Both right doors were flung open, but Ann and the other occupants were nowhere to be seen.

19

PABLO HAD WATCHED THE DESTRUCTION OF THE crate with disbelief. The death of his fellow gunman registered as little more than a nuisance, but losing the box made his face turn crimson. He vented his rage on Ann.

“What do you know of the device?” He jabbed his pistol against her.

Ann gritted her teeth and said nothing.

“Pablo . . . the police are approaching.” The driver’s face was pale, and his fingers shook atop the steering wheel.

Pablo glared at Ann. “You will talk later. Do as I say or I will kill you here. Now, get out of the car.”

Ann followed him out the passenger-side door as the driver grabbed a light jacket and draped it over her bound hands. She glanced back toward the utility van but failed to see Pitt or Giordino. She had been as shocked as Pablo to see them appear alongside the truck, and she wondered how they had been able to track her.

As they stepped onto the sidewalk, a young man in a black silk shirt accosted the driver.

“That’s my car,” he said, pointing to the smashed Chevy. “Look what you did.”

Pablo stepped over to him and discretely mashed his pistol into the man’s stomach. “Be quiet or die,” he said in a low voice.

The man stumbled backward, nodding profusely. His eyes wide, he turned and fled down the street.

Pablo stepped back and grabbed Ann by the arm, then glanced over his shoulder. He saw the police officers exit their car, and then he studied the crowd. He quickly spotted two Americans in work clothes looking under the cement mixer’s right rear wheels. He had recognized them when their van had pulled alongside as the men who piloted the Drake’s submersible.

He turned and nudged Ann forward. “Move.”

“What about Juan?” The driver gazed toward the cement mixer with a look of shock.

Pablo said nothing, ignoring the body of his dead partner as he guided Ann into the center of the busy sidewalk.

Arriving at the pickup a minute later, Pitt and Giordino scanned the crowds for Ann. A small girl sat on the curb, selling fresh-cut flowers out of a cardboard box. She caught Pitt’s eye and held out a clump of daisies. Pitt paid for the flowers, then handed them back to the girl with a smile. Blushing, she sniffed the daisies, then raised a hand and pointed down the street.

Pitt winked at the girl and took off in the same direction. “This way, Al.”

The crowd grew thicker as they made their way down the block. Pitt surveyed the moving mass, trying to spot Ann’s blond locks. They moved with the herd to the end of the street, which opened into a large parking lot packed with cars. Finally, Pitt and Giordino saw where all the people were headed.

A newly rebuilt stadium towered over the opposite end of the parking lot. The structure was perfectly round, yet much smaller than a typical American baseball or football stadium. Streams of people headed into the building, following ramps at either end. Pitt looked up to see the top of the stadium capped in electric lights that read PLAZA EL TOREO.

“Soccer?” Giordino asked.

“No. Bullfight.”

“Darn, and I forgot to wear red.” Giordino hadn’t noticed that his bloody hand had stained one pant leg crimson.

They hustled up the nearest ramp, jockeying to gain entrance with the other late arrivers. The aroma of roasting corn from a vendor’s stand filled the night air. Giordino filled his lungs, trying to mask the odor of burning trash from a nearby slum that was mixed with the sweat- and alcohol-laced crowd entering the arena.

Keeping his eyes on the ramp ahead, Pitt spotted a large man enter the stadium, holding a blond woman beside him. “I think I see her.”

Giordino made like a bulldozer, pushing his way through the crowd, with Pitt close behind. As they fought their way to the turnstiles, Pitt asked Giordino, “Do you have any money?”

Giordino fished through his pockets with his good hand, extracting a loose handful of bills. “The late-night poker games aboard the Drake have been kind to me.”

“Thank goodness there’s no talent aboard that ship.” Pitt plucked a twenty and handed it to the attendant.

They didn’t wait for the change, bursting through the turnstiles and running up into the stadium.

Trumpets blared from a live band as the evening troupe of matadors and their assistants was introduced, the cuadrilla traipsing across the circular dirt arena in a colorful procession. A raucous crowd filled the stadium, standing and cheering. Lost in the mass of bodies, Ann and her abductors were nowhere to be seen.

“They might be making for the exit on the other side,” Pitt said.

Giordino nodded. “In that case, we better split up.”

They descended a stepped aisle to the lower section of the arena, where Giordino moved right while Pitt cut left. Pitt worked his way across the first section of seats, scanning up and down, with no success. When the fans suddenly cheered, he glanced at the ring and saw a lone matador entering for the first fight. An ornery half-ton bull named Donatello was released to join him. Initially ignoring the matador, the beast stood, pawing the dirt and absorbing the crowd’s cheers.

Pitt wormed his way through the next section of spectators, dodging vendors selling cotton candy and cold drinks. Suddenly he caught a glimpse of a woman with blond hair seated by the aisle one section over. It was Ann. The burly figure of Pablo was wedged against her, busily scanning the crowd. He soon noticed Pitt and locked eyes on him. Pablo spoke rapidly to the driver beside him, then stood up, pulling Ann to her feet. She looked at Pitt for an instant, her face a mask of fear and pleading. While the driver stood and tracked Pitt, Pablo jerked Ann away, leading her down the aisle steps to a narrow walkway that circled the ring.

Separated by a full section of cheering fans, Pitt took off at a run down the nearest steps. In the next aisle, the driver hustled to match him. When Pitt reached the low wall that surrounded the bullring, he turned and needled his way toward Ann and Pablo, who were fleeing in the other direction just a few yards ahead. Then the driver leaped off the next set of steps and stood in his path.

He was an inch or two shorter than Pitt but carried broad shoulders on a thick frame. As he shook his head for Pitt to stop, he briefly hitched up his shirt to expose a gun holstered at his waist.

Pitt moved without hesitation, lunging forward and throwing a left cross that struck the driver on his cheekbone. The driver staggered to the wall. Giving him no time to recover, Pitt pressed the barrage with a quick combination to the head.

The driver instinctively tried to block the blows, raising his hands in protection rather than reach for the gun. Then he regained his senses. He charged back at Pitt, swinging with both fists. Pitt ducked the first punch but caught a blow to the ribs that made him gasp.

Pitt countered with more blows to the head as the driver hurtled into him, knocking them both hard against the safety wall. The driver got his left arm hooked around Pitt while grabbing for his gun with his right. But his feet became entangled with Pitt’s, causing both men to lose balance as they fell back.

As they teetered against the wall, the driver pulled the gun free but was forced to catch himself with the same hand. As he grasped for the wall, Pitt swung an elbow into his arm. The gun fell free, and both men tumbled over the side.

Nearby spectators gasped as the men dropped six feet into the ring. At its center, a matador stood with his back to them, not seeing their intrusion, as he flirted with the fresh bull.

Pitt took the brunt of the fall, landing hard on his shoulder, as the two men struck the dirt together, then rolled apart. The driver bounced to his feet first and searched the ground for his lost gun. As he shuffled toward the wall, he bumped into a wooden rack stocked with banderillas. Long, razor-sharp darts wrapped in colorful ribbons, they were the tools of the banderilleros who assisted the matador. They would fling the banderillas into a knotty mass on the bull’s back, which would agitate the bull and weaken his neck muscles so he would charge with his head lowered.