by Lynn Shurr
A moment later, the ambulance shot by the turn for the medical center and continued on the road that rimmed part of the island. Its emergency lights still blazed, clearing the light traffic in its way. That traffic provided some cover for their small anonymous tourist rental until the vehicle turned onto the Cross-Island Highway that bisected Cozumel. Not much out here to hide them and only one likely destination, the Mayan ruins of San Gervasio, closed for the night. Junior killed the headlights, not really necessary on this night of the full moon, and tried to stay in the dramatic shadows that orb cast over their path.
By the time they approached the entrance to the parking lot of the visitor center, the ambulance passed them in the other lane, its siren no longer blaring, its lights stilled. Tom did not take that well.
“They’ve dumped her somewhere along here and because you were so cautious, we have no idea where.”
“I think we do.” Junior parked in the darkness cast by a large tree where taxi drivers often waited for their tourist fares to return. The night guard closed the entrance to the complex as they watched and returned to his post counting a wad of currency.
“Then let’s go in!”
“I’m calling Ancona.” He dialed Connor’s cell. “Did you find Xochi at the hotel?” Junior listened as Tom tried to grab the phone. “Okay, then. I think she’s been taken inside the archaeological park. Get here as fast as you can.”
“Tell me!” Tom demanded.
“The FBI broke into the penthouse. They found Xochi’s uniform dress, her shoes, and a pink and purple scarf I know belongs to her. No blood, just some dark liquid spilled all over the bed. Somehow, they got her out of the room without being seen.”
“Shit!”
Junior got out of the car and put his hand on the trunk where the firearms lay. “I know she’s here. I feel it like a warm breeze on my face. Do you?”
Tom came to stand beside him, quieted himself, breathed deep. “I think I do.”
Chapter Twenty
Xochi stumbled on the moonlit pathway and dragged her feet. Not all of her weakness was feigned. They’d forced enough of that nasty brown liquid down her throat to affect her, though she’d managed to spit out some and let more dribble from the sides of her mouth before Diaz pinched her nose shut and the Animal pried her jaws open for the fake priest. Later, when Indio cut out her still beating heart, she might regret not having taken all of the potion the Mayan said would make the sacrifice painless. The bitter brew contained the same ancient herbs fed to other maidens offered up by their families to the blood hungry gods, Indio claimed.
The drink wasn’t the worst of the indignities she’d suffered. At first, she’d enjoyed her surf and turf. Unfortunately, the turf portion arrived rare and thinly sliced, nothing a table knife couldn’t cut. The lobster tail was large with lots of melted butter for dipping and extra to pour on the baked potato, and the salad as tasty as salad could be. She’d enjoyed the cheesecake followed by a deep bubble bath, wrapping herself in the hotel’s heavy terry robe and watching Mexican TV, which reminded her with a pang of Corazon and Junior. Best of all, near midnight she’d sent Diaz, grinding his teeth, downstairs to fetch hot chocolate and a pastry tray, sure the kitchen would be closed. He did deliver, but it took some time.
In the morning, she’d asked for eggs Benedict and fresh squeezed orange juice only to find herself ignored. “You must fast today,” Indio informed her, speaking through a crack in the door. But the room had a coffeemaker, and no one had removed the more than ample pastry tray. She made a pot and ate every last crumb of the sweet rolls and Danish throughout the morning. So much for fasting. Xo hoped that ruined or delayed their plans. No lunch came, nor dinner, no matter how often she made demands. She brewed more coffee and sweetened it heavily with packets of sugar, though she usually took only milk. The more energy she could muster, the better.
The day passed slowly as the sun moved across the sky outlining the pattern of the Spanish grillwork on the windows onto the thick carpeting. Pretty, but they were bars by any other name. Planning to be well rested for whatever came, she napped as much as she was able. At last, the doors opened and in tottered an old woman who could have passed for Corazon’s grandmother.
“Take off, take off,” she insisted, tugging at the uniform dress Xochi had asked for yesterday. “I brush your beautiful hair and give you something pretty to wear. You will be una princesa.”
As she sat there in her underwear feeling the brush gently untangle her often stubborn curls, Xochi closed her eyes, calmed her nerves, and imagined her mother doing the same and after her, Mama Nell, and Corazon, so soothing. She’d kept her hair long no matter how difficult the upkeep in remembrance of Pilar. Mama Nell never insisted she do any different. Bless them all. Unlike her birth mother, she’d fallen gently into the hands of loving women.
The abuela finished her work and broke the spell by unhooking Xochi’s bra. “What are you doing!”
“Dress you. You stand now.”
The fingers bumpy with arthritis peeled down her panties and wrapped a long swath of embroidered fabric around Xochi, high up under her bosom, tucking it in and ending in a notch that allowed her to walk easily. To be sure it stayed in place, a large safety pin was placed carefully out of sight. The granny withdrew a colorful band from the same bag that held the cloth and drew it over Xochi’s head and arms until it rested just above her naked breasts. Xo tugged it into place to cover her nipples. Her dresser scolded, “No, no, no” and placed it above her breasts again. “No touch! You a Mayan princesa.”
Not the kind of royalty she’d wanted to be when her Papi brought her a huge sack of American princess clothes and fancy shoes that made her twirl with glee and shout, “Soy una princesa!” Of course, he’d stolen them from the Billodeaux twins when he’d robbed Lorena Ranch and taken Tommy as well. Bijou Billodeaux had also stolen some of El Jefe’s drugs and paid with his life. All of that had led to this. How could vengeance sustain itself so long in the human heart without eating it entirely away?
The old woman called out that she had finished her task, and the double doors opened. She accepted her payment and scuttled out. The four men entered. Xochi shook her hair over her bosom and covered her naked breasts with her hands. Three of them laughed at her modesty, but Indio dissented. “This is a sign she is a pure and worthy sacrifice.”
“Hardly,” Xochi said, still hoping to upset their plans. “I’ve done some really nasty things with men other than have sex with them. Use your imaginations. And I ate breakfast!”
Clearly, the Animal had an excellent imagination from the instant bulge in his pants, but the others remained unmoved, Miro too frail, Diaz too cold, and the Mayan too intent on bringing off this worthless ceremony, breakfast not an issue with him either. Would El Jefe’s men kill the priest when it failed to work? His problem, not hers.
Miro gestured to a tall standing closet deeply carved like the bedroom doors. “Let me see her in all the regalia I paid for.”
Diaz opened it with a key. Xochi had tried to explore the closet earlier hoping for wire hangers that could be made into weapons, but without a hairpin or nail file on her, she’d failed at beginner’s lock picking. He removed a dazzling feathered cloak resplendent in red and yellow. Xo wondered how many small, helpless birds had been murdered to provide the materials as Diaz lifted her hair and settled it on her shoulders. Amazingly light and it covered her breasts, freeing up her hands for a fight. The crown he took from a shelf she could only describe as repulsive. A serpent molded from gold, each scale glittering, reared back showing its fangs while its coils looped twice around its writhing body. They set the monstrosity on her head, and when she attempted to take it off, the Animal cuffed her hands behind her back even though it sent the feathered cloak drifting to the floor.
“Perfecto,” Indio said. “Remove the crown for now. Cuff her feet and bring me the shoes.”
Cautious, the Animal pushed her into a sitting position and grabbed both
slender ankles in one hand before she could kick out. He applied the padded cuffs again. Diaz brought the footwear, sandals also made of gold including the straps that held them on. With the Animal restraining her knees, Indio bent reverently to place them on her feet. “As the black Americans say, you will go to paradise in golden slippers.”
“I can’t walk in these! They’ll cut into my feet.”
Indio answered her protest mildly. “You will not have to walk far, Xochitl. Now, sip the drink that will ease your pathway to the gods.”
He retrieved a bowl from the other room and held it to her lips. Xo clamped them shut and turned her head aside, jostling its contents, spilling a little on the royal purple spread. “This is for the best. You will not feel the knife enter your chest.”
The Mayan offered the bowl again. Xochi took a large mouthful and spit it in his face.
“Very well. Restrain her.”
Diaz ripped the top sheet from the bed and with the help of the Animal swaddled her body tightly. Better than struggling naked-breasted, Xo thought at first until Diaz pinched her nose and the Animal pried open her jaws. She held her breath as long as she could and when she finally had to swallow pushed some of the potion out the sides of her mouth in a battle she could not win. At last, they let her alone while Indio placed the crown in a garment bag with the cloak, and Miro watched all from a chair, too weak to stand for long. “Make the call,” the drug lord ordered in a voice raspy and out of breath.
As the drug numbed her legs and her lips, Xochi heard the sirens approach. Please God, let that be the police coming to rescue me. No such luck. When the men in white entered the bedroom, she was already bundled knees-to-chin like a Peruvian mummy burial. They dumped her into a sling beneath the bed of the gurney and replaced the top over her. The weight of a body settled above her, too light to be any of them but Esteban Miro. Sheets draped over the gurney hid her from view.
They moved. The ping of an elevator opening, the ride down, another ping as the gurney exited and rolled across the tiles of the lobby floor. She tried to scream but only a moan came out, quickly echoed by Miro above. No need to gag her, the narcotic had taken her voice. Against her will, she dozed as the ambulance drove away from all help, all rescue.
Xochi woke to the light slapping of her cheeks. She sat upright unshackled in the ambulance. The feathered cloak covered her body and the serpent crown sat atop her dark curls. “You must walk now,” Indio informed her from where he stood by the open doors. “We go to meet the goddess.”
She blinked, trying to focus. Indio had transformed into a figure from the painted walls of his ancestral tombs. He wore a loincloth of spotted jaguar hide, his bare chest covered with an impressive green jade pectoral portraying the head of a screaming man. More of the pelt draped his shoulders, clawed paws dangling. A tall headdress of trailing green plumes sat on his shaved head. He carried a staff similarly crowned with feathers. With his free hand, he offered her help in stepping down. Too weak to do otherwise, Xochi accepted, loathing herself even as she did.
“I will lead and sing the ancient chants of praise to the goddess. Diaz, assist Don Esteban. Animal, you will help the girl to walk.” They set off, no one questioning this suddenly regal man. He sang in Nahuatl of which she recognized little except for the name Ix Chel. Diaz held up the tottering Miro. Perhaps her drugged eyes deceived her, but Xochi swore Miro’s black aura streamed out behind him like smoke from a piece of coal gradually growing smaller and smaller.
El Animal dragged her along, fondling her breast with one hand hidden under her cloak. Good, that offense helped clear her mind with a burst of anger. She tripped, she dragged the golden sandals cutting into her flesh, she sagged to dead weight, then stiffened again before he decided to carry her. What did the poet say—“Do not go gentle into that good night. Rage, rage against the dying of the light.” She had no intention of making her sacrifice easy for them.
Chapter Twenty-One
Junior opened the trunk and took out the weapons bag. He handed Tom a pistol and stuck one of his own in his belt. He yearned to break down the barrier that kept him from Xochi and go after her immediately, but tamped down his emotions. A stupid, impetuous move would not help and might harm. He felt her living presence enough to guide him toward patience.
“What about the assault weapons?” Tom asked with outstretched hand.
“We’ll see how Ancona wants to divvy them out.”
“Then, give me another pistol. You know Connor won’t be able to use one.”
Junior complied with that request, adding extra clips, and zipped the bag. “We might as well get the place open in order to move fast when they get here.” A giant armed man, he strode toward the guard’s hut, and the man came out immediately, not with a challenge but with his hands in the air. He jabbered at Junior in rapid Spanish.
“He doesn’t want us to shoot him. He has no money,” Junior translated for Tom.
“Yeah, I got that. My Spanish is pretty good. But, he does have money from the bribe he got for aiding and abetting.”
“Si, yes, I have money. You take it all,” said the quaking guard who obviously spoke English well enough. “Not a bribe, senores. I am helping a dying man with a last wish to see the temple of Ix Chel on the night of the full moon. His friends, they hire some of the people who meet the cruise ships and pose for pictures to go with them. That is all. No harm to anyone.”
“Since the young woman was kidnapped from the United States, harm is intended.” Junior repeated the words in Spanish to make sure they had an understanding. “Open the entry for us. We’re going in to save her.”
No one could have complied faster with that request.
Tom fidgeted, raising on the balls of his feet and fingering the butts of the two pistols in his waistband. “We should go ahead. Let Tony and Connor follow.”
“You know Diaz and the other thug will be armed. Maybe the Indian guy, too. If we start a firefight, bullets and debris will be flying everywhere with so much crumbling stone around. Xochi might be hit.”
“She could be dead if we wait.”
“Then it will be on me.” Junior accepted that responsibility with dread. How had his father done things like this for a good part of his life? No wonder he kept himself so locked down. Instead of dwelling on that, he questioned the guard. “How do we get to the temple and what will we find there?”
Yes, they had been here before as children, not paying much attention to the guide, scooting off to chase the iguanas sunbathing on the ancient rock walls, the older boys like Dean and Tom making up stories about the red hand prints found in one of the stone houses—the blood of sacrificed victims, they claimed. No, no, the guide said, more like a signature of the people who once lived there, paint, not blood. They needed a refresher course.
“Here, a map,” the guard handed one over. “Follow the path to the central plaza. Go around and take the way to the left to Ka’na Nah, the tall house, a pyramid where the priests made sacrifices before a big clay statue of Ix Chel. There is a small room on top.”
“Thank you for your help,” Junior said, though he didn’t feel moved to offer any money.
“Let’s go,” Tom urged again.
This time Junior did not have to hold him back because Ancona and Connor Bullock arrived in a spray of gravel, barely stopping before they charged out to join them. “I have the guns. We enter through the visitor’s center. It’s unlocked. We’re headed for a pyramid with a room at the top for sacrifices. Xochi is still alive. Both Tom and I felt her presence like a warm breeze.”
“Sure, you did. We’re on a tropical island. All the breezes are warm,” Connor sneered. “We’d better get moving.”
Their group of rescuers got as far as the first cluster of ruins before Ancona stopped them. “Give the doc one of the automatic weapons. He won’t be able to handle anything else. See here, point, pull, and spray side to side. Any two-bit criminal can use one.”
He thrust the weapon into
Connor’s hands, steady enough to perform surgery and also hauling the medical bag. “I understand.”
“Great, but try not to fire. We don’t want bullets everywhere. One for me, Junior, and you take the other so the hothead doesn’t go berserk. Two pistols are enough for him.”
Junior disbursed the weapons and extra clips and tossed the bag aside. Tom fumed like a lit fuse. “Are we ready to go now?”
Ancona ignored him. “The plan is we get to this pyramid. I go up first, the doc behind me. If I get cut down, then you fire, Bullock. You guys go around the back and climb from there. We approach quiet as we can. I want you two to create a diversion. Throw some pebbles. Make some noise, but stay out of the way until I shout the hands up police stuff.”
“I don’t think there will be any hands up with these men,” Connor said.
“I’m gonna say it real fast. Junior, if you can grab Xochi and get her out of there, do it. You’re the only one strong and fast enough to carry her very far. We good? Enough said. Quiet now.”
Junior nodded, but if he had to kill to save her, he would. He’d carry Xochi out of hell on his back if necessary. Or die trying.
They took off at a jog down the stone path white in the moonlight. Iguanas, livelier in the evening, skittered out of their way. The central plaza with its ring of buildings came up fast. No time to sightsee, they skirted its rim and ran on the left-hand path, heavy vegetation pressing in on both sides. A rustling in the bushes and all weapons pointed that way—until a mother peccary with her litter of babies pushed onto the road, thought better of attacking, and took cover on the other side.
“Almost blew it,” Connor admitted. “I thought it might be an ambush.”
“Of Mexican pigs,” Tom said, annoyed because they had stopped.
“Nearly there. You can see the top of the temple from here.” Junior pointed.
They approached more cautiously now. As pyramids went, the structure wasn’t that impressive, not terribly high, with crumbling steps and twisted trees thrusting out of its base. Might have been nicer in its heyday stuccoed over and painted in a rainbow of bright colors, but not now. Stark and gray, it awaited them. From its peak an eerie chant issued in a language almost as dead as its original speakers. The sound covered their approach.