Savages

solely
to
the cartel, which will then take the big profit margin for itself.
    “They’re Walmart,” O says.
    (Have we covered that O is not stupid?)
    They
are
Walmart, Chon agrees, and they have moved horizontally to offer a wide variety of products—they sell not only drugs, but human beings for both the labor and sex markets, and they have recently entered into the lucrative kidnapping business.
    But that is not relevant to this discussion or the vid-clip in question, which graphically illustrates that—
    Ben and Chonny can take
    De Deal
    Or
    De Capitation.

10
     
    “Are you going to take the deal?” O asks.
    Chon snorts, “No.”
    He turns off the laptop and starts reassembling the pretty gun.

11
     
    O goes home.
    Where Paqu is in one of her phases.
    O has a hard time keeping up with her phases—
    But in rough order:
Yoga
Pills and alcohol
Rehab
Republican politics
Jesus
Republican politics and Jesus
Fitness
Fitness, Republican politics, and Jesus
Cosmetic surgery
Gourmet cooking
Jazzercise
Buddhism
Real estate
Real estate, Jesus, and Republican politics
Fine wine
Re-rehab
Tennis
Horseback riding
Meditation
    And now—
Direct sales.
    “It’s a pyramid scheme, Mom,” O said when she saw the boxes and boxes of organic skin-care products that Paqu tried to enlist her to sell. She’d already signed up most of her friends, who were all selling the shit to one another in a sort of merchandizing circle-jill.
    “It’s not a pyramid scheme,” Paqu objected. “A pyramid scheme is like those cleaning products.”
    “And this—”
    “Isn’t,” Paqu said.
    “Have you ever seen a pyramid?” O asked her. “Or a picture of one?”
    “Yes.”
    “Okay,” O said, wondering why she was even trying. “You sell this crap and kick up a percentage to the person who enlisted you. You enlist other people who kick up to you. That’s a pyramid, Mom.”
    “No, it isn’t.”
    O gets home this afternoon and Paqu is on the patio slamming
mojitos
with all her Organic Makeup Cult buddies. They’re all buzzed and buzzing about some upcoming motivational three-day cruise event.
    Which would make you root for Somali pirates, O thinks.
    “Can I fix you some Kool-Aid?” O asks the women graciously.
    Paqu is oblivious. “Thank you, dear, but we have refreshments. Wouldn’t you like to join us?”
    Yes I wouldn’t, O thinks.
    “I’m otherwise engaged,” she says, retreating to the relative sanctuary of her room.
    Six is hiding in his home office pretending to be tracking the market but really watching an Angels game. The door is open and he sees O and quickly swivels around to peer into his computer monitor.
    “Don’t worry,” O says. “I won’t squeal.”
    “You want a martini?”
    “I’m good.”
    She goes into her room, flops on the bed, and crashes.

12
     
    Lado is short for “Helado,” which is Spanish for “stone cold.”
    It fits.
    Miguel Arroyo, aka Lado, is stone cold.
    (A figure of speech that Chon would object to, BTW. Having been to the desert, he knows that stones can be fucking hot.)
    Anyway—
    Even as a kid, Lado didn’t seem to have any feelings, or if he did, he didn’t show them anyway. Hug him—his mother did, a lot—you got nothing. Whip his ass with a belt—his father did, a lot—the same nothing. He’d just look at you with those black eyes, like what do you want with me?
    He’s no kid now. Forty-six, he’s a father himself. Two sons and a teenage daughter who is making him
loco.
Of course, that’s her job at her age. No kid, he has himself a wife, a nice landscaping business, he makes money. No one takes a belt to him anymore.
    Now he drives his Lexus through San Juan Capistrano, looking atthe nice
futbol
field, then turns left into the big housing community, block after block of identical apartment buildings behind a stone wall that runs alongside the railroad track.
    NBM.
    Nothing But Mexicans.
    Block after block.
    You hear English here it’s the mailman talking to himself.
    This is where the nice Mexicans live. Where the respectful, respectable, hardworking Mexicans live when they’re not at their jobs. These are old Mexican families, been here since before the Anglos stole it, were here when the Spanish fathers came to steal it first. Put the stones in the mission for the swallows to come back to.
    These are Mexican-Americans, send their kids to the nice Catholic school across the street, where the faggot priests will train them to be docile. These are the