Read Online Night of the Jaguar by Joe Gannon - Free Book Online Page B

finally pulled the shoe off to solve the mystery of its whiteness. It was a prosthesis. She’d lost her foot just above the ankle and wore a wooden one on which someone had painstakingly—lovingly—carved the separate toes. Not etched on a block, but sculpted, each toe separate from the others, just like a real foot, with toenails and everything. Then she’d painted them red, just like her real ones.
    That had stayed with him. That little red toenail in that immense green jungle.
    Later, when they’d taken the bodies back to the base in Wiwilí, he’d removed the foot and given it to a French group that made prosthetics for the victims of Contra land mines. For all he knew, someone was stumping around on it right now.
    *   *   *
    â€œAjax?” Gladys’ voice cut through the memory.
    â€œKill the vampire.”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œOnce in the throat, twice through the heart. That’s what they called it. ‘Killing the vampire.’”
    â€œWho?”
    Ajax saw that he still had his hand in the air. He jumped up and helped Gladys to her feet. “Sorry.”
    â€œWhy are you talking about vampires?”
    He shook his head. He didn’t trust her yet. “I don’t know. Spacing out. Anyway, that’s how it happened. They got him on his back and delivered the blows.”
    He spun her around and brushed the dirt from her back. His mind whirling—could it be?
    â€œWell, that was a sweet dance! Go on, kiss her!”
    Ajax hated to be surprised, so he already hated the intruder. He knew what to expect when he turned around. If it was civilians, the tone would have been a more democratic teasing rather than the cold, authoritarian mocking he had just heard. He faced the voice. The mocker was a uniform. Two uniforms. What surprised him was to see the uniforms leaning against a car marked DGSE . Dirección General de Seguridad del Estado. It was one of the quirks of the Sandinista revolution that State Security, the secret police, traveled the country in clearly marked cars. And the two cocky hijos de puta leaning against it had Seguridad plastered all over their smirking mustachioed faces.
    While he gave them the once over, Ajax carefully finished dusting off Gladys’s uniform. One man was a major, the other a captain.
    â€œStonewall these fucks, Gladys,” he whispered.
    The major sauntered over. “You’re Ajax Montoya.”
    â€œThat why you came here?”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œTo tell me my name—is that why you came here?”
    â€œI’m Major Pissarro; this is Captain Cortez.”
    Ajax snorted with delight. “I get it. The conquistadores. We’ve been invaded, Gladys.”
    The intruders exchanged a brief glance.
    â€œCortez and Pissarro, the conquistadores. You know, Aztecs, Incas. Guess that makes us the Indians.” Ajax tried to suppress the laugh he felt welling up, but for some reason failed to muster the will power. Gladys, on the other hand, looked ready to crawl out of her skin.
    â€œWe’re here about the murder, compañero . ”
    Ajax cut his chuckle. “What murder?”
    Captain Cortez stepped forward like he didn’t know he was being fucked with. “You just had a body hauled away. That murder.”
    â€œWait, which one are you again? Doesn’t matter, but yeah we had a corpse taken to the morgue. We don’t know if it’s murder. Do you? And if so, how do you know that?”
    â€œLook compa.” Pissarro stepped in front of the other, his hands out in reconciliation. “State Security has an interest in this … death. We got it from here. Thank you.”
    â€œIf it is murder, it’s Policía, compa . That’s me and my young lieutenant here. We do cops and robbers. You do spies and assassins. We don’t need your help.”
    Cortez moved like he was waiting for that. “Yeah, well maybe if you’d had