An Inconsequential Murder Read online

  An Inconsequential Murder

  By Rodolfo Peña

  Copyright 2010 by Rodolfo Peña and Untreed Reads Publishing

  Cover Copyright 2010 by Dara England and Untreed Reads Publishing

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold, reproduced or transmitted by any means in any form or given away to other people without specific permission from the author and/or publisher. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your ebook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to the living or dead is entirely coincidental.

  An Inconsequential Murder

  By Rodolfo Peña

  Contents

  Part 1: Day 1

  Chapter 1: Victor Disappears

  Chapter 2: The Dead Young Man

  Chapter 3: The Three Foreigners and the Car

  Chapter 4: The Governor Gets a Phone Call and Makes a Phone Call

  Chapter 5: A Meeting at the University

  Chapter 6: Clues in the Parking Lot

  Chapter 7: Lombardo Visits a Laboratory

  Chapter 8: A Home Like a Hole in the Ground

  Chapter 9: The Computer Center, Again

  Chapter 10: A Not Too Religious Meeting at “The Church”

  Part 2: Day 2

  Chapter 11: A Visit to the Medical Examiner’s Office

  Chapter 12: The Governor Calls the Dean

  Chapter 13: No Rest for the Dead

  Chapter 14: When a Case Is Not Your Case

  Chapter 15: An Invitation to a Cruise

  Chapter 16: The Team Flies Home

  Chapter 17: The Start of the Project

  Chapter 18: A Meeting with the Widow

  Chapter 19: The Keys to the Tale

  Chapter 20: A High-Stakes Meeting on the High Seas

  Part 3: Day 3

  Chapter 21: A Two-Day Drinking Spree

  Chapter 22: The Logs of Life and Death

  Chapter 23: Double, Double, Toil and Trouble

  Part 4: Day 4

  Chapter 24: The Cowboys Play Dominoes

  Chapter 25: A Series of Political Murders

  Chapter 26: A Visit with the Dean

  Part 5: Day 7

  Chapter 27: Bad News Is Good News

  Chapter 28: Misery Does Acquaint Men

  Chapter 29: A Terrible Chess Game

  Chapter 30: An Invitation He Cannot Refuse

  Chapter 31: The Devil Is Loose

  Chapter 32: Lombardo Confronts His Boss

  Chapter 33: The Director Is Directed

  Part 6: Day 10

  Chapter 34: Lombardo Makes a Promise

  Chapter 35: Lombardo Talks to the New Boss

  Chapter 36: Off to See the Wizard

  Chapter 37: A Dance with the Devil

  Chapter 38: John Gets the Green Light

  Chapter 39: A Deadly Roadblock

  Chapter 40: Tying Up Loose Ends

  Chapter 41: The Awful Truth

  Chapter 42: The Prodigal Son Comes Home

  Chapter 43: Signing Away the Past, Arranging a New Future

  Epilogue: The More Things Change…

  Part 1: Day 1

  Chapter 1: Victor Disappears

  Victor Delgado left the University’s computer center a few minutes past one in the morning. He started his car and pulled out of his private parking spot. As he turned into the main boulevard of the University campus, a car parked in a side street started its engine and slowly pulled out of its parking space a few seconds after Victor’s car went past it.

  The traffic was light in the streets of Monterrey at that hour, yet Victor drove slowly, carefully, just as he did everything else in his life. Victor was a methodical young man, and his training as a computer engineer perfectly suited his conscientious, careful manner.

  The three men in the car following Victor’s were careful and patient, too. The driver of the car made sure that Victor was unaware that he was being followed; he used whatever other cars came along as shields and as cover.

  When Victor turned into Figueroa Avenue, the man sitting in the passenger’s seat of the car that was following Victor’s said, “This is it; cut him off.”

  The car with the three men jumped forward in a burst of speed and the driver expertly maneuvered in front of Victor’s car and stopped. Victor tried to avoid hitting the car that had suddenly appeared in front of him, but even at the relatively slow speed at which he was driving, it was impossible: Victor’s car swerved, hit the left-rear side of the car in front of him and broke its back light.

  Before he could get out of his car to inspect the damage, the three men jumped out of their car and ran toward Victor’s. Startled, Victor pushed a button to open his window and apologize, but before the glass was halfway down, one of the men opened Victor’s car door, grabbed his arm, and dragged the young man out of the car.

  Victor hardly had time to make out the three dark silhouettes grabbing at him before a blow to the back of his head made him lose consciousness.

  Chapter 2: The Dead Young Man

  Lombardo got out of the car slowly. The drawn look on his face, italicized by a furrowed brow and an ample frown, eloquently stated how badly he’d slept. His lack of sleep was not unusual. For the better part of his thirty some odd years as a cop he had rarely slept well. The reason was obvious to anyone who had known him during that time; he abused his body—keeping it awake at all hours by plying it with black coffee and cigarettes, allowing it to get bruised, battered, and beaten in countless violent arrests, fights, and car crashes. Then there were the scars from two gunshot wounds with their litany of aches and pains, which frequently kept him awake until the painkillers kicked in and allowed him a fitful rest.

  The night before had been no exception. He had been asleep only two hours before his cell phone rang and woke him. The duty officer had called to tell him that an anonymous caller to the 060 number had reported a body by the railroad tracks.

  “Why can’t people get killed at a decent hour?” he muttered as he stared at the corpse under the white sheet. “Say at noon or two in the afternoon.”

  Lombardo slammed the car door shut and as he did, it squealed making an ugly metallic noise as if it were a wounded animal in agony. His old Ford Fairmont was falling apart, but in spite of his many requests, there was no sign his wreck of a car would be replaced. “Damn the Purchasing Department,” he said aloud.

  He lit a Delicado and stood there, smoking his pungent, cheap cigarette—mumbling to himself—until he noticed that everyone was looking at him. “The usual gang of incompetents has already gathered,” he said stifling a yawn. He was referring, of course, to the agents from the Public Ministry, cops from the Municipal Police Force, and the sleepy reporters that were assigned to the “night watch.”

  The agents from the Public Ministry, looking tough and mean in their black uniforms, black boots, and sunglasses, stared at him. Lombardo stared back and looked at the guns and automatic rifles the Public Ministry agents held at the ready. “Always out in force after the fact,” he growled.

  He crossed the street and his black mackintosh flapped like the wings of a flightless bird. The only thing people criticized more than his bad smelling cigarettes, was the way he dressed. He always wore the same black suit and a raggedy burgundy-colored tie. The suit had been pressed so many times it shone like sharkskin.

  The people standing inside the secured area pointedly avoided his eyes, but one of the
younger cops walked over to Lombardo, smiling. He carried a thermos bottle and a plastic cup. “Would you like some coffee, Captain? It’s a chilly morning,” he said gingerly.

  “Yes, thank you,” he said as the young cop poured the coffee. He took a sip and then walked over to the group that was standing around the corpse.

  Although the crime scene had already been “secured” and yellow warning tape had been placed—going from a nearby telephone post to a tree and then to a couple of bushes—there were a lot of the people milling about inside of it. The majority were municipal cops who were untrained in even the most basic of forensic procedures. It was obvious that they had already trampled over what little evidence there was.

  As he approached the group that was staring down at the forensic medics working on the corpse, one of the municipal cops turned, clicked his heels, and gave him a half-hearted salute. “Jefe,” said the saluting cop—the others just mumbled, “Buenos días.”

  The cop that had clicked his heels, saluted again, and said he was Sergeant Pedroza of the Municipal Traffic Department. He began his report with, “Con la novedad de que recibimos.…” These old cops had a formulaic way of giving a report that had always irritated Lombardo. As the sergeant began to talk, Lombardo interrupted him and asked who had found or reported the body.

  Sergeant Pedroza said that they had received an anonymous phone call at the 060 number. According to the emergency services people, the caller said that there was a body by the railroad tracks near the brewery and had hung up. He had arrived at the scene soon after. “We found some kids going through the pockets of the deceased but they ran away when they saw us,” said the traffic cop finishing his report.

  Fat Gonzalez, possibly the laziest and most corrupt cop in the Investigations Department, was grinning at him and pointing to the corpse. “Won’t you have a look at what the morning brought, Captain Lombardo?” he said cackling like an old crone. “The Director must really like you; he assigns you to all the most interesting cases—burglaries, dead drunks on the street.”

  “Yeah? What does that say about you, you fat pig? You’re here, too,” Lombardo mumbled.

  For the last year or so, since the present Director had arrived, Lombardo had been assigned to all of the “easy” cases—the suicides, fatal traffic accidents, the persons who had asphyxiated because they left a gas heater on in a closed room, and so on. Things had started badly between the Director of the Agency and Lombardo. When the Director first arrived, he tried to woo Lombardo saying that he was glad to have someone as experienced as Lombardo to act as his personal confidant and counselor. Lombardo had responded that he didn’t like being wet nurse to anybody and that he was nobody’s lackey or “personal” counselor; that he was just a street cop and he liked it like that.

  The Director had not taken Lombardo’s frankness kindly, to say the least, and said that Lombardo was too old for the tough, dangerous police work that involved multiple murders by the drug cartels, or using high-tech gadgetry such as cell phone trackers. He threw a case file at Lombardo and said that the last time Lombardo had investigated a smuggling operation it was one coming the other way: an airplane that had crashed with a load of televisions and other smuggled electronics. It was true. It was twenty years ago that Lombardo had been part of a squad dedicated to fighting corruption in the Customs Inspection Services. In those days, illegal goods flowed from the United States into Mexico. People bought a television in a shop on the American side and paid the shop an extra fee to have it smuggled into Mexico.

  How innocent those times seemed now. Smugglers spent a few days locked up while their lawyers bribed them out of jail, and the most dangerous criminals were bank robbers who used rusty .38 caliber guns to shoot at the policemen when and if they arrived on the scene.

  Now the drug-crazed young killers of gangs like the Zetas would chop off the heads of a dozen rival gang members or policemen and send pictures to their families. “These times are too violent for an old cop,” said the Director.

  He looked down at the corpse that lay on the gravel by the railroad tracks, arms extended backwards, palms up. The head had been neatly severed by the train.

  “Very little blood,” he said. “The man must have been dead when he was dumped here.”

  Fat Gonzalez shrugged. “Probably a drunk, killed by other drunks.”

  “Is that your professional opinion?” asked Lombardo derisively. Gonzalez had been brought over from the Municipal Police as “liaison” when the Director had been promoted from there to the Investigations Department of the Public Ministry. He had been the Director’s lackey there and he was his lackey in Investigations. His job was to snitch on any detective that “lost” evidence from a case—especially if that evidence was in the form a pack of $20 bills from a drug smuggler’s stash. Since Lombardo was never assigned to any “lucrative” cases, Gonzalez was never around, but lately he had shown up at the scene of the cases assigned to Lombardo. It was obvious that Gonzalez had been asked to gather enough proof of “professional incompetence” to warrant Lombardo’s dismissal.

  “Where’s the head?” Lombardo asked the Fat Man and blew a large cloud of blue smoke into the cold morning air.

  “Over there,” said Fat Gonzalez, nodding toward a couple of forensic medics that were squatting a dozen meters down the track.

  “Who got here first, Gonzalez?”

  “I did, Jefe,” said Sergeant Pedroza and clicked his heels again. “You see, sir, I was on my way to work at the station, when I, uh, I heard the call; they ordered us here in response to the 060. When I got here, I too thought it was a drunk, or something, and then. I, uh, I.…” The cop was obviously very nervous.

  Lombardo looked at the sergeant. His face was ashen and he kept swallowing hard, probably trying to keep from throwing up. He was just a poor, dumb cop, about Lombardo’s age. His job did not usually involve the nasty business of finding mangled corpses on busy city streets. He was the kind they usually assign to traffic duty on busy street corners or to stand around during public spectacles and gatherings like football games. He was the kind of cop that joined the force 30 years ago when being a policeman was a safe job for an uneducated man. He had spent all of those years supplementing his meager pay with small bribes he took from drivers that committed some small traffic violation or drunks rounded up as they stumbled out of bars after the 2 a.m. closing time. There was a joke that the young cops, fresh from the Academy, said of these old cops: “The only cold, lifeless body he’s ever seen is his wife’s.”

  A taxi stopped and the driver leaned out the window to ask, “Eh, what happened? Another dead narco?”

  Lombardo said, “Please see to it the traffic keeps flowing, Sergeant Pedroza; don’t let them stop to gawk.”

  “Si, Jefe,” said the cop as he clicked his heels and saluted. He was obviously relieved to get away from the corpse and to do what he was used to doing. “Move along,” he said firmly to the taxi driver and he blew his whistle at him.

  “Come on, Fatso,” Lombardo said to Gonzalez. “Let’s see what this charming young man looked like when he was alive.”

  “How do you know he was a young man?” asked the fat cop. His greasy, black hair was combed back over the large head; the light of the early morning sun made his round, dark face shine like polished leather. Lombardo disliked him. He knew nothing of police work. He was just the Director’s lackey, keeping an eye out for “opportunities” to make a buck, taking the bribes himself so the Director would not be involved. If he had been a soldier in Lombardo’s company when Lombardo was a captain in the U.S. Army, he would have classified him as unfit for infantry duty and would have transferred him to a non-combat job, like a cook or a mail clerk.

  “Didn’t you see his hands?” asked Lombardo, his words accompanied by little puffs of smoke from the Delicado that dangled from his lips. “They are the hands of a young man, a well-educated young man. No calluses, no scars or bruises. Also, he was well dressed. He was no ‘tepor
ocho.’”

  Lombardo used the street slang for the homeless alcoholics that died in the streets of the city by the dozens each year either from cirrhosis or exposure or simply from hunger.

  “OK, so maybe he was not a drunk, but he must have been drinking to wander around at night and fall on the railroad tracks. Anyway, we’re turning him in as a no-name; he didn’t have any identification on him or it was stolen by some of the kids hanging around when the sergeant got here.”

  Lombardo ignored the Fat Man’s attempt to sell him on the dead guy being just a drunk killed accidentally by the train—case closed. Lombardo could guess why the Fat Man was eager to get him to agree on that. The judges in the criminal courts were flooded with files of crimes that were pending resolution. Nearly six thousand murder cases had been reported the year before. In places like Nuevo Laredo, Ciudad Juarez, or Tijuana it was not unusual to find 20 or 30 corpses on any given night.

  The Investigations Department and the Public Ministry itself were “encouraged” to deliver cases for judgment that were practically solved and that the judge could declare closed, so the Fat Man and other snitches were sent on cases by the Director to see if a certain case was susceptible to being closed without much fuss.

  “I don’t think there’s much to this case, eh?” insisted Gonzalez.