Chapter 2

Five minutes later the camera was running and she was holding a mic in my face. She had made the introductions all around.

"What can you tell us about your Niece's disappearance."

"I can tell you this much, it is our opinion that she didn't leave here willingly. Mike and I are going to be taking a hard look at things. I can't tell you what the cops find but I can tell you what we find. I can also tell you who cooperates and who doesn't. Right now the Mexican police are being very helpful. We are sharing the information we come up with but don't expect them to share with us. They have a prosecution to consider. We just have to find Shelly."

"So you are getting all the cooperation you need."

"Not by a long shot. We have been stonewalled by the resort security people. I'm not sure if is a misguided underling or if the resort itself is trying to protect it's image. I frankly don't care who or what it is. I just want the information. I want to be able to interview the hotel staff and gain information from the security cameras of other hotels for the same time period. If I can't do that, and the police can't share, then I'm going to begin to lose patience with all these people."

"What does that mean?"

"Silvia, it means what it means. Nothing more or less." I walked away at that point.

"Mr. Eagle what do you think."

"I think you need to get that mic out of my face." He walked away as well. Meg left with him. Silvia was left to wrap up the interview as best she could.

"You didn't ask the cops for those tapes next door?"

"No, I want to make sure that we see them first."

"Do you trust anyone at all?" It was Meg who asked.

"Hell, I trust you?" I smiled.

Mike and I prowled around the grounds of the Holy Ridge Hotel. "Looks like they all have the same camera system."

"No doubt designed as a package system." Mike made notes and I memorized things of interest.

"You do know we were followed."

"Of course, I wouldn't have it any other way, for now at least. Let's go have a glass of lemonade and see what happens next."

The lemonade was perfect, just as it was in Shelley's hotel. It was made with fresh lemons, sugar, ice and carbonated water. It was made one glass at a time. It must have been a resort trademark. When the waitress came back I expected a bill at least. Instead she said, "Mr. Burke. Mr Sanchez would like to speak with you Sir."

"Now that is a much more pleasant invitation that the last one he sent. Not to mention the bearer is much prettier. When and where would he like this meeting?"

"Now if it is convenient." She turned to look toward a table in a far corner. The man seated there was either neither English nor American. He might have been half Spanish or maybe something more exotic.

She took my lemonade glass with her as she left. "If I'm not back by dark, send out the mounties." Mike understood, Meg pretended to. I was expecting Mike to explain it to her.

Sanchez stook as I approached. "Deacon Burke," I said extending my hand.

"Marco Sanchez," I seated myself after the handshake. "I have certainly been hearing a lot about you."

"All bad I hope."

"As a matter of fact it was. Of course Colonel Estaban was the source."

"His version is probably one sided but also probably factually accurate."

"Then the Mexican police called with news that you were hold up in the American consulate with the tapes. Nice move by the way. Pretty much put us in checkmate."

"I do try," was my only response.

"My son didn't even speak to your niece after the group left." He was looking down at the table.

"Then you have nothing to fear. I am not going to railroad anyone. I just want my niece back. I'm kinda partial to family."

"I could move my son off the resort."

"If he had anything to do with Shelley's disappearance, there is no where he can hide." I looked hard at the boys father.

"They tell me that."

"Oh who tells you that?"

"People, who know people, say the best thing for me to do is to cooperate or kill you."

"Sounds like very good advice."

"With so much media around, killing you would be a bit inconvenient."

"Trust me, it would be anyway."

"That is neither here nor there. I have decided to instruct all the security personal to cooperate and to suggest that the hotel managers to do the same."

"That should make this much easier and also end it more quickly. That is what we all want."

"Yes and of course in exchange you will call off Fox News."

"Tell you what I'll do. I will tell them every day how well the police and the resort cooperates. Now the truth shall set you free."

"You won't object if I make a statement to the press informing them of what I have told you."

"Not at all, I would also that the time to state that I had hired a new security chief."

"You want me to fire Estaban?"

"You want to get rid of the stigma of trying to bullshit us don't you. It's the only way."

"I can see the logic in that. Okay he is gone."

So much for loyalty, I thought but I said. "Good, I do hope your son wasn't involved." I meant it.

"He wasn't."

"Good, then our relationship should stay friendly."

"It isn't friendly," he replied.

"I know." I smiled as I stood to return to Mike and Meg.

"So did he poison you?"

"Are you kidding, I wouldn't eat or drink with that prick. He just sold Estaban down the river. He has no loyalty."

"Well Estaban was a liability." Meg said that. She was beginning to understand, or she always did and just looked lost.

"Yes he was. He spent four days stonewalling my brother."

"I don't know about that, but I do know one thing. He can't read people well. Even I could tell that you were going to bury him. I knew it the moment he opened his mouth." Meg was becoming more likeable by the second.

"Ah my little freedom fighter," Mike was the one who tossed that into the mix. I had known it but had never mentioned it. Meg just looked pissed.

"Don't you ever use that tone around or about me." She had suddenly become angry. I thought that most likely she was relaxing enough to be herself.

"Let's go flex our new muscles." I said it as I stood to leave. I left the tip since it was my party. I went looking for a check.

"Hey, we need a check so we can pay." I suggested it to our Spanish waitress. The waitress spoke to Meg in Spanish. I'm sure she spoke english just fine but she chose to avoid talking to me.

"She said there is no check. Seems you have become the resorts new VIP."

"Well then tell her I said thanks." The three of us drove to the hotel on the far side of the strip mall adjacent to Shelley's hotel.

The hotel security office was also inside the lobby. It was behind a small door just like the hotel where Shelley had stayed. "Hi there, my name is Deacon Burke and I would like to view your security tapes from five nights ago. The night my niece disappeared."

"I can't do that without permission from the head of security for the resort." she said to Meg. She didn't speak enough english to have said that to me. She probably did but it seemed that everyone knew Meg was the one to speak to.

"Then make the call," I suggested.

Less than five minutes later she had the tapes tape from the camera we wanted to see cued up. The camera showed part of the parking lot and the side of the building. It also showed the dark patch that was the natural area that every hotel used as a screen between it's beach and the next building. In that hotel's case it was the strip mall. As Mike had predicted the lights of a car suddenly appeared through the trees. The lights moved then disappeared.

"So she could be anywhere."

"I'm afraid so Deacon," Mike replied.

"Mike someone called another person to drive into that parking lot. Then he goes to presumably a different car and drove away. Any way you cut it this is a conspiracy of some kind."

"Concentrate on the lost hour Deacon. She was somewhere in that hotel doing something."

"It's getting dark. Let's call the police to see if we can do the luminal thing. I want to do the questioning of the hotel staff at about the same time that Shelley disappeared."

The Mexican police met us in the lobby of the hotel. Five of us went out into the night to spray the building. It took a few minutes to spray it with nothing but flashlights to aid in our task. The hotel had killed all the outside lights so that we could check for occult blood. When the black lights hit the building, we found only a few blood spots.

"It could have been anything," the Mexican crime lab man suggested.

"Yes it could," I agreed.

"So Mike," I asked after the cops had gone. "What do you think?"

"Gut feeling?"

"Sure," I replied.

"I think it is in the wrong place for someone with a cut finger. Too high for a kid and an adult would have tried everything to avoid contact with that wall. My guess is bloody body part rubbing against he wall."

"So how about the matted grass behind the strip mall?"

"The body was laid there to wait for the car. Hell Deacon, I don't know. The grass is for sure matted and not yet come back to life. The blood is more speculation than anything else."

"I'm confused but then you are the big brain here not me."

"The lost hour is the secret. Whatever happened to here from midnight till that car pulled into the parking lot holds all the answers."

"Okay if that blood outside is Shelley's then she was dead or dying when she left the hotel. Most likely she was being carried. Is that how you see it?"

"If that is her blood yes."

"Okay, then somewhere in this hotel on Friday morning saw something out of the ordinary. It's time to start talking to people."

"I agree. Let's begin with the people who worked that night."

Meg and I were speaking to a bartender when the night manager came over. "Hi, do you have permission to question our employees. They have already spoken to the police."

"Well you can call your manager if you like, but I assure you I do indeed have permission."

"I'm not going to wake him up at this time of night. So you will just have to wait until tomorrow."

"No, I need to do this now."

"I said you can't talk to these people."

"Now you listen to me. You can call the manager, you can call the police, but I wouldn't try to stop me yourself. If you call your guards, they are going to have to use force. That isn't going to look good on the eleven o'clock news in the states." I had not threatened him with physical force but I did not intend to be stopped from interviewing people. If it came to putting the pudgy night manager in the hospital I could handle that as well.

While he went away to decide what to do, I asked the bartender what he could remember about that night. Anything out of the ordinary. Truth is I asked Meg and she asked the bartender. I know they all spoke some english but I wanted them to give her all the details. She could translate a damn site better than they could.

He couldn't tell me anything. I was almost ready to move on to the next one when it hit me. If the guy wasn't staying in the hotel and they didn't leave, most likely he used her room key to get her out of sight or she led him back there. Either way it was a good chance that they had been in the room.

It was my good fortune that no one had rented the room since Shelley had gone missing. The cops didn't much like the idea of bringing the luminal back to the hotel but they did. The bed was clean. It had most likely been cleaned and maybe even changed. There were blood drops on the carpet. Someone had tried to clean them but you can't fool luminal. The spots led to the bathroom.

"Not enough blood for a murder," Mike said.

"They don't always bleed."

"Check the drains in the bathroom." The luminal glowed in the bathroom sink. It showed up in the crack around the drain."

"It could have been here for weeks," the policeman said.

"If you believe in coincidence," Mike replied.

We were in the bar drinking coffee when Mike began again. "Okay, she meets someone between the ladies room and the front door." I nodded. "Obviously she knows him or he puts a weapon on her."

He gets her to take him to her room. Once there he most likely raped her and at least injured her." I suggested.

"Didn't have to be rape Deacon."

"True." I thought about it a minute then asked. "Who was the only other person at the table who never showed at the disco."

"The manager's son."

"God damn it Mike, we didn't look to see him leave the hotel. If he left alone as he claims he is going to be on the tape."

"Crap, how could both of us not have looked."

"I still have jet lag."

"Me to, lets look at them in the morning. We can go back to the consulate."

"Why not just use the originals."

"I think, I trust the consulate version."

Somehow we all overslept that next morning. It was ten before everyone was up and moving. I might not have made it even then if my brother hadn't called to check on my progress. Breakfast was eggs at the hotel. It had become habit to take our meals there and to always asked questions. I never really stopped thinking about Shelley.

It was a different Marine guard who held us at the entrance. In the end a different unnamed man showed us the tape. He showed it to us only after he called on the phone. My guess was that he called the man from the first night.

Mike spotted the son of the manager leaving the hotel at twelve thirty. It was plenty of time for him to have done whatever was done to Shelley before she was moved from the hotel. But then what? He didn't show up on the tape again.

"He moved his car next door, then he came back into under the camera."

"So why isn't he on the tape from that side looking camera?" I asked.

"He is," Mike suggested. "Take a look." He backed the tape up to the point that a ghost image fogged the screen for a second no more.

"What the fuck?" I asked.

"The camera take very slow shots in that light. He just ran like hell across that small strip. This kid knows those cameras." He saw my look of confusion. "He couldn't run like that with Shelley so he had the car blind the camera. But he knew he could blur it by sudden movements. Those cameras are set for people getting in and out of cars not the hundred yard dash."

"Can they do something to ID him?"

"I'm no expert but I bet these guys can find one." He said it referring to the consulate staff.

"Yeah but I'll have to send it to Washington," the unnamed man suggested.

"Any chance you can just email a frame of it?" Mike asked that.

"I expect it would be better for them to have the tape."

In the car on the way back to the resort Mike asked, "So what do we do now?"

"I expect the best thing we can do is to just talk to the maid who cleaned Shelley's room. Then maybe grab the kid up and talk to him."

"I'll stay for the maid, but I'm taking Meg and leaving after. I want nothing to do with you interrogating the boy."

"That was always the deal." I had known it all along and wasn't surprised at all.

"Speak for yourself Mike. I signed on for it all and I'm staying until the end."

"Meg you better go. The end might be a Mexican jail."

"I can do jail for a bit as long as it isn't life. I don't see you letting it come to that."

"It is true that life in a Mexican jail isn't in my plans, but you never know. It might take a little more convincing than I would like. He does speak english so you really don't need to be here for it."

"Well let's say you never know where the facts may take you."

"I have always said you can't force a woman to do anything." I said it as a surrender with honor.

"Then I guess I am in to. I'm not going to let you send Meg off to jail."

"Mike this isn't going to be clean and pretty."

"Deacon, why exactly do you think I wanted to leave. I know what it is going to be. I'm in."

"You two can work on your tan while I do some recon work." I had packed the laptop and the slightly above average digital camera. It was my surveillance gear. In daylight it is harder to hide while looking, but at night it is harder to see. I always used the hide in plain view method of camouflage during the daylight hours. All I planned to do was to see if the kid had a security detail. If I was his father, and I knew my reputation, I would have the kid locked in a vault.

Finding the large bungalow where the resort manager lived was easy. It was also impossible to get inside on such short notice. There was an iron fence around the place but since the space on the resort was at a premium the compound was small. I walked around it making note of the cameras locations. I shot pictures of them with what I hoped was an invisible camera. After I had been completely around the area, I pressed the buzzer on the gate. I wasn't at all surprised to see a man in a security guard's uniform come from the bungalow. He walked to the gate then asked in flawed english, "What is your business?"

"I would like to see Sean."

"For what purpose?"

"I would like to ask him some questions about Shelley Burke."

"Who shall I say is calling?"

"Deacon Burke," I replied.

I waited in the hot sun while he walked to the house. After a few minutes of consultation, with God only knows who, the guard returned. "The young Mr Sanchez has spoken with the police. He chooses not to speak with you. He suggests you talk to the police if they will tell you anything."

"I didn't really think he had the balls to talk to me, but I did want to ask. Good day." I turned to walk away. Walking back to our cabana wasn't hard but it was hot as hell so I stopped for Lemonade at the Hotel.

I was about halfway through the first glass when the manager of the hotel approached my table. "Mr. Burke, Mr Sanchez is on the way over. He wishes you to wait for him here."

"Ordinarily I would tell you to get screwed but I do want to talk to him. Tell him I will be right here through one more lemonade."

Sanchez made it before I finished the second one, but not by much. "Mr. Burke, why do you wish to speak with my son?"

"That pretty obvious. He was with the group at this Hotel. Neither he nor Shelley made it to the disco. I want to ask him what he knows that's all. Does he have something to hide?"

"Of course not. He has told the police everything."

"Was that after the security force tried to protect him or before."

"That was a misunderstanding. We have young women leave the resort all the time and go into the village looking for drugs. It often takes them day or two to wander back here in a drug induced fog."

"Nice story, but this time it isn't going to fly. The tapes show that Shelley never left the Hotel."

"That truly is a mystery but I don't see how talking to my son will help you solve it."

"To put the very best face on it, he might have seen something that would help us. He might not have been involved but he might know something. Something he doesn't even know that he knows."

"My son knows nothing." Sanchez was adamant.

"Then I will take it up with the Mexican police."

"If you must you must." The prick was smiling. He obviously had the fix in with the police.

"Like I told Estaban, I do what I have to do."

"So you did. But the Mexican government assures me that the loss of tourist revenue will not induce them to do an injustice to my son."

"Now you are sure you don't want to just produce your son to be interviewed by me and my associates?"

"I'm sure."

"Very well." My mind had been racing. I had to do something political before I did anything else. It was a smoke screen but it had to look real. I removed the phone from my pocket and made a call.

"Mr Simon please." I waited quietly. Sanchez looked nervous. "Mr. Simon did you know that there is a village outside the Sannabal resort that runs drug houses. Those same drug houses lure young tourists from Sannabal. It seems to be part of the attraction of the resort. I thought I would give you guys at state a heads up before I go to Fox with it. You might be able to get a DEA investigation going before Fox asks you about it." I listened for a while.

"Simon you know exactly why I am doing this. Fox News is all over this and you are watching the news every night at least." I clicked the phone shut.

"You really are a prick," Sanchez said.

"What took you so long to figure it out."

"I had no idea you knew so many people."

"Well now you know." Sanchez stormed off.

Now, that one had been a bluff. The call had gone to my answering machine back home. However just as soon as I could get to the Fox reporter they would have the information.

I doubted that the Mexican government wanted any embarrassment or slow down in the war on drugs funding from the United States. Still I didn't give a damn it was all a smoke screen. Sean Sanchez and I were going to dance.