Haunted asc-8

by Jeanne C. Stein

  I thought you said it was the boss.

  I wasn’t there when my family was killed. I always figured it was the boss. I didn’t see who was in the car when I was shot. But today, I learned the truth. I heard it from Ramon’s own lips.

  I think of hearing Luis tell his men that Culebra was responsible for the minister’s death. How his brother would kill him. Ramon was setting him up again. Culebra, there’s more—

  A sound from the direction of the vestibule. A scraping, like a person struggling to stand up. A moan.

  Culebra, I have to go. The girls are coming to.

  The next instant he’s gone and I’m rushing to the vestibule. When I open the door, one of the girls is on her feet, wild-eyed and looking around frantically. I see it in her eyes—she’s looking for a weapon. When she sees me and realizes it isn’t Luis or one of his men, her expression shifts to confusion. But the instinct to fight remains strong. She backs into a corner, her fists balled at her side.

  I hold up my hands. “I won’t hurt you,” I whisper in Spanish. I put a finger to my lips and glance toward the window. “You must be quiet. El Jefe is looking for you.”

  The name ignites fear in her eyes but also understanding. She hasn’t been here long enough to have been reduced to the state Adelita was. Her clothes are still intact on her small frame, her hair still shiny and held back from her childlike face with a barrette. She can’t be more than fourteen.

  The others begin to regain consciousness, too. One retches from the effects of the drug, her shoulders heaving. I hold her hair away from her face. The girl who first awoke steps beside me and takes my place, holding the sick girl’s head and crooning softly to her.

  She calls her hermana—sister. This one can’t be more than twelve.

  Revulsion comes in waves of red-hot fury. I want Luis to find us so I can tear him to pieces in front of this child’s eyes.

  Not yet, Anna. Culebra has honed in on my emotions. You will get your chance, I promise you.

  Luis is mine.

  He is yours.

  The young girl has stopped heaving. The older sister hugs her to her chest, whispering that they must be quiet. All four now huddle together, eyes on me.

  I want nothing more than to give them the assurance they seek. That I can wake them from this nightmare and get them to safety.

  I need a plan. And I need a diversion.

  I need Max.

  CHAPTER 38

  IT’S FULL DAYLIGHT NOW AND I LOOK AT MY WATCH. Ten minutes before I can turn on my cell and try to reach Max. A glance around at the girls looking to me for salvation makes my heart feel heavy in my chest. How long can we hide here before someone thinks to look more closely in the church?

  At eight, I switch on the cell. The power indicator reads two bars. Less than half power. I pull up Max’s number and press Send.

  He picks up right away. “Are you all right?”

  “Did you get Adelita to safety?”

  There’s just the slightest hesitation, but it’s enough to jump start my heart. “Max? Where’s Adelita?”

  He snaps back. “Relax, Anna. She’s okay. She’s in a safe house on the U.S. side of the river.”

  I let out a breath. “Good. Here’s the situation. I got four girls away from Santiago’s brother, Luis, and we’re hiding in a church building in the village. I don’t know how much time we have before they look for us in the one place they haven’t searched. It might not be long.”

  “Where’s Culebra?”

  I tell him quickly and succinctly what’s happening to Culebra. What I don’t tell him is that Ramon was one of the bastards that attacked him all those years ago. Some news is better left delivered in person. I finish up with, “How long before you get to us?”

  “I’m already on the way. Do you have the duffel?”

  “You mean the one with the arsenal inside? Yes. Nice thinking, by the way.”

  “I should reach you in four hours. I’ll contact you when I get close.”

  “No Maria sightings?”

  “No. You must have done a good job on that door. Shut your phone down now. Conserve power.”

  He says good-bye and disconnects. I do the same, noticing I’m down to just one bar now as I power the phone off.

  The girls have been watching me whisper into the phone. They don’t say a word when I shove it into my pocket, waiting, I guess, for me to give them some kind of signal that we can leave now.

  Instead, I tell them something that makes their faces grow even tauter with concern. I have to leave them. I need to get the duffel. The weapons inside may be their best hope yet to making it out alive.

  The older girl has assumed the role of protector. She listens to what I tell them I must do. My Spanish must be getting better, because she nods and pulls the others into a close circle. “We will be waiting for your return,” she says. In English. “I will keep them quiet. Please hurry. We have been without food and water since yesterday morning. I don’t know how much longer the little ones can last.”

  At fourteen or so, she is the oldest of the four by two or three years. She is the most physically developed, her sister and the others are barely into puberty. The tear-streaked faces of “the little ones” burn into my brain. Luis’ appetite has not only grown, it’s gotten more perverse. I look around the church, trying to understand how men can perpetuate such horror on children.

  No answer comes.

  This used to be a place of worship. My head spins at the paradox. God created men like Luis in his own image? Then maybe god created this vampire to be his retribution.

  CHAPTER 39

  IT’S GROWN VERY QUIET IN THE VILLAGE. THE WOMEN have taken their men back into their shacks. There is just the occasional muffled cry as a wound is being tended. I can only imagine the primitive tools they’re using to extract those bullets.

  Should I feel sympathy? I can’t. Bastards let little girls be tortured under their noses. I hope it hurts like hell.

  I look out the window. The body of Luis’ dead henchman lies unattended in the dirt. Flies drone around like the corpse in a cloud. A pack of mangy dogs materialize from the brush around the village. They sniff the body, take tentative nips as if testing to see if there is any life left, any movement that could signal a threat. After a while, two of them work in concert, grabbing the ankles, yanking the body to the side of the well out of my view.

  Away from the lone man standing outside the nearest shack.

  Luis’ guard, the only one not searching the perimeter for the girls, stands at attention beside the door to the shack. Trying to ignore the dogs. But he can’t ignore the sound. He can hear as well as I the noise the dogs make as they tear into the flesh of Luis’ victim. His eyes swivel back and forth. Sweat trickles down his face, stains the collar of his shirt. He doesn’t try to wipe it away. He doesn’t move at all, afraid maybe to incur Luis’ wrath like the man being torn apart on the other side of the well—especially if the wrath takes the form of a bullet to the brain.

  I’m glad the girls are huddled in back. They can’t see or hear this.

  When I think it’s safe, I climb out of the back window and drop silently to the ground. I have only to make it a few feet before reaching cover. Then I’m scurrying through the brush like a desert coyote, eyes, ears and nose alert for the return of Ramon and his men or the approach of Luis’ search party. Those cowards seem to have disappeared. Maybe the idea of facing repercussions for not being able to find the girls made running away a more favorable option.

  The duffel remains where I left it. Culebra’s shack is within sight, but I don’t take time to reach out to him. I’ll let him know that Max is on the way when I’ve gotten back to the girls.

  I lift the duffel carefully, hold it against my chest to keep the guns inside from shifting around. It’s so quiet around me, even the slightest sound might draw attention.

  Then I’m racing back to the church. When I reach the back window, I lower the duffel silently to the
floor and climb in after it.

  The four girls are just where I left them, clinging to each other, breathless with fear. The older girl’s eyes flicker with relief when she sees me.

  I zip open the duffel to see if there are any more of the protein bars inside. There are only two left. I hand them to her. “Éste es todo. Tu tienes que compartirlos con las otras.” When she’s taken them and is dividing them, I ask, “¿Como se llama?”

  She waits until the three have started to eat, before she answers, “Esmeralda.” She points to each girl in turn, “Francisca, Dorotea, my sister, Peppi.”

  “Do any of the others speak English?”

  Peppi alone looks up from her bar. She has been eating slowly, one tiny bite at a time. “Sí. Yes. A little.”

  I rummage in the bag to see how much water is left. One bottle. Shit. I think back to a few hours ago when I used a bottle to wash the blood from my face. A stupid waste of water. Water these girls need. With a sigh of self-recrimination, I pull the last bottle out and hand it to Esmeralda. “This is all the water.”

  She understands and opens the bottle. She tells the girls in Spanish, “Take just a sip. We must make this last.”

  There are no groans of protest, just grateful smiles. Each in turn tips the bottle to parched lips and swallows a mouthful. When they pass it back to Esmeralda, she recaps the bottle without taking a drink herself. She hasn’t eaten her bar, either, but has rewrapped it and slipped it into a pocket in her skirt.

  She reads the question in my expression. “I don’t need it. They might.” Her eyes turn to the girls.

  She is saving hers for the little ones. “You need to be strong for them. At least take some water.”

  “You haven’t.”

  And there’s a very good reason for that but telling her what it is might make going back to Luis seem a better bargain than staying here with a vampire.

  “I drank a bottle earlier,” I lie. “I’m fine. Please. At least take a sip.”

  She seems ready to argue but then, since I don’t appear ready to give in, she opens the water bottle and brings it to her lips. As if I can’t tell she’s not really taking a drink. Then she carefully recaps the bottle, and stares at me until I give her a grudging nod.

  She’s stubborn. She reminds me of me.

  I like her.

  Nothing to do but hunker down and wait for Max and hope he gets here before any of the villagers realize no one has yet made a thorough search of the church for the missing girls. The fact that Luis’ men couldn’t move fast enough to get away from him is working in our favor. Hiding in plain sight does sometimes work.

  Esmeralda has the three girls gathered around her like a mother chicken with her peeps. They are all so quiet, so withdrawn. Since they arrived less than twenty-four hours ago, and Luis has had other things to occupy his mind, maybe I’ll be able to get them away before their nightmare becomes worse than being kidnapped and drugged.

  And what Luis had planned for them is infinitely worse.

  CHAPTER 40

  I’VE NEVER SEEN CHILDREN SO CALM AND SILENT. I guess that’s what happens when you’re scared to death. I’m the one who has to remind myself not to keep checking my watch, not to get up and pace to the window. Luis’ shack faces the church directly and if the guard sees a flicker of a shadow or a face at that window, he’s sure to come investigate.

  My whole body burns with the need to do something. Waiting has never been easy—not when I was human, especially not now as a vampire. David used to hate doing surveillance with me. I’d get so antsy, he’d say I was like a maggot in shit. Crude but accurate. I couldn’t sit still.

  What happens when Max gets here? As long as Ramon hasn’t returned, the answer is easy. I “question” Luis about the whereabouts of his brother while Max frees Culebra. Then we get the hell out of here. Get the girls to safety, come back to mop up.

  If what Culebra says is true about Ramon, he’s as dead as the Santiago brothers.

  I’m sure Culebra will insist. As will I.

  Peppi is whispering something to her sister. Esmeralda looks over at me. “She has to go to the bathroom.”

  The little girl has a look of embarrassment on her face.

  “It’s okay, Peppi,” I whisper. “Go behind the vestibule door.”

  Esmeralda helps her sister to her feet and points to the door. Peppi scoots around her, glancing back at us as if ashamed her body has betrayed her.

  “What about the others?” I ask Esmeralda.

  She asks, but the other girls shake their heads. I think they are afraid to move away from her protective arms.

  “Are you all from the same place?” I ask Esmeralda when Peppi has returned and settled down once again near her sister.

  “Yes. A village not far from here.”

  I think of Adelita’s story. “Were you brought here with the promise of jobs?”

  Esmeralda’s face grows dark with anger. “Jobs? No. We were kidnapped from a schoolyard. In the middle of the day. In front of our teachers. They stood by and watched, too frightened of the narcos to fight to save us.”

  “Did you know the men who took you?”

  “Yes. The men in our village grow amapolas . . . um, poppies. When the men came, we thought it was for the opio. The drugs. But they took us instead. For El Jefe.”

  She is quiet for a moment. “I begged them not to take the little ones. They laughed and said I could come along, too, if I wanted to take care of them. They didn’t know Peppi was my sister. But the way they said I could come along, the way they laughed, I knew what they were going to do. I had to stay with the niños. To try to protect them. But I failed.”

  “No. You were very brave. And we will get them out of here. Someone is coming soon to help us. We need only be patient for a little while longer.”

  As soon as I speak the words, the thought “from my lips to god’s ear” leaps to mind. Must be the influence of our setting. The look of hope on Esmeralda’s face burns like a torch. I hope my promise to her doesn’t prove to be as empty as this forsaken church.

  * * *

  THE HOURS PASS WITH SLOW-MOTION AGONY. I CAN’T think of anything else to ask Esmeralda and she, too, stays silent. She doesn’t ask me who I am or why I’m here. I glance down at my bloodstained shirt. Perhaps she’s afraid of the answers. Her eyes follow me each time I walk to the back window and I feel her watching when I return my seat. She’s put her trust in me, but that doesn’t mean she’s going to relax her vigilance. All that’s important to her is that she and the girls are alive and unmolested. In her eyes, I read her resolve to fight for them. Against anyone.

  The village is quiet, too. I keep expecting the search party to return or Ramon and his men to come back. I wonder what Luis is doing in his shack—probably devising ways to torture the men if they come back empty-handed. Or jerking off to mental images of four little girls.

  Finally, finally, I hear footsteps approach. One set of footsteps. I jump up so fast, vampire fast, everyone gasps. I curse myself for the blunder, put a finger to my lips. Only I can hear the stealthy approach from outside. I want to be sure it’s Max before the footsteps come any closer.

  I move to the back door, open it a crack to test the wind.

  Max’s scent.

  Relief washes over me like a tidal wave.

  I look back at the girls. They know someone is outside. Fear is stark on their faces. “It’s okay,” I whisper. “It’s my friend.”

  I wait for Max to get to the door, then push it open. He slips inside. He’s dressed in camos, a large backpack over his shoulders, a rifle strapped across his chest.

  He and I look at each other a moment. Then his eyes go to the girls. He takes off the backpack and opens it. This time there’s a water bottle and protein bar for each girl.

  The food and water are accepted eagerly. Even Esmeralda drinks this time and unwraps her bar gratefully.

  We watch the girls eat and drink.

  “I’m glad you�
�re here,” I say.

  Max is quiet for a moment. “I’m sorry about what happened before. If you love Stephen, I hope it works out for you. I don’t know why I did or said what I did.”

  God, that conversation seems so long ago. And so utterly irrelevant now. Not that I intend to let Max off so easily. I allow a smile. “Maybe you really are a prick. Ever thought of that?”

  “Every minute of every day.”

  He has a wistful tone to his voice that makes me stare hard at him. “Who are you and what did you do with the real Max?”

  His face reddens a little. A sound from outside cuts our conversation short. Once again, I’ve picked up what human ears cannot. I signal Max and the girls to be quiet.

  After another second, though, it’s unnecessary because the cacophony of cries and gunshots is explosive enough for us all to hear. We freeze.

  I gather from the excited calls to Luis to come outside that Ramon and his men have returned.

  I peek out the front window.

  Ramon says he did not return empty-handed.

  The shouts bring Luis to the door of his shack. Ramon and his men are gathered in a circle near the well.

  “Esta son para muchachas,” Ramon says. “Le trajimos una sorpresa. Un premio de la consolación.”

  He is offering a consolation prize for Luis’ lost girls.

  A consolation prize?

  Luis steps forward. “Enséñame,” he says, hand on the gun at his waist.

  Ramon steps aside and one of his men pushes a figure behind him to the front.

  All the air rushes out of my body. My heart pounds so violently, I’m sure everyone can hear it. I whirl on Max with rage bubbling in white-hot fury to the surface.

  “What the fuck have you done, Max?”

  He shoulders me aside to look out.

  He pales. “I don’t know how she got here. You have to believe me, Anna. I don’t know how she could have followed me.”