"It's been a trap from the very beginning, hasn't it?" she asked, putting the sweater aside to reveal a four-inch barreled revolver with a two-inch Stifler silencer attached.
"That's how it started out," Tony admitted.
"You never knew Francisco Barillas."
"No."
"The letter you showed me was a forgery."
"Yes."
"And your name is not Antonio Marcala."
"No. Antonio Marazan."
"When you trained to become an FBI agent, did they give you special lovemaking lessons to use on foolish women like me?"
Tony's expression tightened. "Tela, I'm going to pull over and park. There are things that I must tell you. If you do not want to hear them, you will have to shoot me."
"Keep driving," she ordered.
"No." He slowed and pulled out of traffic. Tela cocked the hammer of the pistol.
"I warn you, keep driving!"
"Shoot if you must," Tony said grimly, and eased the car to a parking place at the curb. Turning off the ignition, he sat with both hands on the steering wheel, looking straight ahead, waiting to see if the bullet came. It did not.
"You son of a bitch," she said tearfully. "You made me fall in love with you even when I knew— I
knew
— that you were an agent."
"Tela, listen to me," he turned to her. "I
was
an agent; I'm not any longer. I've resigned from the bureau. From now on, I am the president and chief executive officer of Salvadoran-American, Incorporated, the new Delaware firm we formed for Mara Salva last week. I will also be president of the other businesses we now have: Ari-Mex, Salvo Printing, Lago Shipping, U.S. Cars, and Delaware Investments. I'm going to do exactly what Frank Barillas would have wanted me to do if we had known each other. Within a year or two, Tela, I can turn Mara Salva's operation into a completely legitimate multi-diversified business that someday will be able to finance a revolution
without
its leaders being outlaws or criminals. In the meantime, we can use profits to make life better for our people now."
"
Our
people?"
"Yes, of course." He was slightly taken aback. "I am a Salvadoran, just like you. Why do you think the bureau selected me for the assignment?"
"I don't know. I guess I didn't realize—"
"Tela, uncock the gun. Please."
"No."
"All right. But please be careful. As I was saying, the revolution may be far in the future, but we can begin laying a foundation for it
now
, with something besides hidden stock-piles of weapons. We can build small, private schools in the rural areas to educate the peasant children. We can establish private utility firms to provide electricity and running water. We can open co-operative food warehouses through the church to import non-profit food products to stop the malnutrition among the poor. There are dozens of other ways that Monte and I have been discussing—"
"Monte will kill you when he learns that you are FBI."
"
Was
FBI. And Monte already knows it."
"You tol' him?" she asked, aghast.
"Yes. When we arrived in San Salvador, I told him the entire truth. I even told him who among his ranks was an informant."
"Informant? In Mara Salva?"
"Yes. How do you think I was so well briefed about Frank Barillas? Where do you think the bureau got all its information?"
"Who is it?" Tela asked, almost in a whisper.
"Who do you think?"
"Perico?"
"Yes."
"Then Monte will kill
him
when he gets back."
"Monte already
is
back," Tony told her. "He is with the others right now. And I imagine Perico is already dead."
Tela lowered the pistol and uncocked it. For several minutes, she stared straight ahead, as if in a trance. All of the strength Tony normally saw in her seemed to have drained away, leaving her traumatized and unable to function. After a while, she said simply, "Take me home, please, Tony."
* * *
That night, thirty thousand feet in the sky, as the AeroMexico jetliner cruised toward Mexico City where they would change planes for San Salvador, Tony and Tela relaxed over drinks in the Aztec-decorated first-class cabin. Tela had been quiet and subdued back at her apartment when she packed a small bag and got her passport out. As Tony drove them toward LAX, she made only light, inconsequential conversation about things like weather, traffic, the increasing smog problem in the Los Angeles basin. It was as if all the sudden and significant changes about to occur within Mara Salva, therefore within her life, were weighing on her so heavily that she had been forced, in the interest of her own emotional well-being, to put everything of any importance on hold, and allow herself to mentally consider only the most trivial and common of subjects. She remained in that repressed mode as they checked in at the Bradley International Terminal, went through security, and finally boarded the plane. It was only after they were airborne and had each finished one margarita and began sipping their second, that the alcohol helped Tela return to her old self, albeit a much less inflexible self. From her window seat, she reached over and brought Tony's left hand across to her lips, kissed it, then held it comfortingly to her cheek.
"You know, you are really the very best," she said softly, her voice shaded, almost nostalgic. Tony leaned his head toward her.
"The best? You mean the best lover?"
"No, I mean the best liar. You're an excellent lover, don't misunderstand me. But telling lies is your real talent."
"There will be no more lies between us," he promised.
"That," she said, rolling her eyes, "might be the biggest lie of all."
"You still don't trust me completely." It was a statement, not a question. Tela shrugged.
"If you were only an agent, how could you have done all the things you did with Monte? All the business things? Where did you get such knowledge?"
"What I told you about my education was the truth; I do have a master's degree in business administration from Stanford. In the bureau, I was assigned to the CRBA Division; that stands for Covert Racketeering Business Affiliations. Our work was to uncover legitimate businesses that were fronts for organized crime or terrorist organizations. I've investigated enough front businesses to be very familiar with them. The one I set up for Mara Salva is complex and very elaborate; I don't think anyone will catch onto it before we become completely legitimate. Does that satisfy you, my angel?"
"I don't know," Tela said. "I mean, suppose you were part of an even larger sting operation than simply infiltrating Mara Salva in southern California? Suppose this is a joint undertaking involving the CIA, the state department, and the Salvadoran government, with the goal being to expose all undercover members in Salvador, all hidden arms, all supporters in the church, the unions, the universities? Suppose you are but one of many agents involved?"
Tony shook his head helplessly. "Tela, my sweet, is there nothing I can do to prove myself to you once and for all?"
"Perhaps." She took a sip of her drink. "If you would do it."
"Tell me what it is."
"You said that I never seemed happy. Do you know what would make me happy?"
"What?"
"What would make me happy would be to see the end of the
Sombra Negra
. The end of the death squads. The way you and Monte are going, the Mara Salva will become like some giant corporation. You seem to be thinking only of profits and expansion, becoming legitimate. But, Antonio, there is still much killing to do."
She took Tony's hand from her cheek, put it to her lips, and kissed it again. And she bit one of his knuckles, just enough to hurt. Tony frowned.
"I want to begin killing the
Sombra Negra
," she said. "I want to see all the black shadows die. That would make me happy."
In the muted light above the seats, Tony saw in Tela's eyes a consuming desperation, not just a desire but a
need
to kill. Perhaps, he thought, it was in revenge for her parents and little sister, or for the thousands she had spoken of who died in the long Salvadoran civil war. Perhaps it was because she did not understand all the complicated things that were going on within Mara Salva, and she did understand the simplicity of killing. Whatever the reason, Tony sensed that it was a deep, deep paranoia, one that had not yet reached the plateau of madness, but seemed so near as to be irreversible. He suddenly knew that through whatever was to come in El Salvador, that he had to protect her. He had to remain at her side, doing as she wished, even if she slipped farther into the dementia that was decaying her mind.
"All right, that is what we will do," Tony said.
"Yes, you and I together, Antonio. We will find members of the
Sombra Negra
and execute them, one by one. Promise me."
"I promise, my love." Now he drew her hand to his lips, and kissed it as if taking an oath. "And when the black shadows die, you will trust me completely?"
"Yes, Antonio. Completely."
"And you will be happy?"
"Oh, yes! I will be very happy when they are all dead."
Her eyes became fierce again as she spoke. Her bloodlust stirred in him a more intense loyalty than he had ever known.
For her, he silently swore, he would do whatever he had to.
Miguel Agustí
Rebirth (Cain and Abel)
MIGUEL AGUSTÍ
published his first story at nineteen and, since then, he has written more than a hundred articles and short stories for magazines such as
Nueva Dimensión, Bazaar, Spirit, Rufus, Playboy
and others. Agustí has also contributed to newspapers and has cultivated many different genres, including thrillers, fantasy, science fiction, and comic strips. He has been editor in chief for several Spanish magazines and also worked as a script writer for the TV series
L'O
fi
ci d'Aprendre
, broadcast by the Catalan regional channel. All of which has given him a unique way of looking at the world. In his story "Rebirth (Cain and Abel)," first published on the Web site Mysterypages.com, he takes a look at a very different kind of sibling rivalry.
Rebirth (Cain and Abel)
Miguel Agustí
I
t could not be hell, but he had dreamed that silence and darkness has enveloped him. It was a silence that was almost a vacuum but not quite nothingness.
He was not alone. In this dream he sensed a very slight presence of someone or something watching him, attempting to probe inside him but in vain. For a moment he thought that the silence had taken on a tangible form. Maybe that was it. He rejected the idea. All forms are tangible yet this one was not. Silence lacks form and can only be measured by its intensity. It must be someone who, like himself, was dreaming. The thought appealed to him: two beings who found themselves in the same dream. Was it possible?
"Who are you?" he asked without speaking. Would silence answer him? No, it would have been too human a reaction, befitting only a living being, and he guessed that he had ceased to live as had the other thing who remained hidden and spied upon him.
Perhaps the other presence was so distant that it could not eavesdrop. That would mean he had tried to draw closer to nowhere because the vacuum that surrounded him had no direction or beginning and was vague and unfathomable.
For a brief instant there was a flash of light. It was not the presence but something else. A brief instant. At least time existed, he told himself. The light had seemed like a flower. Do flowers flash?
"Who are you?" he asked.
Another thought welled up. Perhaps he was awakening, although he was not aware of sleeping or even drowsing. But this was no dream. What was it? What is most like to a dream?
The light flashed again— this time more intensely— and began to move. Nothing around him indicated this was the case, rather he was convinced it was so. Concern gripped him as the vacuum began to fade. He felt it was not the first time and that he had suffered in that silence on other occasions. How many times? The belief began to grip him, like waves running ahead of a storm, harbingers of panic and shipwreck.
He realized that he still had memories, leftovers from some previous existence, that threatened to bear down on him in some crushing avalanche. He felt he was getting tangled in an awful web from which there could be no escape.
The light winked again. It was not exactly a wink, more a pulsing, a palpitation, like a heartbeat, evoking something.
He remembered. Understanding dawned as he relived the experience. A tongue of flame had frozen his heart. The lover had killed him out of love— for her. Love, the reason for everything: life, madness, death. Love, the everlasting excuse and justification.