The Drug Lord's Daughter

By Tom Towslee

When a seemingly innocent food blogger is murdered in the quiet Mexican beach town of Zihuatanejo, John Standard's girlfriend asks him to find out what happened.

Standard, wanting only to be left alone to enjoy the sun, food, and tequila of his new home, reluctantly agrees. His search leads him to the beautiful and dangerous daughter of a notorious drug lord, and an unlikely alliance with a Shakespeare-quoting DEA agent.

After a high-powered encounter with the cartel killers, Standard's search for the truth leaves a trail of dead bodies in its wake. Does he still have what it takes to get the job done?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Next Chapter
• Release date: May 21, 2024

Book preview

CHAPTER 1

THREE WEEKS EARLIER

Zihuatanejo, Mexico

A Spanish version of Donna Summer’s Hot Stuff seeped out of the van’s dashboard radio. A half block up the street, a skinny, inbred dog dived headfirst into an overturned garbage can, using its paws to dig through empty Styrofoam containers and greasy paper sacks. In the van’s back seat, two tequila-guzzling cholos stared out the tinted side windows, dumbly waiting for orders from the driver.

Annoyed by the whole scene, Santiago Perez drummed his fingers on the steering wheel, then angrily turned off the radio. Donna Summer quickly gave way to the drone of golf-ball-sized insects and the irritating hum of a flickering streetlight. Perez looked at his watch: three a.m. Good enough, he thought. Too late for revelers home from a night of drinking. Too early for workers trudging off to menial jobs at hotels, restaurants, and panderias. The norteamericana tourists were still six hours away from spending another day soaking up sun and beer, trading gossip, and trying to decide where to go to dinner.

As good as everything seemed, Perez still wanted to shoot holes in the windshield. He flexed his neck and shoulders to relieve the tension. This was not his kind of job. Not having enough time to double check everything made him nervous. One drive by the house was all he could manage, but he had no choice. She wanted it done now. The woman who hired him and the two in the back seat was rich and demanding. She was too much like her father, or at least she tried to be.

They needed to get the job done tonight, or there would be hell to pay. "Matarlos a todos," she’d said. Fine, he thought. They would kill them all. That’s what they all said. She was no different. There was no reason for her to be. She held all the cards … and all the money.

Perez had parked the ten-year-old van on the shoulder of a narrow, cobblestone street next to a scum-filled canal that trickled through town before oozing into the tranquil bay a quarter mile away. During the day, the benign street served as a waiting area for little white taxis. Happy-go-lucky drivers sat in the shade hoping to pick up fares at the boutique hotels and modest-priced condos two blocks up the hill, the ones offering bay views, sun-soaked patios, and lobby bars serving sangria at sunset.

But there were no taxis or tourists at that hour. No nothing except the cheap plastic streamers hanging over the street, an abandoned car on the curb along a weed-filled lot, and the persistent odor of rotting garbage. And that damned mutt continued digging through the garbage can on a relentless search for some moldy treat.

Perez pulled the pistol out of his shoulder holster, dropped out the clip, then jammed it back in place. Three years earlier, he’d taken the gun off the dead body of a soldier from a rival cartel. The words Mark 23 .45 caliber Auto were engraved on the barrel. He wasn’t sure what all of it meant. He only cared that it felt good in his hand and bullets came out when he pulled the trigger. He looked over his shoulder at the two cholos—Eladio and Miguel—still slumped dumbly in the back seat. He trusted them just enough to do what they were told, as long as it wasn’t too complicated. Let’s get this over with, he said while screwing a silencer onto the barrel of the pistol.

Eladio, tall with a shaved head, wore black leather pants, cowboy boots, and a black western-style shirt with snaps instead of buttons. The dress was the norte style of the Mexican states along the Texas border.

He was three months away from turning twenty years old, a milestone that Perez figured Eladio would probably never see.

Miguel was short, a few years older, and muscular with a crew cut, camouflage pants, and a faded blue work shirt. A grinning human skull adorned the front of the sweat-stained bandana tied around his head, biker style.

Image was everything to Eladio and Miguel. It meant nothing to Perez. He knew they were little more than narco wannabes, half-breed drones from the colonias of Juarez or Monterrey eager to move up to the Knights Templar, Los Zetas, or one of Mexico’s other vicious drug cartels—if they lived that long. The looks on their faces told him they were more interested in the money and the women that it bought than about what they had to do to earn it. If they thought for one second that they could be dead tomorrow, neither showed it. The future doesn’t matter to those who don’t have one.

Without a word, Eladio slid open the side door, then looked up and down the street before getting out. Miguel followed him out, and together, they walked to the back of the van, moving with the arrogance of those who knew that someone would die tonight but it wouldn’t be them. Perez could only shake his head and try not to laugh. He had seen dozens of Eladios and Miguels come and go. They were like goldfish: feed them, but don’t name them. So, what if they ended up dead in a ditch, hanging from a bridge or buried in a shallow grave in the desert. They wouldn’t be the first and surely not the last. Not that it mattered.

There were plenty of others eager to take their places. More cholos. More wannabes. More poor bastards who considered the high risk of death better than the low life they were living. Their only other choice was to sneak over the border to the United States to work in the fields of California and Oregon or wash dishes in Denver and Chicago. Eladio and Miguel, Perez knew, were not that ambitious.

Eladio opened the back doors of the van. He pulled out two AK-47s, handing one of the assault rifles to Miguel. He looked around again before closing the van door. With the rifles held down at their sides, they looked at the driver one more time. Perez nodded and held up his hand with fingers spread. The two men silently moved off—Eladio back down the street to the left and around the corner, Miguel off to the right and up the hill. Watching, Perez sighed. At least they looked like they knew what they were doing.

Perez would be five minutes behind them. They had agreed that was all the time needed to make everything ready for him. Earlier, they’d driven by the house, checking out the surrounding homes and shops, looking into parked cars, trying to gauge if police patrolled the place on a schedule. They skipped a second pass. There was no time, and they didn’t want to draw attention to themselves. Even though the small, cramped neighborhood was like an asilo de ancianos—a nursing home—he knew a white van with Sinaloa plates would eventually attract attention. He hadn’t seen any police since late afternoon. There would be no problems as long as they followed the plan, quickly took care of business, and moved on.

Bang. Bang. Done deal. Trato hecho.

After that, fade into the city for a few days. Hang out with whores. Get drunk. Stay out of sight. When things returned to normal, as they always did, the streets would once again fill with cars, taxis, and buses. Then they would quietly disappear north on the highway to Puerto Vallarta, then back to the more familiar sights of central Mexico.

Santiago Perez knew the drill. No questions, follow orders, kill without remorse, get paid, repeat.

Still, something nagged at Perez. He was uneasy. Maybe it was the place. He had no experience in Mexican beach towns. Too many Americans and Canadians. Too many tank tops, plaid shorts, and flip-flops. Too many sunburned faces and muffin tops. Too many locals carrying trays and wearing aprons. He preferred small cantinas with cheap tequila and cheaper whores. He looked around for the hundredth time, thinking he might as well be on the moon.

He lit a cigarette, leaned against the front of the van, and blew smoke out into the night air. He ran his finger along the deep scar on the side of his face, a souvenir from a long-ago bar fight in Nuevo Laredo with a member of a rival cartel. He escaped with his life. The other guy died on the cantina floor, sliced navel to chest and coughing up blood.

Perez looked at his watch and sighed. Time to go. Tossing the cigarette over the concrete wall into the canal, he opened the car door and pulled a dusty bottle of Hornitos out from under the front seat. He took one long drink, grimaced, and then gulped down another. Putting the bottle back, he checked the street in both directions. In the distance, a dog barked. The only light a dim halo from the humming streetlamp at the corner. Its meager twin flickered halfway up the hill. Together, they cast faint shadows on the inexpensive hotels advertising albercas, TV, and free Wi-Fi.

The closed-up restaurants on the street in front of him and around the corner were dark. Menus taped to shuttered front doors offered fish tacos, shrimp three ways, and cold beer. Cheap flat-screen TVs hung from the ceiling over the plastic tables and chairs. Across the street, ten-foot terra cotta-colored walls topped with razor wire surrounded a condo complex with locked gates. Perez sensed that hyper-vigilant snowbirds were either patrolling the inside or sleeping in air-conditioned comfort. He smiled to himself. Did they really think they were safe? Did they think that someone like him couldn’t just kick in the wooden gate and kill them all in their sleep?

This was Mexico. No one was safe.

He checked his gun one more time, more out of habit than need, then started walking up the hill. The small, one-story house was one block up and around the corner for two more blocks. It had peeling orange paint, an iron, spike-topped fence, and a badly chipped concrete arch over a metal gate. Two other houses on the same block had identical paint and design, but he had double-checked the address. He was headed to the right place, Eladio and Miguel already there waiting for him.

The closer he got, the more wary he became. The persistent fear of something going wrong rattled in his head. Setting traps or getting caught in them had taught him always to be on guard. That was why he had survived this long. No way could it all end on a job that was little more than a "viaje rutinario," a milk run. Besides, if something was wrong, then either Eladio or Miguel would have come back to tell him. At least that was what they were supposed to do.

Still, the gnawing anxiety in his gut wouldn’t go away.

At the corner, he checked the streets and buildings around him, looking for lights in windows or sounds from the dark buildings. He walked past a closed tienda, two more shuttered restaurants, and a small hotel, all encased in padlocked iron gates. He crossed the silent intersection at the end of the block, moved to the left, and eased through the shadows.

Thirty feet away from the house he was looking for he spotted Eladio. He was standing in the darkness of a flower-covered arbor over the house’s small front porch. When Perez walked through the gate, Eladio tilted his head toward the rear of the house, the signal that Miguel was standing guard in the backyard.

So far so good, Perez thought as he followed the short path to the porch and stopped.

Everything okay? he whispered in Spanish.

When Eladio nodded, he opened the security door, careful not to let the cheap chain rattle against the metal bars. When he found the front door unlocked, he marveled again at how careless people were, even in Mexico.

He stepped inside. In the dark he could see the second-hand furniture, threadbare rugs, and colorful paintings of bananas and papayas that filled the small front room. Hand-painted plates, little boxes made of exotic wood, and small painted turtles and armadillos with tails and heads that bobbed up and down covered the shelves of a bamboo bookcase. He’d seen all this stuff before. Any tourist could buy them for a few pesos from the toothless old women and sad-faced mestizo children wandering the beaches and streets.

Standing there, he had the same thoughts as when he first saw the place: Why here? Why hire him to kill someone who lived on a backstreet in a sleepy beach town? Someone with a cottage filled with furniture that even he could afford and decorated with junk from beach vendors? This was not the home—or even the vacation home—of some drug lord or even the people who worked for drug lords. They lived in mansions with concrete walls, steel gates, and men with machine guns. This would not even qualify as a nice guest house. How could anyone who lived in a place like this be a danger to the wealthy and powerful woman who hired him?

It was strange, but he worked for strange people. Always had. Always would.

A king-size bed took up most of the bedroom. More threadbare carpets on the floor. More cheap paintings on the wall. Books he’d never heard of and would never read lined more cheap bamboo bookshelves. The faint scent of a sandalwood candle mixed with the odor of marijuana and the perfumed sweat of a woman.

Perez shook off the nagging uneasiness. Stay focused. Get this done then get out of here. The two bodies in the bed were close together, spoon-like, only the tops of their heads visible above the thin blanket. The room felt hot and damp.

He stared at the bodies for a few seconds, wondering what it would be like to be that close to someone. He had only known whores who did what he asked, picked up their money, and left. To spend the entire night with someone, to hold them, was alien to him.

He stared at them for a few more seconds then pulled the gun with the silencer from his shoulder holster and ripped the blanket off the bed.

Perez walked out of the house, wondering who the two dead people were, then forgot all about it. He had done worse things at the request of better people. Two more bodies to add to the mountain he’d already seen. It was best not to ask.

We’re done, he said to Eladio as he left the house and pointed toward where they left the van. Back to the car.

Eladio nodded and turned to walk off toward the back of the house to find Miguel. Perez walked out to the street and started back the way he came. There was no hurry because he’d made no noise.

The streets were still the same. No cars. No people. No lights in the modest apartments above the tiendas. The restaurants still locked tight. The dog still had his head buried in the garbage can but had been joined by a mangy black cat. Opponents joined in the constant need to survive.

The clicking of his hard-soled boots on the cobblestones echoed off the terra cotta-colored walls of the condo. The van was fifty yards away at the bottom of the hill. He kept a steady, but unhurried pace. The job didn’t go off exactly as planned, but the end result was the same: two people dead. He’d tell her he killed them all just like he was told. The woman who hired him would be satisfied. The only thing left to do was get paid and leave town without attracting attention. His breathing eased. His heart rate slowed. If the other two weren’t back at the van yet, they would be soon. The job was over. He slowed his pace, sure that the unease he felt earlier was misplaced. He reached into his shirt pocket for his cigarettes and a lighter.

Then the shooting started.

CHAPTER 2

The morning sun popped up over the mountains to the east of Zihuatanejo Bay like a jack-in-the-box, sending the temperature soaring into the low nineties. Soon the heat would start rippling mirage-like off the city’s sidewalks and streets. The humidity-laden air would go from a hot, wet washcloth to a sauna.

The handful of sailboats anchored in the bay bobbed on the gentle swells working their way in from the Pacific Ocean. Frigate birds, scouting for a free meal, circled the handful of pangas coming back from a night of fishing. A dozen bored-looking pelicans watched it all while jostling for space on an abandoned boat sitting off Playa Municipal. Restaurant owners and locals waited at the open-air fish market under the palm trees in front of Paseo de los Pescadores to buy dorado, tuna, snapper, or shrimp fresh off the boats.

John Standard took it all in from the back deck of the charter fishing boat Tuna Warrior as it coasted toward the massive city pier. The scene was a far cry from Portland, Oregon. Fine with him. This was why he came here: something alien, foreign, and unpretentious. A place of endless summer. No more months of frigid temperatures and icy rain.

When he arrived in Zihuatanejo five months earlier, sunburned tourists packed the beaches, filled the restaurants, and gathered around swimming pools clutching cold beers and icy drinks. Now, well into a steamy spring, the tourist season was sputtering to an uneven end. The last of the city’s substantial expatriate community was packing up and heading home, taking with them their money, tans, and tank tops. Replacing them were bargain hunters willing to endure hotter temperatures in exchange for cheaper hotel rates. Still, more and more tables and stools in the town’s eclectic collection of restaurants and bars went unused. Hotels and condos emptied. Tequila, beer, and zinc oxide sales dropped in reverse proportion to the temperature.

Across the bay, along Playa la Ropa, fewer and fewer intrepid tourists hung like smoked hams from parasails over the gaudy resort hotels. Salt-stained jet skis and sand-encrusted Hobie Cats sat unused and unwanted. The number of vendors selling jewelry, hand-painted plates, and cheap bobble-head toys dwindled to a few women and children trudging aimlessly up and down the beaches in search of customers that were growing scarcer by the day.

The only people left walking the beach were newlyweds, nearly deads, and German men in Speedos. The few beachfront restaurants determined to stick it out to the bitter end were reluctantly coming to life. Bored waiters in white shirts, matching pants, and food-stained aprons were gathering up empty beer bottles and paper plates left over from the previous night. They diligently raked the sand and set up plastic tables, chairs, lounges, and beach umbrellas in the hope that someone would show up for breakfast and maybe stick around for lunch. In what had become a kind of tradition, the largest number of discarded beer and tequila bottles lay piled up in front of a small two-story hotel with a sign outside announcing AA meetings every Tuesday night at seven.

At Playa la Madera, in the northeast corner of the bay, a handful of women were setting up massage tables while keeping an eye out for any potential customers out for a morning walk. No one was sure if the women knew anything about massages, but a couple of takers a day was all it took to scratch out a living sufficient to get through the summer until the tourists returned in the fall.

That was life in Zihuatanejo: Make money from November through March. Hang on by your fingernails for the rest of the year.

Standard had made an effort to learn as much as he could about the city. He’d eaten at most of the restaurants, drunk in most of the bars, called the waiters by their first names, and learned enough Spanish to earn tolerant smiles from the locals. He’d watched tourists parade by as he wasted away the days lying in the sun or hanging out in the shade with a beer and a book. He ate breakfast or lunch at a beachfront restaurant called The Tortuga, then drank away the hot, humid afternoons. He was tan and, having given up cigarettes, fit, thanks to regular mile-long runs along Playa la Ropa.

His life had evolved into a laid-back one of languid days and exotic nights. He was known to the locals as Juan Estandar, aka Señor Juan. To others, he was just someone from Oregon who shared a palapa house above the beach with the beautiful Emma Parrish. He had yet to gain full admission into the tight-knit community of Americans who started coming to Zihuatanejo decades ago. Convinced of their own uniqueness, they spent their days at the beach playing Scrabble and sharing rumors as if they were true. At night, they hung out at any number of bars, but mostly Mango’s, a high-end restaurant in town. To them, Standard was simply that writer guy shacked up with Emma.

He didn’t mind. His life back in Oregon as a reporter and freelancer was little more than a vague memory. Now, few things could be better than being the boyfriend of Emma Parrish. Besides, being a member of anything was not really his deal. The only club he’d ever joined was an LA Fitness back in the days when he had a job, a wife, and lived in the Starbucks-fueled hipster world of Portland. Things were good, but he knew they wouldn’t stay that way for long. They never did. All he could do was enjoy it while it lasted.

When Special Ed, the Tuna Warrior’s owner and skipper, eased the boat up against the rickety dock at the base of the city pier, Standard jumped over the port side, tied the bow to a rusty cleat, and then did the same to the stern. With everything secure, he reached inside for a six-pack-sized Igloo cooler, set it on the dock, and then helped the elderly couple who had chartered the boat for the morning over the side and up the shaky stairs to the top of the pier.

The couple had paid full freight for a half-day trip that turned into a two-hour boat ride. The old man, an amiable retired English professor from Athens, Ohio, started getting seasick ten minutes outside the mouth of the bay. Fortunately, they immediately hooked a twenty-pound dorado. In an amazing show of agility, the old guy landed the fish while periodically puking over the side of the boat. His wife sat in the boat’s cabin, hand covering her mouth, her eyes portraying a feeling of terror and disgust made worse when Ed hit the landed fish with a baseball bat before gutting and filleting it on the transom.

Here you go. Standard handed the man the cooler filled with the fresh dorado fillets. Take this to any restaurant in town, that’s still open that is, and they’ll cook it up for you. Throw in some fried plantains, rice, and a Caesar salad and you’re good to go. It’ll be the best meal you and your friends ever had. Oh yeah, don’t forget a margarita to go with it.

The stout, bald-headed old man, wore a puke-stained Polo shirt, plaid Bermuda shorts, and a floppy-brimmed hat with a Life is Good logo on the front. His wife, bent and fragile, had blue-gray hair, a red visor, and a fanny pack. The couple grimaced in unison at the mention of food before slowly walking off together up the pier toward town.

When he went back to the Tuna Warrior, Special Ed was sitting in the captain’s chair, a beer in one hand and a cigarette in the other. He’d shed the dark glasses he put on for the benefit of customers in favor of the patch he usually wore over his milky-white left eye. Ed was closing in on sixty years of age and looked every day of it. With a thin, gray beard, a permanently sunburned face, and a scarf worn pirate-like over his head, he came across as someone who decided to stay in town after being banished from a cruise ship for abusing the midnight lobster buffet. That he wore the same clothes pretty much every day—a faded pair of baggy red shorts, sandals, and a T-shirt with a sailfish logo on the pocket—confirmed his status as a permanent refugee from anything that resembled real work. Ed got the name Special Ed shortly after he arrived in Zihuatanejo in the early 2000s. Not knowing he was a filthy rich refugee from the dot-com boom, people wrote him off as just another burned-out surfer looking to relive the old days of surf, sand, and The Beach Boys. As he slipped into Mexican life with its … agricultural distractions … he earned a second nickname: Higher Ed.

You’re the richest man in town, Standard said. You’d think you’d dress a little better.

You’re right, but don’t tell anybody. Ed downed the rest of his beer. It ruins the image.

Ed pulled himself out of the chair, went below deck, and came back with a fistful of two-hundred-peso notes. He peeled off a few of the bills and handed Standard the rest. That’s for today’s charter. You’re also entitled to some of the fish the old guy caught. What we don’t use I’ll give to the locals.

Standard didn’t answer right away, not sure if he was up to one of Ed’s nights on the town, which usually meant food, drink, and passing out in the taxi going home. Let me check with Emma, he said.

Ed pulled a can of Tecate from a cooler and eased back into the captain’s chair. Did you hear those sirens this morning?

Something going on in la Madera. Standard swatted away a pelican that landed on the transom in search of a free meal. I’ve heard sirens before, but these sounded more urgent.

Probably the usual bullshit.

Standard had heard Ed rail against the police more than once. It was usually some variation of how all cops think people fall into two categories—those who commit crimes and those who haven’t gotten around to it yet. Best not to rise to the bait.

When Standard didn’t answer, Ed fired up a cigarette. Tell me, John, how old are you?

Thirty-seven.

And you’ve been down here how long?

Five months. A little more.

And with Emma?

Standard did the math in his head. Fresh off the plane, he rented a house from Emma on the small piece of property she owned above Playa la Ropa. They started living together a few weeks later. A little less than that.

Ed nodded his approval, put his feet up on the railing, and leaned back to watch a couple of other boats that were more modest versions of the Tuna Warrior. Thirty-seven. A good-looking guy. Living in paradise with a beautiful woman. Some money stashed away. A great job on a great boat with a great skipper.

He either winked or blinked at Standard. With a one-eyed man, it was impossible to tell the difference. Reaching in the cooler, he pulled out another ice-cold can of Tecate and handed it to Standard. I’d say you’re doing pretty well.

Standard took the beer. They clicked cans.

At least you’re over the seasick thing.

Standard smiled. Thanks to you and the pills you gave me.

I got something else that works. When’s the last time you smoked dope?

Standard thought for a minute. College, I guess. You? When Ed looked at his watch, Standard just shook his head and laughed. Never mind, he said.

How much are you worth? Standard asked.

Ed thought for a moment. Hell if I know. Mid-nine figures, I think. Maybe a little more. It changes every day. Why? You want some of it when I die?

Just the boat.

Ed thought for a few seconds. Sure. And if you die first, I get the Fury.

Standard laughed. The bright red, seventies-era Plymouth Fury was Emma’s prize possession, a gift from a former boyfriend who died in a SCUBA-diving accident three years before Standard hit town. The mint-condition car had almost as much horsepower as miles on the odometer. Most of the time, the car sat safely in the garage of a condo unit in Ixtapa that Emma managed for friends who lived in Mexico City.

Not mine to give, Standard said, and you’ll never get Emma to part with it. Can’t blame her. Trust me, it is one sweet ride and worth a small fortune. Maybe not here, but back in the States. So I shouldn’t plan it? he asked.

Standard’s answer was a big smile.

With the sun high above the mountains to the east, the temperature soared another five degrees. Ed looked at his watch. It’s still early. What say we go back out? See if we can hook a tuna to go with those dorado fillets. Let this boat live up to its name. He slapped his hand on the gunwale. You can drive. I’ll fish for a change. Then, tonight, the three of us will have dinner somewhere in town. Fresh fish, margaritas, tequila shots. What do you say?

Tempting, but I’m done for the day. Standard downed the rest of his beer in one, long gulp. How about running me over to Playa la Ropa? Maybe Emma’s still in bed. I can surprise her. He smiled when a lecherous look