Snap Judgment (Samantha Brinkman Book 3)
Page 37
“I get it, Tracy.” In fact, I understood better than she could possibly know. Our housekeeper had called 9-1-1 after seeing Sebastian grope me. A lone officer had responded, and though I’d told him it was true, when Sebastian clapped him on the back and said, “Kids have great imaginations,” he’d laughed and agreed. And walked away. The housekeeper got fired.
So Tracy’s feeling of hopelessness was very familiar to me. But things have changed—they’re not perfect, but they are better. Kids are getting more credibility nowadays. I told her that the cops would have to take her seriously if both she and Tammy said Ronnie had abused them, and I pointed out how much it’d mean to Tammy to have her support. “It’ll really help her to know that you’ve been through it, too, and that you’ll back her up. She won’t feel so alone—or like it’s all up to her.”
We talked a little longer, and for a minute, I was worried that Tracy wouldn’t go. But she finally came around and said, “Well, even if it doesn’t work, it’d be nice to see Tammy. Will Tiffany be there, too?”
A stab of guilt shot through me at the sight of her wistful look. But if I didn’t get her out of here, she’d never see anyone—or anything—ever again. “I think so, yeah. Let me go see what those guys have decided.”
She reached out and grabbed my hand. “Wait. Will you come with me?”
That wasn’t part of the plan. But I had to do whatever it took to make sure the plan worked. And if my going along for the ride helped smooth the way, so be it. I smiled. “Of course.”
I’d intended to tell her about my visits with Jorge but now I thought it probably wasn’t a great idea. We couldn’t risk her getting excited and letting a stray comment slip. The agents were already so hyper, the smallest misstep could kill the whole operation. In fact, I was afraid they might even be listening at the door.
I found Liam and Noah in the bedroom across the hall. The letter was laid flat on what looked like a scanner. I stopped at the doorway. “Tracy’s willing to go—if you’ll let her.”
Noah gave me one of his flinty looks. “Everything checks out, so she can go.” I felt relief spread through me. “But we’re going with her.”
As we’d predicted. “Fine. She wants me to come, too.”
Noah wasn’t happy about it, but Liam interceded. “No problem. You seem to have a rapport with her.”
I looked at my watch. It was almost one o’clock. Dale had said they’d be at the interception point by two. “We should get going. If they release her before we get there, she’ll wind up back at home, and then no one will be able to make her talk.”
Liam said we could leave right away. “Go ahead and tell Tracy.”
I fetched Tracy, and as we headed to the living room, Noah moved past us and inched the heavy drapes aside to look out the front window. He spoke with his back to us. “Liam’s going to clear the area. Be ready to go when I tell you.”
Liam went to the front door and turned to Noah, who held up a hand. When he dropped it, Liam walked outside. Over Noah’s shoulder, I saw Liam scan the street as he walked toward a green Ford Explorer that was parked at the curb. He opened the driver’s door and examined the interior of the car, then came back to the sidewalk and nodded at Noah.
Noah waved us toward the door. “Go straight to the car and get in the backseat. And don’t lag. I’ll be right behind you.”
We walked out at a brisk pace and headed to the Explorer. I saw that Liam had now opened the back passenger-side door closest to the curb and was watching the area around us as we approached.
We made it into the car without incident. For a moment, I was amused by the fact that I was the only one who knew we weren’t in danger. Not yet, anyway. That thought was less amusing.
Noah got into the front passenger seat and told us to put on our seat belts and slide down low. Liam got into the driver’s seat. He pulled away, and after a few minutes, I noticed he wasn’t using the car’s navigation. I wondered if that were a security precaution, whether someone could trace you when you used it. I made a mental note to ask Alex about that—assuming I made it out of this alive. I saw Tracy looking out the window hungrily. It was probably the first glimpse she’d had of the outside world since she’d been taken into custody.
We rode mostly in silence as Liam navigated from one freeway to the next. Ordinarily, it would’ve taken an hour and a half to two hours to reach Costa Mesa. But thanks to Liam’s very “special” driving maneuvers—which had me stomping an imaginary brake the whole way—we got there in just over an hour. And I’d thought Dale’s driving was bad.
Liam got off the freeway and headed toward the stretch of road where I knew we were going to be “hijacked.” It was a lonely, deserted area, and Joshua trees and other cacti filled the open land on either side of the road. My palms were sweating, and my pulse was racing so fast I felt like I might stroke out. Everything depended on the next few minutes. It could all go swimmingly—or it could end in a bloody sea of dead bodies.
We’d just passed a billboard advertising a casino in Murrieta Hot Springs when two black Range Rovers—Cabazon must get a fleet rate on those things—suddenly appeared on either side of us. One roared ahead and pulled in front of the Explorer, while the other pulled to the left side of us.
Liam swore and tried to swing around to the right to pass the Rover in front of us, but there wasn’t enough road, and there was no room to maneuver on the shoulder because of all the cacti. In the meantime, the Rover on our left swung into the side of the Explorer. The sickening screech of metal on metal blended with Tracy’s screams as Liam pulled hard to the right. Tracy and I fell forward like crash test dummies as we landed in an unnavigable patch of cacti and lurched to a full stop. The Rover in front of us immediately turned to the right and cut us off. We were trapped.
Tracy was now crying and screaming incoherently. She reached out and clutched my arm, and I could feel her whole body shaking. I grabbed her hand. “It’ll be okay. I promise.”
But just as the words left my mouth, four men in black ski masks, armed with AK47s, jumped out of the Rovers and swarmed our car as they cursed at the agents and yelled for them to put up their hands in Spanish and broken English.
Liam had immediately reached for the gun in his shoulder holster on seeing them, but now he stopped and slowly held up his hands. Noah did the same. Two of the men yanked open the front doors, grabbed the agents, and threw them out of the car. I heard Liam grunt as he hit the ground. The other two men pulled us out, dragged us over to one of the Range Rovers, and shoved us into the backseat. Tracy was now so terrified she’d stopped crying—and breathing. Her face was white, and her eyes were wide.
The car was running, and the second we landed inside, it took off, wheels churning up a cloud of dust as it leaped onto the roadway and sped off. As I struggled to fasten Tracy’s seat belt, I listened for the sound of gunshots behind us as we drove away. I didn’t hear any. Cabazon had promised the agents wouldn’t be harmed, and I knew he preferred it that way because dead agents would only mean a big headache for him. Still, you never knew what his Neanderthals might do. I could only hope they were sane enough to keep Cabazon’s promise.
Our driver, who was doing at least a hundred miles an hour, also wore a black ski mask. I knew that was Dale. Behind us, in the cargo area, a man wearing a Richard Nixon mask was aiming a .45-caliber at our heads.
I’d finally managed to snap my seat belt into place when Tracy finally caught her breath and started to scream. “Please don’t kill us! Oh please!”
The man behind us in the Nixon mask said, “Shut up! Càllate!” He put the barrel of the gun to her temple. Tracy gasped, then squeezed her eyes shut as she began to sob. I took her hand and whispered, “It’s okay, Tracy. You’re safe. Don’t worry.”
But I was finding it harder and harder to believe that myself as we hurtled down the winding road at what felt like a hundred miles an hour. A few seconds later, the driver suddenly stomped on the brakes, throwing Tracy and me
against the front seat. A man in a black ski mask ran up to the car and jumped into the front passenger seat. Before his door could close, the driver hit the gas, and we roared ahead.
As he weaved his way around the few vehicles on the road, Tracy and I fell from one side to another. We were going so fast that when we hit a speed bump just before an intersection we actually caught air. My head banged into the roof as the car landed and I let out a yelp of pain. Dale was driving more maniacally than I’d ever seen—no doubt to impress the company—but damn. I wished he’d take it down a notch; this was getting too crazy. Especially because now we were moving into a more populated part of town. But instead of slowing down, he sped up, maneuvering through the traffic as though it were an obstacle course.
As we approached the red light at the next intersection, he suddenly yanked the steering wheel and made a hard right turn—and cut off an approaching car. The driver in the lane behind us was forced to make a sudden stop, and I heard the brakes squeal as he leaned on his horn long and hard. It sounded like he was just inches away. Tracy screamed again. I would’ve screamed, too, but my heart was beating too fast to catch my breath. This time, the guy in the passenger seat turned around and said, “Shut the fuck up!”
Dale, heedless, continued to weave through traffic doing at least eighty miles per hour. I’d been holding my breath so long my lungs felt like they would burst. I was terrified that we’d wind up wrapped around a light pole.
A few seconds later, I saw that the freeway on-ramp was just ahead. I was trying to figure out whether I was glad or even more terrified that we were about to get on the freeway, when Dale suddenly jerked the steering wheel to the left and turned onto a small side street with a cul-de-sac. He zoomed to the end of the cul-de-sac, then came to a screeching stop. What the hell was going on? I opened my mouth to ask, but before I could speak, the man in the front passenger seat jumped out, opened my door, unbuckled my seat belt, and yanked me out of the car. As I flew out I banged my head on the sidewalk and landed hard, like a sack of potatoes. The man hopped back into the car, and as the Rover sped off, I heard Tracy’s screams over the sound of squealing tires.
I curled up on the curb and held my throbbing head. I felt like I was on a Tilt-a-Whirl, and the spinning wouldn’t stop. I had to put my head between my knees and breathe. As I fought to unscramble my brain, I tried to figure out what had happened. Either Dale had been forced to modify the plan, or something had gone very, very wrong. After a few minutes, the throbbing and spinning subsided, and I managed to push myself up to a sitting position. I started to heave, but my stomach was empty. I coughed out a thin stream of bitter saliva. I wanted to call Dale and ask him what was going on, but he was in no position to have a chat right now. I sat there for a few moments, too dazed and nauseous to think.
It occurred to me that I needed to find a way home. I supposed I’d just have to call Uber. It’d cost a fortune. I’d just begun to imagine how pissed off Michy would be when I realized I couldn’t call Uber. I didn’t have my purse. It’d been left behind in the Explorer when Tracy and I had been “kidnapped.”
Now what? I couldn’t call Michy or Alex. There was no way I could explain what I was doing here. The only thing I could think to do was find someone who might let me borrow their cell phone so I could call a cab—and leave a message for Dale. I should probably see if I could find a grocery store or a mall or . . . something, but I was still feeling too disoriented and groggy from my crash landing to stand up—let alone walk.
I folded my arms on my knees and dropped my aching head. I was so exhausted I couldn’t bear the thought of having to stand up and make my legs move. But I had to find a way home somehow. I’d just begun to ponder the possibility of hitchhiking when I heard the click-click of doggy toenails on the pavement and felt a shadow fall over me. I looked up to see a beagle whose leash was being held by a shaggy-haired teenage boy.
He stared at me with a mix of curiosity and concern. “Are you okay?”
I considered the question. “Basically. By any chance, would you happen to have a cell phone I could borrow for a second? I left mine at home, and I need to get a ride.”
He studied me for a moment, then nodded. “Sure.” He fished an iPhone out of his front pants pocket and handed it to me.
As I pressed in Dale’s number, the beagle gave me a good sniffing, then began to lick my hand. I scratched between his ears and waited for the call to go to his voice mail, but it didn’t.
“Hello?” Dale’s voice sounded strained.
It took me a moment to get over the shock of hearing him answer. “Hey, it’s me. I’m borrowing someone else’s phone. Are you—”
His voice was panicked as he shouted, “I’ve been calling you for hours! Where are you? Where’s Tracy?”
What the hell . . . ? “What do you mean? You just took off with her!”
“I didn’t take off with anyone! They ditched me! We were supposed to meet at noon. They never showed up.”
Oh my God. His answer knocked the wind out of me as I realized what it meant. I barely croaked out, “They screwed us. They totally screwed us.”
FIFTY-FOUR
Dale told me he could pick me up; he was still in the area. I asked the boy for the name of the street I was on and gave Dale the address of the nearest house. He said he was on his way.
I handed the phone back to the boy. “Thanks.” His dog was still licking my hand—which I now realized wasn’t as cute as I’d thought. I’d scraped my hand when I’d been thrown from the car, and he was licking off the blood.
The boy pocketed the phone. “No problem. You’ve got a ride?” I nodded, feeling faint. He gave me a little wave. “Okay. See ya.”
I gave him a feeble wave, and the boy and his dog ambled off. I dropped my head between my knees as another wave of nausea hit me. Dale showed up a few minutes later. He was driving his personal car, the white Lexus. I got in and slumped down in the seat, my arms wrapped around my middle. “Just FYI, I might heave.”
Dale turned on the air-conditioning and rolled down the window as he pulled away from the curb. “Tell me what happened.”
The blast of cold air felt good. “First tell me if Liam and Noah are okay.”
He said they were a little banged up but otherwise fine. I let out a sigh of relief. At least one ton of guilt was off my plate. I told Dale the whole—but actually rather brief—story. When I’d finished I said, “So they’ve got her. Now what do we do?”
Dale drove up the on-ramp and merged onto the freeway. “Nothing. We can’t reach Cabazon, and it wouldn’t matter if we could. He’s done with us.”
Dale was right. Cabazon had gotten what he wanted. Tracy was out of the picture, and now the feds would have to dismiss the case against Jorge. The reality of Tracy’s situation hit me like a frying pan to the face. “The only thing keeping Tracy alive now is fear that Jorge will talk.”
Dale glanced at me, his expression grim. “But Jorge’s going to get out of jail pretty quick. And once he does . . .”
Cabazon might very well decide to punish the nephew who’d dared to threaten him. And there was only one punishment that would ensure Jorge would never be able to threaten him again. “He’ll kill Jorge. And that’ll be the end of Tracy.”
Dale swallowed. “Let’s not go there right now. He might not. After all, Jorge is family.”
But Cabazon was the kind of family who ate his young. Nothing came before his own need for self-preservation. Not even a beloved nephew. I leaned back against the seat as tears sprang to my eyes. After all our efforts to save her, the only thing we’d managed to do was serve her up to her killer on a silver platter. A wave of guilt and misery washed over me.
I closed my eyes to squeeze back the tears and turned to look out the window. All I could do now was hope that Cabazon had enough love for Jorge to let him—and Tracy—live. Or that Tracy somehow managed to escape. The latter seemed highly unlikely given what I’d seen of Cabazon’s operation.
Dale glanced at me out of the corner of his eye. “I didn’t have to go along with it. Besides, all things considered, it wasn’t a bad plan. We had no choice but to collaborate with Cabazon, and that was going to be a dicey proposition no matter what we did. So I’ll give you the same advice: don’t beat yourself up. We did the best we could.”
But it hadn’t been good enough. And if Tracy didn’t make it, I’d never forgive myself.
When Dale dropped me at home, I asked him if he’d mind getting my purse from the feds tonight. “I’m not in any shape to drive right now.”
Dale said he would, and I got out and slowly made my way up the stairs, feeling a hundred years old. I fished my spare key out of the planter near my door and let myself in. I knew I should call Michy and make up some excuse why I hadn’t come back to the office—and given the way I was feeling right now, why I’d probably stay home tomorrow, too. But first, I needed a long, hot shower, where I could cry with no one watching.
Half an hour later, dressed in a robe, my hair wrapped in a towel, and a double shot of Patrón Silver in my hand, I’d just picked up my phone to call Michy when there was a knock at the door. Fear exploded in my chest—then I remembered that Dale had said he’d drop off my purse. I went to the door and looked through the peephole. Sure enough, it was him. I opened the door.
Dale gave me my purse, and I held up my drink. “Want one?”
He shook his head. “No, thanks. I’ll wait till I get home.” He frowned at me. “You okay?”
No, I wasn’t. But he had enough on his plate. “Better than nothing, I guess.”
Dale nodded. “I’ll check in with you mañana.”
He left. I dropped my purse on the kitchen counter and called Michy. I told her I felt like I was coming down with the flu. She volunteered to bring me drugs and chicken soup, but I told her I just needed rest.