Rendezvous in Rio

by Danielle Bourdon

  Cole fell to quiet watchfulness as the driver navigated a route through the city. He met Madalina’s eyes a few times and once mouthed, You okay? She nodded briefly. Her fingers grazed the bump on his head, which wasn’t bleeding any longer, asking a silent question in return. Was he all right? He dipped his head to acknowledge and reassure.

  Lifting a hand, he grazed his knuckles across a spot on her jaw. The same spot that the gladiator had hit with his elbow. She refused to flinch from the fleeting pain Cole’s touch brought.

  “What’s this?” he asked.

  She knew it was coming. And because she didn’t want to lie, didn’t want to throw a wrench into the gears of their relationship, she said, “That really big guy, the one I refer to as a gladiator, knocked me with his elbow.”

  “When he was wrestling to get you in the car?” he asked with a frown. His fingertips brushed across the bruise.

  “No. When I started screaming while they were forcing me into the car. I guess it was his way of shutting me up.” Madalina felt, more than saw, the glances of the others. Her whispers had carried through the interior despite the grind of the engine. Cole’s expression went flat, his eyes glinting with suppressed fury.

  “He hit you on purpose?” Cole asked. Even his voice had taken on a steely edge.

  “Yes.” Madalina paused, then said, “But I returned the favor and hit him in the cheek with my elbow. That’s where that bruise on his face came from.”

  Alston cracked a laugh and glanced into the backseat. “Not bad, little lady. Not bad.”

  “Did he do anything else to you after that?” Cole said.

  “He grabbed me by the hair, but that’s when Alston swerved in front of the car and made the driver turn into the parking lot. He had to let me go. You know what happened after that,” she replied.

  Cole exhaled a short breath. “He’s lucky he didn’t do anything else.”

  “All he did was ask me where you and I were headed—”

  “You didn’t tell him, did you?” Cole asked with mild alarm.

  “No, no. Of course not,” she said. Cole’s question brought up another problem for Madalina. With others sitting within easy earshot, she didn’t know how to tell Cole that she didn’t want anyone, even the men in the car, to know the address of her grandfather’s home. The security would be nice—there was no question about that—but she secretly worried about who she could trust and who she couldn’t. Who was to say that Alston or Reggie or Frank wouldn’t turn on them once they had the dragon in their sights? The notion was a long shot, but wasn’t that what spies did best? Weaseled their way into the inner circle of their prey, then attacked when everyone least expected it? Madalina didn’t care that paranoia was getting the best of her.

  She met Cole’s eyes and tried to convey what she was thinking. He had a gift for being unusually perceptive, for being hyperattuned to her moods. Madalina recognized a knowing awareness surface in the gold-green of his gaze.

  He lifted a brow slightly, as if asking a question.

  She tilted her head. Yes. There was something on her mind. No, she couldn’t say it in the car.

  “Pull over a second at the market right up here? I need water,” Cole said a moment later to the driver.

  Frank glanced in the rearview mirror, then swerved into a small parking lot. He brought the car to a stop alongside a fruit-and-vegetable stand in front of a small convenience store. Like most other convenience stores, this one was medium-size, with a flat roof and a multitude of signage stuck to the windows. Some were even in English.

  SODA, 50% OFF

  THREE DONUTS FOR $1

  COFFEE, BREWED FRESH DAILY

  6 PACK TOILET PAPER, $4.99

  “What do you want us to do, boss?” Carlo asked as he disembarked and looked around the parking lot, then the street, with a wary expression.

  “Stay here. We’ll only be a minute,” Cole said. He slung the strap of the duffel bag over his shoulder after he helped Madalina out of the car.

  Cole led her by the hand through a set of double glass doors, then navigated a maze of aisles toward the back. Only three or four other customers were in the store, too concerned with their own business to give her and Cole the time of day.

  Madalina preferred it that way.

  “What is it?” Cole asked quietly, turning his head toward her to keep his words private.

  “I’m not sure I trust telling the men about my grandfather’s house. What if one of them turns on us if we find the dragon? What if these other men that are after us catch one of your guys and torture the information out of him? Right now only I know the location of the house. Once we put that out in the open, we can’t take it back.” Madalina stopped next to Cole when he arrived at a section of refrigerated units. Rows of chilled drinks filled the interior: water, soda, juice.

  He faced her after a quick scan through the store. “I know it’s scary. The adversary is turning up everywhere, and it appears like we can’t trust anyone. At some point, though, to keep ourselves safe, we have to trust someone. Having said that, I don’t know this particular group . . . ‘our guys’ . . . as well as I’d like. They were contacts Thaddeus sent here to begin with, men he’s worked with before, but they’re not part of our inner circle. If that makes sense.”

  “I think so. You have trustworthy men who work for your family, and other men who are . . . how would I say it, ‘work for hire’?”

  “Exactly. Which isn’t to say that we haven’t used these guys before, haven’t vetted their ability and their loyalty. We have. We just haven’t had time to test them as much as we’ve tested those we know better. That this group here stepped up when we needed them to makes a big difference, but I know what you’re going to say: of course, they’d help us; we don’t have the dragon yet. And you could be right,” he admitted.

  “I know. I feel bad that I’m saying this after what they just did. I’m paranoid after the last attempt, though, and there’s a part of me that doesn’t want anyone to know about this house yet except for me and you. I don’t know if it’s because I want to keep it safe and sacred or what.” Madalina couldn’t figure out why she felt so protective of a place she’d never been.

  “I understand.” Cole scanned the store, then met her eyes again. He set both hands on the outside of her shoulders and gave a gentle squeeze. “They won’t be offended if I tell them to drop us off at the next—”

  The crack of a gunshot outside stalled Cole’s comment. Madalina gasped in surprise and crouched when Cole pulled her down. Customers shouted and ran through the aisles, shoes slapping on the linoleum floor. One man rounded the end of the aisle closest to Madalina, and she felt Cole stiffen as if ready to fight. The man bolted past, one hand covering his head, paying them little to no attention.

  Pop, pop, pop.

  Three more gunshots rang out. Crouched low, Cole guided her along the back of the store until they reached a door with red lettering. Madalina, unable to read the foreign words, guessed the gist. Employees only, or something of that nature.

  “Out, out,” Cole whispered, just as a pane of glass at the front of the store shattered. It sounded like the end of the world.

  She pushed through the door into a storage area, where pallets upon pallets of nonperishable food and other goods waited to be unloaded and put on the shelves. Fluorescent lighting provided enough illumination to see by as she skirted two pallets for another door, this one leading outside.

  In the alley behind the store, Cole grabbed her hand and tugged her into a run. He guided her away from the store, darting across a street between traffic and into another section of shops. These reminded Madalina of old strip malls back home, the kind that had been too long vacant and badly needed updating.

  “What just happened? Why was someone shooting? Is it more than one person? Do you think your guys got shot?” The rapid questions
tumbled from Madalina’s lips as she struggled to keep up with Cole. A sliver of dread turned her spine to ice. She knew, just knew, that the shooting was related to their situation and not some random holdup at the store. Everything had been peaceful and quiet—until she and Cole had arrived. The relentlessness of their pursuers, and the uptick in aggression, worried her more than anything else.

  “I don’t know. I hope not,” Cole said, voice grim. He led her into and out of several other alleys, bypassing two more streets before he pulled her up against a wall in the shade.

  Madalina, glad to pause their flight, chose to press herself into the front of Cole’s body instead of stand beside him against the wall. Immediately his arms came around her. Guilt ate at her for the things she’d said and thought. Cole’s men might be dead, for all she knew, left to defend themselves against an unexpected attack.

  “You all right?” he asked, leaving one arm around her while dragging his phone out of his pocket. He gave her a squeeze, then released her. “Turn your GPS off, Madalina. Turn it off.”

  Stepping back, missing his strength and warmth, she fished her phone out and, with shaking fingers, tapped through to the right menu and turned the GPS off.

  “What are we going to do?” she asked, breathless.

  “I’m sending Thaddeus a text, then we’re going to look up the address to the other house and make our way there as quick as we can.” He tapped on the screen of the phone, then slid the device into his front pocket.

  “You don’t think anyone will be waiting there for us, do you?” she asked, paranoia in high gear. Now she wasn’t sure at all that her grandfather’s house was the haven she hoped it would be.

  Cole met her eyes and said, “I doubt it, Madalina, but I can’t say for sure. The only thing I am sure of is that we don’t know what we’re dealing with here.” He glanced back the way they’d come with a look of remorse and regret.

  “Are you thinking of going back to check on the guys?” she asked.

  “No. And they wouldn’t expect us to put ourselves in that kind of danger. Not when people are shooting guns in the open. If any of them are injured, then the clerk at the store will call medical services and get them some help. Our go-between is Thaddeus, so we’ll hear word one way or another soon. For now we need to get moving.” He hugged her tight, then took her hand and led her on.

  “But I’m worried those other men will be waiting for us at the house.” She voiced her concerns again, unable to shake the fear that they were walking into a trap.

  Cole squeezed her fingers, his attention outward on the labyrinth of streets and alleyways. “It’s our best shot right now, Madalina. We need somewhere to lay low and regroup. Above all, we have to look for the dragon. This residence is our best lead.”

  “Okay.” Madalina knew he was right. Nothing would be gained by holing up in a rundown hotel room or getting on a plane for home. She just wished it felt less like they were running to their doom.

  After what seemed like an eternity, but probably wasn’t more than two or three hours, Brandon abandoned his vigilant post at the door and hurried into the small bathroom. Some things just wouldn’t wait. He was quick about his business and back at his post moments later, modified weapon in hand. With every hour that passed, his senses and cognitive ability sharpened.

  He’d thought he would see or hear something by now. The agents hadn’t even sent someone to check on him, which meant one of two things: the agents were dealing with an event of their own, or they didn’t consider him a threat for escape.

  True enough. There wasn’t any way out of this room without making a hell of a lot of noise. Maybe the agents had the hallways monitored, too, which made it that much easier to keep tabs on him. One man could monitor the camera angles while other agents dealt with unexpected problems.

  Brandon considered that the problem might be Cole. Maybe his brother was giving the agents a run for their money, making himself difficult to catch. Or just being difficult in general.

  “That was a hundred-and-fifty-year-old painting,” someone said suddenly on the other side of the door. “Did you really have to wreck it?”

  Brandon muttered several curses under his breath and tossed the piece of wood on the floor. Not only had the agents been monitoring the hall, they had cameras in this room, too. He’d been watched the whole time. That was the only way the person on the other side could have known about the “weapon.”

  “Step back from the door, please.”

  Brandon marched across the space to the desk and propped himself on the edge as if he owned the place. There was no use being belligerent when the agents had one up on him. Might as well see what the men wanted and look for an opening during the conversation.

  The door opened.

  Two men stepped in, both attired in business suits. Their features were familiarly Asian, and Brandon did not mistake the guarded wariness in their dark eyes. They were not afraid, no, but wary nevertheless. One held a tray of food in his hands, the other what appeared to be a camera case.

  “I didn’t wreck the painting; I wrecked the frame,” Brandon pointed out.

  “Even the frame was old,” the lead agent said.

  “Desperate times call for desperate measures,” Brandon retorted.

  “Ah, that old axiom.” The agent rocked forward and back on his polished shoes, then stilled. “We thought you would have been a little less . . . volatile.”

  “As if you’d just sit around waiting for whatever fate to befall you. I don’t think so.” Brandon didn’t for a second believe either one of these men would have simply waited for torture, or death, or whatever else might be on the proverbial agenda.

  The lead agent cocked his head, which could have been agreement or commiseration. Brandon wasn’t sure. He glanced at the camera bag, then the tray, and added, “Do I have to sing for my supper?”

  “Something like that. Why don’t you stay just the way you are?” The lead agent removed a small video camera from the bag, turned it on, and aimed it at Brandon.

  A video camera, then. Brandon knew what this was about now. He shook his head, then ran his hands back through his disheveled hair and pretended to straighten a nonexistent tie. His sarcasm wasn’t lost on the agents.

  “What do you want me to say?” Brandon asked.

  “Anything you’d like. This is just to let your brother know that you’re all right,” the agent replied.

  “I figured that’s what this is about. Are you trying to get Cole to do something for you? Let me guess—it has to do with the dragon.” That had been the most logical of all Brandon’s guesses as to why he’d been snatched in the first place. He had no beef with any other Asians that he knew of, which left Cole’s interactions over the damned dragon.

  “Say cheese,” the agent said. The red recording light came on.

  Brandon stared into the video camera, his pose casual and relaxed on the desk. “Hey, brother—or brothers. Whoever gets to see this. I think we’re still in Whittier since the view outside is the foothills with all the scrub—”

  The agent grunted and turned off the video. “Ah, no. Let’s leave those kinds of details out.”

  “So I’m right. We’re not far from my brother’s house at all. The terrain is kind of telltale, you know?”

  “Are you going to give us trouble with this?” the agent asked, cocking his head. “This is to reassure your sibling that you’re well.”

  “This is to make my siblings angsty and unnerved,” Brandon retorted. A flicker of ire worked its way into his demeanor. The agents could say what they wanted; Brandon knew the truth. Every image or video would compound Cole’s concern. Not just Cole, but his entire family, making the situation that much more tense. Just because the video wasn’t of a torturous nature meant nothing. Its purpose was to goad and remind, and Brandon wouldn’t make it easier on the agents, food be damned.<
br />
  “It is to reassure them, as I stated, that you are alive and well and not being harmed. Now then, let’s try again.” The agent raised the video. The red light came on.

  Brandon said, “I’m near the foothills somewhere, close to Cole’s house . . .”

  The agent turned off the video, slid it into the case, and headed for the door. His companion followed. They stepped into the hall, locking Brandon in.

  Glaring at the door, Brandon waited a full minute before sliding off the desk.

  The only thing to do now was pace. And wait for the agents to come back and try again.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  By the time they were three streets away from her grandfather’s house, Madalina’s feet hurt and she’d started to wheeze. Her lungs were on fire from the incessant pace and the uphill angle of some of the roads.

  It felt as if they’d been running forever.

  In an effort to stay out of sight and off the main thoroughfares, Cole had bought a map to navigate the safest backroads en route to Ipanema Beach. Even on those less traveled avenues, he’d used every possible option to give them yet more cover: parked cars, trees, groups of unaware pedestrians. Madalina got a firsthand glimpse of just how furtive Cole could be when the situation demanded it.

  As dusk began to creep over the landscape, eating away the light, Cole’s cell phone rang. He brought Madalina to a halt on the sidewalk and fished the phone from his pocket.

  Relieved for a break to catch her breath, she watched Cole rather than the street. There was a minivan parked at the curb between them and the road, giving an extra bit of cover.

  “Yeah?” Cole said. Then he tilted the phone out and turned the speaker on. The volume was low so that Thaddeus’s voice didn’t carry far.