by Cindy Dees
Huayar hauled off and kicked Melina in the stomach, and the pain of the blow shot through John’s gut as sharply as if the blow had landed on him. He swore under his breath. He saw Melina gasping for air, the breath knocked out of her. Damned if he couldn’t make out the tears streaming down her face, too.
In the midst of his panic, an unpleasant truth broke across his disjointed thoughts. Huayar had no reason to hit Melina. She had something he wanted badly. Roughing her up would do nothing to endear her to the bandit. And if Huayar was only trying to make her talk, even the Peruvian knew the fastest way to break her would be to pull out one of her loved ones and make them scream. Why the punching bag act then?
The answer all but hit him over the head.
This little boxing exhibition from Huayar was for John’s benefit. The bastard knew he was still out here. After laying eyes on beautiful, vulnerable, gentle Mel, Huayar had reasoned, correctly, that John had to feel plenty protective of her by now, after spending a few days tromping around in the woods with her. Huayar had also figured out that the fastest way to draw out her soldier/guide was to brutally beat her in plain sight.
John swore under his breath.
Huayar wasn’t going to let up on Mel until John walked out of these woods and handed himself over.
Huayar’s foot drew back again.
And John broke.
He couldn’t do it. He couldn’t sit up here and do nothing while Melina took this pain meant for him. Plan B was back on the table. He was going down there and handing himself over to Huayar as a hostage in place of Melina’s family.
Peace came over him. He would die, but it would be okay. He had let go of his guilt over Afghanistan, or at least arrived at a truce with it. He’d known the love of a good woman. He would be dying for a good cause. Yeah. It would be okay.
Purposefully, he stood up. He shed his gear. Took a step forward.
And slammed to the ground face-first as something impossibly heavy and fast moving smashed into him from behind.
Chapter 16
Melina gathered her courage and lifted her hand away from her face, which was already beginning to swell. She glared up at Huayar and forced herself not to flinch as the bastard wound up to kick her again.
“What kind of idiot do you take me for?” she snapped up at him. “Did you seriously think I was just going to hand over the ingredient list to you? Hit me again and you can forget getting the formula out of me. It’ll go to the Colombians and you can go to hell.”
His foot stopped at the apex of its backswing. Lowered to the ground. His fist flashed down. She flinched reflexively-she couldn’t help it. But instead of plowing into her face again, Huayar grabbed her shirt and hauled her roughly to her feet.
“You’re tougher than you look, little girl.”
Was that actually a hint of grudging admiration in his voice? She couldn’t believe she’d managed to deliver that ultimatum without breaking down in sobs of abject terror.
“I want to see my family. Now.”
“No.”
“Then you might as well start kicking me again. Because I’m not playing ball with you. The Colombians win.”
“What the hell are you talking about, you loco bitch? I could kill you right now.”
She shrugged, the movement making her ribs feel like stalks of celery that had been cracked in two. She put aside the pain-she didn’t have time for it right now. Her blood adrenaline levels must be off the charts.
She looked right into Huayar’s eyes. “Kill me and not only do you not get the formula, but you hand it to your enemies. I’ve put a copy of the recipe in a safe deposit box in Bogota. If I do not call the bank periodically to report in, the contents of that box will be delivered by bonded courier to your competition.”
The back of Huayar’s hand lifted, and she stepped forward as if to walk into the blow. “Go ahead. Hit me. Do it, and we’re through.”
“Your family will die.”
“They’re dead anyway. You’re going to kill them no matter what happens with me.”
That made the Peruvian pull back sharply, staring at her assessingly. Didn’t expect her to call his hand, did he? The recklessness that had roared through her when she lay on the ground about to be beaten to death faltered. Maybe she shouldn’t have brought up the idea so casually of him offing her family. Best to keep that thought out of his head.
Backtracking quickly from her mistake, she took a significantly more conciliatory tone of voice. “Look, Geraldo. I came here to work with you. I expected that our initial negotiation might be fraught with certain misunderstandings. I’m willing to forgive and forget all that’s happened tonight. Send my family back home, and I’ll gladly hand over the entire formula. Vito and I can work together to tweak it, and you’ll get rich beyond imagining when you introduce the synthetic drug of the twenty-first century to the world.”
Huayar stared at her.
It took every ounce of willpower she had to keep the expression on her face pleasant and open as she waited for his answer. After all, everything depended on the guy swallowing the bait of her offer.
A male voice breathed in John’s ear, “What in the hell are you doing, man? You can’t walk in there by yourself and get her out!”
Shock rendered John completely speechless for several seconds. The weight rolled off of him, and he looked over at the familiar face of Brady Hathaway. His boss. Out here in the middle of Nowheresville, Peru.
“How-What-I thought you were out on a search-and-rescue!”
“I am. You’re the S &R.”
“I’m not lost,” John replied, stymied.
“The way I heard it, you were.”
“Jeez. You mean the noose back at Pirate Pete’s? I’m over that. Mel talked me out of killing myself.”
Speaking of Melina, John’s attention turned back to the scene playing out below. He stared, stunned. She was back on her feet and talking to Huayar again. How in the world had she pulled that off?
“I dunno,” Brady replied. “Looked to me like you were planning to march down there and get yourself killed.”
“He was hitting her.”
Brady’s eyebrow cocked. “And you’ve never seen a girl get hit before?”
“But…it’s Mel…”
“Ahh.” His boss packed a world of understanding into that single syllable. Comprehension that John had a more than strictly professional interest in her. Much more, dammit.
John closed his eyes in chagrin. Then he spoke urgently. “She’s a doctor and a chemist. She’s invented a formula for a new drug to replace meth. Huayar kidnapped her family to force her to give the recipe to him. We’ve got to get her out before she talks.”
“Her family still alive?”
“They were as of last night. Mother and father in their late sixties, younger brother in his mid-twenties. In good health and fully mobile.”
“Ahh yes, the wannabe drug dealer. And general screwup, Michael. We have quite a file on him.”
As he’d thought. The brother was the leak of Melina’s research to Huayar. He’d wring the kid’s neck when he caught up with him-
“Where are the hostages?” Hathaway asked, interrupting his furious train of thought.
“They were in that third building on the right yesterday, but they weren’t there when I took a peek an hour ago. I don’t know where they are now. I’d guess Huayar’s quarters on the left-that partially buried structure-or the meth lab on the far right.”
Hathaway asked sharply, “You’ve been down in the camp?”
“Yeah.”
“I’d ask if you have a death wish, but I already know the answer to that one. That place is way too active for operatives to penetrate safely.”
“I’ve been working outside the usual boundaries of safety a bit on this trip.”
Brady snorted. “We noticed. You’ve been a bear to track, dude.”
“We?” John asked hopefully. “Who’s here with you?”
“Bravo
Squad.”
“All of it?” If so, that would mean a dozen Special Forces operatives were here, within striking range of Huayar and his men.
“All of it. Plus a few men from Charlie Squad, and Scottie, Stoner and Ripper from your Alpha Squad. Turns out you’re a popular guy. When the Scooby gang heard I was going to try to save you from yourself, I couldn’t stop them all from coming. It’s a bloody convention out here.”
“Hot damn,” John murmured in fervent relief.
Brady turned his attention to the camp below. “From the look of it, this still isn’t gonna be a walk in the park. Huayar’s got at least a hundred troops down there, and those are his elite guard. They’re tough, smart and armed to the teeth. Some of those guys are ex-Special Forces. Peruvian Army types. We trained them a few years back. They won’t be pushovers.”
John nodded, his exuberant relief tempered by the reality of the dangers still before them. But at least there was hope now. Plan B could go back onto the back burner for the moment. “Have you got any spare weapons I could lay my hands on?”
“I think we might be able to scare up a grenade launcher or two for you.”
John grinned over at his boss. “In case I haven’t mentioned it yet, damn, I’m glad to see you.”
“Likewise, old man. Likewise.”
Melina followed Huayar’s man across the camp to a building whose side walls were partially buried in mounds of dirt. She paused just inside, allowing her eyes to adjust to the dim light of a kerosene lamp sitting on a table off to one side of a narrow central room. After the bright campfire, it took a few seconds to see anything except darkness and that tiny flame of light.
Three shadows stepped away from the wall and materialized into armed, grim-looking men. She pulled back from the threat on their faces.
“What’s she doing here?” one of them growled over her shoulder at the guard behind her.
“The boss says to let her see the prisoners.”
The questioner nodded silently and jerked his head toward the back of the room. The first guard nodded and prodded her in the back with the tip of his rifle. Her head whipped around, and she glared at the guy until he actually took a step back from her. Score one for the weak little lady whom the men talked over as if she wasn’t there.
Prod-free, she headed for the closed door the guards indicated. They went back to lounging around the shadowed walls from whence they’d emerged. Creepy bunch.
As she reached the door, one of the guards stepped forward and inserted a key in a padlock holding the door firmly shut. It rattled loudly, and she heard shuffling noises from the other side. The panel swung open. The guard stared at her impassively, neither giving her permission to enter, nor preventing her.
Abrupt indecision filled her. She eyed that padlock. This could so easily be a trap. Tell the American chick she can see her family, and then lock her up with them. She’d be as helpless as her parents and brother. Although ultimately she was already Huayar’s prisoner. Lock or no lock, she couldn’t exactly stroll out of this camp and live more than a few minutes or hours. The ease with which Huayar’s men had found her before was clear proof of that.
She shrugged and stepped through the door.
“Melina!”
She rushed forward, embracing her mother almost as fiercely as her mother embraced her.
“What in the world are you doing here, child?” Her mother’s hands roamed over her face frantically, reassuring herself that Melina was really standing there in the flesh. Her father wrapped his arms around both of them, saying nothing, but clearly no less delighted to see her in his own quiet way. Her mother exclaimed, “Don’t tell me these men kidnapped you, too!”
“Not exactly, Mom. How are you? How are all of you?”
Her brother hung back in the shadows a moment longer, but then pasted on a smile and stepped forward. “Hey, Sis.”
“Hey, Mike. How are you?”
“Okay.”
He sounded cautious. Wary, even. She asked, “Have they hurt you? Fed you all right?”
Her brother shrugged. “It isn’t exactly the Ritz, but they haven’t treated us too badly.”
Her mother fussed over her, running her hands down Melina’s arms and squeezing her hands almost compulsively. “These boys have been polite, all things considered. They have a hard life out here. The Peruvian government has been hard on them.”
She snorted. Apparently, no one had told her mom what Huayar and his men did for a living. Just as well. No need to completely terrify the woman. She glanced over at her father. “How’s your heart holding up, dad? Any chest pains?” He’d had a mild heart attack a few years back, but had not had any recurrences. So far. The stress of being the prisoner of a vicious killer could do him in fast enough.
“I’m fine, honey. Ready to get out of here.”
She smiled gamely at him. “I’m working on it, Dad.”
Michael piped up. “What was all that hollering earlier? They told us they caught a bandit trying to rob them.”
She opened her mouth to tell the truth, but then glanced down at her mother’s naïvely blank face. No need to elaborate on the gory details. It would only upset her parents needlessly. She made eye contact with her brother, though, and they traded significant looks. His eyes darkened with comprehension. Fear followed closely on its heels in his black gaze. At least he understood the gravity of their situation.
“Have you come to take us home, honey?” her mother asked.
“I don’t think I’ll be going with you, but yes, I think Huayar is prepared to let you go.”
She caught a small movement out of the corner of her eye. Her brother had flinched. Dawning suspicion quickly turned into horror as she gazed across the room at him. Under the weight of her steady stare, guilt gradually bowed his shoulders. She was in front of him in two strides and had him by the shirt.
“You told, didn’t you?” she accused.
“I-uhh-”
“Melina! Turn your brother loose. We don’t act like that in this family!”
She reacted out of reflex to her mother’s berating tone and let Mike go. She took a step forward, though, and got right in her brother’s face. Under her breath so only he could hear, she snarled, “You told, didn’t you?”
“They were going to kill me, Sis. I had nothing else.”
“Why? How’d you get mixed up with people like this?”
“I needed cash. I just carried some stuff around. No big deal.”
“You were a mule for Huayar? You moved his drugs for him?” she demanded in disbelief.
Mike didn’t answer, but he didn’t need to. The answer swam miserably in his eyes.
“What the hell were you thinking? Didn’t you think about Mom and Dad? About me?”
“I told you. I needed the money. It was quick and easy. Pick up a package, drive it across the border into the States. Drop it off. Two grand for two days’ work.”
“Jeez, Mike. You could’ve asked me for a loan if you were that hard up. Look at the mess we’re all in now.”
His face crumpled. “I screwed up. Bad. We’re all gonna die, aren’t we?”
He sounded on the verge of tears. She was angry enough at him to take a certain satisfaction in his remorse, but a kernel of love for her idiot brother-buried very deep at the moment-stilled her tongue from any further recriminations.
“I’m doing my darnedest to get us all out of this thing alive. I need your help. Do what I tell you to and go along with anything I say, okay?”
“Do you have a plan?” Mike asked eagerly. “What is it?”
She glanced at the walls unsure if Huayar’s men could hear them or not. “Just go with the flow, okay?”
He nodded, a pitifully hopeful look in his eyes.
She murmured, “I’m not going to get to leave with you guys. I’ll need you to lead Mom and Dad out of here. I’ve got maps. Supplies. Some contacts for you. Can you at least handle that without screwing it up?”
He nod
ded eagerly, grasping at the flimsy straw of redemption she’d held out before him.
She sighed, not at all sure he could pull it off. After spending the past week with a man like John Hollister, she understood just how immature and incompetent Mike really was by comparison. John she would trust with all their lives. Mike? Not so much.
The door opened and her guide stuck his head in. “Time to go. You owe the boss a recipe.”
Mike’s gaze snapped to hers in dismay. “You’re handing it over?”
“What the hell other choice did you leave me, little brother?” she snapped at him. And with that, she turned on her heel and stalked from the room. She didn’t look back. She couldn’t. She’d lose it if she did. Her relief at seeing her parents safe and sound and her disappointment in her brother were almost more than she could bear. She wanted to sit down in the middle of the floor and cry her head off. Not yet. Not until they were out of here, away from Huayar and his fists and his hired guns.
Walking into the middle of an operational Special Forces hide with so many familiar faces around him, their movements and equipment as natural to him as breathing, was disconcerting. John had been roaming around out here with little more than camping gear for so long, it felt weird to strap on a utility belt and a headset and a submachine gun. It was like coming back to the land of the living after wandering in some alien landscape for a very long time.
Sadness hovered close to the surface of his soul. The last time he’d been out in the field like this, he’d been with his guys. His team. Oh, a few of the old Alpha Squad faces were here-Scotty and Stoner and Ripper-but so many more were missing.
He’d known guys before who’d died. It was inevitable in their line of work. But to lose so many at once, to carry the memory of their bloodied bodies and empty eyes, that was hard.
“You okay?” Hathaway murmured from behind him.
“No, I’m not okay.”
Hathaway nodded soberly. “That may be the healthiest thing I’ve heard you say since you got back from Afghanistan.”
John managed a reasonably casual shrug.
Hathaway looked down at the ground. Back up at John. “I’ve lost some men on my watch. There’s no explaining what that feels like to someone who hasn’t experienced it. It’s a knife that cuts all the way through you, but doesn’t quite kill you. It leaves you hurting so bad you wish you were dead, but instead you just suffer.”
