Total Meltdown

by Elle James

  “Why do we have to leave?” Robbie asked. “Is it because of the bad guys?”

  “Bad guys,” Mari repeated while hugging her doll and rocking back and forth.

  “Your father thinks it would be better if we go back home to Texas until they catch the bad guys and put them in jail.”

  Robbie brightened. “Then can we come back and go fishing again?”

  Lily bit her lip to keep from asking him when he’d stopped hating fishing. Apparently, whatever talk he’d had with Tony had made him feel better about their day on the boat before they’d been attacked. “I’m not sure if we’ll be back this summer. But I’m staying with you at the ranch until your father comes home.”

  “Yay!” Robbie cried and flung his arms around her. “I love you, mama.”

  Mari ran over to Lily and flung her arms around her legs. “I love you, mama.”

  A lump formed in Lily’s throat. She didn’t have the heart to remind them that she wasn’t their mother. Robbie had blurted it out without realizing what he was saying. Mari had mimicked her brother.

  Both statements had gone straight to Lily’s heart. She would love being Robbie and Mari’s mother. They were such good kids, and they deserved to be loved and happy. Swallowing hard, she refused to shed tears. They had too much to do to get on the road in time to make the flight through the break in the weather.

  When they were dressed and packed, Lily met Tony in the living room.

  He’d been on the phone since she’d left him, but he’d managed to pull on his clothes and shoes while making arrangements to fly his family to Texas.

  “Good news,” he said. “I arranged for a charter flight that will leave out a few minutes earlier than the commercial flight. They’re pretty sure you’ll make it over or between the storm clouds in time. If they think the situation will be too dangerous, they’ll divert to someplace else safer to land and wait out the storm.”

  “We packed sufficient clothing to hole up somewhere for a few days, if we have to,” Lily said. “And toys for entertainment.”

  Robbie reached for his father’s hand. “Can’t you come with us, Papi?”

  Tony squatted down beside his son. “You know I would if I could.” He hugged Robbie and then Mari. “I love you both so much. Robbie, I’m counting on you to take good care of your sister.” To Mari he said, “And Mari, I want you to listen to Miss Grayson. She’s going to help Robbie take care of you.”

  “Te amo, Papi.” Her bottom lip quivered, and she flung her arms around her father’s neck.

  “Are you coming with us to the airport?” Lily asked.

  “Yes and no,” he said evasively. “I’m setting up a bait and switch deal. The short answer is no. I won’t be with you on the trip to San José. But yes, I’ll be at the airport to see you off.”

  Lily swallowed her disappointment and tried to be brave. “I understand.”

  “If anyone is following us, I want them to come after me, not you and the kids.”

  “Then this is the last time we’ll have together, just you and us,” Lily said. She looked up into his face. “Remember, I quit.”

  He grinned. “No, I fired you.”

  “Whatever.” She reached out and grabbed the front of his shirt, bringing him close. “Kiss me like you mean it,” she demanded.

  “Oh, darlin’, I mean it all right.” And he proceeded to prove it, kissing her until she almost passed out from lack of oxygen.

  “Te amo, Tony,” she whispered ever so softly she was sure he wouldn’t hear.

  He leaned back and brushed a strand of her hair back behind her ear. “Lily, you’ve changed my life.”

  She chuckled. “I hope in a good way.”

  He brushed her lips with his. “In a very good way. I’m not letting go of that.” Tony reached into his pocket and pulled out a chain with a pretty amber stone pendant. “I want you to wear this until I see you again. It’s not anything special, just something that will remind you of me.” He looped it over her head.

  Lily tucked it under her shirt, close to her heart. He could have given her an old rock, and she’d have felt as treasured.

  Tony squatted beside Mari and pulled a similar but shorter chain from his pocket with a pink stone and looped it over Mari’s head. “A pretty for my pretty hija.”

  Mari grinned and flung her arms around her father’s neck. “Te amo, Papi.”

  “What about me?” Robbie said.

  Tony straightened. “I figured a necklace wouldn’t do for my little man. He pulled a shiny silver disk-like coin from his pocket and handed it to Robbie. “This is a lucky coin. Keep it in your pocket, and you will have good luck on the trip back to Texas.”

  Robbie stared down at the disk and smiled. “Gracias, Papi.” He put it in his pocket and hugged his father. “I will keep it always.”

  Then they were on their way down the elevator and climbing into one of the two SUVs that would be making the trip to San José. Tony explained that the second SUV would contain Hank and two of his guys.

  Marcus and Tony would ride with Lily and the kids to start with. Then they would stop for fuel along the way and switch it up, car and all.

  “They want me,” he said, his gaze steady. “I’m going to divert El Patron’s men away from you and the kids. If they attack anything, it will be the vehicle I’m in.”

  Lily would rather have kept the family together, but she understood what they were attempting. At this point, keeping the children safe was more important than keeping them with their father.

  They started off in the two SUVs, moving northwest on Highway 34. In the little village of Parrita, they stopped at a service station.

  Mari and Robbie both had to use the bathroom. Lily accompanied them to the restroom inside the station while Tony, Marcus, Hank and Hank’s men covered the building, both inside and out.

  Lily was finishing up, washing Mari and Robbie’s hands when an explosion rocked the building. Plaster and dust shook free from the ceiling, showering down on them and making the bathroom cloudy with a fine haze of powdery dust.

  Lily shielded Robbie and Mari with her body, shock making her freeze where she stood. When the shaking stopped, Lily pulled herself together and tried the door. It was jammed. Bracing her foot on the wall, she pulled with all her might. She had to get the children out of the building quickly, before the roof and walls caved in on top of them.

  On her third attempt to open the door, it finally budged enough for her to get her arm and shoulder through the space. Leaning her back into it, she got the door open enough to get out and bring the children with her.

  The station was in shambles, the path to the front impossible to navigate with the ceiling hanging down and live wires exposed.

  Lily turned toward the back exit. The explosion had blown the door open, and sunlight shone in, reflecting off the dust particles and creating a bright haze she couldn’t quite see through.

  Grasping Robbie and Mari’s hands in hers, she ran for the back of the building and burst out into the open.

  Hands grabbed her. She released her hold on the children and went into defense mode, jerking her knee upward, hitting the man in the groin. Then she slammed the heel of her palm against his nose, driving the cartilage up into his head. He released her and grabbed his face.

  But it was too late. Two other men had snatched the children and held them with hands over their mouths and guns pointed at their heads.

  The dark-haired man with beady dark eyes holding Robbie growled low in a Hispanic accent, “Come quiet, or we will kill them.”

  Lily held up her hands in surrender. She couldn’t do anything but meet their demands. Robbie and Mari’s lives were at stake.

  The man, whose nose she’d busted, pulled a gun and held it to her head,

  “No,” the other man said, softly. “No noise.” He jerked his head toward a back alley and turned. Then he lifted Robbie in his arms and carried him away,

  Mari kicked and bit the hand over her mouth
. The man holding her clamped his hand over her mouth and nose.

  “You’ll suffocate her,” Lilly cried out. “Let me take her. We won’t fight.” She couldn’t escape, not when they had Robbie, and they had guns pointed and could kill any one of them with the twitch of a trigger finger.

  Lily and the children were hurried down the back alley to a van and shoved inside.

  Once she regained her balance, Lily pulled Robbie and Mari into her arms and held them tight. The men who’d captured her got in with them, and the driver pulled out of the alley and onto a side road, away from the main street.

  How long would it take Tony, Hank and the others to figure out they were missing?

  With the children huddled close, shivering from fear and crying softly, Lily prayed it wouldn’t be long.

  Chapter 12

  When the explosion went off, Tony was thrown halfway across the inside of the station and hit his head against a brick wall. The force of the explosion must have knocked him out. How long he laid there in the rubble, he wasn’t sure. When he came to, he pushed to his knees and looked around, blinking at the dust filling the air.

  “Tony! Lily!” Marcus’s voice sounded through the haze.

  Something thick and warm dripped into Tony’s eye, and he wiped it away. “Here,” he said, his voice coming out as a croak. He coughed and tried again. “I’m here.”

  Marcus appeared through the fog of dust. “Tony, you all right?” He grabbed Tony’s arm and helped him to his feet. “Where are the kids? Where’s Lily?”

  “Kids?” Tony shook his head, and the room spun. Then everything rushed back at him. “Lily. Robbie. Mari.”

  “That’s right. Where are they?”

  “They were in the bathroom. I was standing by the door.” He looked around, his pulse pounding hard, pain throbbing in his head. “They were in the bathroom.” He shoved Marcus’s hand away from his arm and staggered through the debris toward the bathroom door.

  Ceiling plaster and rubble lay against the half-open door.

  Tony used his shoulder to shove the door wide open. The room was empty. He spun, his heart hammering, his vision blurring. “Where are they? We have to find them.”

  “There’s a back door,” Marcus said through the swirling dust.

  Tony followed the silhouette of his friend through the cloud, out into the open air.

  Hank and his men rounded the sides of the building, their faces and arms covered in cuts and scrapes.

  “Someone shot a rocket at us,” Hank called out. “Is everyone all right?”

  “Tony’s got a head injury,” Marcus said. “My ears are ringing, but we’re alive.”

  Tony turned to Hank. “Where are Lily and the kids? Tell me you have them.”

  Hank shook his head. “They were inside with you. When the rocket hit, we were all thrown.”

  “They must have been watching,” Tony said. He pressed a hand to his forehead that had started stinging and felt a warm sticky liquid. When he pulled his hand away, it was covered in blood. He didn’t care.

  El Patron had his family.

  “We have to find them,” Tony said through gritted teeth. “We can’t let Patron hurt them.”

  “Did you give them the tracking devices?” Hank asked.

  Tony nodded, his head coming up, hope daring to fill his chest. “The tracking monitor. Where is it?”

  “In the SUV.” Hank turned and ran around the side of the building.

  Tony and the rest of them followed.

  The SUVs had taken a beating. One had suffered severe damage: the windows were shattered and two of the tires were flat. The other had been parked next to the solid side of the station where concrete bricks had shielded it from complete destruction.

  Hank reached into the glove compartment of the rear vehicle, retrieved the hand-held device and turned it on.

  Tony leaned over his shoulder, a hard knot lodged in his throat. El Patron had his family.

  Madre de Dios, that bastard had his family.

  It was all he could do not to fall to his knees in despair. Tony shook his head, the pain that shot through him reminding him that as long as he was alive, he’d find them, and he’d kill El Patron.

  “There.” Hank pointed at three bright green dots almost blended together on the screen. “They’re traveling up…Highway 239, into the hills.” He looked up. “Let’s go.”

  With one of the vehicles out of commission, they transferred their weapons to the functioning SUV and all six of them climbed in.

  Marcus took the driver’s seat and Hank called shotgun. Tony sat behind Marcus and leaned through the middle to see the tracking device.

  They sped out of Parrita and turned right at the junction of the two highways. The road was narrow and wound through the hills. They couldn’t go too fast or they risked careening out of control and over the edge of the road.

  Tony clenched his fists and prayed they caught up with El Patron’s vehicle. And he prayed the cartel wouldn’t kill Lily and the kids out of pure spite. If they wanted him badly enough, they’d use them as hostages for trade. Tony was all right with that. He’d rather die than any of them. And once he was dead, Patron would have his revenge. He wouldn’t need to kill Tony’s children and their au pair.

  Deep down, Tony knew the chances of any of them coming out alive were slim. If El Patron held the cards, he’d kill them all and be done with the Delossantos.

  Tony glanced around at the dusty, dirty, scraped and scratched men who’d just survived a bombing. If anyone could help him get his family back, these were the men to do it.

  He focused on the road ahead and the success of the mission. Believing was halfway to winning.

  * * *

  After at least an hour on the road, the van left the highway and bumped along a rutted path through dense vegetation. After being thrown around for twenty minutes more, they came to a halt and her captors got out of the van.

  As the side door slid open, a shout rang out, “El Patron!”

  Lily had known in the back of her mind that one of the men with her had to have been the infamous cartel kingpin. She had hoped she could affect an escape for the three of them before she ran into that particular man. He had a reputation for his cruelty, and Lily didn’t want her or the children to be made the examples of his horrifying appetite for gore.

  The driver and another man grabbed her arm and yanked her out of the van.

  Lily kept her hold on Mari, refusing to let them take her from her. Robbie cowered behind her, holding onto the hem of her shirt.

  Already, Lily was sizing up her options, counting the number of her opponents and searching for potential escape routes.

  The cartel camp was located well off the beaten path, deep in a tropical jungle with rugged hills rising above them.

  If she could sneak the children past the men guarding her, she could hide in the jungle and make her way back to the main highway.

  If she knew which way that was. Escaping through a jungle wasn’t what would make it difficult. Running with two small children would be next to impossible. But to stay captive and risk El Patron killing them wasn’t an option.

  Lily and the children were taken to a small shack, smaller than the size of her dorm room in college. Hastily constructed of plywood and tin, it was situated at the back of the camp. They were shoved inside, and the door closed behind them. The sound of a bar sliding in place might as well have been a lock with no key. Mari clung to her, and Robbie leaned against her side, his fingers curling into her shirt.

  With no windows, the room was dark. The only light was that which found its way around the cracks between the door and the frame and between the tin roof and the tops of the walls. Slowly, her vision adjusted to the darkness, and she took stock of her surroundings. The room was completely empty with nothing she could use as a weapon. The dirt floor was hardpacked. Digging their way out would be difficult with their bare hands.

  “Are the bad men going to kill us?” Robbie
asked, his voice catching on a sob.

  “Not if I can help it,” Lily said. “What I need you to do now is be strong for Mari. If we have a chance to get out of here, you need to be ready to run. Got it?”

  Robbie nodded against her.

  “Okay, let’s see if there’s a way to get out of here,” she murmured.

  The ceiling of the shack was nothing more than corrugated tin, sagging a little in the middle because whoever had built the shack hadn’t bothered to use rafters. The only thing holding up the roof were the four walls.

  Lily set Mari on her feet while she inspected the walls, pushing against the plywood, hoping to find a weak spot she could take advantage of. Having been constructed recently, the plywood was in reasonably good shape. It wasn’t going to mold and fall apart anytime soon.

  Looking up at the roof, she jumped and pressed her fingers to the corrugated tin. It moved, lifting up on one end near the wall. Her heart fluttered. Could it be they hadn’t nailed it to the wall at that point?

  She jumped again, her fingers pushing against the tin, lifting it up. If she could push it high enough, they might be able to crawl over the edge and drop to the ground.

  She dropped to her knees. “Robbie, get on my shoulders.”

  “Why?” he asked, while slinging his leg over her shoulder and straddling the back of her neck.

  “I want you to push up on the ceiling to see how high it will go.”

  Robbie raised his hands above his head and pushed against the tin.

  It rose, creating a gap big enough to fit a small adult through the opening.

  Her heart beat hard in her chest. This could be their way out. All she had to do was figure out how to scale the wall without a ladder or stool to step up on.

  A scraping sound indicated someone was pushing the bar across the door.

  Lily lowered Robbie off her shoulders and set him on the ground. Then she took Robbie and Mari’s hands and faced the door and the man who entered.