Page 30 of Backwater Justice
“The truck must return, no?”
“Of course.”
“Do they bring products back to your Pacific Northwest?”
“We try not to have our guys dead-head it. Waste of fuel, so we work with some of the local produce companies and bring their goods up north.”
“Excellent. In which cities do your trucks stop?”
“It all depends. There is a lot of new construction in Querétaro, and of course Mexico City.”
“Ah. Perfect. So if someone should meet one of your trucks, say off I-25, they would be able to deliver it to you?”
“That’s entirely possible. But then what do I do with it?”
“You arrange for another truck to bring it to Canada.”
“It sounds a bit risky.” Oliver continued to squint. He wasn’t sure if it was the sun, or if his brain was trying to wrap itself around what Ernesto was proposing.
“Life is risky, my friend.” Ernesto took another hit from the brown bottle and handed it to Oliver.
“True.” Oliver thought for a moment. “Would this be a one-time thing?”
“It doesn’t have to be.” Ernesto turned toward the sunset again.
“How many trips do you envision?”
“Perhaps one per week.”
Oliver was struggling with the math in his fuzzy head. “I’ll have to give a vig to the drivers.”
“Of course. Is it possible to have the same drivers? We do not want too many people in our business. That is, if you want to do business with me.”
“Sounds intriguing.” Oliver was sobering up with the idea of making so much money. “We’d have to take measures to mitigate the hazards. Can you increase the fee?”
“I would have to increase the size of the package. Can you fit something eighteen by twenty-six?”
“Should be no problem.”
“Bueno. Then you shall get seventy-five hundred dollars for every delivery. One per week. You will receive your money when the trunk arrives in Canada.”
“How about the border? I have a trucker’s inn just outside Blaine, Washington. That could be a drop-off point.”
“Even better.” Ernesto smiled. He knew he had found the right person. He had an ongoing relationship with several of the hotel personnel here. They had alerted him that a single, rich American male was staying at the resort, and his family business was transportation.
“I shall call you in the morning. We will have breakfast and discuss the details. For now, I must leave. I have a dinner engagement.” He held out his hand to Oliver. “I look forward to a long business relationship with you.”
“Same here.” Oliver shook his hand vigorously. This was the miracle he had been hoping for. Thirty-thousand extra smackeroos each month. He’d have to pick two drivers he could trust implicitly. He figured a weekly bonus of a grand would surely buy their loyalty. Then he rethought the math. Maybe that was too much. Five hundred? That was two thousand a month. Surely enough to buy a good amount of allegiance.
* * *
For two years, Oliver raked in over a quarter of a million dollars. But problems started to develop. Opioid-related deaths were on the rise. It had become an epidemic among people between the ages of twenty-five and fifty-four, with non-pharmaceutical fentanyl contributing to seventy-nine percent of the overdoses. There were lawsuits against drug manufacturers for creating the addiction, but illegal drugs had also flooded the market, from China to Mexico to Canada, and the U.S., with Canada having a seventeen-percent increase in illegal use. The DEA was cracking down on the opium superhighways in conjunction with Canada’s special task force.
Ernesto had been arrested several times, but because of his own backwater arrangements, he skated. After his third encounter with law enforcement, he knew he was coming perilously close to losing his freedom, especially if he was caught in the U.S. He decided it was time to retire and move to Cuba. He wasn’t about to start looking for his replacement. Getting out of the business and out of the country was his priority.
* * *
Ernesto was moving out of the picture, and Oliver could not afford to take his chances with someone else. The drug cartels were ferocious and territorial. They would think nothing of shooting a driver in the head, then dismembering them for the rest of the narcoterrorists and narcoterrorist wannabes to see. The business had become too dangerous, and Oliver liked his face. He didn’t want to end up mutilated and dumped in a ditch. The idea made him shudder. Even though he wasn’t the one transporting the goods, he was the capo-di-capo. He was just another moving target.