"What do you hope I will answer?"
"Or rather, what answer do you want to hear?"
Victor neither denied nor admitted anything, just stared straight at Casare.
There was no need to ask; it was clear enough that the explosion yesterday was his doing, and it was indeed aimed at Haggis.
Casare was half-open-mouthed, "But you're a cop."
Victor, on the other hand, was completely relaxed, pinching something sticky between his fingers and sniffing it under his nose, "Of course, I've always been a cop, and I've often been proud of that fact."
He pushed himself up from the table with both hands and stood up with a sinister look on his face, "But if Haggis wants me dead, then I'll tell him, offending Jesus might not get you into heaven, but offending me, I'll make him die today, fuck it. In Mexico, if he plays with my life, I'll take him down first."
Casare was frightened by Victor's almost insane remarks.
"Are you really a..."
"Mad dog?" Victor finished the sentence for him, leaned back, laughing happily, and pointed around, "How many do you think here are cops? They are all undercover agents sent by drug traffickers from the outside, coming here for the money. The national flag they hang outside feels too rough even for wiping their asses.
For people like you and me, with no background, no education, no culture, what else can we compete with except our lives?"
"Now even selling sperm requires an educational background check! What's your education?"
"I know you have three siblings still in school, and your mother sews clothes for others. After you send your salary home, how many times a month can you afford women? The ones you're with are of low quality, really low-class. Your ex-girlfriend, didn't she run off with some rich guy? If you had money, would she have left?
You could have any woman you wanted, and if tonight you say you want to have children with a female lawmaker, throw the money down, and by the afternoon she'd have her IUD removed. Money, it can do a lot of things."
"Want to join me?"
Victor had gone through Casare's resume. To put it flatly, the guy was as innocent as a white lotus flower, or in other words, always the good boy who did whatever mom said – study, drop out, take exams, become a cop.
It all looks smooth-sailing, but the accomplishments of your lifetime can just be brushed aside with a bribe from a drug trafficker.
"I promise you, you'll earn at least 1000 Pesos more a month."
Casare's breathing quickened at that, but he didn't speak up.
Victor wasn't in a rush, stood up, and patted his shoulder, "If you're interested, you can come to my room after work tonight. You know what to do about Haggis, right?"
Victor didn't wait for his answer and left.
Stunned, Casare's mind raced as he sat there. He'd always thought Victor was as honest as himself, but now it seemed that was all a damn disguise.
"Hey, Casare, you done eating? Time to clean up." The cafeteria's on-duty jail guard came over, saw him still sitting there, and called out a bit impatiently.
He hurried up, apologetically waved at the guard, and watched as the unfinished mashed potatoes were dumped into the bucket, swallowing hard.
A thought suddenly flashed through his mind.
If I had money, probably no one would rush me at mealtime, right?
...
Third District.
In Plateau Prison, it's like a lonely city unto itself, isolated, constantly buzzing with high-voltage electricity, equipped with its own cafeteria, rest area, and work zones. It looks very strict.
But it's actually just a load of crap.
Later, when Guzman was caught in February 2014, his son paid a jail guard to smuggle in a GPS-tagged watch, then spent a whole year from the outside digging a 1.5 km long, over 10 meters deep, 1.7 meters high, and 75 cm wide tunnel, complete with lighting and ventilation.
On July 12, 2015, under surveillance, Guzman escaped from prison again!
So, Mexican Prisons are just a freaking joke.
If you haven't broken out of jail a few times, do you even dare call yourself a Big Drug Trafficker?
But on the surface, Third District was still very "strict". On entering, I passed through four checkpoints, including name and photo comparison, and full-body contraband check.
"I'll have someone take you to get familiar with the office," Cona Belask pressed the desk phone, "Anna, come in."
Someone responded from the other side.
You could tell by the voice that she was well-endowed.
A few minutes later, there was a knock on the door. The sound of high heels tapping rhythmically on the floor came through, and as Victor turned his head, he saw a tall figure wearing a police uniform, with her breasts almost bursting out.
It was particularly eye-catching.
What else would a man look at first if not the chest? The heart?
"Anna, this is the new deputy warden of the Third District, Victor Carlos Vieri."
"Hello, officer," Anna saluted, seemingly shaking her arm intentionally or unintentionally, causing her chest to bounce along automatically.
This was a woman who knew how to use her assets well.
"I'm the head of the Third District's psychological counseling intervention team, and if you have any physical or psychological needs, I can arrange for them."
The Third District has this kind of service?
Why did it sound like she was soliciting?
Mr. Gao blinked.
The message about her was clear at a glance.
Reading the "resume," Victor had an aha moment, his eyes filled with confusion.
He wasn't wrong, Anna was indeed for sale, part of a "night owl" prostitution organization, which belonged to Juarez's operation, doing business even within the prison, mainly providing sex services to the big shots inside.
Charging hundreds and even thousands of US dollars per time.
Just with this, Tijuana could make millions of US dollars a year.
Damn!
This was absurdity opening the door for absurdity—it reached the pinnacle of absurdity.
No wonder many drug traffickers were even willing to go to prison, where they could ensure their safety and control their organizations remotely. In prison, they could live more comfortably than outside, assuming of course they didn't encounter an underling growing too powerful, like the Los Zetas under the Gulf Group later on.
"Take Sergeant Victor to look at the office," Cona Belask said. "I have a meeting to go to in a bit."
Anna nodded with a smile.
Exiting the office, Anna walked in front, her hips swaying more provocatively than a swinging fan. She led the way to the adjacent room, twisted open the door, "Sergeant Victor, this was the former deputy warden's office. Take a look, if there's anything you don't like, I'll have someone throw it all out."
Victor glanced inside, where everything was tidily decorated, with a bookshelf that held world-famous titles, and he even spotted two works from China.
He casually pulled open a drawer, and there lay an envelope, raising an eyebrow.
"I heard there was a new head of the Third District yesterday, this is a welcome gift from the gentlemen..."
The gentlemen must be a veiled reference to the drug traffickers.
Victor peeked through an opening he made and saw colorful money inside.
"It's fifty thousand Pesos in total," Anna said, observing the young officer's clearly surprised expression.
A sense of conquest rose from the depths of her heart.
"Anna," Victor glanced at her shoulder patch, "Corporal, could you do me a favor?"
"Of course."
Anna smiled invitingly, already prepared to take off her clothes.
"Could you help me break down this fifty thousand Pesos? Who among the gentlemen gave, and who did not?"