Chapter 1
The four women made their way unnoticed through the crowd of tourists and shoppers filling the sidewalks in the Mexican border town of Ciudad Acuña. Each of the women blended in, moving as the tourists and shoppers did, and all the while they angled into position to take the beautiful young child while she stood only inches from her mother. They had done it before, and felt confident it would be easy.
“How many will this make?” Sandra Avila, the youngest of the group, whispered to Sofia Cardona as they walked among shoppers and tourists.
“Stay focused,” Sofia said. They watched the beautiful woman and her stunning six-year old child strolling the sidewalk twenty feet ahead of them. The toddler seemed a miniature version of her mother, both with long hair the color of butterscotch. The child also had something rare, so rare it is the reason she is their target: her eyes. Incredible violet eyes that Sofia noticed, even from this distance. Other passersby stopped in mid-stride when the child looked at them. Sandra said, “You plan everything so well.” She copied Sofia’s quickening stride toward the woman and child as they walked along Callé Miguel Hidalgo, a stone’s throw across the Rio Grande from Del Rio, Texas. They pretended to browse the racks of colorful clothes along the open-air displays while keeping furtive eyes on the woman and daughter.
The crowd of pedestrians milled along the sidewalk, while a few people walked alone, admiring the stores and restaurants. Sandra turned to look behind her and nodded at the other two women, one a very fit-looking woman pushing a canopied baby carriage. The other was large and heavy, almost three hundred pounds.
The others picked up their pace until they were positioned closer to the woman and child and readied by arranging blankets in the carriage so they could easily be moved into position.
The blond woman paused at another rack of clothes and looked at one blouse in particular, letting go of her child’s hand.
Sandra moved silently behind the mother’s back and snatched the toddler from the ground, instantly turning with her as she stepped to the baby carriage.
Sofia had put a small chloroform soaked rag to the child’s face and locked it in place with a rubber band over her head so the rag fit like a surgeon’s mask. In an instant, the child lay in the carriage and was hidden under blankets with a flick of a wrist.
The large, heavy woman wore voluminous clothes and stepped to block the mother’s view of the carriage and the kidnappers.
When the mother, Ramona, looked around three seconds later, her daughter had vanished. A huge woman blocked her view and clumsily moved as Ramona did, continuing to hinder her vision, all the while apologizing. Ramona felt a thread of fear as she called the infant’s name, “Anita!”, and looked under the clothing racks in case the little girl hid to play hide and seek. Anita was nowhere to be seen, and Ramona’s voice quivered as she questioned other nearby shoppers.
No one saw anything out of the ordinary. Ramona pulled her phone and called the local police. They arrived in minutes, but the baby, her sweet baby, was gone.
By the time the police entered on the scene, the kidnappers were two blocks away, with buildings hiding them from the frantic mother. They went to a parked sedan and hid the carriage in a trash pile near the alley. Sandra drove away, going west on a road that paralleled the Rio Grande. Five minutes later she took a dirt road that dropped into the cane-choked river vega, following a narrow two-lane car path deep into the tall, green carrizo cane. The sedan drove through a pale, emerald colored, leafy world as the fifteen-foot tall cane formed a half-closed canopy above them, effectively making the car and women disappear.
Sandra said to Sofia, “Keep watch for the turn. It will be hidden.”
Sofia said, “Go a little slower. There it is.”
They followed it to the river while long green leaves like those on corn stalks brushed along the sides of the car. They drove all the way to where a man in a row boat constructed of two old car hoods welded back-to-back floated in the river. He waited underneath an overhang of cane.
As they climbed in the boat, the man said, “Hurry, the Border Patrol will be back soon.”
The older woman said, “Where are they?”
“We sent three boys across as decoys, so they could be caught and the Patrol had to transport them to another vehicle on the highway. They won’t be gone long.”
The younger woman held the limp child and said, “Let’s go.”
He rowed them across the river and had them deposited on the United States side in less than five minutes. A narrow trail in the river cane pointed north. The man said, “The car is fifty yards ahead on this trail. Keys are on the left front tire.”
They nodded and walked into the silent, green shadowed world as the boatman turned his craft to return to the Mexican side. They heard the gurgle of the water as he pulled on the oars for several powerful strokes, putting his back and legs into it.
They reached the ten-year-old Chevrolet in a short time and found the keys on the tire. The older woman took the limp infant and slid into the passenger side while the younger one started the car and drove out of the sandy river bottom and into the sparsely populated subdivision called Vega Verde, at the western edge of Del Rio. As they drove, Sofia reached into the plastic sack on the floorboard and removed the bottle of brown hair dye, applying it in small amounts to the child’s blond hair, working it in with her finger
s and along the strands that ran to her shoulders. She tossed the child’s chloroform mask out the window as they travelled. Sandra asked, “We’re leaving her hair long because the buyers want it that way?”
Sofia nodded, “Already paid extra for it. The boss said this one will bring a high seven figures in U.S. Dollars.” Sandra smiled, thinking of all the money she would have. Sandra hit a large pothole and rocked the car, pushing the child’s head onto the side window leaving a wet, brown smear on the glass shaped like a Nike swoosh.
Sofia continued to apply the dye, even after her partner pulled out on U.S. 90 and turned west. Sofia didn’t stop working on the child’s hair as she said to Sandra, “We’re free,” and she smiled.
~**~
Hunter Kincaid adjusted her old cut-off jean shorts as she relaxed in the passenger seat of Norma Ramirez’s Chevy Silverado pickup. The shorts had seen better days, looking frayed and faded, but felt so comfortable.
She and Norma had been friends and classmates since they went through the Border Patrol Academy, and although the two Agents worked in different stations, still got together occasionally, like this time in Del Rio, heading for the big lake and some boating, plus some much-needed fishing, laughing, swimming, and campfires.
Norma glanced in the bed of the pickup, “I noticed your, ah, vintage fishing gear when you loaded it up. Unless I’m mistaken, that’s the original Fred Flintstone model rod and reel, right?”
“Hah, you should be on Comedy Central. My rod may be old, but it’ll still catch fish, probably more than your new fancy schmancy one from Bass Pro that still has the price sticker on it.”
The wind from their open windows played with both women’s hair. “Want to bet?”