Sanchez and I left M-City in the evening on the Bullet, heading north to Monterrey. An hour later we arrived and picked up our final team member, Balzac Romanov.

He'd been released a few days earlier from the federal super-max, high-tech facility east of the city. But Romanov was not just any old convict. No indeed. He was a famous American gangster, picked up three years ago at a resort in the Quintana Roo during a well-publicized Federale bust of a meeting of the international Russkie crime syndicate--The Brotherhood of the Black Iris. Romanov had been kept permanently on ice at the Monterrey facility because of his reputation. Neither Sanchez nor I had ever met the man or even seen a photo--surprisingly, no pictures existed on the web either; and I must admit I was edgy hooking up with such a legendary figure. In fact, the two of us had never worked with anyone else during our ten-year partnership after Gramps died. Just Sanchez and me. No need really, smuggling tobacco, cannabis, and, lately, a few art curios back across the border--strictly small time operations. For sure no connections to local organized crime, much less the Brotherhood.

So, I was nervous, to say the least, waiting for the notorious gangster in the nearly empty lounge car.

We didn't have to wait long.