Chapter 14
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Bree lay on the floor of yet another fucking cage and did her best not to move a muscle.
She was curled into a ball, trying not to throw up or moan from the motion of the boat.
They were moving incredibly fast, and every time the boat went over a wave and came down hard on the water, her bones ached.
She was pretty sure she had at least one broken or cracked rib from being kicked. And one of her eyes was swollen shut. She had to be covered from head to toe in bruises. She hurt…everywhere. But she was alive.
And Fiona and Julie had escaped. She’d overheard the men on the boat worrying about that.
Clearly concerned about how “unhappy” the boss was going to be when he found out.
A search of the shipyard was being planned at daylight, and she could only hope her friends were able to get out, get beyond the fence before that happened.
Even though she wanted to rage and cuss out the men who were on the boat with her, Bree instinctively knew that her best option was to pretend to be unconscious.
So far that had worked, as far as the men leaving her alone.
The last thing she wanted was to bring their attention to her again.
She had no idea if they were the kind of men who would rape a woman while she was passed out, but she had to continue hoping they weren’t, as they hadn’t touched her so far.
So she lay on the floor of the cage and did her best to act as if she was completely out of it. All the while, trying to remember the Spanish she’d learned during her college days to glean any information she could.
Honestly, even though she’d been beaten to a pulp, Bree wouldn’t have changed anything she’d done.
She wasn’t upset for killing that guy back in the truck.
She wouldn’t spend another second thinking about him.
He’d chosen his path, kidnapping innocent women to sell in the sex trade, and his death was a direct result of his life choices.
But most importantly, Julie and Fiona had benefitted from her sacrifice. Anything that happened to her now would be worth it.
Bree did worry a little about what they’d do now, after getting out of the truck.
Especially without proper clothes. Would a kindhearted stranger in the area take them in?
Give them food, water, clothes? Or would they run into someone Mateo or someone else was paying to look the other direction when illegal stuff went down at the shipyard?
Mentally shaking her head, Bree refused to be pessimistic. Julie and Fiona were smart. They’d be careful. They’d figure out a way to get to a phone, to contact their husbands. To tell them everything that had happened. They’d do whatever it took to give the guys the info they needed to find her.
She just had to stay alive until that happened.
Every painful breath reminded her that staying alive might be easier said than done, but Bree was determined to live long enough to let Smiley know how much he’d come to mean to her.
That she’d been intrigued by him even from that first meeting.
From the first time she’d heard his name, Jude Stark, something within her had sat up and taken notice.
She was going to campaign hard for either Addison or Maggie to name their kid Jude, if it was a boy. It was a kick-ass name, and Smiley had certainly lived up to the feeling of safety it evoked in her.
Thinking about him made her want to cry. How she wished she was back in his apartment, cuddled up against his side, talking about their plans for the day. He had to be freaking out right now.
No, not freaking out, that wasn’t Smiley’s style. He’d be frowning, that furrow in his brow would be super-prominent. He’d be barking at everyone when they didn’t answer his questions fast enough, and he’d be pacing. She had no doubt about that.
Before pretending to pass out from the pain of her injuries, her captors let her have a small amount of water and a piece of stale bread when she feigned delirium and begged for something to eat and drink.
But they didn’t give her anything else to put on.
The slip she’d been dressed in back in the States was filthy.
And one of the straps had broken in her desperate fight for her freedom.
She felt lucky not to be completely naked at this point.
She smelled horrible, like chicken shit, pee, and the dirt she’d lain in when she’d been beaten.
Her hair was greasy, and now uneven since she’d cut some of it to use on her knife.
Thinking about the piece of plastic that had allowed her to distract the asshole who’d been groping her made Bree sad.
She was proud of that weapon. Even MacGyver would probably tell her good job.
And now it was gone. She wasn’t going to get a chance to make something else like it, since the cage she was in had a metal tray instead of plastic.
Her best defense right now was time. To stay quiet.
To try to let her body rest so it would be ready for whatever was to come.
She’d heard the man in the truck. She was being taken to Ecuador.
To Mateo’s private compound. Nothing good was going to happen to her there, but maybe, after a while, those around her would let down their guard and she’d be able to escape.
She wasn’t going to comply with anything asked of her, but in the long run, that might be the only way she was going to be able to escape.
Just the thought of what she’d have to do in order to make Mateo think he’d won was abhorrent.
But she wouldn’t stop fighting. Ever. Her only goal was to live.
Then to escape. If she had to hike through hundreds of miles of jungle, she’d do it.
If Fiona and Julie had been able to endure, so could she.
Smiley couldn’t stand still. Adrenaline was still coursing through him. He needed to be doing something. Not just standing in this hotel room. Bree was out there, she needed him, and yet here he was.
But he was also well aware that he needed intel. He couldn’t just run around like a chicken with its head cut off. He needed a plan. And he needed to hear Fiona and Julie’s story in order to formulate one.
The sun was just starting to rise, and the two women had showered, eaten, and were wearing the clothes the men had brought for them. Smiley refused to think about the pants, shirt, underwear, and toiletries that were sitting in his own bag for Bree, unused. It hurt too much.
“Start at the beginning,” Kevlar said gently. Julie was in a chair covered by a blanket, her legs drawn up in a somewhat defensive position. As much as she said she understood why her husband wasn’t there, Smiley still felt a twinge of guilt for not choosing Patrick Hurt to accompany them.
Fiona was in Cookie’s lap on the bed. He was leaning against the headboard covered by another blanket. She was sitting sideways with one arm around his shoulders and her head resting against his. Cookie literally hadn’t let her out of his sight since she’d crawled out from under that car.
Tex was sitting in a chair next to a small circular table with his laptop open in front of him. He’d been clicking away at the keys ever since they’d returned to the hotel, and Smiley could only hope he was sending, and getting, information about Bree from the women he was working with.
Kevlar was leaning against one of the walls, looking relaxed. But his jaw was ticking and it was obvious he was just as anxious to hear the entire story as everyone else.
“So, we were in the back of my store looking through the bags of donations, when the door slammed open and three men barged in,” Julie said, starting things off.
“Yeah, we saw the surveillance video. What happened after you were put in the SUV?” Tex asked.
Smiley was glad that he was moving things along. He felt bad, because there was probably some therapeutic benefit for Julie and Fiona to give them every detail, but he needed new info.
“They used some sort of gas. The back of the SUV we were in was separated from the rest of the seats by Plexiglas,” Fiona told them. “This fog appeared, and I don’t remember even leaving the downtown area of Riverton.”
“We woke up in that chicken truck,” Julie picked up the narrative. “We were in cages, side by side, all the way at the back. It smelled horrible, and we didn’t have any of our trackers or clothes, only those slip things.”
“The chickens were loud, and I’m guessing the smell was meant to hide our own scents,” Fiona said. “We could tell we were in a truck, but that’s all we knew.”
“And Bree? How was she?” Smiley couldn’t help asking.
“Scared. We all were. It was my idea to see if we could find a way to break the plastic trays we were sitting on. But she was the only one able to actually do it. I guess there was a crack or something in hers, which she was able to get her fingers under and break off,” Julie said.
Smiley fingered the knife Bree had fashioned, which was still in his pocket. He was proud of her, despite being pissed that she’d been in that situation in the first place. “I’m sorry,” he blurted.
Everyone turned confused gazes toward him.
“For what?” Fiona asked.
“I was supposed to be watching over you guys. And I left the store. I left you alone. Which was the exact chance those assholes needed to grab you.”
“Smiley, you couldn’t have known they were waiting for a moment to make their move. It was a coincidence that you were even out front, taking that call. If you were inside, you could’ve gotten hurt.”
Smiley snorted. She was being very magnanimous. Those men did what they did, when they did it, one hundred percent because he was distracted. Of that, he had no doubt.
“He was talking to me,” Cookie told his wife. “I was pissed that my team and I hadn’t been told that the man after Bree had connections to your own abduction, years ago. I was chewing him a new asshole.”