Free Triple Crossing by Sebastian Rotella Page A

grin. “None whatsoever.”
    She drove with relish, handling the vehicle as if she had training at the wheel. He wondered if she had been in another agency
     before OIG. Usually the internal affairs investigators put in some years in ICE, the Marshals or someplace before they got
     into the business of locking up fellow feds.
    They rode north in silence on the freeway past SeaWorld, past inland beaches and bridges. San Diego was impossibly beautiful:
     the slender palm trees lining the curve of Mission Bay, the afternoon sun streaking placid waters, the immaculate lawns of
     hotel resorts. The beauty depressed him. He felt apart from it, rootless, condemned to skim across the surface of the city.
    He asked where they were going.
    “A place where we can talk,” she said.
    A minute later, she said: “What are you exactly, Valentine?”
    “What kinda question is that?”
    Her smile exposed a slight and appealing overbite. “Ethnically, I mean.”
    “Oh. My father was born in Italy, grew up in Argentina and moved to Chicago. His brothers were there. My mother’s family was
     Mexican.”
    “That’s where you got your Spanish.”
    “More my father’s side. My mother’s family came a long time ago. To work on the railroads in Chicago. My mom can’t barely
     speak Spanish, except songs. My neighborhood was Italian, but there were a lotta Mexicans too. And black people.”
    “Where did you fit in?”
    “Good question.”
    “I’ll get this over with, Valentine, so you know the situation.” She sighed, her snub profile intent on the freeway. “You
     almost convinced me yesterday. I should have known better.”
    “About what?”
    “My Mexican police contacts have a witness who saw you in the Zona Norte with dogs chasing you. The smuggler says you beat
     him down after pursuing him into his residence near Calle Internacional. And they found a scrap of green material stuck in
     the border fence. Don’t bother denying it’s from your uniform, because that can be ascertained conclusively. You must’ve spent
     a good five minutes in Tijuana. Quite an excursion.”
    “So you believe the Mexican police.”
    “These particular officers are meticulous and professional investigators.”
    “I bet.”
    She steered down and around an exit ramp.
    “The point is, now you’re in really big trouble. They could assist our investigation. Or they could press charges themselves,in Mexico, for unauthorized entry and assault on that individual. Theoretically, they could request extradition. It would
     make a big stink.”
    He folded his arms. They descended downhill curves, the Pacific shimmering beyond pine trees, and entered La Jolla Village.
     A short steep grade led into the Cove, a triangular coastal park overlooking rocks and surf and walled by cliffs. She parked
     in front of a café-restaurant in a historic-looking house set into the base of a cliff.
    She looked at him brightly. “Ready?”
    “I gotta tell you, I’m not comfortable with this,” he said.
    “What?”
    “One minute you’re talking about the Mexicans extraditing me, which is the most fucked-up unfair outrageous thing I ever heard,
     considering all the Mexican criminals we can’t extradite because of the criminals in their government. And then you want to
     get coffee.”
    “Look,” she said, her door half-open. “I’m being up-front. I’m taking a big chance with you.”
    “Why?”
    “Good question. Come on.”
    It was past 3 p.m. and the café was nearly empty, which was probably why she had picked it. Reached by wooden steps, the place
     was big and homey, a fireplace, pictures of old-time San Diego on the mantel and walls, carved furniture. It was not the kind
     of place he normally went. But it seemed like a nice spot for a date with Isabel Puente.
    They sat in a corner with a view of the ocean. They both ordered coffee, and he ordered waffles with strawberries. Puente
     looked amused.
    “I thought you ate already,” she said.
    “So