Beneath the Truth

by Meghan March

  Unknown Number.

  My hand shook at the knowledge who was probably on the other end, but I forced myself to answer the call. “Hello?”

  “You want to see your brother and your father alive again? Or do you want their heads delivered next?”

  My stomach twisted at the visual. My brother and father’s eyes as lifeless as Erik’s. I gagged.

  “What do you want, Carlos?”

  “If you’re as smart as I’ve always assumed, you already know exactly where I am, so I’ll tell you when you get here. Bring your trusty little laptop. If you call Rhett Hennessy, I swear he’ll die before he can get out of the airport parking lot.”

  It seemed like every cell in my body trembled with fear. No, terror. There was a difference I’d never truly appreciated until now.

  When I didn’t respond, Carlos kept talking.

  “If you’re not at your father’s house, alone, in forty-five minutes, I’ll personally slit their throats. You want them to live out this day, you won’t be late.”

  “Why are you doing this?” My voice shook, but I managed to get the question out.

  It didn’t matter, though—no one heard it. Carlos had hung up on me.

  He had my dad and my brother. My only family, both in the hands of a psychopath.

  Logic told me that I shouldn’t go. I couldn’t go. It was suicide.

  But logic’s role in this decision was overridden by terror. Rhett tore himself apart for not answering his father’s phone calls when he had no idea what his father was facing. How could I live with myself knowing Carlos had my family and I did nothing?

  I couldn’t.

  It didn’t matter that my father might not remember any of this, or that my brother might be a dirty cop. There was no way I was going to let them die while I sat locked in a safe room where nothing and no one could touch me.

  I shoved the terror aside and considered the problem before me.

  How do I get to my dad’s house in less than forty-five minutes?

  59

  Rhett

  The tires of the SUV squealed as we rounded the corner that led to the airport entrance. A private jet was lowering its landing gear on approach.

  “You think he’s here yet?” one of the security crew asked from the backseat.

  “We’re about to find out.”

  I slammed on the brakes, parked in the fire lane, and jumped out. As soon as my feet hit the ground, another SUV roared up beside me and stopped. I pulled my pistol as the window rolled down.

  “What the fuck are you doing?” Rix shouted. “I’ve been following you for two miles debating whether I should pull your ass over after someone called in a possible drunk driver. You’re lucky I was the closest unit.”

  “Not now. Busy.”

  “You care to fucking share why you’re in an SUV owned by Lachlan Mount, hauling ass to a private airport with a bunch of his guys?”

  My head jerked to the side as I looked at Carver. “What the fuck is he talking about?”

  He shrugged. “You needed backup. The best. I got it for you.”

  Jesus fucking Christ. “Don’t have time to explain,” I told Rix.

  The cop slammed his vehicle into reverse to park behind my SUV. He jumped out, gun in hand. “Something’s going down. Don’t know what it is, but you’re not doing this alone.”

  “You can’t be here.”

  Rix glared at me. “Too late. I’m here.”

  I shook my head. “Fuck it. Be stubborn. You want to help take down the cartel before they get to Ari? Then let’s go get this motherfucker.”

  I tucked my gun away as I headed for the door. Private airport. No security. God bless rich people who don’t like walking through metal detectors.

  I walked up to the information desk and slid the slip of paper with the tail number Rome had texted me across the counter. “I need to know if this plane has landed.”

  The woman folded her hands. “I’m sorry, sir. For privacy reasons, we can’t disclose that information.”

  Rix pulled out his badge. “We’re overruling your privacy reasons.”

  Her eyes widened slightly. “I’m not supposed to provide any information without a warrant.”

  “You want to be invited to the funerals you contribute to by not sharing the information?” Rix countered.

  “No.” Her head shook vigorously. “If it’s a matter of public safety, I can make an exception.”

  “We’d appreciate that,” I replied.

  She took the slip of paper, typed the info into the computer, and frowned. “This flight came in ahead of schedule. It landed about fifteen minutes after they filed the flight plan, but of course, we see that when people want to keep their destinations as private as the FAA will allow.”

  “Wait. You mean they’re already on the ground?”

  “Yes, sir. A couple of hours ago. They were here and left.”

  My mind racing, I spun away from the desk with Rix, Carver, and another one of the crew following me. “Fuck. Fuck.”

  “This had to be planned,” Carver said. “You think they wanted us away from the house? Away from Ms. Sampson?”

  My stomach hit the floor.

  “He’s not going to touch her.” I cut my gaze to Carver. “Get on the phone. Call the guys at the house. Make sure she’s still in lockdown and there’s been no movement.”

  He already had his phone out as I reached into my pocket to see a missed call on mine from Ari.

  Fuck. I called her back, but got no answer.

  “She’s in the safe room? You’re sure?” Carver asked. “Can you confirm via camera feed?” We waited for several moments before he froze. “What do you mean, the camera feeds are down?” He asked the question quietly, but it blared through my brain like he’d shouted it.

  No. Not fucking happening.

  I called Ari’s phone again and let it ring until it went straight to voice mail.

  Where the hell are you?

  I snatched the phone from Carver’s hand. “Have there been any disturbances? Anything?”

  “No, sir. Well, something tripped a sensor on the back perimeter, but there was nothing there when we checked and none of the house sensors were triggered. I went to check the feed to see what it was, and just saw it was black. We’re trying to figure out what happened. The safe room door is still engaged.”

  I thought of the day the man came up on a boat and scared the shit out of Ari while she was outside, and how she’d locked herself in the safe room without setting off the alarm for Carver to know. None of that system was foolproof. If she could get around it, so could someone else.

  “Any boats? Coming or going?”

  A moment of silence. “Now that you mention it . . . I heard a boat motor as we came around the house to check.”

  Fuck. “We need confirmation Ari is in the safe room. Go pound on the fucking door, if you have to. I need to hear her voice. Call us back.”

  “On it.”

  I hung up and handed the phone back to Carver.

  “Where’s Sampson? He know his sister is locked down in a safe room?” This came from Rix.

  “No fucking clue where he is. MIA. But we got a head in a box from the cartel this morning. One of Ari’s employees. Saw pictures of another one. Now the asshole who did it is here, and I’m not stopping until we put him down so he can never touch her again.”

  Rix’s eyebrows went up. “You’re gonna need more backup if you’re going to war with the cartel.” He’d done it before. He would know.

  “You offering?”

  “I can’t do it officially, but I’m here. Let’s do this.”

  I glanced to Carver. “We got another body on the team. Now we gotta figure out where the fuck this asshole went.”

  60

  Ariel

  One stolen boat and one borrowed car later, I knew I made a huge mistake the moment I walked into my dad’s empty house and someone grabbed me, wrenching my arms around my back. All my training d
eserted me, and I froze when I saw Carlos standing in the living room, his white shirt perfectly pressed but spattered with a faint spray of red. Blood.

  I could hear Rhett’s voice yelling in my head to fight. I yanked, trying to twist out of the grip of whoever held me, but all I did was waste my energy.

  Carlos waited until I stilled to speak, shaking his head. “You should have done what I told you to do, Ariel. Instead, you had to be foolish.”

  Foolish? Foolish was coming here alone.

  “What did you do with them? Where are they?”

  There was no sign of either my dad or my brother in the room. Movement came from my right, and I whipped my head around.

  Two men in black suits. I wasn’t sure why I was surprised. Apparently, Carlos had increased his security as well.

  My gaze cut back to him to find his face twisted into a mask of displeasure.

  “I am the only one who gets to ask questions here. Like why you let another man put his hands on you?”

  He stepped toward me, and fear curled up my spine.

  “Whore,” he spat. “I thought you were smarter than the rest of them. You couldn’t keep your legs closed for five minutes.”

  My first instinct was to fire back with his transgressions, but I snapped my mouth shut before the words flew free. This Carlos wasn’t the guy I’d dated sometimes when our schedules connected. He was the son of a drug lord who had my dad and brother captive.

  “Where are they?”

  He stepped forward again, this time to backhand me on the cheek. “I said no fucking questions! Do I need to fuck the sense into you right here? In front of an audience? Maybe you’d like that too.”

  Tears stung my eyes as pain radiated from my cheekbone. He just hit me. No one had ever hit me. I jerked my arm, instinctively trying to cover the spot with my hand.

  “I should have kept you in line with the back of my hand this whole time. Then we wouldn’t have this situation. Now I’ll drag you home to Mexico like the disobedient bitch you are, and I’ll put you to use. My father has a pack of dogs that will break you if I can’t.”

  The visual rising in my head threatened to empty the contents of my stomach.

  “Why?” I dared another question. “Why are you doing this?”

  A cruel smile twisted his lips. “Because I can. Because no one offers me something and then tries to take it away. You were part of the deal, you and that brain of yours, and I don’t renegotiate.”

  Part of the deal?

  “I didn’t make a deal. I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about, but I’ll pay you to let me go. As much as you want, just let me walk out of here with my dad and Heath.”

  Cruel, mocking laughter burst from Carlos’s lips. “I never understood how you could be so naive and so brilliant at the same time. I have more money than my children’s children could ever spend.”

  “Then what do you want?” I yelled.

  His expression turned forbidding, and he gripped me by the chin and squeezed before flinging my head to the side. “You will learn respect!”

  The tears burning my eyes tipped over. “Where are they? Just tell me. Please. They’re all I have left.”

  “The fact that you risk my wrath for that piece-of-shit brother of yours tells me just how stupid you are. He doesn’t deserve your loyalty.” He nodded at the large flat-screen TV mounted on the wall. The one Heath and I had gotten Dad for Christmas two years ago.

  One of his goons turned on the power. As soon as Heath’s battered face filled the screen, I froze. He was tied to a chair. A chair I recognized.

  My gaze cut to the breakfast nook and my dad’s table. One chair was missing.

  Heath spat blood at whoever held the camera, and it spilled over his lip and down his chin. “Fuck you.”

  “No, fuck you.” It was Carlos’s voice. “You thought you could show her that picture without paying the price? Didn’t I prove you wrong when they put your father in the hospital? Did you not get the message?”

  “I’m done. I’m fucking done!”

  Bloody spittle coated Heath’s lips as he yelled, and a man stepped into the frame and swung a fist at Heath’s face. My brother’s head jerked sideways when it connected, and the crack of bone on bone had me crying out as he cursed.

  This time, when the man stepped back, Heath coughed up teeth with his mouthful of blood. That’s when I realized it wasn’t bone on bone, but metal. Brass knuckles were secured on the man’s fingers.

  “How do we get into the safe room?”

  The question Carlos asked Heath caught me off guard.

  “She’ll come. She’s gonna come.”

  The man backhanded him and Heath coughed, blood bubbling up on his lips.

  “The safe room.”

  “I don’t know how to get in.”

  “Bullshit. You inspected the whole fucking house before she got here. Don’t lie to me.”

  Another punch, this time to the gut, left Heath doubled over. I shut my eyes and turned away. I had asked him to check out the house before I rented it, just to make sure it wasn’t too good to be true. But the safe room wasn’t something I’d mentioned, nor did he.

  “Stop. Just stop,” I whispered.

  Carlos wrapped his arm around me and closed his fingers over my throat. “Oh no, we haven’t even gotten to the good part yet. And you and I are not even close to done. We’re just getting started.”

  My breathing shallowed as Carlos put pressure on my windpipe. “Is he alive?” I whispered. “Just tell me . . . did you . . . please tell me.”

  I tried to control the shivers racking my body, but I vibrated against Carlos.

  “Control yourself, or I’ll do it myself.”

  His voice once again came from the video. “You’re going to be selfless for once in your life and save your sister from me rather than cover your own ass? I’m shocked. I never expected in the choice of her life or yours, that you would choose her.”

  “What do you mean?” Heath asked.

  “It’s simple. You give me the safe room override and I let you walk out of this room alive. I get her and that brain I’m going to put to work. Then you get to live.”

  “That wasn’t the deal.”

  “No, it wasn’t, but since you didn’t hold up your end of the bargain and take out all the Hennessys when you had the chance, things have changed.”

  “They were never together. After wiring the house, there was no way to take out the rest to make it look like an accident.”

  Realization slammed into me like a runaway freight train. Heath killed Mr. Hennessy? And had agreed to kill the others? That couldn’t be possible. My knees buckled, and I clawed at Carlos’s grip as I fell. He yanked me back up, my lungs burning and my entire body shaking as tears coursed down my cheeks.

  No! Why would he do it? How could he do it? The man on the screen covered in blood looked like my brother, but the man I knew would never . . .

  “It was no accident that you threw your sister at him either. Did you think by pushing them together he could protect her from me? A Hennessy, of all people? The fucking family that has cost me millions? And now you’ll all die.”

  “Fuck you, asshole. You used her to keep me in line, and I did what I had to do. There were no guarantees.”

  “And you can’t trust a dirty cop who steals money from the cartel either.”

  I fought for another breath. Stealing money from the cartel? For what? The remaining shreds of hope that my brother was innocent withered and died one by one.

  In the video, Heath took another fist to the face, and my stomach lurched.

  “Fuck off. I needed the money. Fucking greedy pigs. You got more than you’ll be able to spend. It was getting seized anyway. You were never going to see it again.”

  “Greedy pig? No, that’s you, you piece of shit. You should’ve known better than to gamble with money you can’t repay. Should’ve known better than to fuck with us.”

  The backhand that st
ruck Heath across the face was more of an insult than anything, but I still flinched.

  “Where is he?” I asked, the words sticking in my throat.

  Carlos twisted my head so he could look me in the eye. “What? You don’t want to see the good part?” He turned me back to face the TV as a knife flashed in the goon’s grip and slammed into Heath’s hand, pinning it to the arm of the chair.

  I projectile vomited on the floor for the second time today.

  Carlos flung me away from him, and I landed on my knees. “Disgusting.” He snapped his fingers, and one of the men in black suits disappeared into my dad’s kitchen and returned with a roll of paper towels. Carlos snatched it from him and shoved it at me. “Clean up the mess.”

  It was from my knees, next to my own vomit, that I watched the rest. Heath refused to give up the safe room override code—until a second knife pinned his other hand to the chair and my stomach rebelled again.

  “Fine! I’ll give it to you!”

  My brother’s words slammed into my chest, knocking me back on my ass as he rattled off a series of numbers. He . . . he gave me up. Sacrificed me to save himself.

  “No family loyalty. Disgraceful. Especially when you rushed here to save him,” Carlos said as he stood above me, looking down.

  On the screen, they ripped the knives out, unpinning Heath from the chair, and he rose to his feet on unsteady legs.

  He sold me out. Gave me up to these brutal men to save himself.

  The same person who taught me to ride a bike, and cleaned up my skinned knees when I crashed. The brother I always thought would come to my rescue. The brother I was willing to undertake a suicide mission to save. The brother I didn’t want to believe would willingly offer me up to a psycho.

  But he did.

  He’d lied to everyone.

  Me. Dad. Rhett.

  But he was still my brother.

  “Where is he?” On my knees, there was no doubt I was begging. “And my dad. Please.”

  Carlos laughed and nodded at the screen.