Desperate Hours Final 103116

by Mondello, Lisa

  She is safe there. No one can see her sleeping in the backseat. No one can hurt her. She just has to hold on a little longer.

  Instead of cradling the precious girl against her chest to tell her that she was going to a safe home filled with love, Sonny went over the plans in place to get them home. They’d made it safely through this far. In a few hours, they’d be home free.

  * * *

  Gil’s stomach was growling. The pretzels he’d eaten half an hour ago hadn’t done much to kill his appetite. He needed a hot shower, a good meal and about three days’ worth of solid sleep to feel human again. None of that was likely to happen until he caught Cash Montgomery, brought him back to Miami and collected his fee from the bail bondsman.

  Well, maybe he’d get a shower. He should. If he had any chance of getting close to Cash’s sister, Sonny, he’d do better not to offend her with a rank smell.

  The woman knew where her brother was. Gil was sure of it. Why else would she have come all the way down to Colombia? Alone!

  He’d been watching her every move for the past three weeks. He’d been right to follow her down to Colombia. Her brother was an agent with the DEA who’d turned, probably when the smell of money got too good.

  It happened for a lot of reasons that Gil didn’t really care about. Montgomery got his hand caught in the cookie jar and would have to pay his due. He’d given Cash’s sister some room, sure that she was going to lead Gil right to his bounty. But for some reason, she’d holed up in a crap motel room, barely leaving except to get food at the market.

  Vacation? No way. Not in that low-class dump. Who came down here and hid out in a place like that unless they were up to something? The woman was a computer geek, not a novelist who needed “space.” And even if she were, why the hell would she have hidden herself at the foothills like that?

  No, she’d been hiding. She knew something. And Gil wasn’t letting her get away without finding out what. But when he’d gone to her motel room this morning, it was empty. Too empty. The bed was still unmade, but the place didn’t have so much as a gum wrapper in the trashcan. It was as if she’d purposely sanitized the room.

  And now she was boarding a plane back to the States.

  That wasn’t going to happen. Not if Gil could help it. If Cash Montgomery was here in Colombia, Sonny was going to help Gil find him.

  The whole time he’d been watching her hotel room, something had nagged at him. He’d heard of informants hanging around at the market under the pretense of being legitimate vendors. “Here’s your oranges, senoritas, and oh, by the way your brother is hiding...”

  Maybe. Maybe not. Gil was the proud owner of an overactive imagination. His creative—but critical—thinking had gotten him this far in quest to track down fugitives. He’d earned the respect of his peers many times over when he brought a criminal back in the final hour—and earned pretty big rewards, too. Marco, one of the members of the small team he worked with, was still talking about the payout on the job they did in San Juan as if Bill Gates had died and left all his money to Team Gil.

  Yeah, okay. The bounty had been sweet, but it wasn’t enough to retire on. The Cash Montgomery bounty would bring in a lot more than San Juan.

  Gil chuckled at the irony of the fugitive’s name, won­dering just how much cash Cash was worth. In some ways, he hated thinking in terms of money, but it was nec­essary if he was ever going to leave bounty hunting behind. He wasn’t retiring anytime soon, but finding Cash Montgomery was at least going to pay for a well-deserved vacation on some tropical island. A nice breezy cabana on a beach with white sand and warm water was just the ticket. Maybe he’d even rent one of those catamarans and go scuba diving for sunken treasure. Yeah, that’d be fun.

  Gil was good at what he did but was in serious need of downtime—he’d been chasing shitbags for far too long.

  Gil watched the women’s restroom door, waiting for movement. He’d seen Sonny Montgomery go into the bathroom fifteen minutes ago. She’d probably been told to stay out of sight until her flight. If he were helping her to lay low, that’s what he’d tell her to do.

  The clock on the wall let him know her flight to the United States was going to start boarding in about fifteen minutes, but she hadn’t even gone through security yet. There was virtually no one in line—she’d make it through security quickly. By his calculations, she should be showing her face any second now in order to make her flight with no time to spare.

  He gave her points for that, too. Sonny Montgomery had been coached well by someone who knew how to stay covert. He’d have to move fast if he had any chance of stopping her without attracting attention.

  A group of women were filing out of the bathroom. Two of them who looked very much alike—probably sisters—were arguing. Gil didn’t know the language so he didn’t have a clue what they were saying. Another women was practically dragging a little boy behind her, scolding him as he started to tantrum about something. And then…

  “Whoa,” Gil said, pushing his sunglasses up to see if his eyes were playing tricks on him as Sonny emerged from the bathroom hiding behind the group.

  Gil had expected Sonny to come out of the bathroom wearing the same poncho he’d seen her in all week. He’d almost missed her when she emerged wearing a very American jacket and blue jeans. Strapped around her front was a baby carrier, complete with a baby in tow. Her hair was pulled back in a tight ponytail, a style he hadn’t seen her in before. The only thing missing from this happy home­maker picture was a husband.

  How sweet.

  Words crackled in Spanish over the loudspeaker above his head, announcing the flight to Miami was about to board. Gil’s Spanish was okay enough, but not as good as his cohorts, Cooper and Marco. He usually let them handle interpretation. But he’d heard the same announcement with different destinations for the past hour and after the second time, he was confident in what it was saying. What else did he have to do while staking out the bathroom?

  As Sonny walked by him, she kept her eyes fixed straight ahead and her body rigid. Even when he came up alongside her, she didn’t so much as twitch.

  Bad move. Even a cursory glance would have been more natural. It was less suspicious to anyone who might be watching.

  “Cute kid,” he said, grabbing her lightly by the arm. “Why don’t we take a stroll over to the window so we can have a nice private conversation?”

  Her face was stricken, filled with the panic of a trapped animal as she pulled her arm away from him.

  “I don’t have any money. Nothing valuable. I swear. Please let me go.”

  “Not a chance, lady.”

  “If you don’t leave me alone, I’ll scream.”

  “Nah, you don’t really want to do something like that.”

  “Don’t tell me what I—”

  “You see those guards over there?” Gil said, pointing in the direction of the men with guns who he’d been pretending not to watch. “Mikey Machine Gun and Sammy Soldier over there are looking a little bored with nothing to do but watch all the nice tourists go by hour after hour. I’m sure they’ll be only too happy to take some time out of their busy schedules to ask how you acquired a baby on your little visit down here to their fine country.”

  Her face drained of blood and turned a stark white. “Please don’t do this. I beg of you. You don’t know what you’re doing.”

  “Wrong. I know exactly what I’m doing, Ms. Mont­gomery.”

  Her eyes widened with the use of her name. Although he’d been sure, confirmation that he’d been tailing the right woman was always comforting. He’d hate to find out he’d wasted all this time tailing the wrong girl.

  With his hand still on her arm, he gave a quick glance to the soldiers, who were indeed more than a little curious at their sudden interaction.

  “Act like you know me,” he said in a low voice.

  He didn’t really need the Colombian police interfer­ing in his business, either. That would only complicate matters since he was wa
y out of his jurisdiction. They had their own kind of law down here and they didn’t always care about what was deemed legal in the U.S.

  Of course, Sonny Montgomery didn’t need to know any of that right now.

  “I have to get on that plane.”

  “Not tonight.”

  “What?”

  “Pretend you know me or we’re dead,” he insisted quietly. Then in a louder voice he said, “Baby, I’m only a little late getting here. I told you I was sorry about last night. You don’t have to be so angry with me. No harm done.”

  The light in Sonny’s eyes flared. “What are you doing?”

  He lowered his voice, his lips barely moving. “If you don’t want to be detained and questioned by these fine officers for hours on end, or even days, you’ll follow my lead. Get it?”

  She shook her head. “No. I won’t go with you.”

  “Come on, baby, don’t be sore and leave. Our vacation isn’t even over yet. Let’s have some fun.”

  His heart rate kicked up a notch when he noticed their little altercation was indeed stirring real interest from the gun boys. Sammy Soldier’s finger had already moved into position on that bad-ass-looking gun strapped around his shoulder.

  “You don’t have any idea of what you’re doing,” she whispered, her voice cracking. “I need to get on that plane right now.”

  “And I need to find your brother. You remember him, right? Cash? He needs to come clean or he’ll owe my boss a cool million when he finally shows his face.”

  Gil hadn’t expected her reaction. Panic, yes. Defiance, most definitely. Her brother was on the run and everything he’d uncovered about Sonny Montgom­ery was that she was tight with her family. He hadn’t expected her wide-eyed expression of...hope?

  “Do you know where Cash is?” she asked desper­ately.

  He shook off the feeling that looking into her big deep blue eyes gave him. They were the color of the ocean with little flecks of green and gold that sparkled unlike anything he’d ever seen. She’d changed her hair—curled the ends somehow, making it more sophisticated than the messy style she’d favored these past few days. Or maybe it was just the heat and humidity.

  He laughed, mostly to pull his gaze away from the slight tilt of her nose and the intense way her eyes were now peering at him.

  “Yeah, right.”

  “Tell me. If you know where he is, tell me where I can find my brother.”

  * * *

  Sonny couldn’t believe the break. Okay, it was the absolute wrong time for her to be just standing there in the middle of the airport like this. But if this man truly knew anything about Cash, she had to find out what it was. Dylan could use the in­formation to find him. She hated that she hadn’t had any contact with Dylan since she’d come down to Colombia—she had no idea if he’d succeeded in finding Cash on his own.

  They called her flight again. She glanced at the security checkpoint. Lucia had specifically told her to book this flight at this time because there would be less of a wait in the security line. If this guy didn’t get out of her way fast, she wouldn’t make it in time to board her flight.

  The voice on the loudspeaker spoke in Spanish first and then English. “Last call for all passengers boarding flight 1031 for Miami, Florida.”

  “I have to get on that plane,” she said. “Please, tell me what you know now. I need to go.”

  “You’re not going anywhere, lady. I need you to tell me where your brother is. As soon as you do, I’ll let go and you can fly to Miami.” The man tightened his grip on her arm.

  Her heart plummeted to the floor. He didn’t know. And now, she was wasting precious time by standing here with him.

  She quashed her disappointment as Ellie stirred in her baby carrier. She was probably hungry. But until they were in the air, Sonny wouldn’t be able to do anything to satisfy her.

  “Let go of me,” she said. “Can’t you see you’re up­setting my baby?”

  “Your baby? Is that right? I didn’t know that Sonny Montgomery had a baby.” The man muttered something harsh under his breath as he glanced over her head and eyed the guards. “Terrific. We have company.”

  One of the guards started advancing toward them quickly. His gun looked old and dusty, but deadly all the same. Sonny knew there was little tolerance for Americans in Colombia. The government wanted their money and tourism, but there were stories of people coming for vacation and vanishing into thin air.

  It was a miracle that they’d been able to find the baby at all. But if word got out that Ellie was the baby taken from Eduardo Sanchez’s estate, Sonny was as good as dead—and no one back home would be the wiser.

  This morning when she’d fled the city with Torres, Sonny had questioned whether the baby in her arms was really Cash’s daughter. Cash had been so sec­retive about his life leading up to the time of his arrest and disappearance. It had been a surprise for Sonny’s whole family to find out that Cash had secretly married and had a baby girl who had been abducted by Eduardo Sanchez. After the shock of learning the truth had worn off, they all knew what they had to do. They had to rescue both Cash and Ellie.

  Even with all the information they’d been able to find about Eduardo Sanchez, there were many times during the long wait in that dingy hotel room in Monteria that Sonny fought with the notion she might be kidnapping a baby from her rightful parents. The thought of bringing pain to someone else like her sister-in-law was experiencing was too much to bear.

  But once Sonny had gotten over the shock of Lucia’s death and pushed the poncho off the basket with the sleeping baby inside, she instantly knew. One look at the child and Sonny saw her own mother. This baby was a Montgomery through and through, and Sonny knew there was no turning back. She had to make sure Ellie made it back to the United States. Back to Cash and his wife, Serena.

  The guard’s voice was commanding as he yelled at them in Spanish.

  “I’m sorry. We were just leaving,” the man said, turning his attention away from her but keeping his hand firmly in place on her arm.

  The guard looked vicious as he shouted at them again. It was hard to keep up with the fast-paced Colombian dialect but Sonny got the gist of it. He wanted them to state their business. She could talk to them—tell them that this man was keeping her from getting on her plane—but would they just detain her further while sorting it all out?

  And what about the baby? She really didn’t want them to ask any questions about Ellie.

  If the stranger wanted to be reckless, she’d let him trip over his own feet. After all, he had caused the scene in the first place. If not for him, she and Ellie would be settling into their seat on the plane right now. But he seemed content to play innocent civilian, which only angered the guard further. A vein jumped on the guard’s bright-red neck, making her heart stop. That was enough for Sonny to step in.

  “Excuse me. My Spanish is a bit rusty,” she said. Then she told the guard in Spanish that she was all right and it was all just a misunderstanding.

  He seemed to consider her words. The last thing she needed was for them to ask for her passport. She’d be detained for sure. In the next few hours, news would get out about Ellie and it would all be over. But to her relief, the guard told them to move along or they’d be arrested.

  “My wife and I were just having a little fight. That’s all. A disagreement.” The stranger didn’t appear rattled, but Sonny guessed it was probably an act. How could he not be terrified by staring into the barrel of a gun only a few feet away?

  “What are you doing? It’s done,” she said quietly. “He’s letting us go. Thank you,” she said to the guard. The less said, the better.

  She stared straight ahead and started to walk toward the boarding gate, leaving them all behind. It took con­siderable strength to keep her breathing easy, as if she had every right to be holding this baby in her arms, taking her through the security gate and out of Colombia for good.

  Of course, she did. But if Eduardo Sanchez had anything
to say about it, the law in Colombia might not side with her.

  “Sorry to disturb you,” she heard the stranger say to the guard. But he came up behind her, taking her arm again and pulling her back. This time the other guard blocked their progress with his gun.

  Sonny’s heart stopped cold in her chest. The security gate was just a few feet away. So close. Damn him for stopping her!

  The last call was made for boarding. It was now or never. She needed to be on that plane, not embroiled in a disturbance with the local police. The baby started crying and the loudspeaker drowned out whatever the guard was barking at her. The other guards were watching them with renewed interest.

  Digging deep in her soul, Sonny gathered up all her strength. Pasting on a smile, she reached out and standing on her tippy toes, she pressed her lips to the stranger’s mouth and kissed him square on the lips.

  Turning back to the guards, she said, “See? It’s over. Just a simple lovers’ quarrel. You know, rifia? Sweet­heart, our plane is leaving. We need to go.”

  The stranger’s eyes bore into her. With surprise and determination in his voice, he said, “We’ll take another flight. I forgot my ticket.”

  Sonny’s stomach churned as she caught the impatient looks from the security crew. She couldn’t see the boarding gate beyond security, but she knew the ground crew would only wait so long before they’d close the door without her and she’d miss her chance to get back to the United States—maybe forever.

  “I...I’ll meet you back home then. I don’t want to miss this flight.”

  “Look,” the man said, bending toward her so only she could hear. “These guards are about as curious as kids on Christmas morning. You give them even the slightest reason to arrest you, they will. If you’re lucky. Otherwise, we’ll both be going home. In body bags. Again, if we’re lucky.” He smiled tightly as he pulled his head away and looked down at her.