Blessed are the Peacemakers

by Kristi Belcamino

  Staring at the picture in disbelief, Gabriella noticed deep purple circles surrounding Donovan’s closed eyes. She had thought they were from a beating. He lay on a darkish slab. He was dead—not sleeping.

  She flipped it and written in blue ink it said, “Flores Morgue. Unidentified male.”

  Gabriella sobbed and tried to punch Nico in the chest with both fists, pounding lightly on his silk shirt before he grabbed both of her wrists. “You bastard. You knew and you didn’t tell me? You let me go on thinking he might be alive?”

  “I only got this picture today. I was able to break into an office. I found a screwdriver and undid the door handle. This picture was sitting on the desk. I called the Italian embassy for help. They didn’t believe who I was. They said the deal was that I didn’t even exist, so if I was calling it had to be someone impersonating me. I was going to call the American embassy, but then someone came. I had to hang up and leave. I was so close, Gabriella. So close to getting us out of here.”

  “Then let’s go back to the office. Now.” Gabriella headed for the door.

  Nico put his hand on her arm.

  “That’s where I just was. They changed the lock. It’s a deadbolt now. It cannot be opened. Also, they found the screwdriver I had hidden in my room in a drawer.” He drew away, pacing. He seemed agitated.

  Gabriella stared at him through her tears. Maybe he wasn’t the enemy. He admitted to being in the office and said he was there trying to help them escape.

  She was still clutching the photograph in her hand, which was shaking. When she looked down and saw Donovan’s lifeless face, she closed her eyes.

  “I’m so, so sorry,” Nico said. “That is why I was late. I was trying to figure out how to tell you. The last thing I want to do is hurt you. Don’t you understand I would do anything for you, anything to prevent you from hurting ever again.”

  He held her and she wept into his shirt, not pulling back until the fabric was soaked. When he started to kiss her tears, tracing the path as they fell down her neck and onto her chest, she clung to him.

  When he peeled the dress off her shoulders, she arched her back in pleasure. Donovan was dead. She had her proof now. Nico hadn’t lied to her. She’d been strong long enough.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Slowly, bits and pieces of his previous life returned to Donovan.

  Flashes of memory. Knowledge of the jungle regions around him.

  Most of the tiny fragments of memory involved him on the commercial airline. He gained glimpses of himself studying a thick briefing folder that contained secret, confiscated maps. He didn’t know how he knew the maps were secret and confiscated, but they were.

  The maps were all of areas in the Peten jungle. They showed hundreds of “narco-ranches” with dirt runways hidden deep in the jungle where drug lords and their minions ran elaborate smuggling operations. One map also pinpointed an airplane cemetery full of charred small planes that had been used to transport cocaine from other Central American regions.

  Donovan tried to grab ahold of these small glimpses and snatches of memory before they drifted away. So far, he knew he was a DEA agent working on some operation in the Peten jungle of Guatemala. And he used to be a cop. His mother had red hair. Other than that, he wasn’t sure about much else.

  Each morning, he tried to subtly draw information out of Monica.

  “I know we are somewhere in the Peten jungle,” he’d say. “I’m just curious—are we closer to Mexico or El Salvador?”

  Monica would look down and swallow. “I’m not supposed to talk about that.”

  “It can’t possibly hurt, could it?” He argued. “It’s not like I’m going anywhere. I’m stuck in this basement. A prisoner. I’ve seen daylight once in God knows how many months or days.”

  He tried to hide his frustration and anger. After all, it wasn’t Monica’s fault, but the fury inside was building. His depression was slowly turning into rage. He needed to know more. Much more.

  These brief glimpses of memory were only the beginning. He needed to remember more to figure out who was holding him captive, why, and where he was—information he was sure would help aid his escape. If he knew what they wanted, he could use that against them to escape.

  It was clear his captors wanted one thing of him—to remember. To remember who the woman in the photo was and to remember who he was. But why?

  One day blended into another.

  Each day no different than the last.

  Today, he woke and waited for Monica to bring him breakfast.

  He needed to figure out a way to outsmart the people keeping him prisoner. To do that, he needed to remember who he was. His brain was becoming clearer every day. Not only in terms of his memory, but his thinking in general.

  Right after the plane crash, when he first was taken prisoner, his thinking, his brain, was fuzzy. He couldn’t hold onto thoughts for very long. And he slept. Long hours. He would wake each morning, stay up for a few hours and then fall into a deep sleep that often lasted until it was dark again. Then, he’d stay up for a few more hours to eat and then fall back asleep.

  It must have been part of his recovery from the trauma of the crash. He’d obviously suffered quite a brain injury if he couldn’t even remember his own goddamned name. He was filled with such fury and yet, wasn’t even sure where to direct his anger.

  Sometimes he’d bunch up the flimsy pillow onto the middle of his thin futon and punch it over and over.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Clutching the photo with knuckles turning white, Donovan closed his eyes taking a second to compose himself. Don’t let on. Even though it felt like a blade had entered his chest, he had to hide that he recognized the woman in the photo. He recognized his wife, Gabriella.

  It was the third picture of his wife they’d shown him during his captivity, every once in a while bringing a new one in for his perusal. His wife.

  “Donovan.” Monica placed her hands on his shoulders, kissing his neck. “Do you recognize her yet? The beautiful lady?” She purred in his ear, her breath hot on his neck.

  Instinctively, he knew he had to pretend he hadn’t recognized Gabriella.

  “No.” he forced himself not to fling her off him. Her nails clinging to his arms, her body pressed tight against his back, all of it was now repulsive. He had to pretend everything was the same. That he didn’t know who he was. That he didn’t know Gabriella. He couldn’t let on.

  That’s why he turned and took Monica in his arms pressing his mouth to hers. Nothing could change until he figured out what was going on. He had to play along. But his body wouldn’t respond. Even with Monica sprawled naked before him licking him in ways that had propelled him into a near out-of-body ecstasy just yesterday.

  But today—nothing. All he could think about was Gabriella. Where was she in that photo? Where was he? Only tiny fragments of memory were accessible to him—something about a plane taking off from San Francisco Airport and very little after that.

  He needed to clear his head. Stay smart. Stay alive.

  Right now, that meant making love to this woman the same way he did every day. Thinking that, realizing that he’d betrayed his wife over and over, sent a stabbing pain through his heart. He had to forget about that for now.

  It didn’t take long for Monica to notice his lack of enthusiasm.

  “Mi amore,” she pulled back, searching his eyes. “Are you okay?”

  “I stayed up too late last night,” he said. “I’m a little bit tired.”

  Was that a flicker of suspicion in her eyes?

  He leaned down and kissed her. “I’m sorry. The caffeine in the café con leche you brought me is kicking in now though and I’m starting to feel more awake already. Let’s try again.”

  This time when he leaned down and put his mouth on Monica, he closed his eyes and imagined Gabriella in his arms. He could almost smell his wife. His desire grew so strong he picked up Monica and carried her around the small basement bedroom, pre
ssing her against the floor, walls, the bed, and the seat of the chair.

  When they were done, she leaned back, panting with a satisfied smile. “You should stay up late more often, my love.”

  AFTER MONICA LEFT, Donovan made a fist to punch his pillow in frustration and guilt and fear, but instead at the last second thrust it up into the air and strutted around the basement as if he were doing a victory march. He didn’t know where or how, but he knew he was being watched. Every action was monitored. He had to act 24/7, or they would know he recognized Gabriella.

  To reinforce his supposed satisfaction with the virulent lovemaking session he’d just experienced, he plastered a self-satisfied, smug smile on his face.

  Inside, however, he felt like he was going to vomit. The guilt was suffocating. And it was two-fold. He felt crushing guilt that he was having sex with someone other than his wife, but then he felt ashamed that he was using Monica to keep up the ruse. It was shitty no matter how you looked at it.

  As soon as it grew dark, when any hidden cameras would have difficulty seeing what he was doing, Donovan gathered up the other photos, which had become the most precious objects in his world. Holding them up to the thin trail of light coming in the basement window, he searched the photos for clues as to where they were taken.

  One picture was of Gabriella in a tank top and cargo pants with a baseball cap pulled low over her eyes. She was speaking to a man with dark hair but the man’s back was to the camera. The man wore black pants and a white dress shirt and his hair curled at his neck. It looked like they were outside near a stand of trees. Possibly a jungle.

  Another photo showed her in a red dress that fell to her ankles. She was leaning against a wall, holding a tumbler and smiling at someone just out of the frame.

  In this one, Gabriella was in a black bikini and big straw hat lying by a pool. A dark-haired man was rubbing sunscreen onto her back. Donovan could only see the man’s profile. There was a long scar running down the man’s cheek.

  Gabriella’s skin was the darkest he’d ever seen. Behind her was a large house with giant white pillars and off to one side, he could see a palm tree. Where was she? He squinted and could see jungle behind them.

  An overwhelming sensation of danger and fear trickled through him.

  They were going to hurt her. There was a reason they’d been asking if he recognized her for the past few months. That is why he had to hide his recognition, no matter what it took.

  He spent the rest of the night awake in his futon plotting his escape. He had to find Gabriella. The door at the top of the basement was reinforced and dead bolted from the outside. It would be impossible to break it down by brute force. His only hope was to somehow get the door to the basement opened and then overpower the men waiting behind it. He didn’t know how many men there were. He didn’t know if they were armed. He was outnumbered and weaponless. He’d have to outsmart them. That was his only chance.

  The next morning when Monica handed him a new photo, he barely hid his shock.

  There was no doubt. It was a picture of his wife making love to another man, the man with the scar.

  To hide his horror, he smirked and grabbed Monica in a kiss, burying his face in her sweet-smelling hair, flinging the picture aside and telling her the picture had turned him on.

  He wondered if his captors suspected he had recognized Gabriella and had given him this picture to provoke a reaction. Concentrating on sex with Monica, pretending she was his wife, Gabriella, was his only strategy to avoid the anguish he was sure would show on his face and through his body language.

  Later, when they were done, he leaned back against the pillow propped on the wall and watched Monica sleep. Every day when she came inside the room, she knocked on the door after she closed it, said something in Spanish and Donovan could hear the sound of a sliding deadbolt on the other side. When she left the basement, she knocked on the door at the top of the stairs, said something else in Spanish and the door was opened. Donovan never saw what was on the other side during the brief moments the door opened enough for her to slip out. The door was never opened wide enough for Donovan to see what was on the other side.

  If he were a more ruthless man, he could fashion some type of weapon and hold it to her neck. He could take her to the top of the stairs and tell her to make the guard open up or he would kill her. To make it believable, he knew he had to really be willing to do just that.

  But he didn’t have it in him. Maybe he could’ve before she told him the story of her rape and rescue.

  At least that’s what he told himself—that his pity for her stopped him from using her as a hostage. But the truth was he had started to fall for her. It was the last thing he wanted to admit. He not only was betraying Gabriella physically, but also emotionally, in his heart.

  Monica stretched and opened her eyes and he absentmindedly leaned down to kiss her forehead. Yes, it was much more than lust. She curled herself up in a ball against his side and he wrapped an arm around her protectively. She was sweet and sexy and fun.

  He leaned down. “Do you ever leave here?” He gestured above them. “Ever leave this place, this house? Ever meet other people your age?”

  She shook her head. She seemed surprised. “Why?”

  “To find a husband? To make friends? Do you ever get lonely?”

  Monica thought about it for a moment. “I used to,” she looked down as she said it. “Before you came.”

  It made his heart heavy to hear those words. He had no plans to stick around. But right at that moment, he would do anything to make Monica happy. Maybe she could escape with him? But he knew that was impossible. Gabriella was his wife. His soul mate. The mother of his child. He would never leave her. He didn’t want to leave her. But he couldn’t have it all. He knew that when, not if, but when, he escaped, he would leave a little piece of his heart behind with Monica.

  Despair filled him. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t right. How could he feel this way about two different women? Any anger he had toward Monica about her role in his captivity had evaporated. She was an innocent pawn. She was, in fact in many ways, as much a captive as he was.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  The sound of helicopters woke Gabriella. Their bone-rattling thud appearing in her dreams as warriors pounding warning signals on drums.

  Nico was gone from her bed. The memory of kissing his scar and his lips and his body made her flush. But the sound outside was growing closer.

  Once she figured out that the helicopters were coming closer, another sound startled her. It was a loud metal clanking noise right outside her French doors. Jumping up, she yanked open the floor to ceiling curtains only to see her windows had been blocked by steel plates. She raced to the other window, overlooking the jungle below. A steel plate had also fallen into place over the glass.

  Next, she placed her ear to her door, listening for sounds in the house. Shouting and then a volley of what sounded like automatic gunfire made her draw back slightly, but then when it didn’t get closer, she crouched and put her ear to the door.

  Somewhere outside, there was more gunfire and screams and yells, doors slamming, men shouting. More than anything she wanted to go find Nico. It was more than she didn’t want to be alone right now. It wasn’t that she wanted his protection. If anything, she was worried about his safety. She had no idea who was attacking the hacienda, but by the sounds outside, people were dying and doing so in painful ways. She wondered if when it was over, she’d be next. Her eyes searched her room for a weapon, but she knew there was nothing. She’d already done this when she first arrived.

  Crouched with her ear growing numb pressed to the door, she listened and tried to make sense of the chaos outside her door. Footsteps and voices came closer.

  What she heard sent a cold chill down her body. It was Nico’s voice. Giving orders. Just like she suspected, he’d lied to her. He wasn’t a prisoner. He was responsible for her being here. She had made love to him and this was her punishment. He
was a liar and a thief and he had betrayed her in the worst way possible.

  After several minutes listening to Nico shouting orders, directing people to the helipad, to the garage and ordering them to get more guns, Gabriella felt sick.

  She had been such a fool.

  Then she heard it. This time for sure: the sound of women screaming and crying. She hadn’t imagined the voices. There were other people here that were kept hidden away somewhere. She strained to hear where the noises were coming from, but couldn’t tell. The hacienda was large. She’d thought that maybe the drug lord’s private quarters took up the entire second floor, so that could be where the other women were, as well.

  The sound of voices was lost as the gunfire drowned everything else out.

  The gunfight went on for another thirty minutes and then stopped so abruptly it was eerily silent. The sound of a helicopter made the lamps in her room vibrate and then the noise grew fainter as it flew away.

  Gabriella leaped to her feet as soon as she heard the sound of footsteps coming down the hall toward her room.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  Donovan crouched up against the door leading out of the basement, his head pressed to the crack under the door, trying to hear what was going on in the rest of the house. He’d been awoken by the nearly deafening sounds of automatic gunfire, hovering helicopters and shouting.

  At first, he’d pulled himself up to one of the tiny block glass windows near the basement ceiling. He saw figures moving on the other side. It seemed like there were some greenish colors, but that didn’t necessarily mean U.S. military. It could have been a rebel uniform, as well.

  After a while, when movement had stopped outside his window, and the noises seemed to move inside, above his head, he scaled the stairs of the basement and tried to hear what was going on. It was as if there was a war right outside his basement prison. People had died. He could hear voices and screams. It sounded like a room full of screaming teenage girls. He also heard voices that sounded English, vaguely military in nature, if it was possible to identify that pattern of speech. He couldn’t make out the words, but he swore he heard his name. Sean Donovan.