The Winemaker

by Charmaine Pauls

  She pressed the floor number for her room and waited patiently as the two guards stepped in front of her and checked the elevator before holding the door for her to enter. As she stepped inside, a strange premonition of doom filled her. Her scalp pricked. She crossed her arms over her chest when a sudden chill enveloped her. The flash hit her as the doors closed.

  It was only for a split second, but she clearly saw her limp body being dragged down the hotel hallway. Almost immediately, the pain hit her in waves. She saw two pairs of hands reaching for her when she fell to her knees on the floor of the lift.

  “Fuck, Santiago, get hold of the boss,” the older of the two men shouted.

  “Wait, Rico,” the younger man gripped her arms and pulled her to her feet, “we don’t have a secure line. It’s better I get her to her room. You go back downstairs and warn senor Perez-Cruz. His instructions were specific. We’re not to alarm anyone but him.”

  The man called Rico pressed the ground floor button of the lift, swearing softly. “What the hell happened? Did she faint?”

  “Yeah,” Santiago said, “probably just overworked. I don’t want the boss angry because we didn’t tell him.”

  The lift stopped and changed direction. The pain made Zenna weak. She had no choice but to allow herself to be supported by Santiago. She wanted to shout to stop Rico from going back down, but it was too late.

  The lift stopped. The doors opened. In a second, Rico was out and the doors shut on the vision of him running down the dim hallway. The reflection of her trapped in Santiago’s tight grip replaced it. Zenna wanted to protest, but Santiago let go of her with one hand, slipped it into the inside pocket of his jacket, and pulled out something. It took her a moment to realize the object he was holding was an injection needle. Before she could scream, he lifted his arm and stabbed her neck with it.

  * * * *

  Groggy, it took a while for Zenna’s eyes to focus on the face of the man bent over her. Her first sensation was a headache. She felt weak. She blinked several times. Panic rose as consciousness returned and she recalled the last scene from her memory—the scene in the lift. She was now lying flat on her back on a cold floor. Lifting herself on her elbows, she squinted at the bright light that flooded the room. Between the pain and the fogginess, it was hard to think.

  She tried to take stock of her situation as best she could. Two men. A small, square room. One door. One window. Barred. Her hands and feet weren’t tied.

  She looked at the man who had slapped her cheek, asking if she knew her name. She did. Zenobia Rambling. She sure as hell remembered him, too. Bastard.

  “Santiago, right?” she said in a croaky voice.

  The man who had drugged her in the elevator looked at another one who now also hovered above her. That man had a balding head and the remainder of his graying hair was tied back in a ponytail. His black leather jacket was zipped up over a bulging gut. He wore faded blue jeans, an open-collar white shirt, and a heavy, gold chain with a cross. She noted a blue stone was inlaid on each corner of the cross. Zenna tried to gather as many details as possible.

  The men looked at her from above, scrutinizing her as if she was some type of interesting insect.

  “Fuck, Santiago, she knows your name,” said the bald man.

  Santiago tilted his head, scrunched his eyes, and bent lower to look more intently at her. “That couldn’t be avoided, Zako. What did you expect? I couldn’t exactly go to work in a rubber mask, could I? Never mind. She won’t be talking.”

  Zako swore softly. “Now she knows my name, too. You’re a fuckface, Santiago.”

  The other man shrugged. “I said she won’t talk. Won’t have a chance to say nada.”

  A chill crept over Zenna. “What do you want?”

  She thought she knew the answer to that question—they had finally caught her. For years she had managed to avoid them in England. How did they manage to latch onto her so easily here in Chile?

  The two men looked at each other again. Santiago straightened. “I don’t like hanging around the city. The longer we wait here, the better the chances they’ll find us. When is our contact coming?”

  Zako let out a heavy sigh. “Relax, man. He said he’d be here in another hour or so.”

  “What’s with the delay?” Santiago snapped.

  “You weren’t supposed to grab her until tomorrow, remember?” Zako fiddled in his pocket, took out a stick of gum, pulled the wrapper off, and stuck the gum in his mouth. “Why the hell did you have to go against the plan?” He let the wrapper drift to the floor. “I don’t like being called in the middle of my tea to meet you in front of some fancy hotel.”

  “I told you the opportunity came when she fainted in the lift. It was much easier like that. I couldn’t just let a chance like that go by. Besides, if I had known where the pick-up point was, I would have driven the van here myself. Then I wouldn’t have had to call you.”

  “Well, since you’ve taken things in your own hands, you’ll just have to be patient until he shows. He said he would. Shortly.”

  “It better be with the rest of my money.”

  “He’s a man of his word,” Zako said, apparently irritated.

  Zenna tried to push herself into a sitting position, but a pain shot from her neck to her shoulder. Her left arm and hand felt numb. Her fingers prickled with pins and needles. She fell back onto her elbows and flexed her hand.

  “Where am I?” She tried not to let panic reflect in her voice.

  Santiago looked down at her. “What do we do with her in the meantime?”

  Zako shrugged. “Whatever.” He was chewing the gum, looking less than interested in her dire situation.

  Zenna, her elbows tired of supporting her weight, lay back onto the floor. “Will you stop talking about me as if I’m not here and tell me what the hell is going on?” she hissed.

  Zako laughed. “We caught ourselves a wildcat.”

  Santiago frowned. “She was supposed to be out for longer.”

  Zenna touched her throbbing neck. It ached, and her skin burned. “What did you do to me?” She glared at Santiago.

  He crouched down. “You need to shut up.”

  She swore. “It hurts like hell. What did you inject me with?”

  “A tranquilizer.” He gripped her upper arms firmly and pulled her into a sitting position.

  Her tongue felt thick in her dry mouth. She battled to swallow. “Do you mind telling me why you stabbed me in the neck with a tranquilizer? Who’s supposed to come in an hour?”

  Santiago’s head tilted. He watched her with interest, again. “Do you want some water?”

  “Yes.” She refused to be polite enough to say ‘please’.

  Zako regarded Santiago with a disinterested look as Santiago walked to a basin in the corner of the room, filled a plastic cup with water, and carried it back to Zenna. She drank greedily. When the cup was empty, Santiago took it from her, and she wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.

  Santiago turned to Zako. “Help her into that chair.” He pointed at an old, leather car seat that stood against the wall.

  Zako snorted. “Leave her on the floor. She’s not our guest; she’s our prisoner.”

  Santiago rolled his eyes. “You watch too many movies.”

  He walked back to Zenna, grabbed her by her arms again and pulled her roughly to her feet. Her knees buckled involuntarily under her. She couldn’t make it walking to the broken car seat on her own. She had no other choice but to lean on her kidnapper and let him guide her to the seat, where he deposited her unceremoniously.

  “Listen,” she said to Santiago, her voice thick, “if this is about money, I’m sure I can better your deal.” She wasn’t sure about that at all, but she at least had to try.

  Zako snorted again. “Don’t listen to the bitch. I told you to gag her.”

  Santiago shot him a look over his shoulder. “Shut up, will you?” He turned back to Zenna. “That goes for you, too.”

  She trie
d not to cry. Instead of giving in to the urge, she gritted her teeth and closed her eyes. Taking in big, even breaths of air in a fruitless effort to calm her nerves, she tried to think. She needed to work out where she was.

  She tilted her head back against the wall. What could she sense about the room? There was a strong smell of gasoline. Maybe they were at some petrol station or close to one. There was a soft, humming noise coming from the other side of the wall. A fridge?

  From time to time she heard the buzzing sound of the overhead tungsten light. There was only the broken car seat, the basin, and a few big tins stacked against the opposite wall. There were oil stains on the concrete floor. The barred window was painted white, so she couldn’t see anything outside.

  She could hear traffic. Cars. Honking. The street was busy. Therefore, it couldn’t be too late. The traffic, even in town, normally quieted down in the early morning hours. She was definitely near or at a filling station. Zako’s mobile phone rang. Zenna watched him take it from the pocket of his jacket.

  “The boss,” he said to Santiago as he registered the caller’s number. “I’m here,” he said into the phone.

  He turned his back to Zenna. He listened for a short while, shut the phone, and shoved it back into his pocket. “They’re here.”

  Scarcely a minute later, a soft knock sounded on the door. Santiago crossed the short distance to the door in two, long steps, fished a key from his back pocket, and inserted it in the lock before turning it. In his other hand he held the pistol he had taken from his holster. He opened the door a crack and glanced around it, the pistol behind his back, before he opened it wider and lowered his weapon.

  “She here?”

  Zenna heard the male voice before she could see its owner. She craned her neck as far as she could, trying to catch a glimpse of what lay beyond the door. She couldn’t see much except darkness and some lights on outside. It was night. Santiago motioned with his head and let three men into the room.

  Zenna looked from the older man, in his late sixties she guessed, dressed in a gray suit and pink silk tie, to the two younger men in black slacks and jackets who followed him, presumably his bodyguards. Despite the fact it was dark outside, they wore sunglasses. Both were armed. Her eyes took it all in—the guns in the holsters on their hips, the knives strapped to their ankles, and the automatic rifle the man on the left had slung across his shoulder. They stood, their feet slightly apart, on either side of the door. The man with the thick gray hair approached her slowly. Santiago and Zako stood to the side.

  The man regarding her appeared well groomed, even attractive. His clothes looked expensive. Argentinean shoes, she noticed. Thanks to Marcos’ shoe fetish, she knew a lot about men’s shoes. Anaconda. He had unusual taste.

  The man looked amused at his prisoner sizing him up and waited until her eyes had trailed up and down his body before he smiled dryly. “Zenobia, right?”

  She could do nothing but stare at him. She could hardly deny who she was. That would be stupid.

  “I would have liked to say please to meet you under more ... uh ... pleasant circumstances, but I am very pleased to meet you all the same.”

  His English was perfect, his accent polished. It was an American, not a British, accent.

  “Cut through the crap, will you?” Zenna snapped. “What do you want with me?”

  The smile returned to his face. “I think you know.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Zenna’s heart beat painfully in her chest.

  The man held up his hands. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

  Zenna looked at his face. His dark brown eyes were hard, cold, and shining like black marble. He looked excited and greedy.

  “Yeah, right.” She snorted. “Who the hell are you?”

  He lowered his hands and crossed them behind his back. “Who I am is not important. Who I work for is. Let’s just say I work for an organization that needs your skills. Together, Zenobia,” he said her name softly, “we are going to change the world.”

  Zenna’s whole body went from hot to cold. “Do you really think I’m going to believe you had me kidnapped by those two clowns over there to make the world a better place? I may be vulnerable, but I’m not stupid.”

  He gave a sardonic laugh. “I never said you were stupid. I never said we wanted to make the world a better place. I said we wanted to change it.”

  Zenna broke out in a light sweat. Her limbs started shaking. She cursed inwardly. She couldn’t afford for them to see her fear, but she couldn’t control it.

  His sly eyes hadn’t missed her reaction. “Feeling weak?” he said darkly. “Shaky? It’s the aftereffect of the tranquilizer. Soon, the nausea will come. Then the vomiting. It’s not going to be pleasant.”

  Without turning, he stretched his arm and held his flat palm toward the guard who stood left of the door. The guard took a black box from a clip on his belt and extracted an injection needle and a sealed vial with clear liquid.

  The man in the suit brought his hand forward. Without breaking eye contact with Zenna, he took the vial and broke the plastic seal.

  “Do you know what I regard as the most beautiful, precious thing in the world?”

  Zenna looked at the vial, her eyes following his every movement. “I guess you are going to tell me now.”

  He ignored her sarcasm. “Choice.” He pulled the injection needle from its sterile packaging. “In life, we always have a choice. We can either choose to do it the hard way or the easy way.” He injected the needle into the rubber lid of the vial and extracted the liquid.

  “Soon, you will suffer the aftermath of the tranquilizer. It can go on for hours. It’s one of the less fortunate side effects of the drug we had to give you. You will experience terrible pain. However...”

  He held the injection up to the light. “You can choose to do it the easy way. In this injection is a substance that will erase the effects of the chemicals. It will make you feel better immediately. I can give it to you now. Or, you can decline, and wait it out, which would be rather foolish, wouldn’t you say?”

  Zenna looked from the injection to the man’s tanned face. “How can I believe you? How do I know that’s not rat poison you’ve got there?”

  The man laughed softly. “Ah. That’s the second greatest beauty and virtue in life—trust. You have to trust me.”

  “Trust you?” Zenna scoffed. “Your puppets injected me and dragged me out here. Now you ask me to trust you? You’re an even bigger clown than those two over there.” She motioned with her head to where Zako and Santiago leaned against the far wall.

  Zako grinned. “Told you she was a wildcat.”

  The man in the suit was unmoved. “Fine.” he said, eerily calm. “It’s your choice, Zenna, but when it gets really bad, you’ll beg me for this.” He flicked the thin injection tube with his thumb and forefinger to ease an air-bubble. “By then, it will be too late. The choice only comes once.”

  He lowered his hand. “If you tell me nicely what I want to know, you can have your medicine. If not,” he chuckled, “I’m going to watch you suffer and make you suffer a lot more.” His eyes drifted to hers, holding them, boring into them.

  A tremor ran through her body. “What do you want to know?”

  “Tell me about your visions, Zenobia.”

  “What visions?”

  He laughed. It was a shrewd, scary laugh. “Ah. You want to play hardball. I see.”

  He took a few steps until he stood in front of her, his face merely inches away from hers. His voice dropped. She had to strain her ears to hear what he was saying.

  “You don’t understand exactly how much I know.”

  Zenna went ice-cold with shock. She got it. He was a seer like her. She could feel him probing her mind, feeling around the intimacies of her deepest, suppressed secrets, and she immediately pulled up her barriers, but she was a little late.

  He laughed again, a cruel laugh of satisfaction. The man was the incarnation o
f malice. He scared her, and now he knew it.

  His free hand stroked her hair, while his mouth went to her ear. “Yes,” he hissed like a snake, “I can see it. Who you are. What you fear. What you see.” His head lifted. “You’re a powerful one. A big find.”

  He straightened. “Unfortunately, you’re not enough of a bad girl to go along with what I want from you.”

  “What ... what do you ... mean?” She hated the way in which one word stumbled over the next and fell from her mouth.

  “Some people are naturally motivated by power, money, things, or...” He waved his hand in the air. “You,” his lips drew into a thin line, “are a good girl. You won’t be motivated.”

  “No, I’m not!” Panic rose in her anew, threatening to engulf her. “I’m not what you think I am.”

  The suited man seemed to have lost interest in their discussion. He turned and threw the needle at the guard who caught it expertly in mid-air.

  “We’re going to have to take her in the hard way,” he said to the guard with the automatic weapon.

  The guard nodded stiffly.

  “What do you mean?” Zenna snapped, furious at how easy it was for them to ignore her as if she wasn’t even present in the same room.

  The boss turned to the other guard. “Call headquarters. Tell them she’s got the green light. She’s a seer. Tell them she’ll score a nine, if not a ten. We need to move fast. I want special clearance. They’ll have to move faster than they’ve promised. She’s not under any special protection, and the government is not aware of her status, but I don’t want to take any risks.

  “When they’re ready, you’ve got to move. I’m heading back to the city. I can’t appear suspicious. I’ll be joining the team in two days’ time. In the meantime...” His glance shot over his shoulder to Zenna, “let her sweat it out, but don’t harm her. We need her in one piece and in a healthy state of mind. Call me on the secure line when Zako can move. When he’s delivered her, hide the van, and clean up all traces to the point from where she was taken. Understood?”

  The guard nodded, came to attention, and then both men stepped aside for the gray haired man to slip through the door before following close on his heel.