Fistful of Benjamins (20 page)

H
ours later, Amalia and I are on a private plane for Cartagena, Columbia.

During the long flight, I keep studying Cataleyna's picture. In the back of my mind, I know that there's a chance that she's dead, but I don't want to believe it. Hell, I could be on a wild goose chase to Cartagena. Maybe the Zetas took her or another cartel. Why am I pinning everything on what some chatty bartender says?

After landing, we check into a rundown motel and get one room. This is a time when maybe less flash will do us some good. I don't want Amalia disappearing on me again. I eyeball her, noticing that she's real fidgety lately.

“So what's your plan?” Amalia asks.

“The best I can come up with is we start asking the locals about Carlos and Tomas. Maybe suggest that we got some weight to move.”

“You're joking,” she says.

I shrug. “What? You got a better idea?”

“Yeah. How about we don't go asking about dangerous cartels in their backyard? It sounds like the fastest way to end up in the morgue.”

“Well, it's all I got. And until your genius ideas kick in why don't we go with mine?” I toss my bag onto the bed while she makes a beeline to the bathroom—with her phone.

“I'll be out in a minute,” she says, exasperated.

I nod and watch her close the door. For the first time since we've met, I don't trust Amalia Vega.

I
no longer keep track of the days. I don't even give into the pretense of being interested in the things and events around me. I'm also no longer trusted to be alone. Maria and Ruthie watch me in shifts. They wash, clothe and even feed me as if I'm a child.

Most days I sit in front of my locked window, staring at how the waves crash against the jagged rocks. The scene is both violent and beautiful at the same time.

“How much longer do you think that you can keep this up?” Maria asks, running a brush through my thick hair. “Things will go much better if you would be nicer to Señor Vazquez. Clearly, he has feelings for you. Look at the nice dress that he sent to you today.” She gestures over to the bed where a shimmering blue Prada gown lies. “Won't you come down and have dinner with him—just this once?”

I refuse to even answer that ridiculous question. The only way that I'd share a meal with that man is if he physically tied me down to a chair, which he'll probably do any day now.

Maria sighs, but at least she finally shuts up.

Hours later, the sun disappears and Maria gathers her things as her shift ends. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Maria drop her door key onto an area rug near the bed. I hold my breath while Maria exchanges a few words with Ruthie by the door.

Slowly, I stand up and wander over to the bed to feign interest in the Prada gown. Picking it up, I stealthily place my foot over the key. After so many months, hope returns.

“Are you thinking about changing your mind, Señorita?” Maria asks.

I scoff and toss the dress back down onto the bed.
“Never!”

Maria sighs.

There's a rap at the door. The kitchen has sent up my dinner tray. Ruthie opens the door with her key and Maria says her goodbyes and leaves the room.

Hope spreads like a virus through me and a plan formulates.
I'm going to escape

I
'm a man on a mission.

For days we keep our noses to the grindstone, but everyone we talk to feigns ignorance of the Vazquez cartel or refuses to talk. I must be intimidating most of them because they clam up when I ask them questions.

During this time, I get the distinct impression that we're being followed. Whoever it is, they're good at blending into the background. Whenever I ask Amalia about it, she tries to convince me that after three attempts on my life I'm being paranoid.

As a result, I'm alert around her and while casing the streets. Our paths cross a drunken woman at a hole-in-the-wall bar. She rambles on about a baby. At first, I don't pay the woman any attention until the name
Vazquez
crosses her lips. A few patrons hush her, but the liquor has taken hold. I send the woman a few more drinks and keep my ears open.

“They're monsters,” she slurs. “That baby never did nothing to nobody. And now the mother is always looking for ways to kill herself. I don't blame her. A cage is a cage is a cage, you know?”

“Maria, lower your voice,” her female companion hisses. “You shouldn't talk about such things here.”

Maria shoulders the friend away. “Don't shush me. If I want to talk, I'll talk. What are they going to do—throw me into their little dungeon?” She laughs, while looking like she wants to cry at the same time. “What he's doing to that girl is awful.” She tosses back her drink.

I signal the bartender to pour another.

Grateful, the large woman twists around on the stool and from our dark corner, I give her a small nod.

“N—now there's a gentleman who knows how to treat a woman,” she slurs before continuing to drown her sorrows in the bottom of her glass. Minutes later, she grows loud and belligerent and the bartender throws her and her friend out.

“Showtime,” I tell Amalia. We pay our tab and tail the women.

Out on the dark streets, the women struggle to walk a straight line.

“Excuse me, ladies. Can we talk to you for a minute?” I ask.

Maria turns, but spins around too fast and slips out of her kitten heels.

She tumbles to the street and I snatch off my shades and rush to help her up. “Careful, now. You don't want to hurt yourself.”

“She's okay,” her friend insists. “I can get her home.” She tries to push me away.

Maria takes one look into my scarred and burned face and screams her head off. “Oh, Dios mío. Es el Diablo!” Maria scrambles, losing her shoe trying to get away from me.

“What? Wait!”

“Ahhhh!”
Not waiting to hear a damn thing, Maria and her friend take off.

Crowds spill out into the street and rubberneck to see what the hell all the commotion is about.

Amalia tugs on my shirt. “We better get out of here.”

I look around and don't like the growing crowd. “You're right. Let's go.”

We backtrack to our rental car.

“What do you want to do now?” Amalia asks.

“Let's see if we can catch up with them. They're walking so maybe they live around here.”

Instead of starting the car, Amalia huffs out a long breath.

“Problem?”

“Do you think that is a good idea? The woman was terrified of you.”

“I need her to talk to me—to tell me where the Vazquez compound is located.”

Amalia shakes her head.

“Two minutes,” I tell her. “That's all.”

Sighing, she starts the car. “Okay.”

We cruise off into the direction the two drunken women ran off. Less than a mile down the road, we spot them stumbling through a row of shanty houses. A man steps out of one of the houses and shouts at Maria and her condition. The two go at it even as she pushes her way into the house. Their screaming voices carry throughout the neighborhood. None of the neighbors react, which tells me this is a normal thing with them. An hour later, the fighting ends and the unmistakable sounds of fucking emanate from the house.

“We got a screamer,” Amalia jokes.

My gut knots in frustration.

“So
now
what?” she asks.

“What else? We wait.”

I
didn't mean to hurt Ruthie, but my anxiety and fear made me strike her head harder than I intended. It was a rare chance when I got her out of view of the room's cameras and I attacked. I don't check for a pulse and I push my guilt to the back of my mind. I jet for the door with Maria's key.

Fear nearly paralyzes me but somehow I find the courage to push through. I ease out of the door and creep through the long hallway. It takes forever to reach the end of the damn thing and, even then, I expect to run into a pack of guards or even Carlos and Tomas themselves. But there's nobody here.

The voice in the back of my head parrots that I'm walking into a trap, but I keep placing one foot in front of the other. One hall leads to another and then another. Am I trapped in a maze?

Maybe I should try one of the doors?
I don't like that idea. There's no telling what I might find in this place. Maybe I went the wrong way. Maybe I should've taken a left from the room instead of a right.

I turn around, but doubt that I can remember all the turns I've made.

Suddenly, there are voices. Men talking. Panicking, I reach for the nearest door and then offer up a quick prayer of thanks when I discover it isn't locked. However, the door doesn't lead to a room, but to a staircase.

Tears of relief swell and roll down my face as I tackle the stairs two at a time. It didn't matter that I don't have a plan. I only know that I have to get out of this stone prison. Down and down the stairwell until I'm certain that I've reached the pit of hell. A new wave of panic washes over me. At the bottom of the staircase, I stand still as my eyes adjust to the darkness. It's freezing. I wrap my arms around myself for protection and to ward off the cold.

I jump back and then trip over the bottom stair. When I hit the ground, the wind rushes out of me.

“W—Who's out there?” a gruff voice rumbles through the dark, dank air.

I scramble to get back up, but before I take off up the stairs, the voice asks another question. “What day is it?”

I stop.

“Please. Talk to me,” he begs. “It's been days since someone has been down here.”

The man's desperation pulls at my heart. Despite my best judgment, I turn around and inch further into the darkness. The deeper I go the colder it gets. Every hair on my body stands at attention while goose bumps pimple my skin.

Still, I keep moving. At the end of the corridor, I round a corner and finally see a pool of moonlight flood through a stone window with iron bars. I can also see that I'm in an underground prison. Metal drags against the stone floor and then a pair of dark hands wraps around two bars.

“Are you still there?” the voice rasps.

I stop, certain that I've reached the end of my rope of courage.

“Please,” he begs. “Some water.”

“I don't have any—”

“Over there.” He gestures toward what looks like an iron bucket propped up on a wooden table.

I don't move.

“Please.” He drops to his knees and bows his thick, shaggy head. “Please.”

I close my eyes and tell myself that I shouldn't care what happens to this man. I have my own damn problems and I don't know how much time I have before my captors—our captors—discover I'm gone. I open my eyes, but don't turn to leave.

Sucking in a deep breath, I move forward again.

“Thank you,” he says, before I help him. “Thank you.”

I reach the bucket. There's water but nothing for me to pour it into. “I, uh . . .”

The man coughs and hacks so hard that I can hear his ribs rattling in his chest. It sounds horrible and painful.

I pick up the whole bucket, carry it over and set it down at the bars.

Immediately, he dives his hands into the small pool of liquid and scoops as much as he can into his mouth. He gets more on him than in him.

I flinch, watching him go at it like an animal.

“Thank you. Thank you.” He turns his beaten, black-and-blue face up.

Recognition bolts through me and I jump to my feet and scream.

Unfortunately, I hadn't heard the man who'd walked up behind me, but I bump right into him. I scream again and whip around.

“Ah, here you are.” Tomas grins. “You've been a bad girl again.”

M
y princess has claws. I like that. I smile the whole way back to her room. On the floor is a still very unconscious Ruthie. I should've known better than to have a child watch Cataleyna. After all, she is a Rosales. Being evil and conniving surely runs through her veins.

As I tuck her back into bed, I can't help but notice how angelic she looks with moonlight spilling onto her face. Entranced, I caress her smooth, heart-shaped face. I never understood my brother's fascination—until recently. Carlos fell for Cataleyna the first moment he laid eyes on her. Then he watched her when she would sneak away from under her father's watchful eye to meet her lover: Vicente's right hand man, Julian Arias. Both men were like dogs in heat, following her wherever she went. Carlos would even bug the hotel rooms the lovers frequented so that he could watch the couple make love.

It was an obsession.

I was convinced that Carlos had lost it, but he managed to talk me into this kidnapping scheme. I went along because I wanted to strike back at a man whom our father went to the grave battling. Carlos did it because he simply wanted something that he couldn't have.

Now I'm wondering if I've fallen under her spell, too.

I stand from the bed, order one of my men to take Maria's niece out of the room, and then head back to my office. As soon as I enter, the phone rings.

“Patrón, we have another sighting.”

I exhale a frustrated breath. “Are you sure that it's him this time?”

“I'm not, patrón, but we're fielding an awful lot of calls all around town.”

“In Cartagena?”

“Yes, sir. What do you want us to do?”

“Have
you
personally seen him?”

After a long pause, my man responds, “No.”

I sigh. I'm not about to send out a whole cavalry for another false alarm.

“Patrón?”

“You and Stefan check it out and report back to me. If it's him, you know what to do.”

“You got it.”