Resurgent

by Brynley Blake

  I arrived yesterday, and quickly found out that Noah is currently out of the country. A kink in my plan, but it had been easy enough to find a lobo, one of the lone wolves who doesn’t work for any specific cartel but operates their own circle of bandits and often freelances in gunrunning, human trafficking, and prostitution. Then it was just a matter of dropping Noah’s name and mentioning that I had some military weapons I wanted to sell in exchange for some information, and he agreed to meet me at a dive located just outside of Guadalajara.

  “Señor Johnson?” The Hispanic man’s eyes dart nervously about the seedy cantina as he approaches the scarred Formica-topped table where I’m sitting nursing a michelada—beer with lime juice and a mix of seasonings that’s Mexico’s version of a Bloody Mary. He takes the seat across from me, exposing several rotting teeth.

  “You Estevan Rodriguez?” I ask.

  He nods, gesturing at the waitress to bring him a cerveza, then settles back into the chair. “The weather here…it is hotter than the U.S., no?”

  “Hotter than hell,” I agree with a fake drawl. The truth is, it’s nothing compared to the unrelenting heat of the Iraqi desert, but he thinks I’m a two-bit gun dealer from Texas with vague ties to the American military, here to make a deal in exchange for some information.

  I pull out my phone and click on the picture of the crates of AK-47s I apparently smuggled out of Iraq and already sold to La Frontera. Luckily, he doesn’t know that. I slide my phone across the table to Estevan. “AK-47s. Unmarked. I’ve got twenty of ’em. Fifteen hundred a pop.”

  He glances at the photo and licks his lips, practically salivating. It’s a deal he can’t refuse. “What do you want to know?”

  I pause, draining my drink before I answer. “A girl was kidnapped from the States a few days ago. From Charleston, South Carolina. I want to know where she is. You know anything about that?”

  He stares back at me. “No, señor. I don’t know.”

  “Okay.” I set my glass on the table with a deliberate thud and tuck my phone into the back pocket of my jeans.

  “Wait. I…I might remember hearing something.”

  “Go on.”

  “I’ve heard there’s an American gringa near Manzanilla, at the home of one of El Gato’s trusted men.”

  El Gato. The undisputed head of La Frontera. No surprise there. It’s the cartel I sold the guns to.

  “The word is the girl is the sister of the man who sold over a million dollars in guns to El Gato, but never delivered them.”

  The lobo’s words jar me. “What?”

  “The gringa…she’s the sister of the guy who cheated El Gato out of half a mil he already paid.”

  “No. The guy. Tell me about the guy.”

  He picks up his beer and takes a long, slow pull, clearly enjoying his moment in the limelight. “It’s been all over the news. I thought Americans were supposed to have free speech and all that shit. That Navy SEAL who smuggled guns out of Iraq and sold them to La Frontera. El Gato paid him, but the poor fucker got blown up in Afghanistan or Iraq or some shit like that before he delivered the guns. Now no one knows where they are, and El Gato’s not happy about it. There’s a reward for whoever finds them.”

  “No shit.” I try my damnedest to sound blasé. I never delivered the guns? The drug kingpin must be livid.

  “El Gato thinks his sister knows where the guns are. So they kidnapped her.”

  The blood in my veins turns to ice as I absorb the rest of what he’s saying. The picture all over the news was of Charlotte. Were the news reports wrong? Do they have McKenzie instead of Charlotte? Or do they have them both?

  I force myself to put McKenzie and Charlotte out of my mind. Their lives depend on me acting like I don’t give a shit. Don’t underestimate the power of fuck it. It’s my personal motto, and what’s kept me alive on more than one occasion. The less you care, the better.

  “You know where the girl is? The one the cartel kidnapped?” I ask casually.

  He nods, wiping his mouth with the back of his dirty hand. “I might…for the right price.”

  It takes all my willpower not to finish off the fucker right now. But I need his information. “I got some C-4 explosives…some grenades. How about I throw a few in for free in exchange for a location.”

  A few minutes and a hundred dollars later, I have the address of the La Frontera first lieutenant’s summer home where, according to Estevan, they’re keeping the girl until El Gato can get there and talk to her himself. We make plans to meet the following day to complete our transaction, but I have no intention of keeping them. I have all the information I need. Now it’s just a matter of getting to Charlotte, or McKenzie, or both, before it’s too late.

  Chapter Three

  Charlotte

  I stare out the small window of the second story bedroom of the palatial hacienda in Mexico where I’ve been held since I was kidnapped. I’m barely keeping it together. I keep reliving the horror of walking out of Kenzie’s apartment. The two burly men who grabbed me with rough hands… The knife at my throat… A rancid cloth, so sickly sweet smelling it made my stomach roll, covering my nose and mouth. Blackness. Waking up bound and in the back seat of a car as a blur of tree and signs in Spanish passed outside the window. Arriving at a beautiful mansion by the ocean and being forced at gunpoint—still bound—up some stairs and into a room with red-tiled floors and a queen-sized bed. While one of my captors had pointed a gun at me, another man with a thick accent had told me he would cut the ropes, but if I made any attempt to escape, they’d put a bullet in me. I believed them.

  I remembered enough Spanish from high school to understand some of their conversation. They thought I was McKenzie, and I was going to be kept there until someone they called El Gato arrived, which could take a week or a month. My Spanish was too rusty to know for sure. But they were clearly with the drug cartel.

  Panic and fear simmer just below the surface, threatening to bubble over. What are they going to do with me? To me? Hold me for ransom to recover the money Liam took for the guns he never delivered, thinking I’m McKenzie? Expect me to lead them to the guns? Demand I return the money—or take it back in trade? Kill me, thinking I’m her, in retribution?

  Oh God.

  So far, they’ve left me alone. But for how long? As soon as El Gato gets back… A sob hitches in my throat as I imagine the worst. All my life I’ve been careful and cautious and planned everything down to the nth degree to keep my life under my control. I’ve been the good girl, the responsible one, the one who takes care of the details and doesn’t do anything crazy. And where did that get me? Kidnapped and held hostage in Mexico while my friends are out having amazing sex and exciting adventures. I remember the guy Gemma thought I should hook up with on the beach who I turned down, not wanting to become a statistic in Mexico. The joke’s on me. Despite all my cautiousness, I’m about to become a statistic in Mexico anyway.

  Everything I thought mattered, doesn’t. Even my ten-year plan seems ridiculous now. I’m probably not even going to be alive in ten days, much less ten years! I’ve spent my whole life planning, doing the right thing, trying to control it all, waiting for…what? Nothing. I’m going to die, and it’s all been for fucking nothing!

  Hot tears of anger coupled with fear and hopelessness well up in my eyes, threatening to overwhelm me. I swipe my hand across my eyes. Stop it! I tell myself firmly. Crying won’t keep me alive. I force myself to take a deep breath. Think, Charlotte.

  Unless I was unconscious longer than I think, it’s been four days since I was kidnapped. Plenty of time for someone to miss me, at least in theory. But who? McKenzie’s in Malaysia, and given the time difference and her busy having the best sex of her life in paradise with Noah, we haven’t talked much. It could be awhile before she figures out I’m not answering my phone, and even then, what is she going to do from halfway across the world? Gemma and Walker should be back from San Francisco today, but it will probably be a day or so before th
ey realize I haven’t been answering the phone or showing up for appointments at Tying the Knot, especially since they too seem to have some sort of blossoming relationship. And even when they do realize I’m missing, how will they even know where to begin to look? I’ve watched enough TV crime shows to know that the colder the trail is, the harder a person is to find.

  No one’s coming for me. The realization hits me like a sucker punch. No one’s going to rescue me. Just like when I was a kid.

  My breath slows and my surroundings recede as a sense of calm and resolve washes over me. Of course. I know better than anyone not to sit around waiting to be rescued. I will have to rescue myself. Just like I did when I turned eighteen and left home without a backward glance. But this time, it’s going to be different. I’m going to be different.

  I pace the small room, becoming more resolved and empowered with each step. If I get out of here alive, I’m going to live my life differently. I’m going to mix up my spices instead of organizing them alphabetically. I’m going to go into work late because I was out until 3:00 a.m. the night before, or hell, I’m going to skip work entirely. Every chance I get, I’m going to get drunk and travel and have crazy sex and crazier adventures. I’m going to…to bungee jump and travel to Italy. If I live, I’m going to be so busy having fun, I’ll never be the one left behind again. Liam may be dead, but I’m going to carry on his motto. I will never again underestimate the power of fuck it.

  The sound of male voices speaking rapidly in Spanish in the courtyard below brings me back to reality. The only way I’m going to do all of that is if I get out of here alive. And I’m not sure exactly how I’m going to do that. There’s an armed guard on patrol outside my room twenty-four hours a day. Even when they bring me food, one of the cartel members is there, his hand resting lightly on the pistol to remind me not to bolt. I’m sure Walker will move heaven and earth to save me once he realizes I’ve been kidnapped, but it might be too late by then.

  I glance out the window again. I can see the guard who’s about to take over the evening shift talking to the tall Mexican with mirrored sunglasses and a machine gun strapped to his hip that paces the courtyard below me during the day. This guy’s more muscular, but somehow less imposing looking than the guard who’s here during the day, and a bit of a Casanova, judging by the way I see him flirt with the female staff during his watch. If I can figure out how to escape out the window, maybe I’ll get lucky and he’ll be distracted long enough for me to slip by him undetected. There’s the guard station to somehow get past, but the new me decides I’ll worry about that when I get there. Right now, I need to find a way out the window. It’s a long way down to the courtyard—too far to jump.

  Suddenly inspired, I strip the sheet off the bed and with the small blanket and single meager towel they’ve given me, tie them together to make a rope. But even before I tie one end to the bedpost, I can see it’s barely long enough to extend more than a foot out the window. Frustrated, I sink down on the bed, trying for the hundredth time to figure out a way to escape.

  I eventually drift off to sleep. I dream of Liam, a dream so real I can smell him, feel the slight roughness of his fingers as he tucks a lock of hair behind my ear and caresses my face tenderly, saying, “Let’s get out of here.”

  The words jolt me awake in the dark, my heart thundering in my chest as I realize a man’s hand is covering my mouth. The voice was Liam’s, but the man straddling me looks nothing like him, and I realize it was just a dream. In the thin beam of moonlight shining through the window, I can make out longish hair, the top of it pulled back, and a full beard.

  Panic claws its way up my throat, closing off my airway. I realize, with a sense of dread, that it’s too late for my epiphany. I’ve blown it. I’m never going to have a chance to be the rebel, the carefree one.

  I know what’s about to happen. I’m about to be raped or killed or both. I don’t know if El Gato, whoever the hell he is, gave one of his men permission to use me however he wanted, or if some cartel member decided he’d just take advantage of me. It doesn’t matter. But I’m not going to make it easy for him.

  Driven by terror coupled with an instinctive will to survive that has always served me well, I thrash violently on the bed, trying to wrench myself free of my captor’s grasp. But he has an iron grip, and he’s straddling my body on the bed, pinning my arms at my sides with his knees. My body bucks desperately, trying to throw him off, my feet kicking uselessly. Tears of frustration at my helplessness threaten to spill. I want to scream, to tell him I didn’t make it this far to be broken now, but with his hand still firmly pressed over my mouth, my cries remain strangled in my throat. I’d lost the battle before it even started.

  Icy fingers of fear slowly close around my heart, crushing the breath out of me as reality sinks in. I squeeze my eyes shut, willing myself away to anywhere but here in my mind, a trick I learned when I was younger to distance myself from the fights—my father’s voice raised in anger, my mother’s pleas, the sickening thud of a fist meeting soft flesh. My attacker may do what he wants with my body, but he’s not going to touch my mind, and I’m not about to give him the satisfaction of a reaction. I’m just going to go to my happy place where nothing can touch me.

  Playa del Carmen. Liam’s handsome face smiling down at me as I lie on a beach chair. The heat of his thighs touching mine as he sits next to me, a bottle of sunscreen in his hand. His strong, competent hands on my bare, sun-warmed skinned, turning every bone in my body to molten liquid.

  “Open your eyes.” My attacker is rubbing my shoulder, and his voice, firm and insistent, sounds like Liam’s. I squeeze my shut eyes tighter, trying to concentrate.

  “Dammit, open your eyes, Charlotte!”

  I respond to the command against my will. The moon has moved, and I can make out the man’s face looming over me, although it’s still too dark to see his features clearly. “There you go.” White teeth gleam, and for a moment, I see Liam in his smile. But Liam’s dead. The resemblance is nothing but a figment of my imagination.

  Thanks to a minor in psychology, I know exactly what’s going on. I’m hallucinating, probably as a result of lack of sleep combined with the constant fear I’ve felt since I was kidnapped in Charleston. Of course. It’s my mind’s way of dealing with the trauma. I’ve conjured up the image of Liam, or maybe I transposed him onto my would-be attacker. Although why the hell my imagination would give him that ridiculous long hair and scruffy beard is beyond me.

  “We’ve got to get out of here. Are you okay?”

  I nod.

  “I’m going to take my hand off your mouth now.” He speaks slowly and carefully, like I’m a mental patient. “I know you probably have a million questions, but if we’re going to get out of here alive, you have to be quiet, okay?”

  I nod again.

  “Shh,” he warns as he slowly removes his hand from my mouth. He watches me closely, and after a minute, satisfied that I’m not going to scream, he climbs off me. I kick him as hard as I can in the groin. With a muttered curse, he doubles over. Seizing my opportunity, I scramble off the bed and make a beeline for the door. I’d rather take my chances with the guard than stay in this room and be raped. Hell, maybe he is the guard. I make it five steps before he tackles me, his arms banded around me softening my fall as my body hits the hard tile floor with a bone-jarring thud. I struggle again wildly, but he holds me tight.

  “Charlotte! It’s me. Liam.” Cupping my chin firmly in his hand, my assailant forces my gaze to his. “Look at me!” Familiar blue eyes stare back at me. It can’t be. Liam’s dead. I went to his memorial service. I cried over the scent of him on a bandana what seems like a lifetime ago.

  I shake my head. “No, you’re not. Liam was killed during an explosion in Pakistan rescuing an aid worker.”

  He stares at me for one long minute, then places his palms firmly on either side of my face and kisses me. It’s the kind of kiss that lays claim to a woman, and it levels me, just like it
did in Mexico. There’s no denying that immediate familiar and unmistakable jolt of chemistry that had first scared the shit out of me, then made me believe that maybe I’d been wrong about everything. He’s not a figment of my imagination.

  “It really is you,” I breathe.

  That take charge, dominant, alpha-male stuff, along with that cocky grin coupled with the dark look in his eyes, is undeniably Liam. I stare at him as reality sinks in. Liam’s alive. Liam, who introduced me to pleasure beyond my wildest dreams and told me he loved me and would come back for me. Liam, who let everyone believe he was dead.

  Thanks to Liam, McKenzie’s life is in danger, Walker’s barely been able to function, taking a leave of absence trying to prove Liam didn’t sell guns to the cartel, and I’ve been heartbroken and kidnapped. And all this time, he’s been alive, blithely going about his business in Mexico? Not to mention, he just took five years off my life making me think I was about to be raped and killed. “You bastard,” I hiss. “Get the fuck off me!”