More hands at my arms, and I’m forced to stand up as the dark bag is untied and whipped off my head.
There’s no bright light to blink against as I was taken in the dark of night from San Salvador and it’s still evening. We’re in front of a large Mediterranean-style mansion with peach stucco uplit with landscape lights. Palm trees and other exotic bushes are arranged at the foundation. An ornate fountain sits off to the side where a crane stands in the middle with water jetting out its beak in a graceful arch.
I assume this is one of Mejia’s residences, confirmed when a heavy double wooden door at the top of the porch opens and the man himself steps out.
He doesn’t look like a weapons trafficker. He looks like a wealthy man on vacation at his summer home. He has on cream linen pants and a button-down, short-sleeve shirt of pale blue. The tan loafers on his feet probably cost more than any of these men make in a year.
Mejia’s eyes lock on me, and he seems completely at ease in his surroundings. He slips his hands into the pockets of his pants and trots casually down the steps to stand before me. He lets his gaze rove over me from head to toe, sizing me up. When his eyes connect with mine again, he says, “Welcome to your death, Mr. McDermott. It will be my pleasure to show you the way.”
“Clever,” I drawl, making it clear from my tone that I don’t think he’s clever at all. I also don’t let my gaze waver so he understands there’s nothing about him that intimidates me.
Mejia’s smile is tight. “It seems my man failed to bring your beautiful companion who was with you.”
I tense at his reference to Greer. I’m convinced the reason she wasn’t grabbed was because they simply didn’t recognize her. While it’s clear that Frankie Orellana had no intention of helping us from the start and obviously told Mejia I was in the country looking for him, he didn’t recognize Greer either. I’m not sure what it is about most men never bothering to notice when a woman changes her hair, but in this instance, it has played to our advantage.
Mejia is clearly irritated Greer’s not standing here beside me. I attempt to alleviate that. “I came to El Salvador alone. I didn’t need Hathaway’s help in taking you down.”
Mejia steps in closer to me and wags a playful finger as he chuckles. “You’re lying, Mr. McDermott. I happened to talk to Ms. Hathaway not long after my men took you.”
It takes all my concentration to school my features so he doesn’t see I’m stunned at the haste by which Greer was able to contact Mejia. It’s been at least forty minutes since I was taken… maybe less, and she’s already called him?
There’s no way she had his direct number all this time, or she would have told me. So it begs the question: How in the hell did she reach him so quickly?
I don’t say anything, hoping he’ll reveal more. I’m sorely disappointed that he instead turns to his men and orders, “Soften him up a bit. I want him ready to talk in the next fifteen minutes.”
My mind spins trying to figure out what is going on with Greer. A jaded soul such as my own might think that the woman is leaving me to the wolves. Someone completely distrusting might think she was hammering the nails in my coffin by telling Mejia that I was solely responsible for his son’s death, which is in fact true. Someone mired in bitterness and unable to forgive might even think this was a setup by Greer to give Mejia what he wants in exchange for leaving her alone.
But I am none of those things anymore.
Greer and I may have had a rough past, but I trust her implicitly. She would never set me up or abandon me, and I am sure right now she is trying to figure out something with that brilliant mind of hers. There are only two potential explanations of how she contacted Mejia so fast: either she contacted someone in the CIA and took a risk of her location being found by Gayla Newman, or more likely, she reached out to Jameson for help.
I imagine it wouldn’t take Bebe long to hack this information. After all, Mejia runs legitimate businesses in the capital city as a front for his far more lucrative dark dealings. Bebe is genius enough, she once stole nuclear codes from our government—under threat of death to her young son if she didn’t—so I imagine it would be a piece of cake to come up with Mejia’s cell number.
Mejia turns on his heel, walks back up to his porch, and disappears inside the house. One of the four men who kidnapped me moves forward and cuts the zip ties from my wrists. I rub at the skin gingerly and roll my shoulders to work out the stiffness. I’m not fool enough to believe they’re going to let me escape by freeing my hands.
I was able to discern enough to know that while they may have military training, they are not overly bright and are following simple orders. If I had to guess, they’re former members of the militia or an outlying branch of dissidents left over from the ongoing civil war skirmishes that still sometimes plague the countryside. They’re tough and not afraid of violence.
In the ambient glow of the landscape lighting, their “softening up” of me begins.
The four men put their rifles in the back of the truck, push up their shirtsleeves, and surround me. They all move in a common direction, walking a slow circle as I turn to face my captors. But with four of them, there’s always someone behind me who I can’t see.
There’s no way I can take all four of these men by myself and come out victorious, but I can certainly prolong the worst of what I know is coming.
Acting quite the fools, only one man moves in to take a swing. He’s got a cocky swagger and an even cockier smile. I stay light on my feet, arms held slightly in front of me, ready to block punches.
The man curses at me in Spanish and charges. I launch a roundhouse kick, my boot catching him squarely on the hinge of his jaw, and I hear it crack. He doesn’t make a sound but merely slumps to the gravel unconscious.
The three men left glance at one another and by silent agreement, they know not to take me one-on-one. Two of the men rush in and while I try to ward them off, they manage to get my arms under their control. The third man rushes in and batters me with punches. After two to the stomach and one that glances off the edge of my chin, he gets in close enough and I manage to drive my knee into his testicles. He drops with a tortured groan, cupping his nut sack.
The two men holding my arms do not wait to make me pay for that. I’m thrown to the ground and both of them launch kicks. I take one to my back just above my right kidney, and the pain robs me of breath. I know I’ll be pissing blood for a while.
To my surprise, though, the two men back away and wait for the man who I kneed in the nuts to stand again. He’s pissed but still hunched over in pain.
One of the guys yells at me to get up, motioning with his hand. I take my time, not because I need it but to conserve energy and to let my body take whatever reprieve it can get. When I’m upright, I wipe a trickle of blood from my lip with the back of my hand. The guy I kicked in the jaw is still out cold, but I’m still facing three, although the guy I nut-dropped is clearly in pain.
They circle me again, taking their time. Mejia gave them fifteen minutes to beat me into submission, and with three men against one, in fifteen minutes, they’ll kill me. They’re smart enough not to do that.
Little do they know, however, there is nothing they can do to soften me up to the extent I’ll tell Mejia where Greer is, nor will I give up anything to him.