Angel's Mission

by Pamela J. Nerren

  “What do you want?” she asked him in Spanish.

  He merely kept smiling at her. She looked at Kevin, wondering what to do, when a look of fear came over his face. Before she could turn around to see, a second gun cocked right behind her.

  Slowly, the man behind her began to circle her, looking her over as he did. As she remembered, he was tall and well-built. Exactly the opposite of his friend. Seeing him up close, she had a feeling that he was younger than he looked. He was very handsome except for the long, thin scar down his left cheek.

  “What do you think we want?” he asked her in perfect English, sliding the tip of his gun along the neckline of her dress. He stopped when he reached her right side, leaned in close to run his rough, callused fingers through her hair. “Your hair. it’s very fine, like silk. I knew it would be.” He bent his head close to hers, lifting her hair to his face he breathed deeply. “Ah.”

  Angel smelled the faint odor of his cologne mingled with the strong stench of rotgut whiskey. She turned her head away, pulling her hair out of his grasp and trying to hide her repulsion, without much success.

  “Your friend, Dr. Conner, must be wrong. I don’t believe you are a cold fish. You just need the right man to bring out your hidden passions,” he said.

  Angel snapped her head around. “What did you say?”

  “Your friend, Dr. Conner—he wants you and your…new love to disappear, but I have other plans for you.”

  “You’re a hired killer, a murderer?”

  They were about to die, and it was all her fault. Dr. Conner was taking his revenge out on both of them. What would happen to her children? Who would take care of them if she were dead? What would happen to Isabel, the orphanage?

  The gunman glared at Angel. “I…am a businessman,” he yelled.

  The shorter man spoke up in Spanish. “Jesús, don’t forget my trophy.”

  Jesús turned to berate his filthy friend. “Aaaaghhh! Do not rush me, Juan!”

  Jesús turned a smoldering look at her, his intent apparent. She cringed. “Oh God, You’re gonna rape me too.”

  It was more a statement than a question. He holstered his gun and pushed her back to sit on the edge of the van and quickly reached under her dress with both hands to pull off her silky red panties in one swift motion. Kevin lurched to her defense in spite of the gun to his head, but Juan jerked him by the arm and held him in place. Angel reached to pull down the hem of her dress.

  “Very nice.” Jesús held up her panties to admire them. “You have expensive tastes, I see.”

  Juan couldn’t contain his excitement. “Quick, let me have them.”

  A look of rage came over Jesús’s face. “Will you shut up? How many times do I have to tell you? Don’t rush me! I will do things my way, at my own pace! Estúpido! I should have killed you and your brainless sister three years ago when I had the chance!”

  Jesús reached out to touch Angel’s face when a single shot rang out. Angel screamed and jammed her hand over her mouth, trying to make herself as small as possible up against the inside wall of the van.

  Kevin tried to pull away from the filthy gunman, but Juan tightened his grip on Kevin’s arm and shoved the pistol hard into his side. Jesús looked down to see a small trickle of blood running down the center of his chest. His eyes closed, and he toppled into the van, landing beside Angel.

  Nobody moved.

  Nobody breathed.

  All of a sudden, the little girl they had seen in the van earlier ran around the corner of the building. She dropped her pink purse as she grabbed the remaining gunman’s pants legs and pulled at them. “No. Please don’t,” she begged in Spanish.

  Juan looked irritated at having been disturbed. He shook her loose from his leg, and she fell to the ground. “Get back to the van,” he ordered.

  The little girl stood back up and pulled on his pants leg again. “Please, mister. I have to go to the bathroom.”

  Angel move toward the little girl, and Juan turned the gun toward her.

  She froze. “Wait! Let me please take her to the bathroom, and then she can go back to the van.” The man only looked at her. “Please. It won’t take long.”

  The man hesitated, looking at her fixedly before he nodded. He pulled Kevin away from the outhouse door and pushed the barrel of the gun into the back of his head as he smiled wickedly. “We’ll be waiting for you.”

  Angel nodded and motioned for the little girl to come with her. The little girl picked up her purse, and they stepped inside the small outhouse.

  They almost had the door closed when Juan stuck his foot in. “Leave it open. You might try to escape.”

  Angel opened the door to let him see inside. “Where are we going to go?”

  There were no windows in the small structure, only a couple of small cutouts in the door and the back wall to let light in. Juan gave her a satisfied nod and backed away, letting the door shut behind him, not seeing the backpack behind the door.

  Angel leaned on the door and breathed a sigh of relief before she turned to the little girl, who looked hopefully up at Angel.

  “What’s your name?” Angel whispered in Spanish.

  “Angelita,” the little girl whispered back.

  “I can’t believe it,” Angel murmured to herself in English. “God sent us an angel.” She moved closer and sank to her knees, whispering to the little girl again in Spanish. “My name is Angelina, Angelina Meeker. Can you remember that?” The little girl nodded. “Do you really need to use the bathroom?” The little girl grinned and shook her head. Angel couldn’t help but smile at her initiative. “You’re pretty smart, aren’t you?” The little girl’s grin broadened, but she didn’t say anything. “Is anybody else with you?”

  The little girl nodded. “My brother Luis, and the man with a camera. The bad men taped their hands together. They give them medicine to make them sleep most of the time, but they are awake now,”

  Angel reached into the backpack. “Angelita, I need your help.” She pulled a small pocketknife out and held it up. “Do you know how to use this?”

  Little Angelita nodded. “Yes, my brother lets me see his knife sometimes, but, the men, they took it from him.”

  “Good. I need you to hide this and take it back to the van. Cut the tape off your brother’s and the man’s wrists. Tell the man that we are Americans and we need help, that they need to go get help, okay?”

  From the little girl’s description, the man tied up in the van could be anyone from a tourist to one of the pesky paparazzi who was always hounding her. She could only pray that whoever he was, he would have the presence of mind to help them—that was, if this little Angel could set him free.

  Little Angelita opened her small pink purse, and Angel dropped the knife into it. “Keep the sharp side away from his skin, okay?”

  She nodded. “Si.”

  Angel took a deep breath, and the little girl copied her. Then Angel smiled and reached for the door.

  Little Angelita ran out of the building and took off for the blue van without as much as a glance in the gunman’s direction. When the little girl disappeared from view, Angel walked casually out of the building with her hands on her hips. She was scared of the man but didn’t want him to see that.

  When she was several feet from the outhouse door, she turned her attention to the gunman and crossed her arms over her chest. He tightened his grip on Kevin’s arm, causing him to wince slightly. The two of them spent several minutes sizing each other up before Angel broke the silence. “Now what?” she asked, still speaking in Spanish.

  Juan gave her a wicked grin and motioned with his gun for her to come closer. She lowered her arms to her sides and walked over to stand in front of the remaining hired assassin. She flinched when he leaned closer and whispered in her ear, “Now, we go to the jungle.”

  He laughed and pushed both of them ahead of him, making them stumble. Kevin quickly gained his balance, but Angel fell to her knees. Kevin took her by the arm. “We h
ave to stall him,” she whispered as he pulled her up. She reached down to brush the dirt from her knees.

  Kevin’s expression went from curious to apprehensive. “Stall for what?” he whispered when she stood.

  “A small cavalry, I hope.”

  His look said he thought she’d lost her mind, but she didn’t have time to deal with that. Right now, she had to slow this crazy man down and try to keep them safe. She turned back to their captor. Juan and his dead friend had been hired to kill them, but that didn’t mean she would go down without a fight. “Why to the jungle?”

  He must have read her mind. “Don’t worry. I don’t want to kill you. I only want to watch.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “Watch what…exactly?” she asked, sure she didn’t want to hear the answer.

  “Just…watch.”

  “Us?”

  The gunman nodded. He pointed to both of them and made a crude attempt at a grinding motion with his hips.

  “Is he saying what I think he’s saying?” Kevin asked in disbelief.

  She nodded grimly. “If you think he wants to watch us have sex.”

  Kevin cocked an eyebrow and looked her up and down. When he grinned slightly, she smacked him across his arm. “Kevin!”

  He tried to look remorseful as he rubbed his sore, bruised arm. “What? This isn’t exactly what I want our first time to be like either.” The look she gave him said he was assuming a lot. “Well, that is…if we were to ever…well, you know, have a first time…maybe.”

  Angel shook her head and sighed. “It could be worse. He could want to have sex with me, or you…or worse, that sweet little girl.”

  “Ugh.”

  “Exactly.”

  “Habla español!” They both jumped as the gunman yelled at them.

  Angel pointed to Kevin. “No habla español.”

  When the gunman saw Kevin’s look of confusion, he looked at the ground and shook his head. Then he pointed his gun back at them and took several menacing steps toward them, muttering in Spanish under his breath, “Learn the language.” With his hostile approach, they each took a step back toward the van. “No, to the jungle!” he shouted at them.

  Angel pointed to the van. “Can I get a blanket?”

  Juan hesitated, then nodded.

  She hurried to the back of the van. The dead man was lying half in and half out of the door. She put one hand over her mouth at the wave of nausea that hit her. She reached for the doorframe, trying not to throw up. Behind her, Juan yelled for her to speed up, his perversion apparently much stronger than any feelings for his comrade. She nodded and climbed in the door.

  She crawled through her old Dodge, keeping her body as close to the wall as possible, trying to avoid touching the bloody corpse as she went. She picked up the blanket and had turned back toward the door when she spotted the dead man’s gun lying under his right shoulder. As she glanced out of the window, the gunman saw her and yelled again for her to hurry. She quickly pried the gun out from under the body and crammed it into the pocket of her dress, not daring to take a shot with a gun still pointed at Kevin. Moments later, they were cautiously walking into the dense foliage of the jungle behind the old outhouse. Juan, a few feet behind them, still trained his gun steadily on their backs. Angel momentarily lost her balance and almost fell when one of her sandals became entangled in the mass of vines that pulled at her feet. Kevin caught her by the waist, steadied her then bent to help her get free. He took her by the arm and continued to hold on to her as they made their way deeper into the jungle, cautiously stepping over an old fallen log, half-covered with vines.

  When they got to a small clearing, their captor paused. “Stop!” he ordered. He looked behind him, perhaps making sure he couldn’t see the outhouse on the hill or the road beyond it. When he was satisfied, he turned back to them and pointed to the clearing with his gun. “This will do.”

  Angel moved to the center of the clearing where she carefully and slowly unfolded the blanket, trying to buy them some time—time for little Angelita to cut loose the unknown man in the van, time for the man to hopefully come and rescue them. She spread the blanket out, fussing with the corners.

  She stood and walked back to Kevin. He quickly glanced over at the gunman before reaching out and taking both of her hands in his. “Are you ready for this?” he asked.

  She shook her head. “No, of course not, but I don’t see any way out of it.”

  He nodded and put his arms around her. He glanced again at the gunman, who had found himself a tree to lean on. “Yeah, me neither.”

  Juan gave them a smirk. “Enough already. You Americans, you take too long.”

  Angel’s eyebrows went up, and she whispered, “Apparently, he’s not into foreplay.”

  Kevin nodded to Juan and turned back to her with a sigh of resignation. “I think that’s all he’s into.” He released his hold on her and motioned for her to precede him onto the blanket. “Okay, let’s get on with it. Ladies first.”

  She protested, “No, you first. I’m going to be on top.”

  Kevin was visibly shocked, evidently unable to believe his Angel, his ‘just kissing’ Angel was suggesting positions. No, not suggesting—demanding. “What? No, no, no. I’m going to be on top.”

  She shook her head adamantly. “No, I have to be on top.”

  “Why do you have to be on top?” He shook his head, momentarily amused with his own question. “I can’t believe I just said that.”

  She took his face in her hands. “Kevin, please, I need to be on top. Please, trust me.”

  How many times had he asked her to do that very thing? Several seconds passed. He took one of her hands from his face and kissed her palm. Then he let her go and stepped onto the blanket.

  “I need your head to be in that corner.” She pointed to the opposite side of the blanket.

  He turned to look at her one more time then stretched out on the blanket like she had told him.

  Angel hesitated only briefly before she walked over and sat on top of Kevin, straddling his hips. She tried to hide her nervousness and smiled at him ever so slightly, but she couldn’t maintain eye contact. She simply couldn’t. This was not how she wanted things to go.

  “God help us,” Kevin said.

  “He’s working on it.”

  The gunman muttered something.

  “He wants you to pull your shorts down.”

  “I’m so sorry, Angel,” Kevin said.

  Angel nodded and rose on her knees while Kevin unfastened his khakis, sliding them and his boxer briefs down, skimming past his hips. When he nodded, she took a deep, steadying breath and, staring straight ahead, lowered herself down to straddle his semi-naked body.

  “Jeez,” he hissed through his teeth.

  She had forgotten she wasn’t wearing any panties. She took a deep breath and focused once more on their captor. If she couldn’t get him distracted, she would never be able to use the gun that was still hidden in her pocket. That is, provided she could master the courage to do so.

  “Kevin.” When he didn’t respond, she tried again, more forcefully this time, taking his hands firmly in hers. “Kevin!” He blinked twice and jerked his gaze back to her. “Look at me, Kevin,” she said, softer this time.

  As she reached for the ribbons that held her dress together, he reached up to stop her. He gently moved her hands away and reached for the dainty strips of ribbon. One by one, he pulled them loose. Once he had them undone, he pushed the front of her dress open and slowly slid the delicate straps off her shoulders, letting the dress fall to her waist.

  Angel watched in wide-eyed wonder as he slowly undressed her. Something about the way he looked at her sent her pulse racing. The need she felt for him permeated the air around her, consuming her, making it hard to breath. She wanted this man…desperately.

  When he finished his slow, sensual unwrapping of her, she reached for his hands and shakily guided them to her. “Touch me,” she whispered, placing his hands over the swe
ll of her breasts. “We have to make this look real.”

  After a few hesitant seconds, Kevin moved his fingertips over her pale skin, lightly tracing their delicate veins. He looked her in the eye, and Angel knew he saw the passion she was trying to hold at bay. “This is real.”

  His words both terrified and excited her, and she arched her back slightly, giving him more access to explore her. She grew damp between her thighs when his gentle touch sent chills up her spine, making her shiver slightly in spite of the heat of the jungle. She slid her fingers away from his hands, descending them down over her dress, down her bare thighs to his waist. Undoing the buttons of his shirt, her fingers softly grazed his body. When every button was undone, she pushed his shirt aside. His smooth, muscled chest begged her to come explore, and, gingerly, she reached out, to caress him.

  When Kevin closed his eyes, she took the opportunity to glance at Juan. Still several feet from the clearing, he was leaning against a vine-covered tree, watching them intently. When his eyes locked with hers, he smiled a crude smile and rubbed himself directly over the crotch of his pants. Not bothering to suppress her revulsion, Angel quickly turned her attention back to the man underneath her.

  Kevin’s breathing intensified. He grew hard beneath her as she lightly grazed his nipples, leisurely working her way up to his jaw line. Tenderly, she caressed his bottom lip with the pad of her thumb, wanting to taste him there—knowing she soon would.

  He left the warmth of her supple breasts and easily slid his fingers under the hem of her dress. Running his hands up her inner thighs, he found her sensuous, warm, wet folds there enticing him. He slid the pad of his thumb over her sweet nub and she gasped. He tried to remember the last time he’d felt anything as perfect as being with her, but nothing came to mind. He could barely think at all.

  Kevin felt a sense of loss when she moved away. Then, without warning, the heat of her tongue was millimeters above his navel. His sharp intake of air made her smile, and she softly kissed his chest, following the trail she had already blazed with her fingertips. Lightly grazing his chest with her nipples, she slowly worked her way up to his warm, wet lips and gently sucked his bottom lip into her mouth,