by Toby Neal
“Shut up!” Joao snarled.
The truck towing them continued to pick up speed. The Mustang wove slightly in its wake, hurtling toward wherever these men were taking them.
Lei felt herself lift out of her body into that place she went when things got bad as Joao held her head back and played with her hair, his fingers tangled in the riot of her windblown curls, his hot breath on her neck. Her stomach clenched as he licked her wounded ear and tickled her with the knife, clearly enjoying her vulnerability—but Lei was buffered from it.
This nightmare was happening to Damaged Goods—DG, Kwon had always called her. He’d called her that even in front of her mother, who thought it stood for Dear Girl.
Kelly moaned in terror. Lei wished she could tell her friend not to let on, that such sounds only encouraged men like this—but it was too late.
“Come. Aqui. You sit with me, Blondie,” Joao told Kelly, patting his lap.
Kelly curled herself away in response, and he reached down beside her seat and pushed the lever. The seat reclined abruptly, and Kelly fell backward with a squeal. Joao let go of Lei and grabbed Kelly by the long tresses she was so proud of, pulling her backward into the seat with him. “Nice Blondie,” he said. “We party.”
Lei blocked out the sounds of her friend being molested by scanning around for some way to get help. A glance at the speedometer showed that they were going sixty miles an hour, so jumping was out of the question. Even if she regained control of the Mustang, trying to get loose at this speed would likely flip or tear the car apart.
But maybe Lei could get the attention of another driver? Lei spent a couple of interminable minutes trying to signal cars passing them too rapidly to register the struggle happening in the convertible.
Joao now had Kelly down out of sight in the back seat, her friend’s muffled cries raking Lei’s nerves. Lei peeked around the seat and got a glimpse of Joao’s hand on one of Kelly’s bare breasts, his other around her throat.
At least he’d put down the knife, too occupied with rape to bother with it. He thought he’d neutralized Lei—but she could stop this. She had to find a way.
Lei fumbled for the opening of the glove box, hoping by some miracle it wasn’t locked—but she’d closed the weapons in there with the car key, worried Kelly would find them and question her about bringing them. She’d sweated through lying about carrying a gun at the border crossing—Lei was not a good liar—but now she’d have to turn the Mustang off, remove the key, unlock the box, take out the case, and get the weapon out—all with bound hands and Joao not noticing.
Kelly gave a muffled scream, and the car bounced and fishtailed with the scuffle going on in the back seat.
There had to be something more immediate Lei could do.
She spotted the steel thermos in the wheel well that they’d filled with margarita mix this morning. Awkward with her tied hands, Lei picked it up. She swiveled, pushing herself upright, leaning between the seats, and lifted the thermos high.
Joao held Kelly down with a bent forearm against her throat, suffocating her as he fumbled with his pants zipper with the other hand. He was no longer paying attention to anything but what was between his legs.
Lei’s eyes met Kelly’s terrified ones as she brought the thermos down on Joao’s head with all her strength.
Joao collapsed over Kelly without a whisper.
Her friend gasped for air as Joao’s arm went slack. Kelly shoved at his body, whimpering and frantic. “Get him off me. Get him off me!” Kelly croaked. Tears streamed down her face.
Lei dropped the thermos and wriggled between the seats, picking up the huge combat knife that Joao had set aside.
“Untie my hands,” Lei said. Kelly plucked at the buckled belt around Lei’s wrists, freeing her, as Lei kept a wary eye on the unconscious Joao.
The convertible slowed. Lei swiveled around to look at the truck towing them. “Oh no. He must see something’s wrong.”
But that wasn’t it.
Fernando was merely turning off the main highway onto a dirt road. Pale dust belched up around them as the Mustang bucked through potholes at a much slower speed. Lei helped haul Joao’s body off Kelly, wedging him facedown onto the car’s floor area.
“Kill him!” Kelly exclaimed. Lei looked down at the man before her. It would be easy to cut his throat, stab him. A part of her longed to, but she shook her head.
“No. We still have to get out of this mess. We’re toast if we kill him now, in a foreign country, with Fernando to deal with. We need to neutralize him, though.” Lei pulled Joao’s arms up behind his back and wrapped the belt ruthlessly tight around his wrists. “He made a mistake leaving my hands in front. He underestimated us.”
“He underestimated you.” Kelly’s teeth were chattering. “I was just the idiot you’ve always said I am.”
“You expect the best of people,” Lei said. “I know better, that’s all. Now that we’re going slower, let’s see if we can get loose from the truck. You push Joao out into the road.”
“I can’t lift him,” Kelly panted. “How can I get him out?”
“Then stay down, out of sight. I need to make sure Fernando doesn’t realize what’s going on. He has to think you guys are getting it on back there.”
“You mean, I’m getting raped,” Kelly said. “This is so disgusting.” She grunted with the effort of trying to move Joao. “I can’t get him up off the floor. It’s going to take both of us.”
Lei turned to see what Fernando was up to, glancing at the clock on the dash. The whole struggle had taken less than five minutes.
The bald man had a mirror trained on them, and she noticed the gleam of light on his jaw, the glowing ember of a cigarette in his mouth. He glanced back, and she met his eyes with a glare. He took the cigarette out of his mouth and made a kissing gesture.
Lei shuddered.
Where had Fernando secured the hook under the car? Clearly, it was somewhere a lot sturdier than the Mustang’s plastic bumper, which was more for looks than function.
She needed her weapon. With the gun, Lei could force Fernando to let them go.
Lei made sure the Mustang was still in neutral and turned off the engine. She took the key from the ignition and inserted it into the glove box.
“Help me,” Kelly grunted from behind her. “I’ve almost got him up against the door.”
“Let me get my weapon first.” Lei turned the key.
“What?” Kelly exclaimed.
“My gun. It’s locked in the glove box.” The key refused to turn. Lei jiggled it impatiently.
Suddenly the Mustang slewed, swinging sideways and crashing into the truck’s rear bumper as Fernando put on the brakes. Kelly cried out as she was flung against a door, and Lei sprawled across the front seats. The keys fell from her hand and slid under the passenger side seat as the Mustang swung and hit the back of the truck from the other direction.
Lei smacked her head on the dash and the gearshift dug into her ribs, but she scrambled for the key anyway, popping her seatbelt and heaving herself headfirst downward, to search under the seat.
The car came to a jarring halt.
Lei got ahold of the keys and reached up, shoving the glove box key in. She turned it.
The driver’s side door yanked open. Lei heaved herself over to look up. Fernando stared down at her in consternation, then reached for her.
Chapter Five
Lei kicked out at Fernando, connecting with his belly, which felt like granite under her athletic shoe. The bald man’s expression went dark as his eyes narrowed and mouth tightened. He grabbed both her ankles, and despite Lei’s thrashing, hauled her out of the vehicle with one powerful heave of muscle-bound arms.
Lei landed on her face in the dirt road, the breath knocked out of her. Spangles of light spun in her vision as she tried to get a breath, her hand scrabbling down to reach for Joao’s knife in her pocket.
“Leave her alone!” Kelly shrieked, and jumped out of the car onto F
ernando. She clung to the man’s back, swatting at his shiny pate and trying to grab his ears. Fernando ignored her, much as a rhino does a fly, assessing the situation with his tree trunk legs spread and arms akimbo. “Joao!” he barked.
The other man groaned from the back seat. “Putas!”
Fernando grunted. “Si. But they have their uses.” Kelly had begun to slide down the wall of his back. Fernando reached around and plucked her off, smacking her hard on the side of the head. Lei finally got a breath and scrambled to her feet, just in time to see her friend knocked out from the blow. Fernando tucked Kelly under his arm like a limp kitten, walked over and threw her into the cab of the truck; Kelly’s head thumped against the doorframe.
Lei ran to the opposite side of the Mustang from Fernando. With the car between them, she felt able to engage him a little bit.
“Let us go. We have connections in the United States. We can pay, but you’re going to get in big trouble if you hurt us.” She pulled Joao’s Buck knife out of her pocket and waved it threateningly. Truth was, she had no idea how to use it—she’d been planning to take lessons at some point in the future, if she ever lived to be a cop.
Fernando gave her a dismissive glance. He opened the back door of the Mustang. “Get out, you idiot,” he told Joao; Lei was able to understand with her high school Spanish.
The other man complied, wriggling gracelessly out of the vehicle and heaving himself to his feet. Fernando snorted at the sight of his bound arms and loosened fly. “Thinking with your dick again. You were supposed to wait.”
Joao shrugged. “I didn’t want to wait.”
Fernando pulled a knife at least as big as Lei’s out of a scabbard at his waist. He slashed through the concha belt binding Joao’s arms like it was spaghetti, and the leather fell to the ground. Joao shook out his bulky shoulders, flexing his hands.
Both men turned to face her.
Joao’s eyes slitted with rage as Lei waved his knife at him. “You’re mine, bitch,” he snarled, stalking around one side of the car toward her.
Fernando smiled. His expression scared her more than Joao’s as the bald man circled the vehicle from the other side. “No. You can have the blonde. This one’s mine. I like ‘em with a little fight.”
“Oh, shit,” Lei muttered, glancing back and forth between them. “Oh shit.”
She spun on a heel and made a break for it, straight into the desert.
The area around the dirt road was sandy soil, dotted with the round balls of tumbleweeds and desert sage with an occasional barrel cactus or saguaro adding an extra hazard as Lei ran.
She had one advantage over the men—she ran a lot.
Terror gave her extra speed and she tore through the sagebrush and sand, leaping over a small barrel cactus in her path like a hurdler, never looking back to see if they were catching up to her. Lei’s only advantage was speed, and she couldn’t waste it.
Lei could hear them behind her: panting breath, crunching brush, the occasional curse. She focused on the ground directly ahead of her, thankful that she’d worn her usual outfit of athletic shorts, tank shirt, and a pair of running shoes, in spite of Kelly’s teasing to get into a cuter outfit.
The sounds of pursuit grew fainter. She was leaving them behind, and it was a good thing too, because she was reaching the limits of her endurance. She hurtled up the long swell of a brush-covered sand dune, breath tearing through overworked lungs.
She reached the top and turned, slowing her steps. Her shoes sank in loose, deep sand as she paused, leaning over to rest her hands on her knees and look back.
The two men were already returning to the car, and a moment later, Fernando looked right at Lei in her place on the dune as he opened the door of the truck. He reached in and pulled Kelly up by her hair. Looking right at Lei, he flourished his huge Buck knife against her friend’s neck. Lei gasped, covering her mouth with her hands.
He was trying to make her return, by holding Kelly hostage.
But if Lei went back, he’d just have two girls to torture—and if Lei found help, one of them at least might survive.
Was she justifying leaving Kelly there to suffer alone? Lei’s mouth was chalky with the horror of her dilemma.
She took too long to decide.
Slower on his feet, Joao finally reached the vehicle. She saw the men exchange angry words, and Joao got in. Fernando waved the knife toward Lei again, and then unceremoniously shoved Kelly into the middle of the seat between the men and climbed in, too, slamming the door. The truck fired up and drove away, churning dust over the red Mustang still fishtailing in its wake.
“Oh no.” Leis knees buckled, and she sat abruptly. “Poor Kelly. I have to help her.”
But how? She was in the middle of nowhere, in the desert, without water or a cell phone. She hung her head for a moment, getting her breath and her bearings, shaking with delayed shock. She stood up and hiked the few more feet to the top of the dune.
From that vantage point, Lei could see back to the road, an empty line through the desert that led toward the mountains. Those hills were arid and shadowed with shades of mauve, blue and dusty green as afternoon waned. In the other direction, the ocean gleamed in the distance, cool and taunting, behind a bank of dunes.
Might as well head that way. Where there was a beach, there was the possibility of people, and she was afraid to return to that rough, empty road.
Lei slid and sank down the loose sand on the front of the dune and labored over two more before she saw an unexpected sight: another sandy road, and a large, battered sign advertising TACOS DELICIOSO.
“Tacos,” Lei murmured. “And water.” The thought of biting into a tasty taco washed down with cool water got her moving again. Where there were tacos, there were people.
Lei was hot, sticky, and thirsty past the point of discomfort when she stumbled into an empty parking area in front of a low cement block home. A couple of lonely picnic tables painted the same blue as the sign marked this isolated spot as the taco place. The ocean glittered off in the distance beyond yet another dune. A rusty RV, the kind built on the back of a truck, was parked to one side, tires half-buried in drifting sand.
No one appeared to be around.
Lei’s mouth was too dry even to call out for help as she collapsed at one of the picnic tables. She lowered her head to her crossed arms. She’d just rest a minute before she looked for a way to communicate.
A deep growl raised the hairs on the back of her neck.
Lei turned very slowly. She faced a large German shepherd dog. A handsome buff and black, his intelligent brown eyes gazed at Lei unblinking, as a black lip drew up to reveal gleaming white teeth. Lei could feel the rumble of the dog’s growl through the wood of the table.
“Good boy.” Lei pitched her voice low, which wasn’t hard given her dehydrated state. “You’re just surprised I’m here. Come get scratches.” She extended her hand slowly in a fist, fingers down.
The shepherd approached, the growl dimming, his ruff settling. He sniffed her hand, then sat and bumped his head under her fist. Obediently, she scratched behind his ears.
“You look all bad, but you’re just a big sweetheart.” This dog was just her type: large and protective, but with a sweet side.
“He doesn’t usually like strangers.” A young woman stepped down from the back of the RV; she was long-legged and brown, with a tumble of black hair past her shoulders. Lei paused, and the dog butted her hand until she scratched him again. His coat looked rough, but felt soft as lamb’s wool under her hand.
“I approached on foot. I’m sure that’s unusual.” She was being assessed, and she gazed right back as the woman approached, moving with the springy grace of an athlete. “Is he your dog?”
“Yes. His name is Kona.” The woman wore an outfit similar to Lei’s—athletic shorts and a tank top. No shoes. Deeply tanned skin hinted at an ethnic heritage and made the woman’s light brown eyes stand out dramatically, framed by that wild black hair falling over s
houlders tight with muscle. “My name’s Harry. Harriet Vierra.”
“My name’s Lei—and I need help.” Lei’s voice cracked with strain, and her hand tightened in the dog’s fur. “I ran here through the desert. My friend and I were attacked by some asshole rapists. They stole the car and they have my friend. Do you have a phone to call the police?”
A long moment passed as Harry stared at Lei, then she made a gesture with her head. “Come into my RV. I’ll give you something to drink, and you can tell me what happened.” Lei got up and followed her inside the battered vehicle. Just to be out of the sun was a relief as Lei stepped up into the trailer—she could feel the freckles that had come out on her nose burning, even in the shade.
The space inside was cramped, but perfectly tidy and in much better shape than the exterior. The woman opened a tiny refrigerator and took out a jug of what looked like lemonade, splashing a plastic cup full of the cool liquid. The drink tasted like heaven going down. Lei felt the warm burn of alcohol on her throat—she was drinking a homemade margarita, and it was ambrosia. She tipped the cup and finished it to the last drop.
Harry sipped her drink, eying Lei over the edge of the cup. “Lei—that name sounds Hawaiian.”
“I’m one-fourth.” Lei held out her cup for a refill. “Half Japanese, and another fourth Portuguese.”
“Classic local girl blend. Interesting to meet you out here—I’m half Hawaiian.” Harry refilled Lei’s cup.
That too was unusual, but they didn’t have time to swap stories. Lei was here to get help for Kelly. She mustered her scattered attention. “My friend Kelly and I were on a road trip, coming down here to Cabo for spring break.” Lei, loosened up by relief and tequila, quickly told the sorry tale.
“What direction did the men go down the road?” Harry turned and opened a cabinet. Reaching in, she took out a pistol. It was an old-fashioned six-shot Colt, and Lei frowned as the woman flipped open the barrel, pulled a box of ammo out of the cabinet, and slid bullets into the circular chamber.