by L. T. Ryan
“Senator,” Michelle said, touching his shoulder gently. He instantly turned toward her. “Senator, I’d like you to meet a friend of mine. This is Jack.”
Jack stuck out a hand while the senator stood. They shook briefly. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, sir.”
“You too, Jack,” the senator said. He had a politician’s smile plastered across his face. “Any friend of Ms. Hernandez’s is a friend of mine. Please, sit.”
“No, I don’t want to inconvenience you guys.” An untouched steak caught his eye.
“I insist,” Goddard said. “Jordan, bring up another chair for our new guest.”
A squirrelly young man with severely parted hair jumped up and grabbed a seat for Jack. He placed it next to Michelle’s and the two of them squeezed in and joined the rowdy table.
Goddard leaned forward and spoke directly to him. The rest of the table seemed to be wrapped up in their own conversations. No one was paying much attention, except for Jordan.
“How did you two meet?” Goddard asked.
Jack opened his mouth to answer, but Michelle beat him to the punch. “College. Jack went out with my roommate for a few months, but it was bound to fail.” Her lie was smooth and she laughed easily. “Jack and I became friends, but I hadn’t heard from him in years. Can you imagine running into him here, of all places?”
Her adeptness at lying was not lost on Jack.
“What are the chances?” Goddard said. He took a deep sip of wine. “Which college?”
“Pardon?” Jack asked, leaning forward as if he didn’t hear the question in order to give him more time to come up with an answer.
Goddard wagged his index finger between both of them. “Which college did you two attend together?”
Jack looked to Michelle to see if she was going to continue the lie, but she only looked back at him with wide eyes, waiting to see what he’d come up with.
“Michigan,” Jack said. He heard Bear chuckle in his ear. It was a partial lie. He’d declared to attend, but then opted for the Marines after high school. “I didn’t last long there, unfortunately. Probably part of the reason why Tina and I didn’t make it. Had trouble with school, but did decent in sports. That only carried me so far, though.”
“Go Blue,” Bear whispered in his ear.
“Go Blue,” Jack repeated.
Michelle and Goddard both laughed, and Jack felt her hand snake across his knee and give it a squeeze. If he hadn’t felt like he was walking into a trap before, he certainly did now. What was Michelle up to, and why did she need to lie to Goddard about how they knew each other?
The rest of dinner passed by in a blur. Goddard mostly ignored Jack, talking to several of his guests in turn. He seemed pretty buzzed by the end, but he was ever the politician, leaning in whenever someone wanted his ear and then nodding and smiling at whatever they said. His assistant made sure he had plenty of wine, but when it hit eleven on the dot, he lightly tapped on his boss’ shoulder and gave him a nod.
Goddard’s guests stood and began dissipating in twos and threes. The senator placed an arm around Michelle’s shoulders and shook Jack’s hand again, this time extending the grip in his intoxicated state.
“Jack, Jack,” Goddard said. “The night is young. You should join us at Vita’s.”
“Vita’s?” he asked, looking between the senator and Michelle. He couldn’t quite read the expression on his old friend’s face.
“A bar owned by a friend of mine,” Goddard said. “Come. Join us. I promise, you won’t regret it.”
“Wanna bet,” Bear said.
“All right.” Presumably the bar would be a little more low-key. If Bear couldn’t get a shot off while they were loading into the cars, Jack would be able to do it at the next spot. “Why not?”
“Wonderful,” Michelle said. “But first I need to use the ladies’ room.”
“Jordan,” Goddard called over his shoulder. “Call Santiago and tell him we’re coming.”
“Yes, sir.” Jordan put a phone to his ear.
Jack felt a buzzing in his pocket and pulled out his own phone. It was Javier’s burner line. This close to the hit, there could only be one reason why he’d be calling.
“Excuse me,” Jack said to Goddard, taking a step away from the table. “I have to grab this real quick.”
“No problem.” Goddard turned back to Jordan to check on their reservations.
Jack held the phone to his ear. “Hello?”
“You have to call it off.” It was Javier. His voice was tight and terse and had a tinge of panic to it.
“What?”
“You have to call it off!” he shouted.
“Slow down, man.” Jack turned away from the senator and cupping his other hand over the phone. “What’s going on?”
“They have my daughter,” Javier said. “They have my daughter and they’ll kill her if anything happens to the senator. You must call it off. Now.”
Before Jack could ask for specifics, he noticed Michelle step out of the bathroom and level an icy stare at him. The light and playful woman from the table was gone. He raised an eyebrow at her, and she pointedly looked over his shoulder and toward the front entrance.
He turned and saw Goddard speaking with the hostess, one hand congenially on her arm and the other pressing open the door. Things started to move in slow motion.
“Jack, do you hear me? Call it off now!”
With the phone still held to his ear, he could think of only one thing to say.
“Shit.”
Chapter Seven
I heard Jack swear under his breath as a crack of light spilling out onto the sidewalk drew all my attention. It was Goddard and in a few seconds he’d be in my sights.
“He’s got one foot out. I’m lined up. Two more steps and he’s dead.”
“Don’t do it,” Jack said.
I heard a woman say, “What?” at the same time I did. The static in the earpiece went silent. Jack had terminated the connection. A beat passed and I saw my cell light up at my feet. I was on the rooftop across the street, my aim perfect and my window closing. I could take the shot or I could answer the cell. I couldn’t do both.
But Jack had called it off. I grabbed the phone and cradled it between my shoulder and my ear. When I looked back through the scope, Goddard was already halfway in the black sedan.
“What?”
“Javier’s pulling us back,” Jack said on the other end.
I saw Michelle step through the door. Her face was drawn tight. She looked confused or angry. She threw a glance over her shoulder, presumably at Jack, and continued onward and into Goddard’s car.
“Why?” I asked.
“Cartel has his daughter.” Jack’s voice was low and close to the mic on the phone. “If this goes down, they’ll send him her head.”
“Shit.”
“Exactly.” He ended the call.
I watched for a moment longer as Jack exited the bar and flagged Goddard’s sedan before it could pull away. I broke down my gear and heard snippets of Jack’s conversation with the senator rising and falling with the breeze. He was getting out of meeting up at the second spot. Something about an emergency call from a friend. After the vehicle pulled away, Jack restored the connection to his comms unit.
With precision and a bead of sweat rolling down my temple, I broke the rifle down and placed it in my bag and swung it over my shoulder. Staying low, I crept toward the door that would lead to the stairway that led down to the first floor. I was on top of an apartment building, one of the few in this part of town. It was a classy neighborhood, but the age of the brick façade made it look as worn down as it did historic.
The trip to ground level was a quick one, and I met no one on my way through. The stairwell smelled of bleach. My steps echoed throughout. Once I hit the last step, I slid through the back door and checked the alley up and down. The same vagabond was still sleeping on a trio of cardboard boxes surrounded by his belongings. Maybe he was the reas
on for the bleach. He clutched a half-eaten burger. If it weren’t for the occasional snore, I would have thought he were dead.
I headed off in the opposite direction, shoving my hands in my pockets and keeping my head low. I couldn’t exactly make myself look smaller, but walking with an air of determination usually made people’s eyes slide right past you.
The street was still busy by the time I reached the main thoroughfare. Lines stretched out of the entrances to bars and restaurants. The smell of local cuisine drifted through the opened doors. My mouth watered. I could hear the crowd all around me and in the piece in my ear. Jack and I were waiting to discuss everything when we met at our rendezvous point, but we weren’t about to cut communication completely. This complication with Javier’s daughter put an unknown element into the mix. If someone had her, did that mean they knew about the op? Did they know about us? My mind raced, thinking of who might’ve sold us out.
“You’re the one that wanted to keep it interesting tonight.” Jack was leaning against the corner of a building, looking up at the light-washed sky. He appeared relaxed, but I could sense the tension rolling off him. He didn’t like the situation any more than I did.
I ignored the jab and placed my hand on the cool brick next to his head. “What in the hell is going on?”
“I don’t know, man.”
He pushed off the building and we made our way through the crowd. It thinned out a couple streets over where there were more shops and offices than restaurants. The road we had parked the Land Rover on was practically dead.
I scanned the street before sliding in behind the wheel. The stiff leather squeaked as I eased down. I spotted a couple teens smoking across the street, that was it. We sat in silence for a minute, trying to process the sequence of events that had occurred in the last hour or so.
I gripped the wheel until my knuckles turned white. “Walk me through it.”
Jack knew I had heard everything he had while he was on the inside, but having him paint a visual changed the whole situation. He rolled the window down and stuck his arm outside. A cool breeze finally dried the sweat on my forehead.
“After she spotted me, I went to the bar and had a couple drinks. She came up to me thirty minutes later, invited me to the table. She acted just how she had the last couple times I saw her, but she’s a good liar, man. No tells. No hesitations.”
“Trained?”
“I don’t know. Could be natural.” Jack rolled the window up and nodded toward the ignition. I started up the car and pulled away from the curb before he continued. “Could be a criminal. She’s got this…air about her.”
“An air?”
“Yeah, an air.” He shifted in his seat. He was visibly frustrated. “Dangerous. I thought it was just her personality. Hotheaded. Stubborn. She’s got an attitude.”
“Just the way you like ‘em.”
He ignored me. “But there’s something else. The way she carries herself. She’s not afraid. Not of me, that’s for sure.”
“She might feel protected by Goddard.”
“It’s more than that. She played him so smoothly. She didn’t even blink an eye. She either had that story ready or she’s just that good.”
“And if she had the story ready—”
“Then she knows I’m not who I say I am.”
I eased off the gas and took a sharp right, checking my rearview for any tails. The road had been clear so far, and it appeared to remain that way. “Think she knows exactly who you are?”
Jack watched the blur of buildings whiz by for a moment before he answered. “I don’t know. She had this look on her face right before she left that said, ‘Don’t screw this up.’”
“So she knows why you were there?”
“Goddard is a high profile American politician. He probably gets death threats all the time. She could know I was trying to get close to him without knowing who sent us.”
I nodded a couple times. “Think she knew who you were that day on the beach? I mean, maybe she’s been watching us since we landed.”
“Hell if I know.” Jack ran a hand through his hair. “If she did, she’s one damn good actress.”
“It happens to the best of us.” My stomach rumbled loud enough to draw his attention.
“I don’t like being played, man.”
“Me neither.” I pressed the gas pedal down a little further. “So let’s go get some answers.”
Chapter Eight
It was late by the time we pulled up to the concrete building. The jungle roared with the sound of the night. It’s inhabitants were out in full force. The air was crisp, free of the trappings of the city.
Javier was already waiting for us, his agitation mostly hidden by years of training. But no amount of training prepared you for the sickening feeling of knowing someone you loved was in serious danger. The kind of people we dealt with didn’t give second chances, even for little girls who had nothing to do with their father’s job.
Our second trip to the facility had a different feel to it than the first. Javier scanned the trees once, quickly, and then walked inside, barely waiting for us to keep up. His secretary was not sitting at her desk and everything seemed to be shut down for the night. There wasn’t a night assistant at the desk.
Javier was halfway down the stairs before Jack had hit the first step, with me close behind. He threw a glance at me over his shoulder but there was nothing to say. He was all business right now and as much as we didn’t know about him or his daughter, this was our op that went sideways. She didn’t deserve to be mixed up in any of this. I couldn’t blame the man for wanting to put this experience behind him and just find his daughter.
Javier stopped several doors ahead of his office and entered a long room that housed only a single table and four chairs. He stepped to the side until we had walked in, and then he shut the door behind us. He stood there with his arms across his chest, eying us warily.
Jack was the first to speak. “An interrogation room?” There was a slight challenge in his voice.
“Who did you talk to about the op?” Javier took two steps forward and put his hands on his hips. In any other situation, I would’ve gone toe to toe with him, encouraging him to take the first swing. But this wasn’t the time or the place.
I pulled out a chair and sat down, arms crossed over my chest, left ankle over my right knee. I stared up at him with as transparent a face as I could pull off. “Frank’s the only one we’ve talked to.”
“He wouldn’t betray me.”
Jack followed my lead and sat down in the chair next to mine. He kicked one leg up on the table. “You’re one of the lucky few, then.”
“Who else?” Javier leaned forward on the table, but he was no longer hostile. He was desperate. Lines of sweat stretched from his sideburns to the corner of his jaw.
“The only other person we had contact with was a guy name Thorne,” I said. “One of Skinner’s guys. We don’t know him. Could be he didn’t even look at the dossier.”
“Nosy little shit probably opened it the second Frank was out of sight,” Jack said.
I scratched at my chin. “Possible. Can’t vouch for him, but if you trust Frank, then you can probably trust Thorne.”
Jack scoffed but he didn’t say anything else.
Javier nodded his head a few times. His eyes went glassy as he presumably thought through his own contacts. “I will reach out to Frank, but I think it’s a dead end.”
“Our aliases are clean,” Jack said. “We didn’t have any trouble on the way here. If someone knows what we’re doing here, it must be from your end.”
Javier stiffened, but I held up a hand and shot Jack a look. “He means here in Costa Rica. Someone either got here ahead of us or found out once we started tailing Goddard.”
“Were you spotted?”
Jack and I exchanged a look. Javier struck the table with his fist and stalked to the other end of the room where he put his head against the wall. I could hear him taking dee
p breaths to calm himself down.
“It happens, man,” I said. “And I’m sorry it had to happen on this op. But someone would have to recognize me, and then connect me to you, and then find your daughter and have the means of taking her. That narrows the list. I don’t think we’re looking at someone coming after us. This is a pretty big warning sign for you.”
“How do you know she was taken?” Jack asked.
Javier pushed away from the wall and sat down opposite me. He pulled his phone out of his pocket. “This came to my personal cell from her number.”
I slid the phone over and placed it between me and Jack. A video took up the whole screen. I hit the white triangle in the middle and it immediately began to play.
A girl about nine or ten was sitting in a chair, her hands tied behind her back and a white strip of cloth in her mouth, gagging her. The cloth was tinged red in a few spots. She filled most of the frame, but I could see a stack of boxes in the background and a high window near the left-hand corner of the screen.
A hand reached over and pulled the gag from her mouth. The girl flinched, but she didn’t cry out. Instead, she looked up at her captor and pleaded with him, tears streaming down her face. Blood trickled from her nose.
“Speak,” a voice said, its accent thick. Hispanic. Male. Could be a native or anyone from the surrounding countries. Javier and Jack would have a better ear for the accent than I would.
The girl turned to the camera. The hidden side of her face now revealed a large bruise.
“Daddy,” she said. “Daddy, please.”
“Say it,” her captor shouted, and this time the girl did flinch.
“Daddy, they say you have to leave the senator alone. They say if you don’t—” she hiccuped here and fresh tears started down her face “—then they’ll deliver me to you in pieces.” Her voice wobbled along with her chin, but she bit her lip and looked directly into the camera. “If you leave him alone, they’ll give you an address in three days.”
The camera tilted to the side and the screen went black. When I looked up at Javier, his jaw was clenched so tightly I thought his teeth would crack.