by Vivian Wood
“ . . . Santa Maria, Madre de Dios, ruega por nosotros pecadores . . .”
“I don’t think he wants to play with us,” Frank said to either Rodney or the girls.
Alex’s heart began to race. He was stuck. At this point, he hadn’t heard Frank reload. Everyone probably had the same number of bullets left—four at the most. And what happens when we all run out?
“ . . . ahora y en la hora de nuestra muerte.”
“Amen!” Rodney shouted.
“Ready or not.” Frank’s voice lilted in melody. “Here I come.”
Chapter 32
Faith
Faith pressed her lips together and held the rifle against her chest. She’d trailed behind Alex all the way to where the traffickers were transferring the cocaine. But when she’d heard a shot ring out, she’d raced to Alex’s boat to search for something—anything—to help.
Buried underneath what she’d thought was tackle gear was a heavy rifle wrapped with a worn leather strap. Faith had tried, without success, to figure out whether it was loaded. Too scared to tamper much with where she thought the bullets were, she’d grabbed it and hoped for the best. If nothing else, the traffickers didn’t know she couldn’t shoot.
As soon as Frank had sung to Alex, “Here I come,” something deep inside her took over. Faith stepped out from between the trees and came face-to-face with the two men.
“What the hell?” Frank said. He was just five feet from her. His gun still pointed toward Alex, and there were no girls on his right side for protection. “Who’re you?”
“Put down the gun,” she said. Her voice didn’t sound like her own. It sounded like some bad Hollywood script.
Rodney started to giggle, and her finger found the trigger. Stories about how rifles could kick so hard into a grown man’s shoulder it could break his collarbone rushed through her head. Don’t think about that.
“Fuckin’ Yank,” Frank said. “Shoot her,” he said over his shoulder to Rodney.
Faith braced the rifle against her hip and squeezed the trigger. She aimed for the sky and prayed it was loaded.
The shot was so loud that the pain in her hip barely registered.
“Jesus Christ!” Frank shouted.
Rodney dropped the gun and released his grip on the girl. She fell to the ground, but her prayers got louder.
“They’re Gonna hear!” Rodney yelled at Frank. “Fuckin’ rifle, ya know the feds are all up about illegal huntin’ this time a year. They’re Gonna hear—”
“I fuckin’ know, goddamn it,” Frank said.
Faith was charged with adrenaline. The girls started to crawl away toward the cover of trees. She braced the rifle against her hip again, away from the bruise she was sure had started to spread, and shot into the air again.
“We gotta go!” Rodney said. He sounded like a little boy afraid he was about to get spanked.
“Alex,” she said under her breath. She saw him race through the trees on the other side of the trail. With the girls out of the way, he fired straight through Frank’s hand.
“Shit,” Frank said in a tight voice. He dropped his own pistol and grabbed his bloodied hand. “Get goin’,” he said to Rodney. “Take what you can.” Rodney glanced around for the girls, but Frank gave him a kick in the shins. “Forget them bitches. The coke! Go!” Rodney grabbed a few of the bricks and took off alongside Frank.
“Are you . . . are you going after them?” Faith said. They stood side by side and watched the two men run toward the rowboat.
“Nah,” Alex said. “They won’t get far. ʼSides, they left two of their own back in the woods.”
“You didn’t . . . you didn’t kill them?” she asked.
He gave a short laugh. “Nah. Just knocked ʼem out.”
She let out a breath of relief. No matter who they were, what they were, she didn’t want Alex to bear the burden of having killed them.
“Gimme that,” Alex said and reached out for the shotgun. She happily handed it over. “Nice shootin’, ma’am,” he said. “Thought you didn’t know how to fire a gun.”
“I don’t,” she admitted. “I just pulled the trigger and prayed.”
“Yeah, I could tell,” he said. “Thank God they couldn’t.”
The girls had settled into a cacophony of quiet sobs. Faith made her way toward them, while Alex trailed behind. “Let me,” she said to him softly. “You’ll probably scare them.”
“Está bien,” she said to the girls. She approached them with her hands open and squatted down to them. “Estas seguro. La ayuda viene. Mi nombre es Faith. ¿lo que es tuyo?”
“Sofia,” said the one who looked youngest. One by one they wiped their eyes and said their names.
“What did you tell them?” Alex asked.
“Just that it’s okay, they’re safe,” she said over her shoulder.
“I didn’t know you spoke Spanish.”
“I’m from California,” she reminded him. “Besides . . . there’s probably a lot you still don’t know about me.”
“I’m starting to see that,” he said. She heard the smile in his voice. “Let’s head to the boat. Y’all will be safe there.”
“Where are you going?” Faith asked, worried. She glanced around but saw no sign of the bad guys.
“I need to tie those guys up in the woods,” Alex said quietly. He saw the dark eyes of the girls watch his lips, but they didn’t seem to understand. “Then I’m gonna grab just the essentials from the campsite. Don’t worry,” he said. “We’ll have to pass by where they’d docked anyway. I promise you, they’re far gone.”
Faith explained it to the girls as best she could, her Spanish not nearly as good as it had been when she’d worked tirelessly with a client based in Mexico City.
“Parco?” one of the girls asked, and wrinkled her nose in confusion.
“Barco,” Faith said, embarrassed as she corrected herself. “Boat. We’re going to our boat.”
“Ah,” the girl said. She smiled up shyly at Faith.
“Bring down my flip-flops for them,” Faith said.
Alex nodded as he helped the girls up. All but one pulled away from him as if his touch stung.
“I think it might be better if I’m the only one who touches them,” she said to him gently.
Alex jogged into the woods to check on the two men. He returned quickly and nodded to her. “They’re still out cold,” he said. “I’ll still tie ʼem up once I get y’all to the beach, though.”
The youngest girl, Mercedes, held tightly to Faith’s hand as they walked toward the beach. It was slow. Even though the girl with flip-flops had given one to the youngest girl, they still winced at the stones and pebbles below their feet. Mercedes stiffened as they passed the area where the boat had docked.
“Nobody’s here,” Alex said, slow and loud. “They’re gone.”
The girl nodded, but pulled tighter at Faith’s arm. Footsteps were still evident in the mud.
It was just a five-minute walk to Caleb’s boat. “Y’all stay right here,” Alex said. “Here.” He pulled one of the walkie-talkies out of the boat and handed one to her. “Just push this button if you need me. I’ll be twenty minutes, max.”
“Alex,” she started but didn’t know what to say. Don’t leave me alone? I don’t know what to do with these girls? What happens if they come back? She searched his face, which was calm and stoic.
“It’ll be okay,” he said. “You want to keep your rifle?” he asked with a smile. “Or should I put it back in the boat?”
She rubbed at her hip. There was already a goose egg that had emerged from its kick. “The boat,” she said.
“I’m going to leave you with this handgun just in case,” he said. “It’ll make you feel safer, at least.”
The girls winced when he pulled out the gun. “Está bien,” she told them, but it wasn’t enough to soothe their anxiety. It wasn’t until she’d tucked it into her shorts that they breathed again.
“¿A dónde va?”
Mercedes asked as Alex walked away.
Faith did her best to explain, leaving out the part about Alex’s plan to tie up the men in the woods.
“Novio?” Mercedes asked. “Your boyfriend?”
“Um,” Faith said with a blush. “I don’t know,” she said finally. “No se,” she added with a shrug. It made Mercedes giggle, and she covered her laugh with a small hand.
Faith looked at the young, curious eyes that probed her face. She tried to ask them how they’d stumbled into this situation but wasn’t sure how much they understood one another. The oldest, at sixteen years old, said she’d found an ad on Craigslist for a “professional cuddler.”
“I’ve heard of that,” Faith said in Spanish. “I have a friend who thought about doing it in California.”
“California?” Mercedes asked. Her ears perked up.
“I live in California,” she explained. “I’m here on business.”
“Y Alex?” Mercedes asked.
“It’s a long story,” Faith said with a sigh.
Another girl had responded to a similar ad, though it was supposedly for stripping in Miami. She shrugged and said it hadn’t sounded too bad. She’d been promised a lot of money and had a cousin who used to do it legitimately in Texas.
For Mercedes, her parents had been approached by a man who’d been looking for young girls to work as au pairs, housekeepers, and cooks. All she’d packed had been a backpack nearly as big as her full of spices and cooking utensils her parents thought wouldn’t be available in the United States. It hadn’t taken long for her to figure out she wouldn’t be cooking. The traffickers had tossed her entire backpack in a dumpster as soon as they’d cleared the border.
Part of her wanted to ask how much abuse they’d already faced, but part of her didn’t want to know. What difference does it make to me? She started to think about who to call for help. Natalie, she thought. Natalie’s firm had worked with human trafficking victims before, though Natalie had never been on any of those cases. Still, these girls would need someone beyond ICE on their side.
“Do you know your parents’ numbers?” she asked the girls. “In Mexico? Or family here?”
They looked at each other, unsure whether they should tell her or not. “I can help you call them,” she said. “As soon as we get off this island. You should talk to them before we have to tell the police.”
“No police,” Sofia said firmly. “No police, no police. La migra,” she said to the rest of the girls.
Faith let out a sigh but didn’t want to argue at the moment. “Do you want to talk to your parents?” she asked again in Spanish.
“Yes,” Mercedes said vehemently.
“Okay,” Faith said, grateful that she had at least one ally among them. “We can do that. I’ll help you do that.”
“Y’all all right?” Alex called suddenly. Faith’s heart leaped when she saw him round the corner of the trail, her backpack slung over his shoulder.
If she’d had any doubts before, they vanished in that moment. I love you. She wanted to yell it but kept it together in front of the girls. “Yeah,” she said warmly. She felt a stupid smile spread across her face but couldn’t help it.
“Su novio,” Mercedes told the other girls and giggled again.
Alex looked at Mercedes, aware that she was talking about him. “Huh?” he asked.
“Nothing,” Faith said quickly.
“Alex es su novio,” Mercedes said, a knowing tone in her voice.
Faith groaned. “Did you bring my shoes?” she asked.
“Oh, yeah, here,” he said. “I have one of my extra pairs, too. It’ll be too big, but good enough till we get to Greystone.”
The girls dug through the backpack and pulled on shoes along with Alex’s extra T-shirts.
Alex straddled himself between the boat and the dock. “After you, ma’am,” he told Sofia. He’d learned not to reach his arm out to her, but she grabbed his arm as she stepped onto the boat. Mercedes happily took his hand and leaped onto the boat.
“Comin’?” Alex asked Faith once the girls were on board. She took his hand and saw Mercedes cover her mouth with a smile once more.
“Nada de ti,” she said to Mercedes with a smile. It made the little girl laugh.
“What y’all gossipin’ about?” Alex asked as he started the boat.
“Oh, you know,” Faith said. “You.”
She sat by the girls while Alex directed the boat toward Greystone. The girls chattered in Spanish and wrapped themselves in Alex’s too-big shirts.
As she watched him at the helm, his broad shoulders lit by the moonlight, emotion overwhelmed her. God. I really do love him, she thought. This . . . this she hadn’t expected. None of it. Not that she’d really been right about what had been going on with the trafficking, not the hours of endless sex on a cliff, and certainly not that she’d end up falling so hard for him. Faith looked into the distance and blinked back tears.
“Que está mal?” Mercedes asked. She scooted close to Faith, reached up, and wiped at Faith’s eyes.
Faith laughed. “Nothing’s wrong,” she said.
Mercedes nodded as if she’d figured out the whole story. The girls all held their long hair in their hands as the wind whipped across them, but Mercedes let hers fly wild like a wedding veil.
“Almost there,” Alex called over his shoulder.
“Mama? Papa?” Mercedes asked. Her eyes bore into Faith’s. “Llamada? Call now?”
“Yeah,” Faith said. “We’re going to call them right now.”
Chapter 33
Alex
As soon as they got reception, with the dock near Greystone in sight, Faith called the inn. He couldn’t hear what she said because of the wind, but he knew whatever happened, Mama would be on their side.
He docked the boat and jumped out. “C’mon, y’all,” he said and offered his hand to Sofia. Already the girls were more comfortable with him. He took in Sofia’s wide hips and the swell of her thighs and winced, unable to imagine what the girl had been through.
Faith emerged last, and as she gripped his hand, he saw Mama and the boys up the path. Mama was in front and looked impeccable as ever. However, Alex knew she’d really pulled on something fast in the middle of the night. The navy-blue slacks and cream-colored blouse looked well thought-out, but Mama’s staple matching jewelry was nowhere in sight.
“My word,” Mama said as she looked at the girls.
“They don’t speak English,” Alex said. “Faith’s been translating.”
She blushed as Mama looked at her. “I’m not fluent,” she said quickly. “But I promised they could call their families before we got anyone involved.”
“Of course, of course,” Mama said. “I don’t know anything ʼbout calling Mexico, but you take as long as you need.”
The girls were wide-eyed as they approached the inn. “Su casa?” Mercedes asked her. “Home?”
“Mama’s,” Alex said. He pointed to each of the boys and said their names. Mercedes was quick to offer her own, but the older girls hung back. Alex suddenly realized what this must look like—him bringing them to a big, fancy house full of young American men.
“Everything okay?” Alex asked as they entered the foyer. He could sense the trepidation in the group.
“I think it might be better if they come with me to make the call,” Faith said. “Having a bunch of men around, it’s making them nervous.”
“Will one man be okay?” Alex asked.
Faith nodded, and led the way upstairs. The girls followed her upstairs to her room, with Alex trailing behind. “Mi dormitorio,” she explained as they entered.
He watched as she bought a digital calling card to Mexico, one that offered both English and Spanish audio instructions.
“Call home?” she asked them. Sofia cocked her head. “Uh, quieres llamar a tus padres?”
“Mama,” Mercedes said with a smile.
Faith showed the calling card instructions on the screen to Sofia
, who nodded as she read the Spanish portion. When Faith handed her the phone, Sofia grinned and said “iPhone.”
Faith laughed. “Yeah.”
The volume was loud enough that Alex could hear the robotic calling card as it barked instructions in Spanish followed by the unfamiliar Mexican ringtone. “Papa?” Sofia asked as tears filled her eyes.
Alex felt a pull in his gut. I shouldn’t be here, he thought. “I’ll be downstairs,” he said, and Faith nodded.
Alex, Mama, and the guys were seated at the formal dining room table with mugs of tea in hand when Faith came downstairs alone. She looked exhausted, but he could hear the happy smattering of Spanish upstairs.
“I just can’t believe it,” Mama said when she saw her. “I mean, I’d heard stories about drug smuggling on the islands. But I thought they were just stories. This . . .”
“Nobody could have known,” Faith said. She sat beside Mama and squeezed her hand.
“You did,” Mama said.
“No,” Faith said. She shook her head. “I just suspected.”
Mama sighed. “I shoulda never let y’all go to that island alone.”
“Well . . . you didn’t really know,” Faith reminded her.
Alex gave her a look, but Mama laughed. “Isn’t that the truth! I s’pose I should have asked for details beyond ‘going camping.’ To be honest, I though y’all were just taking up an excuse to get away and be all romantic.”
Caleb, Lee, and Matt stared with intensity at their tea. “What’re they doin’ up there?” Caleb asked to break the silence.
“Calling home,” Faith said. “But now . . . we need to call the police,” she said. “Especially with those guys, you know, tied up on the island.”
“What now?” Mama asked.
Alex and Faith went into the kitchen to make the call. “How do you even report human trafficking?” she asked.
He shrugged. “I reckon you just call the local police and they take it from there.”
Of course, Alex knew the dispatcher and the Saint Rose chief. He’d gone to high school with both of them, though the chief had been a senior when Alex was a freshman. “You shittin’ me, Caldwell?” the chief asked.