by Diane Capri
Her mother set her magazine aside. “Tell me about your day at school.”
The same thing she said every day, as sincerely as if she’d never made the request before, as if something about Dominique’s life would ever be different from one day to the next. The best part was that while Dominique talked, her mother listened intently. Exactly the same way she listened to Dominique’s very important father.
Telling her mother every small detail of her life was one of Dominique’s favorite things to do. She felt quite grown up as she disclosed the day’s events and her mother always knew the perfect thing to ask or say no matter what the topic.
Both of Dominique’s parents loved music and she often sang for them in the evenings, always garnering praise and love and sometimes even special treats if her performance was especially good.
Her mother said Dominique had been blessed with the voice of an angel. She said Dominique would sing for the world someday.
Saint Louis took the usual route. The Impala rolled smoothly toward their home on the edge of the hill on the edge of the city where Dominique imagined she could see the entire countryside. Maybe even the whole world.
The Impala slowed when they approached the busiest intersection of the trip. She glanced out the windows to watch.
Saint Louis steered carefully around vendors selling fried bananas, art, and gasoline from cans. Tattered rags of assorted colors adorned dozens of Haitians making their way from one place to another on foot. Some were loaded down with purchases, but others simply looked and bought nothing.
Dominique was entranced by the colors and the action and the joy of being alone with her mother. She turned and climbed onto her knees and leaned into the seat back to watch through the back window while Saint Louis continued the Impala’s slow forward momentum.
She barely noticed when the Impala rolled through another intersection.
Then, at the next cross street, Dominique turned and slid back into her mother’s warmth. A tacky multicolored bus called a tap tap approached the stop sign to their right.
But instead of stopping, the tap tap accelerated rapidly.
Dominique gripped her mother’s hand and screamed as the tap tap charged toward them. Her mother squeezed her tight, one hand on Dominique’s head forcing her face against her mother’s chest, bracing against the coming collision.
She felt the big Impala swerve in a tight arc and stop hard, throwing them both forward before slamming them back into the seat at the same moment Dominique heard the tap tap screech its brakes.
Her mother loosened the grip on Dominique’s head. Dominique pulled away to see. The tap tap had narrowly missed slamming into the Impala, but only because Saint Louis had skillfully steered to a corner of the intersection and stopped just inches away from an enormous metal pole.
Dominique’s chest hurt and her breaths shortened, as if she was going to cry. But she didn’t. Her mother held her close enough that Dominique felt the rapid pounding of her mother’s heart, too.
Three men in straw hats, dark shirts, sunglasses, and jeans jumped out of the tap tap and ran full out toward the Impala. Saint Louis slammed into reverse, but the skinny one sprinted to the back and pointed a gun directly at the back window, blocking retreat.
Dominique knew who they were. Everyone in Haiti knew.
Tonton Moun Nui. Thugs. Killers. Fanatics who sought to take the place of the infamous Tonton Macoute and repeat their reign of terror.
The tonton carrying two machetes on his belt tried to open the front door. Locked. He tried her mother’s door behind Saint Louis. Locked.
The third man was blocked from Dominique’s view. He shouted something and stepped closer and pushed his hideous face close to the window and stared inside. Sunglasses covered his eyes. Deep scars marked both cheeks of his face where he’d been cut by a machete long ago. His wide mouth opened into an ugly grimace.
Dominique’s entire body began to quiver and she pressed herself closer to her mother.
She knew him. She’d seen photos of him many times in school and at home when Haitian children were warned to hide from him. He was evil, this man. Pure evil, the teachers said. He was the Tonton Moun Nui leader. Marcel Mesrine.
Dominique tried not to cry. But tears came anyway.
Mesrine pointed a large gun toward her mother’s window. “Unlock the door or we shoot.”
Dominique screamed and held on tighter. “Don’t do it, Mama. Don’t unlock it.”
“Open the door!” Mesrine shouted and slammed gun butt against the glass.
His angry face stared into the Impala as if he hated her mother. But how could that be? No one hated her mother. She was an angel. Everyone said so.
Sobs clogged Dominique’s throat and her runny nose blended with the tears she felt covering her face.
“The child is right. Don’t let them in,” Saint Louis said, without turning around. Dominique saw his eyes in the rear view mirror. His face showed his terror.
Her mother squeezed Dominique a little harder and said softly, “I have no choice.” Her fingers trembled as she unlocked the door.
Mesrine pointed his gun while the two tontons swung the Impala’s door open, grabbed her mother by the arms, and yanked her out of the Impala. They left the door standing open. Dominique scooted all the way to the opposite side of the Impala where the door remained closed and locked. She huddled into as small a space as possible.
Now Dominique’s mother struggled against the tontons, crying and screaming, too. Dominique could barely see through her sobs.
“Leave the girl alone!” Estelle begged, as the tontons dragged her to an old brown minivan Dominique had not noticed before, parked on the side of the road. “Leave the girl!”
A fourth tonton opened the back of the minivan from inside. The two who held Estelle’s arms lifted her and tossed her into the back like they’d toss a sack of grain. One of the tontons closed the minivan’s doors and slapped it hard with the palm of his hand.
Mesrine waited beside the Impala with his gun pointed at Dominique through the open passenger door until the tontons were seated in the minivan. He kicked the door closed with his boot. He rested the big gun’s barrel over his shoulder and sauntered to the passenger side of the minivan and ducked inside.
The minivan drove away leaving the tap tap where it stopped.
Dominique, bewildered, shaking, terrified, still crying and almost unable to breathe, huddled deep in the corner and stared out the windows until the minivan disappeared.
Gardenia perfume still scented the air inside the Impala.
Everything outside at the busy intersection continued as if nothing had happened. No vendor or customer so much as glanced toward the Impala. No surprise.
Kidnappings were common. Followed by a ransom demand or a murder, or sometimes both. People were numb to them now.
Even at nine years old, Dominique knew the police were corrupt. No one would help her mother because volunteering could get them killed.
“Dry your tears, Dominique. Your mother wants you to be brave,” Saint Louis said gently. He handed her a handful of tissues.
She did as she was told and waited as quietly as she could in the back seat while Saint Louis called her father.
Saint Louis drove Dominique home, where her father waited. He held her close while she cried and cried until she was exhausted.
After the Tonton Moun Nui took her mother, Dominique asked Saint Louis and her father and her teachers every day, “Why did they take my mother?” No one knew.
All Dominique had left were a child’s memories, her love of music, and a small bottle of expensive gardenia perfume.
And the constant, unrelenting terror that she would be the one Marcel Mesrine chose next.
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The Heir Hunter Series:
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Jack in a Box
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Mistaken Justice
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Dear Reader,
Welcome to the continuing Jordan Fox Mysteries, starring tenacious multimedia journalist Jordan Fox. An ambitious newcomer with a difficult past, we’re thrilled that readers have fallen in love our feisty new heroine!
I’m also excited to continue working with my colleague, Beth Dexter. Beth brings realism to Jordan Fox the way only an insider can because she’s a journalist who worked as a producer in a TV newsroom. Like Jordan, Beth began her TV career after college, at age 22. If you want to know what being on the inside of the news is really like, look no further!
We’re joining Jordan Fox almost in real time. We’re living her career and the developing stories she’s reporting, right along with her. Jordan is an MMJ (Multimedia Journalist) in one of the largest media markets in the country and very quickly finds that journalists don’t simply report the news—sometimes, they’re right in the middle of it all!
The series of Jordan Fox Mysteries intertwines with my other work, but is designed to be read independently. Jordan lives and works in Tampa and her adventures are loaded with Florida atmosphere. You’ll also find some of the characters from my other books that you already love—such as Judge Willa Carson and Attorney Jenny Lane. You can join in the discussion via Facebook here: http://www.facebook.com/bethdexterbooks. For a complete listing of all Diane Capri books look here: http://dianecapri.com/books/
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ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Diane Capri is a New York Times, USA Today, and worldwide bestselling author. She’s a recovering lawyer and snowbird who divides her time between Florida and Michigan. An active member of Mystery Writers of America, Author’s Guild, International Thriller Writers, Alliance of Independent Authors, and Sisters in Crime, she loves to hear from readers and is hard at work on her next novel.
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Beth Dexter is a New Adult author. She is a seventh generation Floridian who took a detour to North Carolina to receive her B.A. in English at Davidson College. She went on to pursue a career in journalism, working as a TV News Producer. She loves photography, traveling, swimming, and her family.
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