Tequila Sunset by Sam Hawken

“Information? Names?”
    “I can’t say!”
    “Then we’re finished here.”
    “ ¡Por favor, espere! ”
    Matías had the door half open. His twenty minutes were almost up. There were five others to interview. He was torn between leaving and staying. Finally he shut the door and stood with his back to it. “Okay,” he said. “Tell me what it is that you can’t say.”
    “Will it come back on me? Will people know I talked?”
    “That’s not something that interests me. If you give good information and we can use it in court, then maybe some accommodations can be made. If you feed me a bunch of shit then you can go to hell. I’ll tell everyone you snitched to me just for fun. How long will you last then? You won’t even have to be on the streets to bekilled. Los Aztecas will reach out for you and you will be gone.”
    Meza’s face turned dark and he wrung his hands. Time was ticking past twenty minutes. Sosa and Galvan would be waiting.
    “Talk to me, Eberto.”
    “Please…”
    “Oh, this is bullshit,” Matías said. He put his hand on the doorknob.
    “All right,” Meza said. “Just don’t send the other one back in.”
    Matías came back to the table and put down his notepad. He sat and clicked his pen. “We’ll start with the names of the shooters.”

SEVENTEEN
    O N S UNDAY F LIP WENT TO M ASS WITH HIS mother at El Segrado Corazón, the ancient church at the heart of Segundo Barrio. They met Alfredo there and afterward went to a restaurant to have Sunday lunch. It was only when he saw Alfredo and his mother holding hands that Flip realized they were more than just friends. Alfredo brought Flip a uniform shirt that he had to wear for work.
    Afterward Flip asked his mother about a cell phone and they went to the store to find one. His mother picked out a cheap, simple phone and added it to her account. Flip thought about calling Graciela immediately but reconsidered; he did not want to scare her away and she might have her own Sunday business, too.
    He spent the remainder of his afternoon shooting baskets in the driveway. From time to time he glanced up the street, half expecting to see Emilio coming down to carry him off, but he did not see anything of Emilio or anyone else that day.
    Monday morning came early. He showered and shaved and put on the new uniform shirt. It was a little tight under the arms, but Flip thought he could get used to it. His mother made breakfast and he had only just finished when Alfredo honked his horn on the street. The sun wasn’t yet up.
    “Have a good day,” Flip’s mother said. She pressed a paper sack into his hands. “Here’s some lunch for you. Make sure you eat to keep your strength up.”
    “I will, Mamá.”
    Alfredo drove a Ford pick-up truck that had been worked hard. The paint on the sides was scraped, the panels dented, and the toolbox mounted behind the cab was spotted with rust. A few loose boards and screws rattled around in the bed. Alfredo had the heater running because the morning was chill.
    “Ready to put in some time?” Alfredo asked Flip.
    Flip struggled with the seatbelt until finally it released. “Yeah,” he said.
    “You’ll do fine.”
    “Okay,” Flip said.
    They drove in silence for a while. Flip looked around the inside of the cab. Compared to the rest of the truck it was well-kept. There was not even any trash on the floorboards and the ash tray had coins in it instead of butts.
    “I wanted to ask you something,” Alfredo said.
    “Ask me what?”
    “I wanted to know if you were all right with me and Silvia.”
    “What, that? No, it’s fine.”
    “I didn’t know. Sometimes it’s hard for these things to change.”
    “My father’s been dead a long time,” Flip said. “I’m glad she found someone.”
    “She’s a good woman.”
    “I know.”
    Alfredo had nothing else to say and they didn’t talk the rest of the way. When they made the final turn, Flip saw the warehouse: a big, square building with several truck