Not His People, Part Iii

* * * Five days later the casket was lowered, and Rico stood there with his red-haired wife, she held up his two-year old daughter Jan, he never felt more grateful for his life. Things had gone much as Anthony had feared, bureaucrats wrangling when he’d been seized, even now they argued about justice, cartels had lots of sway in that country. He would have died, that much was obvious, he had to admit, it filled him with rage, many times he had been tempted to quit, none would blame him if his mind had been swayed. But then he remembered the killer’s words, about his people, where loyalties lay, and ironically, that man’s diatribe was what convinced Rico that he should stay. When all had been lost, and his life forfeit, one of his own had come to save his life, was not Anthony an American? Had he not died doing what he felt right? Were not many like him at this service? Even the woman he held in his arms? He felt that his people needed protection, and he had the skills to keep them from harm. So tomorrow he’d been back on the job, not for governments or the games they played, they and the cartels were not his people, he had chosen the American way.