by Bryn Bauer
Absorbed in these thoughts, she nearly jumped when a cool, clammy hand squeezed her knee. The touch brought her senses into sharp focus. She looked down at the speedometer. She was already going sixty, heading away from the residence. She turned her most brilliant smile on Castro who looked slightly breathless. The windows were down making it difficult for her to hear his words.
“You drive like the wind, Sofia!” His hand ventured a few inches higher, his little finger coming to rest just under the apex of the skirt’s slit. Sofia thought, calculating for one brief moment. She thought, Push him, but not too far. She didn’t want him to contact his emergency crew. He needed to be so captivated, so engaged that he would brazen it out until it was too late.
“Thank you. I do love to feel the thrum of the engine!” and with that she pressed the accelerator down further. She closed her eyes as if in ecstasy, though in truth, trying to keep her stomach contents in place.
“You are a woman who knows what she likes, what she wants.” His hand moved another inch.
“I am that Mr. President.” Then looking pointedly at his hand, “And you are a man who knows what he wants.” She pressed the accelerator again, making it clear what he had to do to get what he wanted.
Now they were going seventy-five miles per hour and she saw that through the bravado he put on, his face was nearly white. Not knowing the exact top speed of the car, she hoped it would be enough. To ensure success, she veered from the track onto a rougher road, hoping that would accelerate the onset of his condition. As she turned, she noticed a glint of light in the rearview. It was one of the ministerial cars. Shit. Shit. Castro had not yet seen them; maybe she could still finish the job.
Suddenly, Raul Castro threw his head back, hand massaging still further up her thigh and yelled, a wild, haunting ululation that made the hairs on the back of Sofia’s neck stand up. She watched as he seized, his eyes rolling back and his hand grabbing the triangle of silk between her legs. Then his body slackened and his head lolled as though in sleep.
With her attention momentarily diverted toward Castro, she didn’t see the rough patch of gravel in the road ahead. The tires caught and shimmied. Lacking dual suspension and wheel slip technology, the car faltered and Sofia couldn’t control the wheel. It pulled out of her grip and the car careened into a sturdy growth of trees. She felt a great jolt, saw the steering wheel coming toward her, and then blackness. Nothing.
SIXTEEN
Sofia felt cold, her head was splitting and something sharp bored into the back of her skull. Sofia lay dazed for several seconds. Where was she? What happened? Then her hand twitched against the place on her left leg where the pepper gas cartridge should be. It was missing. Her eyes flew open and she bolted into a crouched position. She immediately fell back onto the wall. A pulse of lighting pain seared her eyes, raced along her head and down her spine. She breathed deeply to keep from vomiting. After another few seconds, she opened her eyes slowly hoping that it wouldn’t trigger another lightning strike. Her vision was slightly blurred and she blinked a few times to clear it. She had to resist the urge to shake her head knowing it would only exacerbate the pain. Slowly she became aware of a musty, acrid stink and the feeling of slimy wetness under her bare legs. She stood slowly. Gazing in the dim light from a bare bulb some feet away, she saw that she was in a small stone jail cell. The light was coming from a narrow hall outside the corroded metal bars.
Sofia’s breath came fast and she had to close her eyes again and consciously keep her breathing under control so that she wouldn’t panic. With her eyes closed, her father’s face materialized in her mind’s eye. Something he said came back to her. When she was six, Sofia had been locked into one of the tiny sheds on their property. The ambassador’s son had tricked her and broken the lock so it couldn’t be opened. She had panicked, scratched and beat the door until her hands bled. Once they found her, her father spoke through the wooden door. “Sofia, you must calm down. You will get out. Repeat after me, ‘Calm, focus. Calm, focus.’” He had made her repeat it over and over while others were presumably getting tools to break the door down. Finally, calmed and accustomed to the darkness of the shed, she opened her eyes to see a crowbar lying on the ground among old nails and warped lumber. She hadn’t noticed it through her earlier panic. Her slender girl’s arms picked up the crowbar as she shouted.
“Get away from the door Daddy!” Then she swung the crowbar as hard as she could at the latch. With a few more blows it broke free. She emerged just as the gardener ran up with tools.
Her father beamed at her and said, “You did it. You just needed to be calm and focused.” The green, woodsy smell of the shed faded and the grimed and grainy stench of the cell filled her nostrils once again. Though this time, it did not trigger panic. She repeated her father’s phrase several times and then slowly opened them to stare directly into the face of her attacker from the Mariana. Sofia nearly gasped. He gazed at her through the bars, hands resting casually on the horizontal cross bar.
“You look like you did when I finished with you in Miami.” He pulled back his lips in a lewd smile to reveal teeth browned by tobacco. Sofia didn’t need to touch her face to know he was telling the truth. Her cheek and jaw throbbed with every heartbeat and she had a strong taste of silver in her mouth. She remained silent, gauging how to handle this situation.
His smile widened. “Do you want to know what you’re doing here?”
Without thinking, Sofia replied. “Speeding ticket?” His smile disappeared.
“No Puta, even better. Then he amended, “Well, better for us.” The man raked his eyes up and down her form again. “When you heal up you’ll be the jewel of the next auction.” And with that he laughed. A cold finger drew down her back at the horror of this prospect. They were planning to sell her at the next auction; she would be sold like cattle with the other kidnapped souls.
“No reaction? Do you think your boyfriend will save you? He won’t, you know.” The guard paused for effect, waggling his substantial eyebrows. He crooked his finger beckoning her closer. “Want to know a secret? He’s the one who sold you. He told us all about what you’re doing in Cuba. Not hard to see why he did it. He already sampled the goods. And they do look good.” He rubbed a hand across his mouth.
Sofia instinctively took two or three steps backward. She used all her energy to remain upright. This amused the guard and he continued.
“He gets into the President’s inner circle plus fifteen percent of your sale price. A very good deal.” What was he saying? The look of shock must have shown on Sofia’s face because the man’s expression brightened, seeing that his words hit the mark. Then he withdrew his hands from the bars and delivered the final blow. “You didn’t really think he meant it when he said he loved you. You didn’t think he was actually protecting you. He was arranging this set up the whole time. Stupid bitch.” And with that, he spat in Sofia’s face, laughed and disappeared down the hall.
Sofia felt the blood drain from her face, pooling in her feet and rooting her to the spot. She would like to have fainted, anything to escape the humiliation and betrayal. Quint. How could he possibly have done this? Sofia wanted to cling to the ebbing numbness; she didn’t want to let in the feeling of utter stupidity and naiveté. How could she have been so blind? Of course, Quint had pushed her back into the mission each time she wanted to quit. At the time she thought he supported her, wanted her to succeed. But no, it was a setup to show his value to Castro.
With shame she thought back to the previous night. No, he didn’t just happen to show up on the property right when she was attacked. He had probably ordered it, wanting to kidnap her. Then seeing it had failed, he sought to put her back in the game and close the trap. Had he been planning this since offering her the chance to interview? She groaned. To make her trust him, love him. No. She wouldn’t allow herself to think about that, couldn’t think about that. She had to figure out a way to get out. Only God knew what Quint might do to Joe and Helena.
Sofia glanced around the cell, taking in each square foot for some advantage, some other tool. Nothing. There wasn’t even a bunk or toilet. She felt a pang of sympathy for prisoners that spent any amount of time here in the sparse, dank hole. However, while continuing her scan she noticed that there were no windows and the cold feeling continued. It had been at least eighty five degrees that day and shouldn’t be this cool even at night. Glancing up she saw stones above her head but with hair-like plant roots peeking through the cracks in the mortar. They were underground then. She would need to find a corridor leading upward. That is, if I manage to get out of the cell, she thought. She bent to examine the lock and peeked between the bars to ensure the guard wasn’t returning. Sofia pulled out the hairpin stiletto and caught a glimpse of her puffy, bruised eyes in the reflective metal. Unbidden, the thought of Quint’s hands caressing her face passed through her mind. A drop of salty wetness fell onto the sheath and Sofia’s hands began to shake slightly. The clang of the sheath hitting solid stone rang throughout the cell. Sofia’s heart raced. Damn it. Get a grip Koury!
Heavy, booted footsteps sounded in the hallway, much closer than Sofia would have guessed. He must not have gone far. Reining in the alarm that threatened to overwhelm her, Sofia snatched the sheath from the floor. To her consternation, she found that her hands still shook slightly and she couldn’t sheath the stiletto. With the footsteps just outside of her cell, she shoved the sheath into the bodice of her tattered dress, and whirled to face the man, the stiletto itself in her hand hidden behind the shreds of her skirt. It was the guard who had taunted her.
“What are you doing? Making trouble?” Sofia was pleased to hear that she managed to keep her voice low and even.
“Of course not. How can I? There’s nothing in here that I could use to make trouble.”
He narrowed his eyes. “You don’t talk to me like that; maybe you don’t understand your position. You’re no better now than a dog. You’re nothing.”
Something in Sofia’s mind snapped. Her mind paraded images of all she had been through over the last few days, all she had put in and all she had endured. Did it really boil down to being caged and treated like a dog by this scum? The heat of Sofia’s fury rose behind her eyes as she spat out her words, her voice dangerously cold and calm.
“I’m the dog? And who is stuck down here? Who is only fit to guard a woman? Not even a woman, a dog. What kind of man do people send to guard nothing?”
Rage filled his face and he fumbled with the key ring at his belt. As the man unlocked the door Sofia noticed, in a detached sort of way, that she was no longer shaking. She didn’t feel panicked. She only gazed at the man calculating each move through to its inevitable result.
He came at her, only needing to take three large steps to reach her and put his hand around her throat. Though, to Sofia, time seemed to slow. It appeared to take such a long time for him to finally reach her. As soon as his rough hands touched the hot skin of her neck, time snapped back into proper motion. In a moment he had her down on her back with his face millimeters from hers. She was forcibly reminded of their encounter aboard the Mariana. But this time, she didn’t feel the fear she had then. She heard him as through over a long distance.
“You need to be taught how to speak to your betters. Maybe I’ll show you just how much of a man I am. They’ll thank me for taming you.”
Though the image of his face was beginning to swim from the pressure on her throat, she looked him straight in the eyes. As she did so, she wrenched her right arm from under her body, pinned there when he pushed her down. Her expression must have changed because the pressure on her throat lessened somewhat as he pulled back slightly. Then she struck, taking that tiny window of space and time to drive the needle thin weapon neatly into his eye up to the hilt.
As the guard sagged to the floor, Sofia plucked the stiletto by its emerald lily. Remotely, she noted that only one drop of blood clung to the tip. She wiped it on the guard’s pants while with her left hand she drew the Makarov PM pistol. She quickly replaced the stiletto in its sheath and put it back in her hair, then checked the pistol. It had been many years since she accompanied her father to the shooting range though she might still be able to wound someone enough to slow them down.
She pressed her back against the stone wall, listening. She heard far away voices raised in teasing tones. Someone is having a good time, she thought. I hope I can spoil it for them. Sofia’s quadriceps bunched, ready to spring out into the hall and run. Then her eye caught a glint of metal on the dead guard’s belt. It was another ammunition cartridge. She checked the weapon and found only two rounds left. With her skills being as dull as they were, she knew that two wouldn’t be enough. Sofia crouched and unhooked the leather strap holding the ammo to the belt. She checked that it was full and stood.
In her haste to return to the open cell door her foot struck the corpse causing the limp military jacket to fall open. Sofia stopped dead, barely breathing. A ragged, well used book peeked from the inside pocket. Slowly, as if wading through water she moved back to the body, picked up the book and covered her mouth to stifle a sob. The ink of the title was nearly worn off, but Sofia could just make out the words, The Odyssey.
Quint. He loves this book. There is no way he would part with this willingly, Sofia thought. The realization eased her mind about Quint’s connection with the kidnapping, though she couldn’t quite erase all of what the guard had said. After all, someone had ordered her kidnapping and sale. Someone who had access to her. Granted there were several people, but…then another thought occurred to Sofia. Quint could be down here in another cell! True, she had not heard anyone else, but he might be unconscious or…
Sofia stuffed the small tome in the slit pocket of her skirt and listened at the cell door one last time. Hearing nothing but the continued revelry from somewhere above, Sofia sprang into the hall, crouching with the pistol at the ready. She glanced to both her right and left where she saw more cells. There were possibly twenty-five in all. To the right, the hall ended in a blank stone face. She had to check these for Quint before going the other direction, towards a possible way out. Sofia glided barefoot down the hall, she vaguely wondered whether her kidnappers discarded her shoes or saw an opportunity to sell the Alexander McQueen pumps. Each cell she came to was empty, save for a growing stench. The slightly sweet purification grew thick in her nostrils as she approached the last cell.
Sofia pressed her back against the stone wall, sliding toward the bars and trying to take shallow breaths. She knew that smell; it was the same smell that surrounded the butchering shed after one of her father’s hunting weekends with his associates. The kitchen workers would throw the deer entrails to the dogs, but the dogs covered them with leaves and let them sit for a few days before eating them. The rotting meat always made Sofia dread deer hunts. Closing her eyes, she prayed hard that she wouldn’t find Quint’s body in the cell. Please, she thought. Please. Slowly, she arrived in front of the cell, pistol raised. The sight that met her nearly made her keel over and she had to cover her nose and mouth to prev
ent bile from rising. On the floor was a body. It was nearly unrecognizable but Sofia could just distinguish the features. It was the young mother from earlier that day. Through her swimming vision she saw that the woman had been badly beaten and many areas of her naked body were blackened and nearly crisp, giving off the smell. She noticed that her son was not with her. What had they done with him? She didn’t want to think about it, yet visions played in her mind like a film strip.
Sofia closed her eyes to shut them out, then opened and looked down the hall the other direction. There’s nothing I can do for her now, thought Sofia. Nothing, except prevent her son from being sold and enslaved. She moved down the hall back towards the voices, taking care to make no noise. As before, she examined each cell as she passed. She reached the second to last cell in the hall and spied a bare and bloodied foot that protruded through the bars. Sofia crouched, raising the pistol and turned so that one eye could peer into the dim room.
Her heart leaped. Quint lay in the cell. He also had been beaten, but not badly. She could see the rise and fall of his chest further fueling her relief. Though she still harbored doubts, Sofia couldn’t help but be thankful he was alive. She glanced around and then whispered, “Quint, Quint.” Nothing. She tried again, a little louder and he stirred and moaned. Quickly, she removed the stiletto from its security in her hair and began to pick the lock. In a flash, Quint was up, thrust his arm through the bar and had his hand around her throat. She gasped and jerked back, staring at him. Was he really the one who wanted her dead? Had he waited here to ambush her? No, as soon as he looked in her eyes, he released his grip and dropped to the floor. She opened the cell door as he spoke.