Chapter 16
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Wren wanted nothing more than to sleep the rest of the day away, but she couldn’t. She was obligated to go to the presidential thing, which was unfortunate, because after this morning’s session, her nerves were shot.
The meeting with the different ethnic groups had been unbelievably tense. There was a lot of arguing and accusations of corruption flung back and forth. It was all Wren could do to keep everyone calm enough not to start fighting right there in the conference room. She did her best to explain how the pipeline would benefit everyone, but the men in attendance were more concerned with how much money their communities would get.
It had been exhausting, and combined with the very little rest Wren had gotten the night before, all she wanted to do was sleep. But Colby had told them all in no uncertain terms that they’d be going to the presidential compound, and ordered them to meet in the lobby at six o’clock sharp .
All Wren could think about was making it to tomorrow morning, when they would get on a plane and fly back to California. She had no idea if this trip had accomplished anything. If they’d managed to convince the people of South Sudan and the men in power that the pipeline was a good idea. The project had already been approved, but this trip was supposed to finalize the details and be a shiny, glossy PR campaign to convince the citizens that the partnership with BT Energy and the government would be beneficial for everyone.
She had no idea who would be at the dinner tonight. Didn’t even know what to expect. She supposed there would be food. Maybe drinks. More schmoozing with muckety-mucks. More putting on a happy smile to convince everyone in attendance that all was well with the project and BT Energy.
But the shine was gone for Wren. She simply wanted to be home.
Wanted to see Bo. Wanted to joke with Remi. Wanted to set up a meeting with her father.
She’d thought about Tyler Farris a lot over the last few days. All her life, she’d assumed he wasn’t a good guy. That he’d left her mom high and dry. That he’d even killed someone. And to learn that none of that was true, and in fact he was a very successful, prominent, well-liked businessman, had been a shock.
Though in hindsight, it shouldn’t have been. Her mom was a horrible human being. The fact that she’d lied about her father shouldn’t have been a surprise at all.
Regardless, now that the shock of his existence had faded, Wren was curious. Did she look like him at all? Did they share any traits? And she had three half-brothers. Not to mention two nieces and a nephew!
Knowing her dad wanted to meet her was both scary and exciting at the same time. She wanted to meet him as well. At least once. Maybe they wouldn’t get along. Maybe he wouldn’t like her. But she’d gotten to the point where she at least wanted to meet him face-to-face. See for herself what kind of man he was.
And Wren had no doubt that Bo would go with her. He’d stay by her side, protecting her from anyone saying or doing anything hurtful, while she faced a part of her past she didn’t think she’d ever get to experience. Hadn’t wanted to experience.
Then there was her relationship with Bo himself. She wanted so much more with him. Sleeping together on the couch the night before he left had been so new and unfamiliar. She’d had sex, of course, but had never spent the night with a man. Had never trusted anyone enough to completely let down her guard that way.
She’d slept hard in Bo’s arms. She wanted to do it again. She also wanted more of his kisses. His touches. Wanted to be intimate with him. To take him deep inside her body and watch him lose himself in her. Just as she wanted to lose herself with him.
“You gonna get ready or what?” Luke asked as he walked out of the bathroom.
Wren sighed. She was just losing herself in the fantasy of what it would be like to be with Bo, and Luke had to go and ruin in. “Yeah,” she told him.
“We’re leaving in fifteen minutes. Better get your ass in gear. I’m headed down to grab a beer before we leave. I’m hoping if there’s beer at this thing tonight, it’ll be better than the crap we drank last night.” Luke shivered. “Warm piss, that’s what it tasted like.”
“Maybe it was,” Wren said with a small smirk.
“Mean,” Luke told her with a shake of his head. “I had no idea you were so mean when I agreed to room with you.”
Wren laughed, and was glad to see the smile on Luke’s face. Teasing felt good. Released some of the tension in her tight muscles.
“All right, I’m headed down. See you soon. Don’t be late. You know how tense Colby has been. And Bob and Tom haven’t been much better.”
“I’ll be there,” Wren said.
Luke left the room, and Wren headed into the bathroom. She put a clip in her hair, made sure her toe ring was still snug around the second toe on her right foot. Then she went into the bedroom and put on a clean pair of cargo pants, then the belt with the ferro rod. She made sure the secret pocket still held the cotton wool slathered with Vaseline. She grabbed the tube of lipstick and put it into one of the many pockets of her pants. Then she sat on the bed and grabbed her boots. She made sure the tiny knife was still under the insert in the arch of the left boot. Thankfully, she couldn’t feel it when she walked.
Finally, content she had all the super-secret things the SEALs had given her in place, Wren took a deep breath and checked herself out in the mirror over the dresser. She bit her lip. She didn’t look like a commando. She looked like a woman who needed a good night’s sleep and was ready to go camping or something.
She supposed Colby did have a small point about her clothes. She looked nothing like the put-together professional woman she’d been when she’d interviewed with BT Energy. But then, this wasn’t sunny California, and she’d sacrifice looking pretty for being safe.
Turning her back on her image, Wren grabbed her phone and sent a quick email to Mozart. Letting him know she was about to leave for the thing at the president’s compound. She reassured him that she’d email again when she was back at the hotel, and thanked him for being her point of contact.
Shoving the phone in her back pocket, Wren left the room and headed to the lobby. One more social requirement, then she was home free. In twelve hours, they’d be on their way to the airport. She couldn’t wait.
Everyone piled into two small minivans. Bob, Tom, Colby, Luke, and Aaron got into one van, and Wren, Dallas, Archie, and Oliver got into the other. Both had native drivers and another man, each introduced as members of the president’s security team. There was also a man who wore what looked like a police uniform and was driving a motorcycle with flashing lights, leading their group.
They drove away from the hotel down a very busy street. There were people everywhere, going about their business, which actually made Wren feel better. Women with packages, men talking on street corners, shop owners selling their wares. It all seemed so…normal.
They’d only been driving for about ten minutes when Wren sensed something was wrong. They were no longer in the city proper, but instead driving at a high rate of speed down what seemed like a pretty rural road.
“Where are we going? Is this the way to the president’s house?” she whispered to Dallas, who was sitting next to her.
“No,” the older man said succinctly.
“Stay calm,” the supposed presidential security guard said from the front seat. He turned around and pointed the rifle he’d been holding—one like all the military and police officers in the country carried—at the occupants of the minivan. “Don’t do anything stupid.”
Wren froze.
This wasn’t happening. Of course, Bo and the others had warned that it might. But it still felt totally unreal.
“Where are we going? Where are you taking us?” Archie demanded harshly.
“No questions!” the man barked.
“Screw that!” Archie said. “You can’t just take us away from our hotel without telling us where we’re going!”
“I can’t?” the man said with an evil-looking grin. “Looks like we did just that. Now shut up. Do what we tell you and you’ll be fine.”
“Right, sure we will,” Oliver muttered.
“This is bullshit!” Dallas exclaimed. “Do you know who we are?”
“Of course. Why do you think we’re taking you? Your company will pay money to get you back. Well, at least the man in charge. You? I’m not so sure.” The man holding the weapon on them laughed.
“Is this happening?” Oliver asked no one in particular. “Are we seriously being kidnapped?”
Wren wanted to smack him. Of course it was happening. They’d been warned. Time and time again, and yet no one took the possibility seriously. Except her and Bo.
She wanted to reach into her pocket and grab her phone, but it wouldn’t work anyway. It only worked when she had Wi-Fi, and there was definitely no Wi-Fi out here in the middle of nowhere.
She wondered what was going on in the other van. Was Colby freaking out? Had Bob and Tom attempted to do something to stop this kidnapping? She wasn’t sure what they could do in a van with a rifle pointed at them.
They drove for what seemed like forever, but was probably only around thirty minutes. Enough time to leave the city of Juba far behind. The road had turned to hard-packed dirt, and everyone in the van was bouncing around like pieces of popcorn in a microwave. The flat, dry land was replaced by more and more trees, until the dirt road they were driving on was completely surrounded by lush jungle.
Finally, the van came to a halt.
“Don’t do anything stupid,” their captor reminded them. Then ordered, “Get out.”
Oliver reached for the door handle, and suddenly the van was surrounded by armed men. They appeared as if out of nowhere. The door was wrenched open and Oliver was pulled out by a hand on the front of his shirt. He sprawled onto the ground on his hands and knees. Someone kicked him in the stomach, and he fell to the dirt with a moan.
Wren braced as the rest of them were yanked out of the vehicle without fanfare. She managed to stay on her feet and did her best not to look anyone in the eyes. They were all hustled over to where the rest of her coworkers were standing.
“I demand you take us back to the hotel!” Colby shouted.
No one listened. Looking around furtively, Wren couldn’t count all the men, but there were over a dozen, more than enough to subdue their group. Every man was holding a rifle or gun of some sort. They wore tattered and torn clothes and their skin was filthy. It looked as if they’d been living in the jungle for quite a while.
“Search them,” ordered the man who’d been on the motorcycle, leading their small motorcade.
Within seconds, Wren was grabbed from behind and another man was in front of her, running his hands up and down her legs. She held still, hating his touch but knowing if she protested—or kicked him in the face, like she really wanted to—things would become much worse for her in a hurry.
He reached into her pocket and pulled out her phone with a grin, throwing it onto a cloth that had been spread on the ground nearby. Then he shoved his hand into the pocket along her thigh and held up the lipstick she’d put in there earlier.
He smirked and said something in a language she didn’t understand. The man holding her elbows responded—and to her surprise, the lipstick was put back into her pocket. The man resumed his search, either not noticing or not caring about the small clip in her hair. Pulling up her shirt and pulling down the cups of her bra, he checked for anything she might have hidden there. Wren was humiliated, but still she didn’t fight. She stood stock still and let him do what he’d been ordered to do.
Eventually, he shook his head with a look of disgust and reached into his pants.
Wren froze, thinking this was it. This was when she’d be violated.
But instead, he pulled out a pair of plastic zip-ties. The man behind her shoved her arms forward, presenting her wrists. The cuffs were attached, pulled extremely tight. Wincing at the discomfort, she held her tongue. The last thing she wanted to do was piss these men off. She was at their mercy. They knew it, she knew it. And as the only woman in a group of men, she was in deep trouble.
Keeping all the advice from the SEALs in mind, she did her best to be compliant. To not bring any attention to herself.
The same couldn’t be said for the rest of her coworkers. Colby was trying to fight off the men who were searching him. Swearing and outraged when they took his expensive watch, his phone, his gold bracelet, and everything else he had on his person.
The others were also being stripped of anything and everything worth money. The literature they’d all received before the trip had warned them not to wear anything expensive or flashy, but most of the men had obviously ignored that advice .
The pile of their belongings on the cloth had grown quite large, and when their captors were sure they’d gotten everything they could find, one of them tied the corners of the cloth together, making a bag of sorts, and got back into one of the minivans and drove back the way they’d come.
“Walk,” the guy in charge ordered.
Everyone else also had their hands cuffed in front of them. Her coworkers looked a little disheveled and a lot scared. Wren figured she had the same expression on her face as well.
To her surprise, Bob suddenly yelled, “Now!”
Bob, Tom, Luke, and Aaron broke away from the group and started running into the jungle.
Without hesitation, shots rang out from all around them. Wren dropped to a crouch, trying to protect herself as best she could with no cover and without the use of her hands.
The men were yelling as they fired off shots, the sound deafening, and when all was quiet again, Wren opened her eyes and looked around.
She gasped when she saw four bodies lying motionless on the ground about ten or fifteen feet into the trees. Luke, Aaron, Bob, and Tom were all dead. Whatever strategy they’d hatched in the van on the way here, obviously hadn’t gone the way they’d planned.
Wren wondered what they’d hoped to accomplish. Where were they going? How did they think they could get away from more than a dozen armed kidnappers? It was stupid and such a damn waste!
Thinking about Luke, how young he was, how excited he’d been when he was chosen to come on the trip, made Wren want to burst into tears. She struggled to hold them back. Knowing if she made a scene, she could be the next one lying in a puddle of blood.
“Anyone else want to try to escape?” the man in charge yelled.
No one said a word.
The leader stalked toward Colby and shoved the barrel of his rifle under his chin. Colby flinched and tried to take a step back, but was stopped by another kidnapper standing right behind him.
“It’s hot!” he complained, obviously talking about the metal from the barrel against his bare skin.
“That’s because I just shot your friends,” the leader sneered. “Stay quiet, do what we say, and maybe we’ll let you live. You better hope your people are willing to pay to get you back. Otherwise…” He shot off a round into the dirt at his feet.
Colby, and everyone else, jerked in surprise and fright.
“They’ll pay,” Colby babbled. “I’m the CEO. They’ll pay for me!”
Wren frowned as the implication of his words sank in. Was he saying that they’d pay for him…but not the rest of them?
She didn’t have time to reflect on it before they were all being marched into the jungle.
Trying to stay calm, Wren carefully and stealthily used any opportunity to look around until she’d counted the men holding them hostage. Twenty. There were four captors for each of the remaining five members of her group. There was absolutely no chance of escaping at the moment. But just as Tex had predicted, the toe ring wasn’t found in the search of her body. The man hadn’t even bothered to take her boots off.
She had to hope that wherever this Tex person was, he’d know that a jaunt into the jungle wasn’t exactly on the official itinerary. And he’d call someone to help.
Wren hated that their kidnapping would ultimately put others in danger. It sucked that Colby hadn’t listened to all the warnings about coming here, and now his bodyguards and Luke and Aaron were dead.
“Do as we say, and you’ll not be hurt,” one of their captors said as he jerked Archie by the arm when he stumbled.
That was the key. Do what they said. Stay compliant. Lay low. Don’t bring any attention to herself.
It would be one of the hardest things she’d ever done, but Wren hadn’t lived through her shitty childhood, hadn’t found a man she felt she could finally trust with her true self, hadn’t found out her father wasn’t a deadbeat asshole, only to die now. In the jungles of South Sudan, her body left to rot. No, she’d do whatever it took to survive.
Tex would know something was wrong. Mozart would also know when he didn’t get her proof-of-life email. They’d send help. She had to believe that. Otherwise, she’d fall apart.