Chapter Eight
"Ruben Santiago," said Barbara as she read the rap sheet that was displayed on her computer screen. "Colombian … thirty-nine … has priors for drug trafficking and assault with a deadly weapon."
Helena's eyebrows shot up in amazement. "He's THIRTY-NINE?!"
"Pathetic, isn't it?" said Barbara. "A middle-aged man playing a teenager's game." She then resumed reading the rap sheet. "According to this, he just got out of prison six months ago after doing ten years for drug trafficking."
"He doesn't know," said Helena. "About Batman being … gone." Helena paused. "There's something I don't understand..."
"What?"
"How did Dinah know where to … find me? I mean, I could've been anywhere in this city."
"As near as I can tell, there's always been a psychic link between you two."
"Really?"
"How else do you explain her seeing your mother being killed from over a thousand miles away?"
"If that's the case, then you should share a link with her as well," said Helena. "She saw Joker shoot you." Helena paused. "I wonder why she hasn't spoken to you."
"I don't know," said Barbara. "Maybe she hasn't felt the need."
Carlos Salazar was sitting in the La Teresita Café, dining on paella con pollo and a side order of tomatoes stuffed with Spanish rice. A bald, hulking figure of a man in his late twenties walked in wearing a black trenchcoat and a paper clip earring. He walked over to Salazar and stood before him.
"May I help you?" asked Salazar.
Without saying a word, the bald man reached inside his coat, pulled a 9mm out from behind his back, aimed it at Salazar's forehead, and fired. Salazar slumped forward into his paella, dead.
Coolly and calmly, the bald man tucked the 9mm back into his waistband, walked out the door, and vanished into the night.
Pedro stood in the produce aisle at O'Brien's Food Mart, squeezing a beefsteak tomato amidst a display of bell peppers, cucumbers, tomatoes, lettuce, and celery.
Coolly and calmly, the same trenchcoat-wearing bald man who had shot Salazar earlier walked up behind Pedro, reached into his trenchcoat, pulled the 9mm out from behind him, leveled it at the back of Pedro's head, and fired. Pedro collapsed onto the floor, dead -- the tomato slipping from his grasp as he fell.
Just as coolly and calmly as he came, the bald man tucked the 9mm back into his waistband, turned around, and left.
