One Wrong Step (Borderline Book 2)

by Laura Griffin

  Celie watched him, slack-jawed, as he did this again and again. She felt the nephew’s eyes on her, and she clamped her lips together in a vain effort to hide her terror.

  Saledo abruptly turned to face her. He wasn’t even breathing hard.

  “Do you speak Spanish?” he asked in a heavily accented voice.

  “I’m sorry, I don’t.”

  “We have a word, respeto. In English you say ‘respect.’”

  Celie nodded dumbly.

  “Your husband, Robert, he did not know this word.”

  Saledo’s voice thundered again, and two pigeons went flying almost simultaneously. He shattered both of them with ease. Then he turned back to Celie.

  “Years ago, your husband came here as my guest. He and his friend”—he turned to his nephew—“como se llama?”

  “Josh Garland.”

  “Sí, sí. Josh Garland.” He looked back at Celie. “Your husband and Josh Garland spent a weekend here. We hunted dove together. I shared my food, my horses, my women. In my culture, such hospitality is a signal of respect.”

  Celie’s throat felt like sandpaper. She knew she should say something, but her mouth wouldn’t form any words.

  “Stealing from a man, this is falta de respeto. Disrespect.” He held his gun pointed down, casually, as if it weighed nothing. “Your husband stole from me. And then you stole from me.”

  “I didn’t—”

  “No talking!” He stepped toward her, glowering. “Just listening!”

  Celie glanced at the nephew, looking for help. He smiled vaguely, like he was enjoying himself.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, and this seemed to have a calming effect.

  “In my business,” Saledo continued, “respect is everything. It is a currency. And when one man shows disrespect, you lose some of that currency. Then another will do the same, and another. If I allow this to happen, I become a poor man. It is like…it is like dominoes. One domino can make all the others fall. That is why you are here. Do you understand?”

  Celie bit her lip, swallowed. It was time to make her case, but she needed to do it in a way that wouldn’t anger him.

  “I think there’s been a misunderstanding. Robert Strickland isn’t even my husband. He wasn’t. Before he died. We were divorced. And I never—”

  “Basta!” Saledo held up a hand. “We will finish this later.”

  Celie wanted to protest, but she could see his temper rising. He took another step closer, and she caught a sour whiff of perspiration. She tried not to cringe.

  “Tonight,” he said, “You will pay for your husband’s disrespect. And when that is paid for, you will pay for yours.”

  Vincent brought the plane down smoothly, and if it hadn’t been for John’s churning stomach, he would have congratulated him on an impressive landing.

  As it was, he barely managed to get out of his seat without puking.

  Two hours and thirty-eight minutes had passed now, and John was so wound up he could hardly think. As soon as his feet hit the tarmac, he jogged across the pavement toward the primitive airport, searching for any indication of a car for hire—a taxi, a bus, a freaking rickshaw. There was nothing. The airport—if you could even call it that—was located on the northeast outskirts of Monterrey, closer to Saledo’s property than the main airport in the city. Not only was the place a shithole, it was practically deserted except for someone tinkering with the engine of a single-prop plane. The plane sat in a neat row of other single-and twin-engine aircraft parked along the apron near the main building. Logos for several charter airlines had been painted on the building’s cinder-block walls; no one seemed to be manning those operations.

  The door to the main building opened, and a uniformed man stepped outside, shielding his eyes from the glare reflected off the tarmac. Abrams flagged his attention. The agent was in charge of dealing with local officials, somehow convincing them to allow three Americans into the country without proper documentation. John wasn’t sure whether Abrams intended to accomplish this with his FBI shield or with money, but he didn’t give a rat’s ass as long as the fed did it quickly.

  A dinged white pickup pulled onto the tarmac and stopped near the airport’s main entrance. A young man in blue coveralls hopped out of the truck.

  “Hey,” John called, rushing toward him. “Is that your truck?”

  John peered into the pickup. The driver looked like some kind of aging cowboy, with a ten-gallon hat, a faded plaid shirt, and a face like cowhide.

  John switched to Spanish. “Is this truck for hire?”

  Both men eyed John silently, so he promptly produced some twenty-dollar bills. The skydiving school had taken plastic, but somehow John doubted that would work here.

  “I need a ride. To a place maybe twenty miles from here. Can you take me?”

  “Where?”

  “A private house,” John said. “Out Highway 85, near Rio San Pablo.” Abrams had confirmed Marco’s information that Saledo had a house out that way, and John just hoped they didn’t have trouble finding it. Having traveled extensively in Mexico, though, John knew getting directions and actually finding a place were two entirely different things.

  “Rancho Saledo,” the old man stated.

  John nodded, wondering if this changed things. For all he knew, Saledo was hated by the locals. It was also possible he employed a good many of them, in which case he might be a hero.

  The cowboy’s gaze flicked over John’s shoulder. John turned to see Abrams jogging toward him. Evidently, Vincent had decided to stay behind and keep an eye on his boss’s plane.

  “Two passengers,” John said, pulling another few bills from his wallet.

  The cowboy nodded, and John climbed into the cab.

  Celie stood by the window of the sparsely furnished room and tried to formulate a plan. She couldn’t stay here. It simply wasn’t an option. The moment she’d entered these quarters, she’d been overcome with the certainty that someone had died here.

  Or possibly several people. She didn’t know for sure, but there was something about the spare furnishings—a chair, a cot, a table—that made her blood run cold. Or maybe it was the machine gun–wielding guard stationed outside her door.

  The only thing Celie could stand to look at was the window, but if she got too close, it spooked her, too. The view was spectacular, but it was a four-story drop to the rocky ground below. And just beyond that was the steeply sloping hillside leading to the scrubby plain surrounding the compound.

  She was trapped here, and she got the distinct impression she wasn’t the first Saledo houseguest to be put in this position.

  Suddenly a woman entered carrying a wooden tray. When Saledo’s nephew had led Celie through the spacious kitchen to the back staircase, this woman had been standing at the stainless steel sink. She was young, with a voluptuous figure and shiny black hair that hung to her waist. She didn’t look at Celie as she set the tray on the table. She wore a simple outfit of tight black jeans and a black sweater, and no jewelry. Celie doubted she was a family member. Surely a man who collected oil paintings, bronze sculptures, and expensive electronics would provide his female relatives with better footwear than faded black Keds.

  “Gracias,” Celie said, utilizing twenty percent of her Spanish vocabulary.

  The woman nodded meekly, and turned to leave.

  “Wait!” Celie stepped toward her.

  The woman darted an anxious glance at the guard standing outside, and Celie lowered her voice to a whisper. “Do you speak English?”

  She nodded slightly.

  “Can you help me?”

  The woman bit her lip and gave a slight shake of her head.

  Celie looked down at the tray she’d delivered. It contained a white ceramic pitcher, a matching cup and saucer with the cup flipped down, and a custard bowl filled with sugar packets. There was also bowl of brown soup covered in plastic wrap. Celie’s stomach lurched. She hadn’t eaten anything since a yogurt that morning, and it was
almost evening.

  “Would you mind pouring that?” she improvised, pointing to the pitcher. She needed to keep the woman in her room. She was the only other female Celie had seen since her arrival, and the only person besides Saledo’s nephew who hadn’t been armed with a big gun.

  The woman cast a glance at the guard and stepped closer to the table. The guard—also clad in black—was staring straight ahead, military style, but Celie had no doubt he was listening to every word. She didn’t know whether he spoke English.

  “Please,” Celie whispered. “Is there a way out of here?”

  She looked at Celie, and her eyes filled with pity. That, more than anything Saledo had said, told Celie what lay in store for her.

  The woman’s gaze slinked toward the window, and she nodded.

  The window? That was the best way out? Even if it hadn’t been locked, it was thirty or forty feet off the ground. Celie looked toward it and tipped her head fractionally, making sure she understood. The woman nodded.

  Her black hair fell in a curtain around her face as she poured the coffee. Celie watched, thinking about what she’d just learned.

  The window was her best hope. But even if she managed to get through the glass undetected, she’d probably break her leg. She glanced around the room and noted that there were no drapes or bed linens or anything else that could be used to make a rope.

  The woman uncovered the soup, and Celie realized she was using her other hand to arrange the sugar packets end to end in a straight line.

  She was trying to say something. She traced an invisible R on the table.

  Was she signaling a rope? A road? A river?

  “Follow the river?” Celie said, barely audibly.

  The woman nodded.

  “Which way?” Celie had seen from the air that Saledo’s property was connected to a highway by a long dirt road. But Celie had no idea how far it was to the nearest town. She could be out there for days, wandering around the unforgiving terrain and getting lost.

  Or, even more terrifying, getting found.

  With one hand, the woman made a noisy production of arranging the flatware on the napkin. With her other hand, she dipped a finger in the coffee and made a cross. Was there a church nearby? But she added an N on top, and Celie realized she was drawing a compass. She pointed to the bottom.

  Go south.

  “How far?” Celie whispered.

  The guard shifted in the hallway. The woman hurried to leave the room, holding both hands behind her back and flashing a number—ten, twenty, thirty, forty.

  Forty what? Miles? Kilometers? How would she ever walk that far? Suddenly the door slammed shut, and she was alone, once again, in the creepy little room.

  Celie looked down at the soup tray, no longer hungry in the least. She went into the small adjoining bathroom and turned on the faucet. After splashing water on her face, she turned around and studied the tiny shower stall. It was bare. There wasn’t even a shower curtain that could be made into something useful.

  How was she going to get out of this place? The window was too high to hazard a jump, and then she’d have to walk or hitchhike either forty kilometers or forty miles to the nearest town.

  Celie leaned against the sink, staring at the shower stall as all her most deep-seated fears paraded through in her head. Being tortured by Manny Saledo. Jumping to her death. Wandering alone in the pitch-black desert looking for help. Climbing into a truck with some strange man who might or might not deliver her safely back to civilization.

  She weighed each possibility, and her gaze skimmed over the tile, fastening on the rust pattern she saw in the grout. Was that…?

  Blood.

  Yes, it was. About four feet off the ground was a red-black stain where someone’s blood had spilled. The tile had been wiped clean since then, but whoever did it hadn’t managed to clean the grout.

  Feeling woozy, Celie stepped out of the bathroom. She sank down onto the cot and tried to think, but as she glanced around her surroundings, her mind refused to work. She doubted the moves she’d learned in her self-defense class would pose much of a challenge for a muscle-bound guard with a machine gun. She glanced at the crack under the door.

  The shadow of his boots had disappeared.

  Slowly, silently, she crept to the door and crouched down to double-check. She pressed her cheek against the dusty floor. Through the half-inch gap, she saw the empty hallway. He was gone.

  Her stomach clenched. This was her chance. She rose to her feet and quietly tried the doorknob. Locked.

  Had he gone for a bathroom break? Food? Wherever it was, he’d most likely be back soon. She scanned the room desperately, praying for a bolt of inspiration.

  Her gaze landed on the wooden chair. It looked sturdy. She stared at it a moment, thinking, calculating, considering the odds. Then she made up her mind. Hands shaking, she yanked off her shoes. She took one final glance at the crack under the door. Still no shadow. Still no sound. She took a deep breath and unzipped her jeans.

  CHAPTER

  23

  Rowe already hated this operation, and it had barely started. From the moment his cell phone had started humming several hours ago, he’d been informed of one bad decision after another, all culminating in an ill-conceived plan to confront one of the most dangerous drug kingpins in Mexico.

  Rowe blamed Abrams. If the rookie agent had been doing his job in the first place, Rowe wouldn’t be here right now, crammed into a helicopter with guys from an alphabet soup of Mexican and American law enforcement agencies, hovering above a Pemex station not twenty miles south of Saledo’s compound.

  The helo started descending about fifty yards north of the gas station. Rowe looked out the window and saw two pickups parked at the station, but neither looked to be filling up, and Rowe surmised that the trucks represented one of this operation’s major flaws. Not only had Abrams botched the surveillance of Cecelia Wells and let her get kidnapped out from under his nose, he’d compounded the problem by allowing at least three civilians to involve themselves in the rescue effort. Rowe had never met Vincent Somebody-or-other, the pilot who had ferried Abrams down here, but he’d met John McAllister and Marco Juarez. Rowe felt certain the two hotshots would somehow derail this op, which was already shaping up to be a train wreck.

  The helo touched down, and Abrams approached, shielding his eyes from the tornado of dust swirling around. He climbed inside and took a seat next to the SAC. Rowe watched him begin briefing the man, obviously eager to smooth things over and convince the boss he wasn’t a complete moron.

  Good luck.

  Rowe shook his head as the helicopter lifted off and veered toward its destination. They were approaching from the south, hoping to use the element of surprise. Mexican authorities, who—like their American counterparts—had been monitoring Saledo in an effort to build an irrefutable case against him and his network, had predicted the compound would be staffed by a few household servants and between five and ten heavily armed guards. That was the bad news.

  The good news was, Saledo had just arrived here by private plane yesterday, and so his typical entourage of relatives and girlfriends hadn’t caught up to him yet, which meant collateral damage might be kept to a minimum.

  That was about the only good news. In Rowe’s opinion, rushing into an armed confrontation, with scant intelligence, at night on the target’s home turf, was a bad idea. Rowe had wanted to wait, but apparently the top brass of several of the agencies involved had a hard-on for Saledo right now and were using the kidnapping of Cecelia Wells as catalyst for a major arrest.

  Rowe suspected egos were involved, too. The Americans couldn’t sit idly by while one of their civilians—particularly a young woman—was kidnapped and dragged off to be murdered by a Mexican drug lord. And the Mexican authorities were under pressure to take a stand against one of their most notorious criminals, a man they supposedly wanted to bring to justice, yet had never mustered the political will to punish with more than a slap o
n the wrist.

  Poor planning, civilian yahoos, and oversize cop egos. This operation was doomed.

  Rowe looked to his immediate right, where Stevenski was fastening a flak jacket over his shirt. Rowe noticed the tremor in his partner’s hands and the sheen of sweat covering his face. This was one of his first raids.

  He glanced up at Rowe. “You ready?”

  Rowe checked his sidearm. “Yep.”

  The AFI—Mexico’s FBI equivalent—was running the show, so their guys were bringing the big guns. Rowe shouldn’t technically be carrying a firearm at all, but the the head of the Monterrey legat had a beer-drinking relationship with the AFI commander, and so everyone had agreed not to notice the Americans were packing today. Rowe felt grateful for this bit of luck because he never felt right without his gun.

  The Mexican SWAT team would insert from the air, the commandos fast-roping down, while the helo containing the Americans landed at the base of the property. Assuming the SWAT guys could quickly disarm Saledo and his guards—which Rowe didn’t—American agents would be allowed to participate in the search for Cecelia Wells. Rowe’s boss had pushed hard for this arrangement, apparently not trusting his AFI counterparts to take adequate care of the hostage.

  Rowe thought about Cecelia Wells. Having known the woman for more than a year, he’d developed an affection for her, not to mention a respect. She had more courage than most men Rowe knew, and, besides that, she had heart. Rowe didn’t know many people who fit that bill.

  “When we find the hostage,” Stevenski said, “you should take the lead. She trusts you most, I think.”

  Rowe agreed, knowing as well as Stevenski did that this whole plan was based on a pretty shaky assumption.

  If and when they found Cecelia Wells, she might already be dead.

  The sun was hovering over the western cliffs when Marco’s Chevy Silverado made the turn onto Saledo’s road. John watched the desert landscape fly by, still angry beyond words that the feds had gone ahead without him. John had asked the man in the white pickup to pull over at a Pemex station to meet up with Marco Juarez, whose knowledge of the area and skill talking to the locals would help them make a plan to sneak into the compound. But no sooner had Marco shown up than a chopper had arrived to whisk Abrams away, leaving John and Marco in the dust. Now instead of participating in Celie’s rescue, they were stuck waiting to observe the aftermath.