Massive Attack (A Guy Niava Thriller Book 1) by Dana Arama (diy ebook reader TXT) 📕

“Understood,” I answered, and she continued.

“Lately, a number of key operatives from Los Zetas were killed and instead of the older commanders, young commanders took over. Since then, a higher but less skilled level of violence has been seen.

“The second group is the Juarez cartel, who over the years controlled the Ciudad Juarez area. The Juarez controlled the territories of the fields and the transport routes of the drugs. They managed to do all this with the help of corrupt officials. Their trouble started in the late Nineties, when the head of the cartel, Amado Carrillo Fuentes, died. By the way,” she smiled, “It happened during plastic surgery. The sleeping beauty went to sleep and never awoke. Fuentes’s death caused a big problem, as their connections were based on his acquaintances with the corrupt officials. From that moment onwards, the cartel lost a lot of its power.”

“So, this is only the background story, in order to understand what is happening today in the field?” Laura asked, looking earnestly at Zorro, waiting for her to continue.

“Yes. That’s correct. The Gulf cartel signed a treaty with the Sinaloa cartel, which controls more than forty-seven countries, where they are the sole cocaine distributors. This makes them the largest South American cocaine drug distributor in the world. Besides cocaine, Sinaloa supplies heroin, marijuana and amphetamines. Their smuggling into the United States is concentrated in the Arizona area. There is a group of citizens trying to put a stop to the smuggling, but the smuggling doesn’t just happen above ground, but through specially-constructed tunnels.”

“The amount of money they have allows them to hire people, just like any other industry,” Laura said.

Zorro nodded and took a sip of her drink.

“And what happened to the opposing cartels?” I asked

Before she could answer, there was a knock on the door. Zorro went to open it. An excited gush of Spanish, spoken in a masculine voice could be heard by the door. Zorro answered him calmly and turned towards us. “There is a small problem in the kitchen. Give me a few minutes and I’ll be back.” She closed the door behind her, and we were left with our empty glasses and a story only half finished.

“You do realize that she could rat on us now?”

“Do you want to go and see what’s happening out there?”

“Yes. I will ask where the toilet is. I don’t trust her at all,” Laura said and stood up, but as she was about to walk towards the door, it opened, and Zorro entered with three new drinks.

“You have to taste these. They taste like heaven. I know he put passionfruit in it, but he refuses to tell me the rest of the ingredients.”

“We have to get out of here by four,” Laura smiled, as if a moment ago she hadn’t said she mistrusted our host.

“A bit of alcohol, a lot of flavored ice. There is so little alcohol that even you won’t get drunk. Let’s continue the analysis of the situation. We left at the point of the cartel opposing the Sinaloa -- The Tijuana cartel. In the beginning they accumulated a lot of power, but as soon as their leader was killed in a shootout, the cartel was left a mere shadow of what it was. It currently limits its activities only to Tijuana.

“Beltran Leyva was in the same Juarez treaty as Tijuana and Los Zetas. He was the head of the newest cartel. Him and El Chapo have an ongoing conflict -- a personal conflict, really. It started when El Chapo’s son was released from prison and by chance or not, Leyva Beltran’s brother, Alfredo, was arrested. That was the turning point from business to personal. That was when the murders of key cartel players started and the climax of it all was when they assassinated the twenty-two-year-old son of Joaquin Guzman, the head of the Sinaloa, in a parking lot.

“In the last three years, three out of four Sinaloa brothers have been either arrested or killed. Remember this detail. It is important in order to understand the complexity of the present situation,” Zorro commanded.

“If I understood correctly, it seems as if all the cartels are losing their power slowly,” I commented.

“And as everyone knows, there is no such a thing as a vacuum in the field,” Zorro said. She brushed stray hairs from her face and continued. “The authorities hunt down the small cartels, and rightfully so, along with the big cartels, and in their place a new power has emerged. A branch that used to belong to the Sinaloa -- The Jalisco, or to be specific, the new generation of the Jalisco, called the CJNG.”

Another knock came at the door and, without waiting for an answer, a young man peeked his head in the room. He didn’t say a word and Zorro got up from her seat. “I’m sorry, duty calls. Will be right back.”

The ‘be right back’ turned out to be longer than expected. “I think you need to go to the toilet,” I hinted to Laura. She nodded her head, got up and put her ear to the door, listening to the outside noises. By the look on her face, she was listening to something very disturbing on the other side. She opened the door wide open to see Zorro talking to the young man. They both shut up and looked at us when the door opened.

“Where is the bathroom?”

They pointed left, silently, towards the way we came, and Laura made her way in that direction. Afterwards the door closed shut again. I continued waiting. Would the conversation outside influence her decision to help us?

A few moments later the door reopened, and Zorro and Laura walked back inside.

“I am sorry for the break, but I have a business to run, we were at the Jalisco story. Well, ‘The new generation’ popped up for the first time in the spring of the year two thousand and eleven within half a year, became