by Ellie Danes
They leaned against their shiny black car, smoking and taking occasional sips from coffee to-go cups. It looked like they had been there a long while. As I cruised by, I recognized one of the men from outside the bank and my fingers tightened on the steering wheel.
The good news was if they were trailing me, then Bree had probably gotten past them. The bad news was their parking spot had a perfect view of my motel room.
I pulled into a parking spot at the opposite end of the small motel lot and wondered if I could wait them out. Just then the taller man, the one I hadn't seen before, stood up and tossed his coffee cup into the bushes. He stubbed out his cigarette, clearly fed up, and marched across the parking lot.
If there had been any doubt in my mind, it was cleared when he marched right up to my motel room and tried to peer in the windows. Clearly the motel clerk had caved and told the men where someone of my description had been staying.
Another shiny black car pulled into the motel parking lot, and I sunk down low in my driver's seat. They were looking for me and had no idea how close I actually was.
I knew it was only a few minutes until they picked the cheap lock on my motel room door and found those bricks of cocaine.
That evidence was important to me, and I had clearly gone to great lengths to keep it from them. I couldn't just sit in my used car and watch them take it back. I had to do something.
There were no good options.
I could peel out of the parking lot and tempt them into a car chase, but my rusted-out sedan was no match for their import luxury cars. I could confront them, try to draw them away from the motel room, but my presence there would tip them off to the fact I still had important things inside. Or I could open fire with my Glock 49 and hope I caused enough confusion that witnesses wouldn't make my maroon sedan.
Maybe I could call the cops and give them an anonymous tip about the gunmen. The man I recognized had already run from the police and showed no signs of worry, so I figured that would be a useless exercise.
The best option was to just lay low and try to get out without being seen. If I knew they were waiting at the motel, I had an open road. The idea of tucking tail and running burned in my chest, but I slumped down in the driver's seat and shifted the car into reverse.
I might have made it, doing my best impression of an old man driver, except the bored gunmen were quick to do a double-take. They called to the man I recognized from the bank, and he raced across the parking lot to confirm it was me.
I yanked the gear shift into drive and the maroon sedan gave out a horrific groan. I pumped the gas to keep it from stalling, but it was already too late. There was no way I could get away clean now. The men were fanning out to surround me, and the used car's license plate number had already been memorized.
Still, I gunned the engine in the hopes it would send them running back for their car. It was then I realized how large of an organization I was up against. The men didn't even falter, they knew they had other teams on the road and all they needed to do was call. One of the men was already shouting details into his cell phone.
I saw the net they were forming tighten around my end of the parking lot. If I wasn't going to make it out of there clean, then at least I could give them a hard time.
I shifted back into reverse and rammed down on the gas pedal. The maroon sedan bucked and peeled backward across the parking lot, heading straight for the man who had been peeking in my motel room windows. He jumped away even though all I did was crash into the curb before I slammed on the brakes.
There was no way I could run them over. It wouldn't have done anything but add more weight to my already sinking conscience. But, I could make them run.
I slammed the sedan into drive and lurched forward at the two men approaching me. They scattered and reached into their suits for their guns.
Now was the time for me to speed out of the motel parking lot and take my chances on the road, but the man I recognized stood calmly in the center of the parking lot exit. He didn't even flinch when I revved the engine at him.
It was desperate times, and I reached into my belt for the Glock 49. One casualty, my retaliation for when he shot at Bree. I thought I could live with that. So, I rolled down my window and leveled the gun at him, balancing it on my side view mirror.
The man smiled down the barrel of my gun.
He'd called my bluff, and I couldn't bring myself to run him down. He smiled at me as if he knew me, and I was certain he knew what I had done during my missing days. The man was, in fact, the only solid tie I had to my disappeared memories.
I hesitated long enough for his grin to widen. The man held out his hands, low at his sides, and started to walk toward my open window. One look and he made the other encroaching men back off. Then he strolled up to my window and smiled down at me.
"Nathan. I'm glad you came to your senses," he said.
"At least one of us has." I waved the gun at him. "If you had any sense, you'd tell me what this is all about right now."
"Come on, Nathan. You can't have forgotten the deal that quickly."
The road in front of me was clear and I could have taken a chance, but his smile bothered me. He had to have something over me, some leverage, that would make him so confident.
"The deal's changed," I said.
The man smiled again. "We'll see about that. How about I take it up with your lady friend and see what she says?"
"My lady friend?" My words were as leaden as my mind.
"Pretty little waitress. Found her uniform in the back of her car. I wouldn't mind her serving me from time to time," he said.
I wanted to knock that leer clean off his face with the butt of my gun, but I was frozen. "If you've done anything to harm her," I growled.
He chuckled and put a hand on my car door handle. "Enough chitchat, Nathan. I think it's about time you listen, don't you?"
"And if I don't?" I got out of the car and faced him, toe-to-toe.
"Then I'll go have a little chat with your girl. See if I can't emphasize my point," he said.
"She has nothing to do with this. She doesn't know anything," I said.
He shook his head and smiled. "It's a little thing called leverage. You know all about leverage, don't you, Nathan? Trouble is, it's a slippery thing."
I dropped the Glock 49 to the ground and put my hands behind my head. It didn't matter what happened to me anymore. They had Bree, and I had to get her out safe or give up my life trying.
Chapter Sixteen
Bree
"Wanna watch TV?" I asked the silent man. "I bet there's a game show or something on at this time of day."
He remained stony-faced and watched the motel room door.
"What's wrong with a little conversation?" I asked. The tense stream of words seemed to ease my nerves a little. "Afraid it will humanize me? Make it hard for you to do your job?'
I swallowed hard and perched on the end of the motel bed again. I hated to think what his job actually was. The silent man had fists the size of Easter hams and nasty scars across the knuckles. I was nothing but a pesky fly buzzing around him.
"Fine," I said. "But I'm warning you, silence makes me nervous. Makes me want to sing."
He didn't acknowledge my threat, only shifted in his seat and refocused his beady eyes on the motel room door.
I paused and held my breath. Maybe the man was listening to something I had yet to hear.
There were the usual motel sounds: a maid humming tunelessly as she pushed her creaking cart, the opening and closing of anonymous doors, and the faint blare of other guests watching afternoon game shows on television.
He heard the voices before I did.
They were faint, faraway, and punctuated by the slamming of car doors. Still, it was enough to get my silent jailer to his feet. He stood his ground by the motel room door and listened.
Icy reminders of being tossed into the van slid down my spine as I recognized the voices. The men who had thrown a black hood
over my head and brought me here were walking up the stairs from the parking lot. Then there were more voices and a sudden scuffle.
My jailer scrunched his brow together as he strained to listen. At the end of the hall was some sort of scuffle. It was quiet, muttered curses and grunts, the dull thud of fists meeting flesh.
When there was a crash loud enough to rattle the cheap light fixture above my head, my jailer ripped open the door and disappeared.
I ran to the door but realized I was useless. My hands were still securely tied behind me. So, instead of trying to escape, I looked around wildly for something to free my hands.
The latch on the closet door was bent, one corner of sharp metal sticking up. I backed into it and began sawing the plastic zip-tie back and forth across the sharp point.
"Come on," I whispered. "This always works in the movies. It's not supposed to take an hour."
My shoulders were sore from the sawing motion and when I paused to rest, I heard the voices in the hallway again.
"I came here willing, so you can tell your goons to keep their hands off me," Nathan said.
"You made your point, but don't forget why you're here," another man responded.
A few other voices protested, one saying very nasty things I certainly did not learn in high school Spanish, while the other demanded a fair fight. Nathan must have gotten the jump on them in the narrow motel hallway and shaken them up.
I wanted to smile at the thought of Nathan cracking their heads together, but I was too scared. He shouldn't have come! If he was there, talking to those armed men, then it was all my fault. If I hadn't been stupid enough to approach my car, they never would have spotted me, and they would have assumed Nathan was far away.
Instead, they must have figured out I lied about the motel. It wouldn't have taken them long to call the other motels and give a description of Nathan and me. What I couldn't believe was that Nathan was still at the motel when they went looking for him. Had he been waiting for me?
"Why don't you make it easy on yourself, Nathan?" a man said outside my motel room door. "Just tell us where the drugs are and this will all be over."
"I don't know what you're talking about," Nathan said.
There was a dull thud, and I heard Nathan gasp for air.
"See, none of us are buying this whole amnesia thing. And Pedro here, he hates liars. So, I'm going to ask you again. Where are the drugs?" I recognized the man's voice from the bank and shivered with fear.
"Drugs are bad for you," Nathan said. "I'm doing you a favor by keeping you away from temptation."
My stomach clenched as I heard another heavy punch. Nathan groaned but came out of it laughing.
"You're forgetting about my leverage," the man said.
"It's not my fault your guys are as dumb as a box of rocks." Nathan's voice was strained. "You were so busy chasing me around that no one thought to look in my motel room."
"The drugs are there?" the man asked.
"In the vent," Nathan said.
"Pedro, thank our friend for me." The man waited while my jailer delivered another heavy blow. "We found those drugs before you even showed up. What I want to know is where the rest of it is."
"The rest of it?" Nathan asked, panting hard from the last gut punch.
"Stupid, stubborn gringo." The man spat on the motel hallway floor. "There's no way someone forgets about stealing that many kilos from my boss."
"Hey, I want my memory back as much as you do, but the doctor says I need rest and relaxation. So, how about you back off your goon there and give me some time to think?" Nathan's voice was back up to full strength.
The hard edge I heard in his words stopped my heart. Nathan wasn't going to give the men what they wanted, he couldn't, and he was going to get himself killed over it. I was afraid I was going to hear a gunshot any second now and it would all be over.
"How about we find some ways to jog your memory?" the man asked.
I jumped back from the door as someone was slammed against the other side. "Nathan!" I cried out.
"Excellent timing," the man said to me through the door. Then he turned his attention back to Nathan. "Remember our deal? You tell me what I want to know or I take it out on your pretty little waitress in there."
There was a deep, guttural roar and all hell broke loose in the motel hallway.
"Pedro, grab him! Jesus!" The man swore in Spanish close to the motel room door.
I wished I could have bashed him with it but my hands were still bound and there was nothing I could do to help.
Pedro remained silent but I could hear the splintering sounds as his heavy fists missed and hit the wall near my head. The cheap watercolor painting jumped off the wall and crashed to the ground next to me.
I heard a harsh chuckle escape Nathan as there was a pause in the commotion. The floorboards creaked as the men circled each other. Then the door strained against its hinges as someone was thrown against it hard.
I had to get my hands loose. I struggled to keep tabs on what was happening outside as I ran to the closet. I slashed the plastic zip-tie against the sharp metal latch and prayed that it would saw through soon enough. I worked so frantically I could feel the plastic rubbing my wrists raw, but I still couldn't pull my hands free.
"Get him detained before I get back," the man called.
"Poor Pedro gets the dirty work again," I muttered as I sawed at my restraints.
Nathan was panting hard when he told Pedro, "it doesn't have to be this way. You've been given orders not to harm me. Just go down easy and this will all be over."
My jailer gave a bull-like snort, then the floor shook as he charged Nathan. I heard the neighboring motel door splinter and both men grunt as they crashed to the floor.
By the time it was quiet, I had no idea if either man was still conscious, much less who had come out on top. Then there was the crunch of footsteps across what must have been the wreckage of the motel hallway.
I sawed frantically and couldn't help but laugh when the plastic finally fell off my wrists. I was free, but I had no idea who I'd be facing in the hallway.
I crept toward the door but was too afraid to even put my ear against it. There were voices calling out up and down the motel corridor: people complaining about the noise, the maid in a panic, and the gunmen's colleagues trying to reorganize.
But where was Nathan?
Suddenly, the motel room door knob rattled. It was locked but someone pushed against it hard and tried to rattle it again.
Pedro had the key; he would have just unlocked it.
"Nathan?" I whispered, putting one hand on the door knob. "Is that you?"
Loud voices and the wail of distant police sirens drowned out any possible response. The door knob rattled harder, and I had to make a decision.
I stood up, took a deep breath, and then turned the lock. I spun aside as the motel room door flung open, concealing me behind it. Then I held my breath and hoped I had let the right man in.
Chapter Seventeen
Nathan
I heard the door unlock and rushed through, only to find the room empty. "Bree?"
Had the men lied just to get me to come with them? I hadn't even thought through whether they were lying or not. Just the thought of Bree in trouble had been enough for me to forget caution. And, because of that, I had caused an all-out brawl in a motel hallway. More armed men would be up the stairs any minute and I was alone.
"Nathan?" Bree peeked out from behind the motel room door.
"Oh, thank god," I said.
She flew into my arms, and I caught her tight against me. It hadn't been a lie, those men had really kidnapped her and tried to use her as leverage over me.
"I'm so sorry, Nathan," she said against my neck. "This is all my fault."
"Your fault? How? I'm the one who got you into this mess," I said.
"I left. I should have stayed. I'm so glad they didn't hurt you." Bree leaned back and looked up at me with tear-filled eyes.
Then I caught sight of her raw wrists and a surge of rage went through me.
"It's okay. I did that. Trying to get loose," Bree explained.
I didn't let her pull away. Instead I caught her closer and kissed her. Every ounce of sadness I had felt at her departure, every bit of fear, and all my anger at her assailants crashed back and forth only to be erased by her passion. Bree locked her arms around my neck and kissed me back until I felt my knees go weak.
"We've got to get out of here." I couldn't pull back and spoke against her wet lips.
The alarmed voices in the motel hallway were growing louder. Other guests had peeked out of their doors to see the destruction. And others had noticed the group of armed men organizing in the parking lot. One glance out the door told me we had less than a minute to get moving.
"Wait," Bree said. "I need to know the plan first. I can't keep going on blind faith, Nathan. We're in this together."
"I know, you're right," I assured her as I tugged her out of the room and into the hallway.
Bree stumbled over the massive shoulders of the man slumped across the door jamb. "He's the one who was watching me. Nathan, how did you—”
Her question died on her lips as we saw the stream of dark-suited men running up the motel stairs. "Doesn't matter. We've got to run," I said.
Bree grabbed my hand and led the way down the narrow motel hallway. Then men had passed the first landing and were almost up to where they could see us.
"We're not going to make it," Bree cried. She pointed to a pair of men in dark suits who had just rounded the corner in front of us.
"Quick, in here!" I pulled her into the next open door.
The maid drew a sharp breath and opened her mouth to scream but Bree grabbed her hands. "Are you okay? Are you hurt?" Bree asked the maid.