She feels useless here, she says, treating rich patients, when there is so much poverty and need back home. She could do something there, mean something to people there, be part of the struggle instead of just making symbolic gestures at protest marches. She can’t live like this anymore.

“We can still see each other,” she says. “I can come down here, you can come to Juárez…”

“Sure.”

It’s the sort of thing people tell each other when they both know it isn’t really going to happen.

“Arturo, please understand,” she says. “I feel like I’m living a lie here. That we’re living a lie.”

Keller gets that.

He knows about living lies.

—

Adán decides to make peace in the Gulf.

The CDG and their Zeta troops have proved to be a surprisingly tough and resilient enemy, even with Osiel Contreras in jail. There have already been seven hundred killings in Tamaulipas, another five hundred in Michoacán, and the Mexican public is growing tired of the violence.

“Do you think they’d come to the table?” Magda asks. She knows her role—play devil’s advocate to let him test his ideas. So she asks, “Why make peace now?”

“Because we can get what we want now,” Adán says.

“What about La Familia?” Magda asks. “They’ve been good allies, and they’ll never make peace with the Zetas.”

She’s heard the story about the murdered young whore and the boy who loved her.

It’s almost romantic.

“The Zetas can have Michoacán,” Adán answers. “I don’t want it.”

Magda knows what he does want.

—

Eddie sits with Diego and Martín Tapia in the back of a Cessna 182 on its way to the meeting with the CDG and Zetas. After long negotiations, the Sinaloans had agreed to meet at a ranch Ochoa owns between Matamoros and Valle Hermosa.

“Let me teach you what my mother taught me,” Diego says to him. “If you keep your mouth shut, no one can stick his dick into it.”

“Your mom didn’t teach you that, Diego,” Eddie says.

Diego says, “What I’m telling you is, at this meeting, you keep your fucking mouth shut.”

Eddie looks out the window at the sere landscape below. “If you think I’m just going to sit there with the people who tortured my best friend to death—”

“Sí, m’ijo, I think you are,” Diego says. “Or you take your money, go back el norte, and open a Sizzler’s or whatever.”

“Maybe a Soup Plantation,” Eddie mutters.

“Cheer up,” Diego says. “Things might go bad and then we can kill everybody.”

God knows they have enough firepower to do it. They didn’t come light—four airplanes full of automatic rifles, handguns, grenade launchers, and the people to use them. If this is a trap, they aren’t going to be defenseless.

“Remember, I get Forty and Ochoa,” Eddie says.

Gordo Contreras—aka Jabba the Boss—he could give a shit about either way, although it was Eddie who started the joke: “What happened when Gordo took over the Gulf?” “The water level rose three feet.”

Martín has warned Eddie that if he wants to do jokes, he should find an open mike night at a comedy club, but definitely, definitely not try out his material at the peace table.

The plane lands on a strip on the west side of Ochoa’s ranch. Eddie looks out the window to see a dozen jeeps, three of them with machine guns trained on the aircraft, and Forty on full alert.

“Yeah, I can feel the love here,” he says.

“If that’s you keeping your mouth shut, it’s not working,” Martín says.

—

The hacienda has a tiled roof and a broad, covered porch where a long table has been set with carafes of ice water, iced tea, and bottles of beer. Ochoa, looking like a matinee idol from one of those old movies, steps down from the porch and walks toward Adán as he gets out of the jeep.

It’s a key moment, Adán knows. Everyone here knows that the whole thing could go south and the guns will come out. He looks Ochoa up and down and then says, “You’re as good-looking as they said. If my gate was hinged on the other side, I’d marry you.”

A moment of silence, then Ochoa cracks up.

Everyone laughs and then they go up onto the porch.

Gordo Contreras—the little brother who is now the putative head of the CDG—is sitting at the table, not having bothered, Adán notes, to haul his fat ass out of the chair. He’s sweating heavily—it’s disgusting. All the more so when he leers at Magda.

“I didn’t know segunderas were invited,” Gordo says. “I would have brought mine.”

Adán is about to step in when Magda says, “Partners were invited, Gordo. Your segundera can stay home where he belongs.”

The look on Gordo’s fat face is priceless—slack-jawed and furious at the same time. He glares at Magda but she looks coolly back at him until he drops his eyes.

Advantage Magda, Adán thinks.

They sit down, Adán and Ochoa at respective ends of the table. Drinks are poured and then Nacho says, “I think we should limit our discussions as to how we move forward. I see no gain in bringing up the past.”

“We didn’t start this war,” Gordo says.

“Your brother tried to have me killed in Puente Grande,” Adán says calmly. “I considered that a declaration of war.”

“There was a gap of several years before you acted on it,” Gordo says, already huffing with effort. He leans over and gulps from a glass of ice water.

Adán shrugs. “I have a long fuse.”

“Can we just focus on how to end the war?” Nacho asks.

“Sure,” Gordo says. “You withdraw all of your people from Tamaulipas, and if you want to use the Laredo plaza, you pay us tax. And we want what-do-you-call thems…reparations.”

“You’re out of your mind,” Magda says.

Adán notices that Ochoa has said nothing. The former soldier is sitting back, letting Gordo go through the preliminary nonsense. As Tío taught me, Adán thinks—Él que menos habla es el más chingón.

He who speaks least has the most power.

Speaking of nonsense, Vicente Fuentes weighs in with cocaine-inspired gibberish. “Profit is the blossom of the plant of peace. While we are watering the fields with blood, we should be…”

As Vicente goes on, Ochoa looks down the table at Adán, who wonders if he’s really seeing what he thinks he’s seeing. Ochoa’s smile is subtle, almost undetectable, but it’s there, and then Ochoa ever so slightly juts his chin at Vicente.

It’s a question.

And Adán ever so subtly nods.

Yes.

The real deal of this meeting has been made—Juárez is a legitimate target and the CDG won’t interfere. Adán stands up. “We’re not going to withdraw from Tamaulipas nor are we going to pay reparations. But here’s what we will do…”

A cease-fire will start immediately, with each side keeping the territories it has taken.

The CDG will keep all of Tamaulipas with the exception of Nuevo Laredo, which will be an open city. In addition, it will retain Coahuila, Veracruz, Tabasco, Campeche, and Quintana Roo.

The Alliance will move product through Laredo without paying a tax. It will retain control of all of its old territories—Sonora, Sinaloa, Durango, Chihuahua, Nayarit, Jalisco, Ochoa, Guanajuato, Querétaro, and Oaxaca, as well as Acapulco, and it will acquire—as Diego had insisted to Adán—the Monterrey suburb of San Pedro Garza García, the richest municipality in Mexico.

The territories of Nuevo Léon, Federal District, State of Mexico, Aguascalientes, San Luis Potosí, Zacatecas, and Puebla will be neutral.

Gordo struggles to his feet. “Barrera graciously offers to give us what we already have. This is a waste of time.”

“Sit down,” Ochoa says quietly.

Gordo glares at him.

But he sits down.

An amazingly blunt show of power, Adán thinks. Which Ochoa didn’t bother to disguise and so wanted me to see. Gordo Contreras will hold on to power for as long as Ochoa wants him to and not a moment longer. Then Ochoa says, “I’m sure Barrera wasn’t finished with his offer and was about to say something about Michoacán.”