“It’s a lighter. It’s what she’s using to set everything on fire. If you look at one of your border surveillance photos you’ll see it in her hand after she’s lit a cigarette. She made a point of having it in that shot while she was looking directly into the camera. She was sending me a message.”

“What message?”

“I assume something along the lines of ‘They’re coming to get you, Barbara.’ Maybe she just wanted me to know the chickens are coming home to roost.”

“I knew you were lying,” Letitia says. “You said you didn’t know why she would be killing all these people and trying to pin it on you.”

“It’s one of my superpowers. So here’s the truth. I wasn’t in Mexico taking down cartel bagmen. They just happened to be in the way. This sicaria, she goes by La Niña Quemada, is working with an Aztec wind god named Quetzalcoatl who I managed to piss off while I was down there. Now he wants to get back at me. And it looks like everybody else is in the middle of it.” I sip more of my coffee and enjoy the stunned silence.

Chapter 17

Letitia makes a face like she’s just bit into a really nasty lemon. “A god. Not a nature spirit, or a demon? It’s really a god. Okay.”

“That was awfully easy.” Alarm bells are going off. Did she already know? I don’t think so. That’s not the vibe I’m getting.

“Just because I don’t like it doesn’t mean I think you’re lying to me. Why did you go to Mexico to piss off a god?”

“I didn’t. I went to Mexico to kill two other gods and ended up pissing off a third. You ever hear of Santa Muerte?”

“Yeah, I know about her. Narco saint. Cartels worship her or some shit. We had a week-long course in gang suppression and she came up a lot. Creepy as fuck.”

“She’s my wife.”

Letitia stares at me waiting for the punchline that doesn’t come. “Okay,” she says. “I’d heard stories, but . . .”

“Well, I think she’s still my wife. I’m a little afraid to find out. It’s complicated. She started off as the Aztec death goddess Mictecacihuatl and was married to Mictlantecuhtli, who was supposed to be dead but wasn’t. They were both playing me for a patsy so I went to kill both of them.”

“Did you?”

“Sort of, but that’s not the point. The point is that I’d accidentally made a deal with Quetzalcoatl and agreed to burn down Mictlan.”

“Mictlan?”