It reminded her to keep the role-play alive and that gave her an idea on how to get answers to some of the many questions she wished she could openly ask Duardo.
“The scar on your back,” she said. “Is that why you use a cane?”
“I ask the questions,” he snapped.
“What, I’m supposed to shut up unless spoken to?” she shot back. She kept her gaze on her feet, to keep the challenge less confrontational. “You like fucking mechanical dolls so much?”
Silence.
She resisted the need to look around to see what his reaction was. Instead, she concentrated on the soap in her hands and lathering it across her stomach. The silence stretched on and she realized he would not answer her question directly. It would be an admission that she was right.
She rinsed the soap off. “I figure someone shot you in the back,” she prompted. “Do you know who made you a gimp?”
“There are many of us with scars on our backs,” Zalaya answered dryly. “Which proves the lack of honor in the Vistarian army. But for me, that is an old scar. That is not why I must use a cane.”
She looked at him then. “I didn’t see any other scars,” she said. Challenge, always challenge, she reminded herself. “I got a pretty good look at you buck-naked a while ago.”
“You were not looking closely enough then.” He turned his knee out and lifted the edge of the robe. At that angle, she could see the hamstring on the back of his right leg. A thick, viciously red, almost writhing scar ran for eight inches down the length of it. It was recent. The flesh around it was colorless and delicate. “A sniper shot me—also from behind,” he explained with a humorless smile. “It tore the tendon from the bone, shredded the muscle and shattered the femur. It also nicked the great artery. They replaced my blood three times over before they could control the wound.” He replaced the robe and folded his arms again. “They told me I would not ever again be able to use the leg—that I would be a cripple. I told them...” He grinned. “I told them I always get my way.”
Her heart jumped and cold touched her. How did Duardo get that scar? Her mind raced as she forced herself to casually bathe.
Duardo could not fake such a scar over the long term. Somehow, he had been shot a second time. Only, he had been taken into the infirmary and then possibly to the city hospital...
Yet he was playing Zalaya, so this wound had to be Zalaya’s.
It fell into place with almost an audible click. Zalaya had been wounded and sent to hospital. Duardo had been in the same hospital. That was where the deception had begun. That was where, somehow, Duardo had become Zalaya.
She shut off the water with a snap of her wrist, making the chain rattle, and reached for a towel. She glanced at the mirror. More words were there.
You must leave. I will help. For now, play the part. D.
Minnie stared at the words, her heart hammering. She could not reach the mirror to leave her own message for the chain was not long enough. It meant she had no way to protest.
She had no intention of leaving without him.
She heard him moving. The scrape of the chair over the thick carpet. A drawer opening. Small sounds.
When she stepped out of the bathroom, she found him fully dressed in the black trousers and simple shirt. He tossed the paper bag from the previous evening onto the bed.
“Wear that,” he said shortly and picked up the cane where it leaned against the bed. He pointed to the door that opened onto the security control room. “I have a meeting in my office in ten minutes. You will serve coffee.”
He left without waiting for her answer.
Aware that she was within camera range again and that someone might be staring at the monitors in the next room, she kept her face neutral, tipped the contents of the bag onto the bed and inspected them. A pair of high stiletto shoes. A baby-doll nightgown. Delicate organza roses decorated the triangles that would cover her breasts, the rest of the tiny garment was sheer pink chiffon, with satin bows over the shoulders. She held up the tiny panties. They were also sheer pink chiffon. She would be more naked than if she poured coffee, well, buck-naked. This would call attention to her body.
Play the part, Duardo said. She fingered the chiffon, the chain clinking softly. So be it. If Zalaya wanted to parade her in front of his men, he’d get a parade and damn his eyes.
She got dressed.
Chapter Thirteen
He came for her after fifteen minutes.
Minnie leaned against the foot of the bed, her arms crossed, with a bored expression. He unlocked the cuff secured to the foot of the bed without comment and made no attempt to catch her gaze with his own.
From the other side of the partly open door she could hear the murmur of male voices. Fast Spanish interspersed with low chuckles.
Zalaya carried the cuff through to his office, drawing the chain with him. The chain tugged her into motion and she strolled through the doorway, trying to make her stance and her bearing as careless as possible. It was difficult to pull off because she was shaking and her adrenaline was surging in sickly waves. With Duardo as Zalaya, she knew that no matter what Zalaya demanded of her, Duardo would find a way to protect her from the worst of it. He was already risking much by keeping her in his room. The other Insurrectos had been disappointed that he didn’t place her directly into the bordello, which meant keeping her had been a break with custom. Breaks in custom could breed suspicion, but he had taken the chance anyway.
Now he had to dangle her before this congregation of savages because that was also something that Zalaya would do. It was even more important that she keep up the façade when she was in the same room as these men.
As she stepped through, Zalaya was closing the cuff around the drawer handle. There were five officers, all sitting around Zalaya’s desk. They looked up at her and eyes widened, a jaw dropped. Soto was there again and his slow smile was the worst, as his eyes crawled over her.
There was a chuckle and a comment in Spanish. Minnie understood enough words to put together the intent of it. Is this the latest toy, Zalaya?
Zalaya shrugged, sat at his desk and brought his leg up to rest the booted heel on the surface. “I’ve yet to decide if she is worth the trouble,” he said in Spanish. He pointed to the communications console on the other side of his desk. “The tray there. Pour coffee for everyone,” he said in English. “And don’t spill any on the console.”
“She’s American?” one of the men said, sounding displeased.
Minnie slid past the back of Zalaya’s tilted chair, heading for the wide console where the big silver tray sat, loaded with a huge coffeepot and stacks of crockery and condiments.
“Australian,” Zalaya corrected. “Although we’re still confirming that.”
Minnie realized that Zalaya’s Spanish was clear and easier to understand than the others’. He used none of the metaphors and slang that peppered the others’ talk.
“Does she understand us?” came the cautious question.
“Enough, I think,” Zalaya answered. “Do not trouble yourself about security, Correa. What she learns will never leave here.”
A shudder rippled down Minnie’s spine. She understood that implication only too clearly. Zalaya was not bothering to hide anything from her because she would not survive to pass the information along.
She shook her hand to get the cuff out of the way and picked up the first bowl of heavily spiced coffee. She placed it in front of the closest officer—an unshaven, grossly fat man with wobbling jowls and sharp eyes that ogled her breasts as she leaned over to place the bowl down. As she straightened up he grabbed her rear and squeezed painfully.
She stepped back half a step and her spiked heel rammed down on his instep. As he grunted and grabbed at his boot, she turned away without comment and picked up the second cup. The officer she placed it in front of didn’t touch her, but he chuckled as she turned away and so did the others. She saw in one of the monitors on the console that he was holding his hands up as
if he were weighing a pair of melons in each hand. He was silently describing her breasts to the rest of them, who were chuckling their appreciation.
She gritted her teeth harder and brought the third cup over to Soto. He was not laughing. Nor did he smile. There was sweat at his temple as he watched Minnie with the intensity of a cat watching a mouse.
She put the cup down carefully, just as Soto’s hand rammed its way between her thighs.
She jerked back, looking for his shoe with her heel and unable to find it. His other hand grabbed her breast and the rest of the men in the room chuckled, including Zalaya.
She tried to take another step back and this time the results were immediate and spectacular, for the chain around her wrist had somehow looped itself around Soto’s bowl of coffee. Her step backward jerked the entire bowl into Soto’s lap.
Soto clutched at his crotch and screamed. He pulled at the steaming, sodden fabric of his pants, squirming on the chair.
“Idiot!” Zalaya cried. He pulled on the chain to bring her around the table to his side then grabbed her arm and pushed her into the bedroom. Duardo was getting her out of the snake pit.
She turned in time to see him unlock the cuff from his desk with jerky, furious movements. His face was red with anger. How did he do that? He looked certifiable. He slapped the cuff back around the bed frame.
“You are useless,” he told her in Spanish, which meant he wanted the men behind him to hear. The door behind him was wide open and everyone but Soto was leaning to see into the room, their heads bobbing as they moved to see around Zalaya’s back.
The name of the game was humiliation, Minnie reminded herself.
He went back into the office, his cane thumping. The sound of the lock turning on the office door was another thud.
Minnie stared at the closed door. It wasn’t really closed. There was a whole bank of monitors out there at his command. His view of her out there was as clear as the view he’d had of her when he had sat upon the chair watching her shower that morning. His men could see her just as easily on the monitors.
Minnie made herself stretch like a cat, long and luxuriously. She ruffled her hair to portray total indifference as she thought swiftly. She would not give them a second’s more entertainment than possible and if they were watching the monitors, she knew they would be ogling her again and making crude comments to each other.
She gave another yawn, climbed into the bed and pulled the covers over herself. Let them watch a shapeless mound under the blankets instead.
But beneath the blankets she could smell Duardo. It reminded her of the night of abandoned entertainment she had indulged in. It brought images and sense impressions zinging back into her memory.
She shivered and curled into a ball under the blanket and let the mindless peace of sleep take her.
As she slipped into sleep, her mind returned instead to the moment the bowl of spiced coffee slipped from the table. She had made sure the chain did not tangle with the bowls as she’d slipped the cuff high up on her forearm to keep it out of the way. How had it fallen over Soto’s bowl?
Duardo must have slipped it over when the men were all watching what Soto was doing to her. The spilled coffee had given him the excuse to scream at her and throw her back into the bedroom, out of their reach.
He had been protecting her all along.
* * * * *
“God, I can’t stand it!” Nick cried, clutching his hands to his head.
Josh glanced over his shoulder to make sure the office door was firmly shut, then crouched to pick up the spill of folders and paperwork Nick had thrown up into the air to accompany his declaration.
“What makes you so special?” Josh asked carefully. “Plenty of other heads of government put up with it.”
“Christ, they have money for a start.” Nick lifted his head from his hands and shook it. “Everyone has this sublime faith that I can just figure this out, but I can’t fight physics. I can’t fight facts.”
“Don’t, then. Go around them,” Josh said, pretending a blitheness he did not feel. It had taken a while, but Josh only now understood that Nick kept him close was because Josh was one of the few non-Vistarian people Nick trusted enough to disgorge his doubts, fears and hesitancies.
Nick rolled his eyes. “How the hell does one launch a beachhead assault without a beachhead?”
“You’ve got a beachhead—it’s three hundred yards from here.”
“And the equipment?”
“Buy it.”
“Landing craft don’t come cheap.”
“Use credit. Every other freaking country in the world does.”
“They have security.”
“And you’re a bellyaching old woman,” Josh said calmly.
Nick grinned.
Josh cleared his throat. “You’re just letting the scale get to you. Running a country and organizing a counter-revolution is just like running a business and a hostile take-over. Just a whole lot bigger.”
Nick’s smile faded. “It’s not the scale that’s the problem,” he said. “I’ve been thinking on that sort of scale all my life. It’s the impossible-to-solve stuff that’s bothering me.”
“At a high enough level, nothing’s impossible to solve.” It was Calli’s voice that interrupted. She stood at the private door that led to the master bedchamber, which everyone had insisted she and Nick continue to use after their wedding, a DVD disk in her hand. “Basic world economic theory. You should know that as well as me, Nick.”
Nick grimaced.
“She’s the economics professor,” Josh reminded him.
“Almost professor,” she added. She came into the room, kissed Nick’s temple and stepped over to the small TV and DVD player on the sideboard behind his desk and shoved the cassette into the maw of the player and switched the TV on. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but I thought you’d both like to see this. General Blanco brought it to me.”
Nick took a deep breath and shoved his hands into his pockets. “Go.”
She hit play.
It was the breakfast news and business show of one of the Acapulco television networks. Because the majority of the population in Acapulco were tourists and inclined to sleep in late, the news show was a low-ratings one. As a result, it was free to provide hardcore news of interest to real Acapulco residents and the antics of Mexico’s near neighbor formed part of that interest.
The footage concerned some sort of official visit by Serrano to the poorer communities along the eastern coast. In fast Spanish the commentator exclaimed over Serrano’s generosity as the camera captioned him dolling out the big Vistarian currency in fistfuls to happy family members gathered around him laughing and crying tears of gratitude.
Josh winced. “It’s so melodramatic I want to puke. Surely anyone with half a brain can figure out he’s doing it purely for the PR?”
“The families getting the money don’t care about that,” Nick said quietly. “What I want to know is how the Acapulco station got this footage. Vistaria has been sealed tighter than a drum for the last three weeks.”
Calli clicked her tongue and stopped the tape. “You’re both missing it,” she said and set the clip back. She played it again. “Watch the background,” she warned.
They watched again and this time Josh lurched to his feet at the same time Nick breathed, “Jesus Maria!”
Calli paused the playback and backed it up a few frames at a time until the image was back in frame. They all stared at the ocean view the sweeping camera shot had included. The lone yacht in the bay stood out like a sore thumb.
“That’s your boat, Nick,” Josh murmured.
“What’s that flapping from the sheets?” Nick asked, narrowing his eyes. “The image is too small.”
“They’re dresses,” Calli said quietly. “One red, one green.”
He looked at her. “You’re sure?”
“I’ve seen more dresses hanging loose than you have. I’m sure.”
Josh pushed his han
d through his hair. “Then Calli guessed right. They’re over there.”
Nick was still staring at the television. “Is this a message?” he asked of no one. “A message for us?”
“From whom?” Calli asked. “And saying what?”
“From Minnie and Carmen,” Josh offered. “‘Na-na, we’re over here’.”
Calli gave him a gentle look. “Neither of them are that stupid. Whatever the reasons they went over there, I guarantee they know the risks they’re taking. They wouldn’t indulge in a childish gesture.”
Nick punched the button that ejected the DVD and the television turned to snow. He flicked it off with another impatient jab. “I can’t deal with this right now,” he said, thrusting the disk at Calli. “Please.”
She nodded. “I’ll look into it. I’m better at recognizing dresses than you anyway.” She smiled.
Josh recognized that she was trying to lighten the moment, to assure Nick he could at least let go of that one responsibility. “All that almost-professor training, right?” he said to Calli.
“Absolutely,” she agreed. Then her eyes narrowed and she looked at Nick. “What was impossible, by the way?”
“Nothing. Don’t worry about—”
“Don’t tell me don’t worry,” she said swiftly. “What’s impossible?”
“According to you, nothing.”
“Try me.”
Nick took another deep breath. “Well, for a start, everything’s impossible without money.”
“Credit?” she countered in a thoughtful tone, her forehead wrinkling.
“Personally, I’m already extended so far I’m in danger of tipping off the end of the world. I’ve liquidated anything that is worth it, except this house as I assumed people would like shelter from the sun.”
She frowned harder. “National debt.” It was again a soft suggestion.
“We’re a nation without a country,” Nick said. “We have nothing to secure the loans against. Most of the countries that have the cash to lend us won’t deal with us on diplomatic levels. That means they can’t deal with us on economic matters either.”
“You’re thinking of the States,” she said.
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