Say Your Goodbyes

by Linda Ladd

  Jenn revived a bit, looked slightly more alert for a moment. “They’re giving me what I need, but they’ll leave me here alone if he tells them to. They answer to him.”

  “Okay, try to hold on a little longer. I’m coming to get you. It might take me a while but I’ll get there, I swear.”

  The nurse hung up the phone before she could answer. Novak felt a hell of a lot better. He turned to the Mayan. “Okay, now you can tell me where she is.”

  The Mayan sighed audibly. “You must know that I will die before I tell you that. Not unless you give me what I want in return for her.”

  Novak grimaced. “I guess what you want is that poor little abused girl I found on your boat, right? The one you tortured and starved? The one who can identify you as the bastard who did it to her? I’ll never turn her over to you, not in a million years.”

  The Mayan started desperately jerking on the cords. Then he just stopped, panting hard, and stared at Novak. “That poor little girl you took? She is my daughter, Carmelita. I would never hurt her. Never. I want to see her. I want to know that she is all right and being cared for.”

  Okay, now that sure as hell wasn’t anything Novak had been expecting. But he’d be stupid to believe it. “Your daughter, huh? Yeah, right. If she’s your kid, why’d I find her on your boat, bruised and beaten half to death and chained up in the bilge?”

  “Is she all right? You haven’t hurt her, have you? Was that her you carried upstairs a while ago. Is she up there now? Please let me see her.”

  “I don’t hurt children. She’s holding on. That guy on that island that you paid a visit to was the one who got an IV in her arm before it was too late, if you want to know the truth. If she makes it, he saved her life.”

  “I’m telling you the truth. Ask my baby, ask Carmelita who I am. Ask her who did those terrible things to her. She will tell you. It wasn’t me. I have never hurt her in my life. I couldn’t.”

  “She hasn’t spoken a word since she came around. She just lies there and stares at us, or cries herself to sleep.”

  “Let me see her. Let me see that she’s all right.” The Mayan’s voice was getting a tad shrill now, so he cut it off and controlled his anxiousness. Then he spoke more calmly. “Please, I beg you. Let me see my child.”

  Novak stared at him, not sure what to think. It seemed preposterous, but then again, maybe the guy was telling the truth. “You expect me to believe that if I bring that little girl in here, she’s going to tell me that you’re her father?”

  “Yes, yes, she will. She must be frightened to death. She’s been through so much. Marisol Ruiz took her from us. I swear that on the Holy Mother. She took her to blackmail me.”

  “Know what? I don’t believe a damn word you say. I want to know where Jenn is. Tell me that and then we’ll talk about the kid.”

  “No way. Not until I see my daughter is alive and well. Is she upstairs? Tell me. I saw you take her there.” He was twisting around, trying to look up at the bedrooms.

  Novak thought about it a moment, then decided it wouldn’t hurt anything to let him see the girl. No way could he harm her, not tied up the way he was. But it would tell Novak a whole lot. He pulled out his phone and dialed up Claire. When she picked up, he said, “Can you bring the little girl over here? This guy says he’s her father and she was kidnapped. I want to see her reaction to him. It’s safe enough. No way in hell can he get loose.”

  “You sure it’s not some kind of trick?” Claire asked, her tone telling Novak that she didn’t like the idea one bit.

  “He’s hanging by his arms from your banister. He’s not going to do anything I don’t want him to.”

  They hung up. The Mayan watched him. “Where is she? Is she not upstairs? Who was that I saw you carry up there?”

  “It wasn’t her. We would never put a child in danger like that. Don’t worry about it. She’s been in a safe place. They’re bringing her over, and then we’ll see if your story pans out, or not.”

  It took about forty-five minutes before the Cobalt roared back into the cove. The instant the Mayan heard the boat’s powerful motor, he strained to see out the window. Minutes later, the front door opened, and Black walked inside carrying the little girl in his arms. She had her head lying on his shoulder, her face turned away. Claire was right behind them. She had her Glock out, and she immediately pointed it at the bound man.

  “Carmelita! Carmelita, come, come to me!” the Mayan cried out.

  The child raised her head off Black’s shoulder, and when she saw the Mayan, she struggled desperately to get down. Black placed her on her feet, and she ran and hugged the killer around his legs. She burst into tears.

  “Papi, Papi!” she kept saying.

  “It’s okay, baby. I’m here now. Don’t cry.”

  That’s when Novak started believing the Mayan’s story.

  “Cut me down, please,” the Mayan was begging them. “Let me hold my child and I’ll tell you everything. I won’t try to escape. She is why I am here, the only reason.”

  “What do you think?” Novak asked Claire.

  “I think she knows him, all right. Cut him down. I’ll keep my weapon on him. He’s not going anywhere.”

  With some reluctance, Novak pulled out the bowie knife and slit through the ropes. The Mayan fell to his knees and gathered the child into his arms. She couldn’t stop crying, and he held her tightly against him. But he stared across the room at his captors as he whispered reassurances into her hair.

  Novak realized that there was a lot more to this story than the Mayan was telling them. At the moment, though, he was more interested in getting Jenn back. “Okay, you have the kid. Where’s Jenn?”

  “She’s at my ranch in the mountains south of Merida. She’ll be all right there for a few days. Right now, we have to finish this. We have to find Marisol Ruiz and kill her.”

  Novak picked up his cell phone. “Tell me where Jenn is, or I’m turning you over to the American authorities. You can guess what they’ll do to you.”

  “Do not call in the police,” the Mayan warned, “or my men will take Jenn away and you’ll never find her. My ranch is quite secure. They will have time to escape with her. Do not play games with me, Novak. I will be true to my word and take you to her. I am an honorable man.”

  Claire did not like that. “You are not honorable,” she said.

  After that exchange, they sat in silence and watched the assassin sit on the floor, leaning against the wall and rocking his frightened daughter in his arms. Novak and his friends sat there, relaxed, but with weapons drawn and trained on the notorious assassin. He didn’t seem to mind. He only seemed relieved to have his daughter back with him. When she went to sleep in his arms, the Mayan waxed conciliatory. “I owe you my thanks for taking care of my daughter. She was very sick when I found her on that boat. I gave her all the medicine I had on board and was bringing antibiotics back to the boat when you stole the Calakmul.”

  “When I stole your boat, you had her chained up in a dark and filthy bilge. How could you do that to your own child?”

  “She had been in bed up in a cabin since I got her back that night off the Orion’s Trident. I only put her down there when I had to leave the boat. She was breathing okay and sleeping comfortably. I was afraid she’d wake up and wander off or that somebody would find her, that Marisol would find her. I couldn’t risk that. I knew Marisol was getting close to you and Luisa because I was keeping track of her GPS chip, and that meant she was close to me, too. I couldn’t let her get my baby again, so I hid her while I went out that night and tried to find you. I wanted Marisol dead. That’s all I could think about after I found Carmelita, all cut up and beaten.” He stopped as if overcome with emotion. Probably anger. “I managed to sneak aboard and surprise Luisa and Diego that night. Then I chained them up the same way they’d chained up my baby, and took my child up to a stateroom so that I could tend to her wounds and stop the bleeding. Those devils had tortured my little girl, you have to
understand that. And then when she was finally calm and sleeping, I went back down and methodically beat the truth out of both of them. I wanted to know where Marisol was. I intended to kill them as soon as I got Carmelita down into my inflatable boat. But they got loose somehow and tried to escape.” He stopped, his face as hard as a stone carving on a Mayan temple. “I made them tell me everything down in that bilge. Then you showed up and interfered with my rescue of Carmelita.” He looked at Novak and held his gaze. “I took pleasure in beating them. I wanted Luisa and Diego to suffer for what they’d done to my baby, and then I wanted them dead. They were as guilty as Marisol was. They sat back and watched Marisol torture her. I got him first, shot him down, but then you started shooting at me before I could finish off Luisa. I thought it was Marisol shooting at us. I thought she had returned to the yacht with her men, so I just took off.”

  “Tell us how the hell this all went down. Don’t think you’re going anywhere until I find Jenn and get her out of there.”

  “I will uphold the bargain. All I want is my daughter. That’s all I wanted from the beginning. Now that I have her back, my only desire is to kill Marisol for the crimes she’s committed.”

  “What crimes?”

  “Let me take her upstairs while you talk,” Claire said. “Put her to bed. It’s the middle of the night. She’s tired and still weak. Then you can tell us the rest of it.”

  “Please allow me to hold her,” the Mayan whispered softly. “She can tell you the parts of her abduction that I cannot. You can keep your weapons on me. She needs to be in my arms when she wakes up. She has suffered terrible things.”

  Novak sat there, still unsure. A lot of questions still needed to be answered. The child knew the Mayan, no question there. She loved him. The Mayan rocked his child and said nothing for a few minutes. Novak wasn’t sure what else the Mayan was going to tell them, but Novak was willing to listen. One thing he did know. The rest of the story damn well better be good.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  The cabin had grown quiet again. Novak was waiting to hear the real story of the Mayan and his little girl. The Mayan had been allowed to mop off some of the blood and move with the child to one of Claire’s new leather recliners. He had the little girl on his lap and was rocking and patting her back. She had begun sobbing again when she was moved, but was now lying against her father, calm and almost asleep again.

  Novak stared at them. Carmelita had finally gone to sleep. He wasn’t sure what to believe. He did not want to trust a killer—an assassin, for God’s sake—who suddenly decided to play loving father to a kid that Novak still considered to be one of the man’s victims. Maybe he’d brainwashed the kid while she’d been in the bilge. Maybe she was exhibiting signs of Stockholm syndrome. Maybe the child had developed fondness for the captor holding her prisoner. It was obvious that she trusted him now. Worst-case scenario, maybe this guy was a pedophile and had made her think he loved her. The idea made Novak sick to his stomach. But it was a possibility.

  “Where would you like me to start?” the Mayan asked softly.

  “Just get on with it. I want to get Jenn somewhere safe. Maybe you should start by telling us your real name.”

  “My name is Sebastian Desoto. I was an assassin for many years. But for the last ten years, I’ve spent my time as a professor of Mayan history at the Museo Nacional de Arqueología in Guatemala City.”

  The Mayan gently shifted the child so that she lay against his shoulder. She didn’t stir. “Few people know my name.”

  “So go ahead.”

  “I grew up an orphan, starving and stealing on the streets of Guatemala City until Arturo Ruiz found me and took me in. He trained me to become what I am. He convinced me that by killing his enemies, I was helping him to eradicate evil people who preyed upon the weak ones suffering such as I suffered as a boy. I believed him, because he raised me out of poverty and gave me a home. I lived at his estate in the mountains. He treated me as if I were his own son, and called me the Mayan. He educated me in the finest schools. He told me he loved me more than he did his own daughter, Marisol, because I was a male and she was not. She resented me from the beginning. So I learned to kill from him, and kill well, and kill without thought or remorse. I did the jobs he gave me without question. I became very good at it.”

  Novak frowned. “Yeah, we know all about you. You’re going to pay for those crimes, by the way. You should’ve stayed a thousand miles away from me and mine.”

  The Mayan gave a slight shrug. “I suspect you’re right, as I sit here with those weapons pointed at me. To shorten my saga, I met a woman, a woman that I love more than life itself. I married her and she gave me my only child, little Carmelita here. Then the two of them became my life. I no longer wished to kill, not even to please Arturo. So I quit killing and left the Ruiz compound for good. He allowed it because he loves me.” He stopped, shook his head. “It was a violent business into which he indoctrinated me and then Marisol after me, when she showed an aptitude for murder. But I loved him as much as any son could love a father. I have always been loyal to him. To this day, I am loyal to him. I would die for him.”

  “That might happen.”

  Desoto stroked his daughter’s soft hair.

  “Luisa said you kidnapped her,” Novak said. “Is that true?”

  “I never took Luisa or Marisol. Nobody took them. She was lying to you from the beginning, about who she was and about why she was on that yacht. Luisa Mendez was a talented liar.”

  “Look, I saw you slug her in the head with the butt of your pistol. I saw you knock her into the water.”

  “I told you that I wanted her dead for kidnapping my child. You must believe me. Luisa lied to you about everything. I swear it.”

  “You’re saying that Marisol abducted Carmelita and held her aboard the Orion’s Trident. You tracked them down, killed Diego, failed to kill Luisa, and got your child back.”

  “Yes, that is the truth. They kidnapped my baby. Marisol called me on FaceTime and made me watch while she used her knife on Carmelita. She made me listen to her screams. She doesn’t know it, but I recorded those screams. I recorded Marisol laughing as she tortured my child. You can hear the audio recordings if you like. I have them on my phone. After that, I just wanted Marisol and the other two dead for what they did to my baby. But Marisol left before I got to the boat that night, so I found only Luisa Mendez and her boyfriend aboard. They had been left to guard Carmelita.”

  “You are sure the others were in on the kidnapping?”

  “I told you, they were all in on it. Luisa and her boyfriend kept her chained up on that boat. I found them because I knew about the chips. Marisol and Luisa never knew we could track them. Arturo was determined to know where they were and what they were doing because he knew what his daughter was capable of.” He paused. “After Carmelita was born, I did the same thing after a few years, in case she was abducted. I implanted her with the chip. Many wealthy families in Mexico and Central America implant their children, because kidnappings are so rampant now. That’s how I found them out on that boat the night you saw us. I went there to get my daughter and take them out. I told you all this. You need to listen and believe me. Now they’re all dead, except for Marisol. I want her dead, too. I saw her hit my daughter and swipe her knife down through her skin with my own eyes. I heard Carmelita cry and scream and beg me to make them stop. It was sickening. I want her dead. I am going to see her dead.”

  Desoto paused there, and Novak could see the emotions churning inside him from the awful memory of his daughter’s torture.

  “I will get Marisol soon,” Desoto continued. “Luisa led Marisol straight to Jenn’s beach house. She was a stupid girl, influenced by Marisol’s beauty and money. She was expendable, so Marisol killed her so that Luisa could never tell Arturo what she had done to my daughter. Marisol tried to kill Jenn for the same reason. She only returned to her father’s house because she knew I was right behind her and wouldn’t stop until I
killed her.”

  Novak stared at him. “That’s it? That’s what you want us to believe?”

  “That is the truth. You need to believe it. You have been duped by those evil girls. They were on that boy’s boat, Diego’s, and I surprised them. I do not regret killing him, and I wish I had ended Luisa, too. You, mi amigo, would be much better off if you had left her out there floundering in the ocean to drown. Can you deny that?”

  Now that was something Novak could readily agree with. “Why were they holding your daughter? Were they blackmailing you? What did they want?”

  “They didn’t want money. Marisol wants her father dead. She wants me to kill him, because she knows I’m the only one who can do it. Arturo knows that she is evil. He has been trying to control her for years. She was born bad. That’s why he sent her to the convent, where she and Luisa concocted this plot against him. Marisol Ruiz is crazy, filled with a kind of bloodlust that I’ve never witnessed in anyone else. After I retired to be with my wife, Marisol took my place as her father’s assassin. She likes to kill and she does it well. She’s the one who has taken the scalps of her victims. I was a pro. I never wasted time on theatrical stunts and stupid calling cards. I have never done that, never, except on that one night after I tracked you and Luisa to Li Liu’s camp. I wanted to send Luisa a message that night if I didn’t get to kill her. That I was coming. That I was right behind her with my knife. I wanted her to run. I wanted her to lead me back to Marisol.”

  “Where was Marisol?”

  “She was hiding out but moving so often I couldn’t catch her. I knew Luisa would lead me to her, sooner or later.”

  “Luisa was terrified of you.”

  “She knew what Marisol had done. She and Diego just sat back and watched her do it. She knew I would seek vengeance, if it took me the rest of my life.”

  “Why does Ruiz’s daughter want him dead?”

  “He controls her, and she doesn’t like it. She didn’t want to be in that convent, saying the rosary every day. What she wants is to head up the Ruiz cartel. With him dead, she could take it over. Some of his men are loyal to her. She was trying to coerce me into murdering him because he trusts me. She knew I could get into his inner sanctum. I refused, of course. So she abducted Carmelita and used her against me. So I tracked them out to sea, boarded, and took my child back. I was just sorry that Marisol wasn’t there. If she had been, none of this would have happened. I would have killed them all and taken my baby home and stayed there. I have no wish to kill anymore. Except for Marisol. I will kill her.”