Chapter 6 - The Perimeter of the State
The toll plaza at Km 42 of the Toluca-Valle de Bravo highway was a collection of grey concrete barriers, yellow flashing lights, and the high, corrugated steel roofs of the payment booths. The rain had arrived from the north, a freezing, slate-colored downpour that turned the mountain road into a slick sheet of oil and water.
Gabriel sat in the idling Dodge Ram, parked behind the heavy steel frame of a federal highway maintenance truck. Fifty yards ahead, two black-and-white Dodge Chargers of the Guardia Nacional sat with their engines running, their blue-and-red strobe lights painting the wet asphalt in rhythmic streaks of neon.
At 08:34 AM, a yellow municipal taxi from Valle de Bravo approached the toll lane.
The vehicle was an old Nissan Tsuru, its exhaust smoking in the cold air, its windshield wipers struggling against the heavy downpour. In the back seat, her face pressed against the glass, was Lorena. She had changed into a cheap, grey sweatshirt she had taken from the hotel’s laundry locker, her wet hair wrapped in a green towel, her luxury leather handbag clutched tightly against her ribs like a life preserver.
A federal officer in a black rain-cape stepped out from the toll booth, his hand extended in a flat, authoritative gesture.
"Good morning," the officer said, his voice coming through the driver's side window of the taxi. "State identification and route check, please."
The taxi driver, a frightened young man from the mountains, immediately handed over his license. "I’m just taking the lady to the bus station in Toluca, chief. She said it was an emergency."
"The lady needs to step out of the vehicle," the officer said, his hand resting casually on the butt of his Sig Sauer rifle. "Lorena Vance?"
Inside the back seat, Lorena exploded. She slammed her palms against the door panel, trying to force the lock, her voice screaming through the rain-streaked glass. "Let me go! This is an illegal stop! My husband is an army officer! He’s doing this to kidnap me! Let me through!"
The secondary door of the taxi was opened from the outside by a female trooper in tactical gear. Within three seconds, Lorena was pulled from the vinyl seat, her bare feet slipping in the grey mud of the highway shoulder, her wrists brought behind her back with the sharp, metallic clink of standard-issue Smith & Wesson cuffs.
Gabriel stepped out of his truck, his black rescue jacket dark with water as he walked through the downpour to the edge of the concrete barrier. He didn't say anything. He didn't look at her face as she screamed every curse word she knew at him through the rain.
He walked to the front door of the taxi, handed the young driver a five-hundred-peso note to cover the fare, and took Lorena’s leather handbag from the back seat.
"The handbag was purchased with the trust card, Lorena," Gabriel said, his voice entirely flat as the female trooper guided her toward the back of the patrol vehicle. "It’s going into the evidence locker along with the spa receipts."
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"I hate you!" she screamed, her face twisting into a hideous, feral mask as the blue strobe lights illuminated her wet skin. "I hope those miserable kids rot! I hope they rot in a home!"
"They're not going to a home, Lorena," Gabriel said, turning his back to her as the heavy steel door of the police cruiser slammed shut with a permanent, muffled thud. "They're going to my house. And you're going to the fence."
