Chapter 102 - Setting the Course - Feddos
Simón
In Mr. Fausto's eyes, I saw gratitude for what had happened. She was back.
"Thank you also for not killing that man," Santiago said, extending his hand to me. He looked around at everyone present. "Thank you all, even though I don't know some of you, thank you for taking care of my sister."
"Roland wanted to leave this world for his daughter," Mr. Fausto confirmed. "I think we've given meaning to his days with the new businesses of the boss."
"The organizations?" I asked, looking at Santiago.
"Yes."
"What's next?" asked Roland's father-in-law.
"Return the children to their homes."
The three men who were with me looked out through the large window, which overlooked the place where the doctors were examining some children, Inés serving dinner to a group, the social workers interviewing, Mrs. Verónica and Luz Marina showering the youngest ones with hugs and kisses. Enrique was clinging to the lady. Tomorrow will be a long day.
"How can we help?" I smiled.
"We need to organize three rooms so they can sleep. Tomorrow will be a long day, we'll return them all. We will focus on calling the relevant entities to make this exchange and ensure we contact each of the parents so they can come tomorrow."
"Do you have that information?"
"Not all of it," commented Cebolla. "With the children's names, we can find out who their parents are. We're good at tracking people. These six brains know how to do it."
"Alright," said Mr. Fausto, saying goodbye to each of us. "We'll organize the mats in the rooms. Let the geniuses try to straighten the path."
The morning brought countless children's laughter in a pool, those giggles could be heard from the office. Since last night, we had the doors open, and now we saw them running and diving into the water.
None of us had slept more than three hours, each one settled as best as they could with a laptop on their laps on any piece of furniture. Every time they updated information, it reached my database.
I admired the children's ability to adapt to situations when they received attention and affection. The doctors' report was three girls and two boys violated, twenty with bruises from severe blows, all malnourished. The violated children were under the care of the two psychologists and social workers.
I had only slept two hours while everyone else did. We dedicated ourselves to finding the children's addresses, downloading information from the police, the parents who had filed reports, and with downloaded photos, we already had thirty children identified that we would start returning to their families in the afternoon.
"Aren't you going to rest?"
"Not yet."
Inés came with breakfast. There was a special glow seeing us all together. It rarely happened in front of her when we were working for the Boss, but since things changed, the meetings felt different. She had always been by our side, knew everyone, and the future associates. That way, we became a brotherhood thanks to the boss, which is why we were loyal to Roland. It was one of our strengths, training together once a year, in a not-so-pleasant training.
"Mrs. Verónica is back to her old self, she's the sponsor of those laughs you hear. The friendly doctor cured her because she injured one of her stitches."
"Friendly doctor?" She shrugged. "Don't get all..."
"She's already made it clear to the young man."
I smiled. Mojón and Churrusco were asleep with their necks twisted. Gustavo was the only one working at that moment. Cereza had gone out with Cebolla.
"At some point, she'll find someone. She's very young. Mojón is going to get a stiff neck from that position."
"I suppose so. Let him be, they collapsed less than two hours ago."
"Where did Cebolla and Cereza go so early?"
"To find the entities responsible for handing over the children. I've discovered that fifteen were kidnapped in Bogotá, ten in Medellín, two are from Barranquilla, and three from Pasto." I looked at the clock. "They shouldn't take long to arrive with the helicopter and transport to return them."
"Cereza is shaken, he put himself in the shoes of those parents who lost their children, thought about his babies."
"That's his effect, Mrs. Verónica. We didn't have a conscience before."
"You're right about that."
Cebolla arrived with trusted representatives from Gaula and Family Welfare. We had already done a similar handover, the one where Roland went against his partners. Cereza arrived with many cars, each to be driven by someone from our organization. The faces of Mole, Zombie, Cuajao, Lobo, and Mueco arrived each in a truck, waiting for instructions.
"When is Rino coming back?"
"He has special training, he's specializing in combat medical care now."
We met for two hours with the entities to inform them of what had happened. The woman was present, she didn't speak, but her gaze was an open door of satisfaction, sometimes lost in her thoughts, and when she looked at the children through the window, she showed a slight smile.
She misses him like we do, surely in her solitude she gives in to tears, although now she has found a reason to continue. The children said goodbye to her, whether they were getting into the helicopter or any van.
We witnessed the calls made to the parents and the joyful tears of the little ones, that was our reward, doing good wasn't as bad as people think, quite the opposite. What a personal satisfaction you get from nothing, a smile is worth a fortune.
We have twenty children left, three informed us that they didn't want to go home because their parents mistreated them, they remained under the custody of Welfare and an agreement was reached for them to stay in one of our orphanages. Enrique's mother would be brought by Cebolla, who left with the committee from Bogotá in the helicopter. I don't want to take that boy away from Mrs. Verónica yet, it has done her a lot of good to have him close.
We agreed that the Gaula would come back the next day for the rest to continue delivering them, most of those who remained were from remote populations. The arrival of Enrique's mom was more emotional, seeing that scene took us a bit further away from the rotten world we were in, and Roland swore he would never let his wife enter... I swear if I hadn't seen him not breathing, I would say everything was planned to get out of this mess.
I understood firsthand Roland's desire to get out of the filthy world of drugs. Mrs. Gladis, who was Enrique's mother; a young, slim, attractive woman, arrived bearing the pain of her missing child, she stayed with us until the last delivery a week later, during that week I saw Rasca culo looking at her more than necessary.
She became very close to the lady, she was a woman about four years older than her, Don Fausto and his family also left, now with renewed plans for Santiago's wedding.
"Simón, can I talk to you?"
I was organizing our return to the capital for the next day.
"Sure." The lady entered, still dressed in black.
"Gladis… Well, since I'm going to take care of Roland's new businesses."
"They're all in your name." She rolled her eyes and I shrugged.
"Why am I not surprised, such a tremendous ability to keep imposing his decisions despite being... dead."
"He's not giving them back to me, I have no stake in this." I raised my hands.
"No, this time I will gladly accept them. I want to ask you several favors. The first is to hire Gladis to work with me, there are many and she is an administrator."
"You are the owner, you can hire whoever you want."
"Perfect, the other thing is... I want to destroy that damned human trafficking network. Even if it means killing each of the bosses."
"We can intervene and thwart the first part, the second is more delicate, I don't want to start a confrontation where many innocents would die, the country already went through a cartel war in the late eighties." She stayed silent, my phone rang and it was González. "Tell me."
"Salcedo was killed."
"I killed him." I heard silence on the other end of the line. "He broke his word, he had fifty children to send to Spain. I'm sorry González, I shot him in the mouth myself and I will do the same to anyone who doesn't comply with the Boss's decision, there's less than a month left to read the will for the cartels, until that day I will enforce the decisions he made."
"Rat…"
"They are still under watch, no women, no children, and if they do, they will meet the same fate as Salcedo. Spread the word, although I will visit two partners myself."
"I hear command in your voice, do you think you're the successor?" I controlled my anger.
"I hope not and while that happens, I will enforce Roland's doctrines. Now I have to hang up."
"From what I heard there will be another shipment."
"Yes, but this one is of women." I hung up before he continued speaking.
"I want to accompany you, please," the lady said.
"Fine, but then you will stay away from this and only take care of your businesses. I am running out of time to find who killed Roland, I want to have the culprit before the will is read. I see I can leave you alone, that's something reassuring."
"When will the rescue of the women take place?"
"Tonight."
"Good, will we bring them here?"
"Yes, although I had organized to return home tomorrow."
"Simón, we'll do it after helping those women. Besides, give me a few more days to process going back to Roland's house without him being there."