Fee swallowed the bile threatening to come up her throat and refused to rise to his taunts. “Your boss is dying. I need to wash up. You’re wasting precious seconds. I can’t save him if you don’t get out of my way. Or do you want your boss to die?”
Was bringing Aznar here, instead of taking him to a hospital in Mexico, Chavez’s way of taking over? Was she part of a power play where she’d be the patsy blamed for the cartel leader’s death?
Chavez surrounded her throat with his large hand and then squeezed. Fee couldn’t breathe. Her heart raced out of control. Her vision blurred. She tugged at his hand, but his grip was too powerful. There was no way she could stop him from choking her.
He won’t kill you.
“If mi jefe did not need your aid, I’d kill you now.” He tightened his grip even more.
She closed her eyes and waited for the incipient darkness to take her. Then he released her. She took in huge, gulping breaths of air.
“Prepare yourself. See that he does not die.” Chavez moved, and she scuttled past him into the bathroom. “The medical kits will be here when you are ready.” He turned and spoke rapid Mexican Spanish in a dialect she couldn’t quite follow. The man who’d held the gun on Pia ran out of the room.
Weak, shaking, Fee turned to the vanity and braced herself for a second before she began to wash up. She glanced in the mirror. The woman staring back at her was pale, a bruise already blooming on her face, and dark red marks showed on her throat. God, would she even survive this?
You can. You will.
She’d damn sure try.
“I need Pia to assist,” she called out, her voice hoarse from being almost strangled to death. “I also need someone to help…”
Heavy feet sounded on her wood floors. She looked in the mirror and saw the guy who’d held the gun on Pia had returned with two large medical kits. Ernesto had also entered the bedroom. The hulking brute still applied pressure to Aznar’s wounds; she realized he was someone she’d seen in her emergency clinic for a drug overdose. She also processed, for the first time, that Chavez and his men were armed to the teeth with rifles slung across their chests, handguns holstered around their waists, and knives strapped to their thighs.
She prayed to any deity listening that she and Pia would live through this somehow.
“…strip Señor Aznar’s clothing off. Try to keep pressure on the wounds while doing so. There are clean sheets in the hall closet, get several. Place one under him and then use any sterile drapes in the kit to create a field for me to work in.”
“Sí, Doctor.” Pia’s voice was strained, but at least her friend no longer had a gun aimed at her head.
Fee turned to leave the bathroom, and Chavez blocked her way once again. “I will be watching you closely.”
His tone was a dark promise.
Jaime Aznar might be a piece of crud, but he was now her patient. Being the ruthless thug he was, Chavez wouldn’t understand her moral code—she’d do her best to keep the bloody butcher alive, no matter the dire circumstances, because she’d sworn an oath to preserve life.
Fee swallowed painfully and forced herself not to gulp in each blessed breath. Mining every bit of stubborn Teague pride in her body, she met Chavez’s gaze. While working in the inner city, she’d learned never to let the animals see you blink—they’d use that split-second to tear out your throat. “I’m sure you will.”
Chavez’s lips twisted savagely, and he moved just enough that she was forced to rub up against him yet again. She inhaled sharply. Fucking typical male dominance bullshit, but it was effective. He scared the bejesus out of her, because if she fought him, she’d lose. He was bigger and stronger—and a stone-cold killer.
Fee approached the bed and nodded at Pia who was preparing to start an IV. Her nurse had the one cartel thug she’d recognized from the ER still applying pressure on the wounds. The bastard who’d held a gun on Pia was now absent, probably outside standing guard.
Pia’s brother Ernesto stood away from the bed, leaning against the wall beside the room’s only window. He held a hand gun in a very shaky hand.
Narrowing her eyes, she examined his face. His eyes were wild and dilated. His body jittered. He was on something and looked to be in the early stages of withdrawal.
“Chavez,” Fee said as she pulled out what she needed from one of the medical kits, “should Ernesto be holding a loaded gun near my patient? He isn’t competent at the moment.”
Chavez moved to stand next to her and stared across the bed, then swore under his breath. He pulled his hand gun and pointed it at Ernesto and then shot him. The bullet caught the edge of Ernesto’s sleeve and grazed his upper arm. Ernesto cried out in pain. Blood bloomed on the olive drab cloth.
Pia whimpered and Fee muttered, “Sweet Jesus.”
“Segundo?” Ernesto’s voice was slurred, but his attention was on the here and now and not on his next fix, for sure.
“Get out of here, pendejo. Guard the outside. Send Garcia back in. You know better than to take drugs while on duty.”
Ernesto’s lips thinned, but didn’t argue. He left after shooting a nasty glare at Fee and then another at his sister. Pia tracked her brother’s exit with sadness in her eyes and posture.
“Pia?” Fee murmured. Her heart ached for her friend. It wasn’t as if Pia hadn’t known her brother abused drugs; Manny had said as much earlier today. But to see it confirmed under the current circumstances had to make the knowledge even worse. “You with me?”
Nodding, Pia inhaled on a slight sob, started the IV drip, hanging the bag from the canopy on Fee’s bed, and began to clean the patient’s sweaty, bloody torso with antiseptic wipes from the field medical kits. Moving the hulking brute aside, Pia applied pressure bandages to stave off the bleeding until Fee could work on each of the wounds. The nurse’s hands trembled only slightly. Like Fee, Pia was holding it together … for now.
Once the blood, sweat, and dirt were removed, Fee’s earlier determination of the critical nature of her patient’s injury was reconfirmed. There were three bullet wounds—two in the mid-torso, one near the lower lobe of the lung and one in the stomach, and the third bullet had gouged the edge of the patient’s right hip. All the shots had come from the front and from mid-to-long distance range since there were only minor abrasion rings around the holes in the soft tissue.
“Vitals, Pia,” Fee requested in a soft voice.
“BP is 85 over 50. Pulse is 100 and thready,” Pia replied.
Fee eyed the two men who stood by the bed. “I need you two to roll the patient gently onto his side and hold him in place.”
The men didn’t move and stared at her, insolence in their gazes.
“Do as she says,” Chavez snapped out. “Now.”
The men moved swiftly and turned Aznar as she’d instructed. She walked around to the other side of the bed to view her patient’s back. Of the two torso wounds, there was only one exit wound, the one where the bullet had entered through the stomach. The exit wound was massive and was located just above the upper buttock. The shot had come from above and the wound track would go down through the intestines. A dirty gut wound.
All she could do was flush the wound as best as possible and pray Chavez got his boss to a good surgeon before peritonitis set in.
The other bullet was still inside, near the man’s lung.
Fee turned and looked at Chavez who raised a brow and said, “Well?”
“I can’t remove the bullet near the lung.” As he opened his mouth, she hurried on, “I could puncture his lung and cause even more damage. The best I can do is flush both wounds, pack them, and get fluid in him to replace blood volume lost.”
Chavez snorted. “I agree. It is good you did not lie to me. Do these things and then we will leave.”
Fee let out the breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. She turned to Pia who already had a syringe ready to administer a pain medication. “I also can’t guarantee to get all the debris cleansed from any
of the internal wound tracks. Infection is a given.”
“Woman,” Chavez growled, “he will die for certain if nothing is done.” He moved to her side as she prepared to inject the pain meds into the IV. He stopped her hand and peered suspiciously at the medication label on the pre-prepared syringe, then nodded. “Go ahead.”
She raised a brow at him and then injected the meds. Then she proceeded to work on the gut wound.
“Pia, what’s in the kit to pack the wounds once I finish flushing them?”
Chavez answered before Pia could open her mouth, “There is wound sealant. It is sterile and will do the job.”
“Yes, that’ll work.” Fee turned to see him pluck a packet of wound sealant out of one of two field medical kits and place it on the bed within her reach. “I’ll need help to hold him still. Even with the pain meds, the saline solution I use to flush will cause him pain.”
His face grim, he nodded and spoke to the others in rapid Spanish.
“Turn him onto his back … gently now,” she instructed.
Aznar moaned piteously at the movement.
The men did their best to hold the arching patient in place. To the background noise of Aznar alternately screaming and moaning piteously, she flushed both wounds until she was sure she’d gotten as much detritus out of the wounds as possible. Anything left in the wound tracks would have to have to stay there until the man reached Mexico.
After what seemed like hours, she straightened from her position bent over the patient. She then began to apply the wound sealant to the entrance wounds.
With a roaring shout, Aznar surged upward, managed to tear one of his arms loose from the man holding it, and swung out blindly. He hit Fee across the face in the exact same spot Chavez had struck her earlier.
She saw stars as she fell backward and would’ve landed on her butt, but Chavez caught her and steadied her against his body.
“Puta torpe,” he ground out, then took advantage of the position and grabbed one of her breasts and squeezed it hard. “Very nice.”
“Let me go, you bastard.” She shrugged away from his loathsome touch. Taking several deep breaths, she got the nausea his touch evoked under control. “Vitals, Pia.”
“Um, pulse is 180 and thready. Blood pressure is 70 over 45.” Pia rattled off the numbers. Her friend’s frightened gaze caught hers.
Shit. Aznar was bleeding internally.
“What’s his blood type? He needs blood stat.”
Chavez’s nostrils flared at her tone. She imagined she’d pay for her tone and for moving away from his touch later, but right now, he still needed her to save his boss.
“He’s O-positive.” Chavez rolled up his sleeve. “I’m a universal donor. He will have my blood.” He snapped out an order at the other two men who pulled their weapons and stood guard, their gazes fixed on her and Pia.
“I can’t use your blood.” Fee stared at Chavez. “Even if I trust that you are a universal donor, it still needs to be tested for disease.”
Chavez stared back, his anger reflected by a pulsing muscle in his jaw, and stated defiantly, “I do not use drugs. When I fuck,” he raked her body slowly with a leering glance, “I always use a condom.”
Fee felt herself going pale, but nodded. “Fine. It’s his life.”
Beggars and loathsome drug cartel butchers couldn’t be choosy.
Fee pulled off her bloody gloves and tossed them onto the pile of used gauze, towels, and sheets. She allowed Pia to help her pull on clean gloves and began to prep Chavez’s arm as he sat on the side of the bed. “After we give him some blood, he’ll be as stable as I can make him. So what happens then?”
As Fee prepared to insert a second IV into Aznar, Pia covered the packed wounds with gauze.
Chavez wrapped the rubber tubing around his upper arm, pulling it tightly with his teeth, then picked up a needle and found his own vein. He then allowed Fee to hook the tubing from his arm to Aznar’s IV. “After we’re through here, my men and I will drive to a ranch where a Mexican Army helicopter will pick us up and take us across the border. We have a trauma surgeon and medical equipment back in Madera awaiting our arrival.”
“You’ll need to monitor him carefully during the transport,” Fee said. “You can easily switch out the bags of saline. I’ll show you how before you leave. I’ll also write down the pain med dosages you should inject into the drip by volume. I’ll give him a loading dose of antibiotics now. Do you know if he’s allergic to any meds?”
Fee stripped off her gloves and then rummaged through the pharmacy tray of one of the field kits and found it was stocked with every wide-spectrum antibiotic known to man.
“Yes, I could handle all that.” Chavez sat on the edge of the bed, his arm elevated as blood flowed from him into Aznar. His sly tone raised the hairs on the back of her neck. “But since you and Señorita Lopez will be coming with us, you will handle his care during the journey to our base.”
“What?” Fee’s head shot up. Her pulse thrummed loudly in her ears. She couldn’t catch her breath. Her vision dimmed and she was afraid she might faint. “No.”
“No.” Pia echoed and backed away from the bed only to be stopped by Garcia who grabbed her arm and held her in place.
Chavez lifted his hand as if to strike Fee for her refusal. She backed further away. “You will not die as long as mi jefe lives. If he dies, you’ll feed the wolves after I and my men are through with you.”
Fee caught Pia’s gaze. Her friend looked as frightened as Fee felt. Chavez held their lives in his hands.
As Chavez’s blood steadily flowed into her patient’s vein, Fee considered and rejected their options and came to realize they had none for now. If she and Pia tried to escape, they’d die, but only after Chavez made them pay in ways Fee didn’t want to think about.
Fee really wanted to live.
“You are thinking of escaping, sí? Do not try. It will only make things worse for you.” Chavez sneered at her as he calmly pulled the needle from his vein. “We must be going.”
Fee automatically covered the injection site with sterile gauze and then wound an elastic wrap around it.
“Now go change.” Chavez stood and pushed Fee toward the bathroom and dressing area. He followed her inside and closed the door behind them.
Pia’s strangled “Fee!” was cut off and the sounds of a scuffle could be heard through the thin wood.
“Pia!” Fee headed for the door.
Chavez yanked her against him before she could reach for the door knob. His hard-on jutted against her abdomen. His grip on her arms was punishing. She could smell the lust oozing from his pores as his breathing escalated.
Hard-learned lessons took over. She went still. Moving away got you beaten. However she couldn’t stop the whimper that escaped her throat.
“Do what I say. Give me everything I want, and you and your friend will not suffer.” He rubbed the patchy stubble on his jaw over the bruise he’d given her. She inhaled at the burning pain. He chuckled. “Keep these thoughts in your mind. We will talk of what I want from you later. For now, Garcia is merely taking your friend to her brother. She will be in the truck when we get there. Now, you need some better fucking clothes. These are bloody.”
He turned her around and shoved her toward the dressing room. She entered it, and the once spacious dressing area closed in on her with his added presence. The air seemed to grow thicker and she fought to breathe.
Holding her in place with one large hand, he jerked a long-sleeved cotton T-shirt and a shearling jacket off the rods and a pair of jeans from a shelf. “These will do.”
She clutched the clothing he thrust at her and held them to her chest as he rummaged through her lingerie drawers. Her stomach revolted at the thought of wearing anything he’d touched.
A leering smile on his lips, he handed her a sheer, sky-blue-colored lacy bra and matching boy short panties. “Wear these. I like them.” Then he leaned against the wall. “Change. Now.”
; She was so scared, so cold inside, that she couldn’t control the shivers that took over her body. “I can’t. P-p-please…”
Chavez glowered and moved a step closer. Frozen in place, Fee waited, eyes closed, resigned to her fate.
He grabbed her by her upper arms, his grip merciless. “Since you begged so nicely, I will give you privacy … for now.” He pulled her roughly against his body, then took her mouth, biting at her lips until she gasped with pain. Her mouth open, he thrust his thick, fat tongue inside.
Gagging, Fee fell into the memories from another time … of another cruel mouth and hands. And just as she had when Stall had raped her mouth, her body … her mind, Fee endured, holding onto her sanity with everything in her.
Just when she thought she might faint from sheer terror, Chavez pushed her away. “You will get used to me, Fiona Teague.” He cupped the bulge in his pants. “I can be very generous to a woman who seeks to please me.”
Fee bit her lip and managed not to gag or scream. With a last painful tweak of her nipple, he left the room and shut the bathroom door with a definitive thud that rang in her ears like the sound of doom.
She changed clothes quickly, not trusting him to stay away.
Tears streamed down her cheeks. The only hope she had in her heart and mind was the knowledge that Trey would arrive for their date later. He’d see the bloody mess in her bedroom. He would try to find her … but how?
Use your brain, Fee. He’ll need clues … a place to start looking.
She turned on the water to cover the noise of her actions. Opening her vanity drawer, she pulled out an eyeliner pencil and wrote what she knew of the cartel base’s location and the name El Hacha on the back of her medicine cabinet door. Carefully, she closed the door, the snick it made sounding like a boom of thunder to her scared-shitless ears. Then she proceeded to wash her face and apply the moisturizer she’d removed from the cabinet, just in case Chavez had heard the door closing.
An Ill Wind Page 5