by R. B. Schow
“Did he say anything about Callie?” Leopold asked. “Start with her, what did he say about Callie?”
“He said she was long gone, that she sold right away.”
“Oh, God,” Leopold muttered.
“He said that he sold Zoey and Maisie, too.”
“We’re going after them now,” Leopold said. “We’re trying to catch them before they’re transported out of the country.”
“I want to find that son of a bitch and cut off his head!” Camden screamed, not the slightest bit concerned about neighboring rooms, complaints he may garner, the bad press that was sure to end his career if anyone was nearby recording him.
“Who exactly are you referring to?” Leopold asked. “Because we’ve encountered our fair share of scumbags already.”
“Santiago Cardenas,” he hissed.
“Been there, done that,” Leopold said.
“What do you mean?”
“Your wife just killed Cardenas in ways that physically hurt to explain.”
“You found her then?” he asked.
“A few minutes ago.”
“Oh, thank God!” he said. “I want to talk to her.”
“We’re going way too fast to keep a low profile here in Juárez, Camden. If the Juárez PD decides to come after us, your girls are gone forever. If we get into a wreck, your girls are gone forever. If we miss the flight or can’t find the airfield fast enough, your girls are gone forever. Are you sensing a theme right now?”
“Call me as soon as you get them,” he said, now more of a basket case than ever. “And…tell Sydney I love her.”
“You can tell her yourself when you meet us with a diplomatic escort at the border. Because the second we get the girls, we’re going to need help getting back into the U.S.”
“I think I have a way to take care of that,” he said, the gears turning in his brain. “It may take a day or two, but yeah, I might know just the guy to help.”
“Good,” he said. “I’ll call you shortly, hopefully with good news.”
Chapter Forty
ATLAS HARGROVE
The Mercedes-Benz S560 roared through the streets of Juárez creating havoc and chaos as it went. Atlas didn’t care. He was trying with all his might to get to the private airstrip. Codrin texted them the images and directions to what looked like a dirt airstrip in the right location. Still, it took ten minutes of hunting around to find a dirt road leading into the smuggler’s airfield.
“The plane is on the runway,” Leopold said.
“I see it,” Atlas growled.
The private plane had already taxied to the back of a packed-dirt runway and was now turning around and preparing to take off.
“Get the guns ready,” Leopold said.
Sitting next to Sydney—who looked like she was ready to come out of her skin—Kiera was readying her weapons.
At the end of the dirt road leading to the airstrip, two cars with three men were watching the plane getting ready to take off. Now they turned around and were watching the Mercedes bounce and slide across the slightly uneven road as Atlas headed right for them.
“Why aren’t they shooting?” Leopold asked.
“This is Santiago’s car,” Atlas said. “They think it’s him.”
That’s when Kiera rolled down the back window, slid her lithe body out, and strafed the men with gunfire. She hit two of the three men but one ducked for cover just in time. Atlas raced past them, hung a hard right onto the runway, and smashed the accelerator.
“What are you doing?” Leopold asked, tensing up.
Most people would probably block the runway but Atlas charged the plane before it could get too much speed.
“I’m stopping this plane,” Atlas said.
Kiera rolled up her window, sat back down, reloaded her magazine.
“Are you really going to play chicken with a Learjet?” Leopold asked, gripping anything he could find.
They were on a collision course with the plane but that didn’t matter. As the distance between them began closing exceptionally fast, Atlas said, “Kiera, we need to get on that plane.”
“Don’t kill us first,” Leopold said as everything in him went piano wire tight.
The Benz roared down the runway while the jet headed toward them full throttle. The minute the pilot realized Atlas wasn’t moving, the jet engaged in emergency braking procedures, dropping the nose hard as the back end lifted high. Atlas slammed on the brakes at the last minute, the car going into a controlled skid.
Seconds before the impact, Leopold started to scream. Even though Atlas was shot through with adrenaline and clenching his sphincter like his life depended on it, he felt like he knew what he was doing.
“We’re going too fast,” Sydney said from behind, her voice filled with terror.
Atlas was standing on the brakes at that point and preparing to get blasted in the face with an airbag.
The second the nose of the plane started to taco the car’s windshield, they came to a dead stop, the plane now pushing against them. Atlas shoved the transmission in reverse and floored it, pulling the car away from the jet just enough to keep them from all getting blasted with airbags and then squashed by the jet.
When the jet came to a full stop, Atlas and Kiera jumped out of the Benz with guns drawn. The jet’s stairs lowered and some guy popped out with an automatic weapon and opened fire on them. Kiera put a bullet into the side of his forehead. His head snapped sideways and then his knees gave out and he fell slightly forward, his body skidding down the staircase and landing face-first on the dirt runway.
The Audi roared up to a stop beside them, Yergha and Esty rolling out with guns at the ready, Cira following right behind them with her XD9.
“Did you get the last guy coming in?” Leopold asked.
“Esty shot him,” Cira said.
Atlas and Kiera boarded the jet and to their relief, they saw a man and a woman of Eastern Indian descent holding the familiar-looking girls. Atlas lifted his gun and said, “Girls, come to me.”
The girls looked scared but they complied.
“Zoey and Maisie?” he asked. Both girls nodded, holding each other. “Come with me, I have a surprise for you.”
The two girls willingly went with him. When he took them down the stairs, it was in time to see Sydney getting out of the Mercedes-Benz. She saw them and ran to them. The group piled together in a needful hug, the three of them devolving into a joyful, teary-eyed reunion.
Atlas went back on the plane where he saw Kiera’s eyes. There was more hatred than he had ever seen in her eyes before. Her face, however, was completely passive. How she seemed to feel so much while showing so little emotion let him know she not only had feelings but she had restraint as well.
“Get off the plane now,” Atlas said to the couple.
The heavyset man dressed in a traditional dhoti kurta stood and offered his hand to his wife, a rotund woman dressed in a colorful Indian saree. Together they exited the plane, walked down the staircase, and looked at the armed group awaiting them.
Atlas would not have expected an Indian couple to be buying white children, but there were so many other things that didn’t make sense in the world these days that he didn’t bother questioning this one.
Leopold got in the couple’s faces and started screaming bloody murder, but just as he was hitting his stride, Esty walked up to the Indian man and slashed open his throat. Leopold backed up to avoid a spurting arterial geyser.
The Indian woman’s hand flew to her mouth as she watched the animated red waterfall spilling out of her husband’s gashed-open throat. Esty flipped the blade around and drove it straight into the woman’s neck. Now it was everyone else’s chance to gasp. Changing position with her feet and body, Esty turned the blade sideways then forced it out of her throat, destroying everything in the process. The woman collapsed into the dirt and bled out quickly.
“The time for talking is over, Leopold,” Estella looked at him and said.
>
Atlas gave a little laugh, then got on the plane, went to the pilot—who had seen all of this—and ripped his identification badge off of his uniform. Reading the man’s name, Atlas said, “If you’re ever in this country again, I’ll find your family and I’ll slaughter all of them before your eyes. And then I’ll gut you like a pig.”
The pilot nodded his understanding, his face ashen.
“The second I move that Mercedes out of the way if you don’t work to get airborne as quickly and efficiently as possible, you’re going to see the ugliest side of ugly, and then you’re going to see me pulling out your insides. Am I clear?”
He nodded again.
“Good.”
Atlas got out of the Learjet, the staircase lifted, and when he moved the Benz off the runway, the private jet started its engines and prepared to take off.
Chapter Forty-One
GUARD, U.S. EMBASSY, PRAGUE
Two days later… The man wearing double COVID masks, big sunglasses, and a Fedora hat pulled up next to the newly reopened US Embassy in Prague and parked the car. He got out of the Audi A3 hatchback, went around the back, then opened the hatchback, and tossed three large plastic bags out into the street. He then got back in his car, buckled up, and drove off.
The Embassy guard alerted his supervisor of the highly suspicious activity.
“Go check it out and keep me in the loop,” the man said as he ate a hot bowl of beef and barley soup.
The guard walked out to the heavy-looking garbage bags, then stopped as a car swerved to avoid hitting them. When the road was clear, he proceeded forward. He lightly toed the nearest bag quickly realizing that whatever was in there was dense.
He withdrew his knife and cut the plastic bag open near one of the more prominent bulges. Half an arm fell out immediately, the skin pale white and bruised.
He turned, swallowed a bit of bile that had gushed up his throat, then turned back and cut the bag open a little more. The smell of raw carnage startled him, but he was a guard, not some rookie with a weak stomach. When he saw a delicate foot connected to an ankle bone he knew what this was. The foot had been cut off, the fleshy red ends so rough and ragged-looking it appeared as though someone had used a power tool to get the job done.
Coughing, gagging, he stood up and stepped back. He turned and called his supervisor right away. A moment later, the man who didn’t want to be bothered realized he needed to see the scene for himself. The guard’s supervisor was a hardened soldier with several tours of duty behind him. He did not possess a fragile constitution. But when he saw the arm and the foot, a pained expression crossed through his eyes and he glanced at the other two bags.
“Open them up, but don’t touch anything. We’ll need to call this in.” To one of the other guards, the supervisor said, “We need to set up a perimeter and divert traffic. This is officially a crime scene.”
The first guard on the scene begrudgingly sliced open the other bag, and a girl’s head rolled out. Standing there in the middle of the road, horrified and trying to keep his lunch down, the guard watched his supervisor take a deep breath, then let out a troubled sigh. For a second, he thought he saw a tear in the man’s eye. The girl had been beautiful once, someone’s daughter.
After the local police arrived to properly secure the scene, the guard’s supervisor called the current Secretary of State, a friend of his from a few years back from what the guard had heard. He stood by the supervisor to answer any questions if necessary, but by no means did he feign any interest in the conversation.
With the call on speakerphone, the guard’s supervisor said, “A few days ago, we received a memo saying that Camden Fox’s family was kidnapped but that it was to be kept hush-hush while an off-the-book KRT went after them, right?”
“Yes?” the woman asked.
“I believe we just found the oldest daughter,” he said.
“Is she okay?”
The man shook his head and said, “It looks like she was cut into pieces with some sort of power tool. My guess would be a chainsaw or maybe a reciprocating saw. But that was after she was beaten to a pulp and most likely raped.”
“Where did you find her?” the woman asked.
“Someone bagged up pieces of her and threw her out in front of the Embassy.”
“Oh, dear God,” the woman grumbled. “This is going to create a shitstorm of monumental proportion.”
“No kidding,” the supervisor said.
“I’ll get this information to Congressman Fox right away, thank you.”
“Madam Secretary?” he said.
“Yes?”
“If you can help it, I don’t want to be on the radar with this thing. We just reopened the Embassy and I don’t want to have to send a bunch of people back home.”
“I understand,” she said.
Secretary of State, Morgan Finch, opened her desk drawer and pulled out a bottle of Scotch and a small crystal tumbler. She poured herself three fingers of the liquid and tried not to imagine the scene at the Embassy. When she drank the Scotch, she did so too fast, but that only meant she would need another three fingers. With her insides sufficiently warm, she called Camden Fox’s good friend, Damien Stone. The former federal prosecutor answered right away.
“Madam Secretary,” he said. “To what do I owe the honor?”
“You’re friends with Camden Fox, correct?”
“Yes I am,” he said. “Why do you ask?”
“I’m sorry for skipping past the pleasantries, and for being so abrupt, but I know you helped set up a kidnap response team for him.”
“I did no such thing,” he protested.
“We know for a fact that you did. If your concern is for your own well-being, you can relax. You’re not in trouble because none of this is on the record.”
“Are you monitoring my communications, Secretary Finch?”
“You’re a former federal prosecutor,” she said bothered by the formality and the posturing. “You should know better than anyone that we monitor everyone’s communications, yours included.”
“I knew you guys pulled this crap, but—”
“Spare me the sanctimonious bullshit; I have a larger issue that needs to be addressed. It is of a sensitive nature.”
“What’s larger than this, Madam Secretary?”
“Callie Fox was just dumped at the doorstep of our embassy in Prague.”
“Is she all right?” he asked, sounding shocked.
“She’s been cut into pieces, they think with a chainsaw. We can’t really say for sure until we get our hands on the remains.”
Morgan felt sick to her stomach saying this, let alone with such little emotion. Had she become so practiced at hiding her emotions that the brutal slaying of a US Congressman’s daughter would warrant such little warmth?
The answer was easy.
Yes.
“Are you positive it’s her?” Stone asked in a voice that had fallen a few octaves.
“Unfortunately, I am,” she said. “I’m about to call Camden now and let him know. I just thought you should know as well, in case you have to contact anyone on the ground.”
“Why don’t you let me break the news to Camden,” he said. “He should hear it from me.”
She breathed a sigh of relief. “Thank you, Damien.”
“I appreciate the call, Morgan.”
Chapter Forty-Two
LEOPOLD WENTWORTH
When Damien Stone phoned Leopold, he found himself reluctant to take the call. He took it anyway. Later, it would prove to be a good thing that he picked up because Stone answered the question as to where Callie Fox had gone. Unfortunately, it was probably the worst news he’d heard in his entire life. At that moment, he was thankful that Atlas had been driving. With Sydney and the girls in the car, however, he had to hold fast to his resolve, his professionalism, and his sense of leadership.
“Who was that?” Sydney asked.
He wanted to tell her, but he couldn’t make himself sa
y the words.
“Leopold,” she asked again, “who was that on the phone?”
“No one,” he said.
“That sounded like Damien Stone. I’ve heard him talking to Camden and the girls on the phone from time to time and honestly, that sounded just like him.”
“They found Callie,” he said, forcing himself to speak. Just saying the words, however, brought tears to his eyes. Even worse, Atlas looked over at him at that exact time and saw his emotions breaking through.
“And?” Sydney asked with so much tension in her voice, the woman was ready to crack.
He only shook his head. There was no way he could tell her this information with Zoey and Maisie in the car.
Sydney’s shoulders began to shake, and then she started to cry, and when this happened the girls understood they would never see Callie again. Soon, they began to cry as well. Leopold turned away from Atlas, the only calm one in the group. But when he glanced over at the former SWAT commander, Leopold saw there were tears in Atlas’s eyes as well.
“Still human,” Atlas said under his breath.
By the time they returned to the Chevy Spark, Sydney had stopped crying. Emotionally, however, she was gone, her body just a shell that couldn’t let go of her daughters.
“While we’re here,” Leopold said, “we should gather whatever valuables we can from Santiago’s house. We may need cash to cross the border. And who knows, maybe the scumbag’s got more weapons stashed somewhere.”
“Kiera and I will tie off the connection at the maquiladora,” Atlas said. “We’ll take Zoey if that’s okay with Sydney.”
Something passed through the woman’s eyes. Sitting up, she said, “Maisie and I will come with you. I won’t let these two girls out of my sight again.”
“I would do the same, Mrs. Fox,” Atlas said.
After they left, Leopold dialed Scotty, who answered right away. “It looks like we’re all done here, Scotty. Please send me the pertinent information on the people you found, every detail if you would. You can write a formal report when you get back.”