7. / Old Business

In his short-sleeved pullover shirt, Lisiado conceals no obvious weapons. The tall man takes this in with one glance, then his eyes meet Lisiado's and widen. "Cesar?" he says in disbelief. His astonishment shifts rapidly to a scowl. "Or should I call you 'Bucho'?"

The older man shakes his head. "I suppose it's too much to hope that you might call me brother." For the second time in his life, the devil himself has turned out to be his own flesh and blood. How is this possible? He has heard from several sources that General Marquez massacred his brother and his family.

"You're dead," says not-so-little Manito, as if trying to convince himself this isn't happening. "I shot you."

"Five times," nods his elder brother. "Twice in each lung, and my right hip as I was falling." Lisiado's breath whistles and he concentrates on each inhalation.

"I confessed it." The guns are still aimed as if he wishes to claim the death he has already done penance for.

"Maybe they will give you credit toward something else?" suggests the man called Lisiado with forced irony. He manages a smile, although lack of oxygen is beginning to make him light-headed.

They survey each other for a moment. Then, to Lisiado's relief, the younger man holsters his guns as the priest's compartment opens. "Did you wish confession?" the priest inside asks Lisiado.

"Thank you, Father, but at the moment, I am trying to reconcile with my brother." The priest raises an eyebrow - having just heard Manito's confession, he must be curious - and murmurs a blessing as he exits the booth and departs the area. "Does that make me Cain, or Abel?" he asks Manito wryly when the black cassock is out of sight.

"Cain slew Abel. But you are not dead. And Abel was a good man. I don't think the parallel applies." His brother's tone makes clear his opinion.

"A truce?" Lisiado suggests. "While we are here, at least?"

His brother studies him for a moment. Glances around the cathedral and nods shortly.

"I hope you don't mind if I sit down?" Without waiting for an answer, Lisiado lowers himself onto a pew, trying to regulate his breathing. "I heard about what happened with Marquez. I thought you were dead."

There is no trace of a smile on his brother's face as he says, "I am."

"And Carolina?"

"Remembering how hard you tried to kill her, I don't think you wish to remind me of Carolina right now."

Ouch. "How is it that you come to be in Culiacan?"

"I'm here as a favor to someone. I won't be staying long."

"Would that 'someone' be with the CIA?" asks Lisiado, and is surprised to see Manito's eyes narrow.

"Why do you ask that?"

Lisiado rises reluctantly from the pew. "There is a gun under my shirt in the back," he tells the other man. "I let you know this because I am going to take something out of my back pocket - slowly! - and hopefully without getting shot..." He produces the much-creased sheet of paper he's been carrying around. "What do you know about this woman?" he asks, unfolding the blurred fax and handing it to his brother, who scans the information, and unerringly picks out the information Lisiado would most prefer not to discuss.

"You work for the Gomez cartel?" he asks harshly.

"I've been acting as an advisor to Nestor for years, ever since my business was destroyed." This deserves a note of irony, since it was, after all, Manito who brought him down. "Nestor's doctors - and a good woman I don't deserve - kept me alive. He's in prison now, and probably won't come out again. His heir is a snake, to whom I owe nothing. Getting away...isn't as easy as it sounds."

Manito steps over to one of the niches, and touches a corner of the paper to one of the candle flames. Lisiado says nothing as Eduardo's final message goes up in smoke. "The woman is an American with no connection to the CIA. She's back in her own country, and is of no concern to the Gomezes."

"Now what?"

The musician gestures to the rows of pews. "Let's talk."

And so, for the next hour, Lisiado talks. He goes back to the beginning, to the night their mother took him, and only him in her flight from their father. Tells his brother how she wound up as the plaything of a cartelista, and how he learned the business from the inside at a young age. "One of the first things I did was help stage cockfights. That's where I got the nickname 'Bucho'."

He glosses over nothing. Finally, he reaches the present, and tells Manito about the situation with Ernesto. As long as Eduardo was there to hold the balance of power in check, all was well, but Esteban is too young, not cut out for the machinations of his family.

When he's finished, Manito is regarding him, if not with sympathy, at least with marginally less loathing. "Now I know how a priest must feel after hearing confession," says his brother. "It is very tiring. I think we should get something to eat. And there is someone I think you ought to meet."