could be someone you know.”

It was a possibility that she seemed unwilling to consider, but he could see her defenses breaking down. They always did. Instinct may have cautioned that it was better not to know, but in the end, the prisoners craved answers.

“Come, let’s have a look.” He was speaking softly but not out of concern. The insincerity was palpable, and it pleased him to see the heightened anxiety in her eyes. He nudged her forward, and there was another scream from inside the room. This one was so loud and lasted so long that even El Oso stopped to listen. It ceased only when the prisoner had no more voice, no more ability to express his suffering.

Had to be the testicles, thought El Oso.

The party music continued to play.

“I don’t want to go in there,” said the woman.

“That’s not important.”

“No, please. Don’t make me go.”

“It’s your only chance. In a minute, he’ll be crying for his mama. They always cry for their mamas.”

The tears started to come. Her body trembled. “I don’t want to see.”

“That doesn’t matter.”

“Who’s in there?”

“The enemy.”

“What’s his name?”

“He has no name.”

He pulled her forward, but she resisted. “I can’t go in there!”

A slap across the face silenced her. Then he jerked her by the arm with so much force that she slammed into the wall. In her advanced state of pregnancy, her balance was not what it might have been. With another quick shove from behind, she stumbled through the open doorway. She collided with the counter, which rattled the guards’ empty beer bottles, and then she fell to the floor.

“Look, woman!” one of the guards shouted. “See who’s on the grill now.”

The grill was a metal table in the center of the room. A male prisoner was strapped to it, completely naked and flat on his back. The soles of his feet were purple and swollen. A guard stood at the foot of the table with a length of hardwood, ready to swing it at the prisoner’s arches like a baseball bat. Another guard tended to the electric transmitter and several strands of wire that ran directly to the prisoner’s torso and genitals. His chest and stomach were dotted with black burn marks. His testicles were grotesquely discolored and three times their normal size.