Zona

Douglas, Arizona is a nice enough town tucked down in the southeast corner of the state. The murder rate was directly tied to the drug trafficking that was that latest money making industry. A Walmart was built five blocks from the border, or "the line" as it was referred to by locals and that sealed the fate of downtown to a doom of cheap one dollar type stores. There were aging schools built in the 1930's with dirt playgrounds filled with kids playing soccer and tetherball. Kids whose parents and sometime grandparents played in the same school yards. Douglas high school opened in the early 50's that still had many of the same facilities. One of those was the baseball stadium. Visiting teams were impressed because it had real dugouts with hallways that lead to a locker room. Many of the local kids who played there went on to college and a few even got a shot at the pros and fame in the local newspaper. David Aguilar made it to double a with a pro team before being let go. He still returned home a hero, got a job with the Douglas police department, and married his high school sweetheart's sister. She drank too much, drifted, and they were divorced. There was a daughter and David got custody. His family all helped raise the girl. David's ex left for California and nobody heard anything about her until a couple of years later when she was killed in an automobile accident.

Her death had a profound impact on David and not only because of his daughter. He felt guilt even though he deserved none. He concentrated on work and was promoted to detective. David was one who always played his cards close to his chest because he knew that he could not trust many people in law enforcement circles. He had a group of informants and they trusted him because he was not quick to act on their information. He liked to use what they told him as background and build a case slowly. He didn't want the killer or the mule. He wanted the next guy up the chain. He was not foolish enough to believe that he could nail the kingpins. The only people who could do that were other kingpins and it meant killing. Any cop who got too close to one of the big fish quickly drowned. He had a daughter to raise. She was eleven. Seven more years to graduate and hopefully they would both leave Douglas together.