The Edge (19 page)

L
aura and I held hands while we watched the sun sink into the ocean. The evening was mild with only a light breeze coming off the ocean. We walked along the cliffs, stopping every couple of steps to talk or kiss.

“You’re right,” she said, her arms clasped tightly around my back.

“About what this time?” I kissed her silly before she managed to pull back.

“We’ve talked to almost everyone today. You baited Tarcher. You went after Paul and he’s locked himself up. It’s hard to know how to make any more progress. Unless you’ve got a better idea, maybe it’s time to call my boss and let the DEA come on out and kick butt.”

Savich agreed with her. I agreed with her. But what hit me full in the gut in that moment was that I had met Laura less than a week before. Yet I knew she was honorable and, I’d wager, as loyal as a tick. After less than a week, I knew I didn’t want to let her get away from me.

I couldn’t stop looking at her. She was wearing Nike running shoes, tight jeans, and a long, loose white shirt.
She’d pulled up her long hair and fastened it with a banana clip. She wore a bit of coral lipstick and no other makeup. I’d nearly kissed all of it off. I looked at her mouth and decided it was my duty to get the rest of it. I closed my hand over her forearm and pulled her to a stop. We looked out over the ocean, following the flight of several seagulls that were cruising for dinner in the water below. It was quiet and peaceful, tastes of salt blowing in the wind.

“Let’s sit down,” I said. We found a trio of rocks leaning into one another, back about fifteen feet from the cliffs.

“Talk to me,” I said.

“You want me to tell you how sexy you look?”

“Yeah, but it can wait a minute. Tell me about yourself, Laura.”

“Nothing wild in my youth, Mac. Actually, I had a pretty normal life growing up in Tacoma, Washington. My mom and dad were close to me and my older brother.

“I played the clarinet growing up. I had great technique but my tone wasn’t very good. I could never be first chair because of that.”

“You couldn’t play those sweet solos, huh?”

“Only once in junior high. I was a pretty sight, my mom said, but my clarinet wasn’t a pretty sound. I went to Boston College, dropped the clarinet—no loss to the music world—and got a degree in psychology. I always knew I wanted to be a cop. I love my job, Mac. My older brother, Alan, is a homicide detective in Seattle. My dad was a cop. He’s dead now. My mom lives near my brother and his family in Seattle.”

I noticed how the wind, stiffer now than just five minutes before, lifted some stray hair and blew it across her
face. I watched the fading daylight shadow-play across her face.

In that instant, a bullet struck the rock not an inch from her hand, spewing out sharp shards. She looked at me blankly as I grabbed her and hurled her to the ground, rolling back behind those rocks. Not much cover, but it was all we had.

Two more shots rang out, one striking the rocky ground and flinging out clumps of dirt and shards of stone, and the other probably high and wide. I grabbed Laura’s head and flattened her face against the ground. I had all of her covered with my body, I hoped.

I leaned close to her ear. “Damn, we’re about twenty feet from the cottage and there’s not even a stump for cover.”

There was another shot, this one thudding solidly into the ground beside us. I pulled her back farther under me.

I looked back at the cottage, beyond that huge expanse of naked ground, and saw the front door slowly open. “Sherlock, Savich,” I shouted. “Keep inside. Call the cops.”

I saw a good half-dozen bullets slam into the cottage. Those shots came from my right, near the cliff. I squirmed around, pulled my SIG Sauer, rose up on my elbow, and fired off six rounds in that direction. I heard a yell.

I smiled. “Maybe I got one of the bastards. Now they know we’re armed, they won’t take the chance of rushing us. They might have heard me yell for Sherlock and Savich to call for the backup. Just hold tight, Laura. Think of me as your Kevlar vest.”

Her face was covered with dirt. She spit some out. “Damn, that was close. This is incredible, Mac. Who are
these people coming after federal agents? What good does this do them?”

I was lying only half on top of her now. Three more shots sounded, these toward the cottage. I wasn’t surprised to hear return fire from the cottage, fast, an entire clip in a matter of seconds. I knew I wasn’t mistaken—there was a shout of pain. Sherlock or Savich had hit one of them. How many were there?

There was silence now. Even the seagulls were quiet. Laura began to squirm away. “No,” I said, grabbing her shoulder. “Don’t move, not yet. Wait a few more minutes.”

I yelled, “Savich, did you get through?”

He yelled back, “The cops should be here in three minutes, no more.” But there was something about his voice I didn’t like, something that didn’t sound right.

“Those guys must have thought they’d died and gone to heaven when you and I came trooping out here.”

I looked up at the sky. We had another fifteen minutes of daylight. Laura and I had three rocks for cover. A piece of cake.

She twisted about to get more comfortable, lying fully beneath me now, and said, “How many are there?”

“I don’t know. At least three. Two of them may be hit. Now we wait for Sherlock and Savich. It shouldn’t be long.”

We waited stiff and silent for two more minutes. Laura spit out some more dirt.

The door to the cottage opened. I heard Savich yell, “Come on in, Mac. Run!”

We ran hunkered over, zigzagging over the ground as we’d been trained to do, Sherlock and Savich covering us. They fired off another clip each, fanning the area behind
us. There were three or four stray shots that didn’t come near us, several more that struck the cottage, then silence again.

I literally threw Laura through the door, turned and fired as Sherlock and Savich eased back into the cottage. I slammed the door, crouched to the floor, and turned to see both women laughing.

“Well done, you two,” Laura said, her arms around Sherlock. “You really saved our hides.”

Well, I thought, staring at the women, everyone reacts differently to being shot at. I checked out the other narrow window that looked toward the cliffs. Nothing. I pulled the curtain tightly over the window. Savich nodded. “All clear from here.” He was staring from his wife to Laura. Laura’s face was dirty, her hair hanging in tangles. Sherlock was grinning at her like a loon.

“You’ve got a clot of dirt in your ear,” Sherlock said and picked it out.

“So who did you call, Savich?” I said.

He pulled the curtain back into place. “They cut the phone lines, Mac. It’s just us in this little box of Cracker Jacks.”

“Damn,” I said. “These guys are good.” I got to my feet and went into the kitchen to check the back of the house. I brought the two beers left in the refrigerator back into the living room. I looked from Laura to Sherlock, knew there was no hope for it, and pulled a quarter out of my pocket. “Call it in the air, Sherlock,” I said.

So much for fairness. They started on the beers without the slightest guilt.

“They’ve got balls,” Savich said, looking up from cleaning his gun by the window. “They can’t shoot worth a shit, but they’re serious about this.”

“Please tell me our rental car has a cell phone, Dillon,” Sherlock said.

“I’d tell you so if it were true,” Savich said.

“This is very depressing,” Sherlock said. “I wish I hadn’t finished my beer off so fast.”

I checked the dead bolt again and shifted the chair more firmly beneath the knob. “When it’s dark we’ve got to try to get out of here.”

“It’s dark enough,” Laura said. “We’ll all go right now. Let’s try to make it to your car, Mac. We can get the hell out of Dodge.” I saw she was chewing on her bottom lip, looking toward Savich, who’d been silent. He said finally, “I agree. It’s been nearly a half hour that we haven’t heard a thing. If they wanted to kill us, they’d still be shooting. Yeah, why not try to get out of here?”

I opened the front door very quietly. I waited, then eased outside, looking toward the cliffs, sweeping my SIG Sauer slowly around in a wide arc. There was a big moon floating over the water, but roiling dark tattered clouds kept sliding in front of it. The night was blessedly dark. I waited until the moon was covered, then ran low to the Taurus, Savich, Sherlock, and Laura on my heels.

Both women were in, down on the floor of the backseat, Savich in the passenger seat as I turned the key in the ignition. Nothing. I tried again, then stopped. “Somebody disabled the car,” I said.

“They must have been very quiet about it,” Savich said. “Let’s get back inside. I’ll cover you.”

No one tried to shoot us on our mad run back.

Once the four of us were back inside the cottage, the front door closed and locked, Savich said, “This is interesting. We’re in America and we’re as effectively cut off from help as you were, Mac, in North Africa.” I
remembered that day when I thought my ticket was punched. There’d been help there though.

Laura shook her head, her face drawn. “This should have been just me. It doesn’t matter that you’re cops too, this wasn’t your assignment. You’re innocent bystanders. I’m sorry you got tossed into the middle.”

“I made the decision with you,” I said. “It’s Sherlock and Savich who are the innocent bystanders.”

“Shove it, Mac,” Savich said.

“Coffee,” Sherlock said. “We might as well start making some. We’re just going to have to wait for the sheriff. You do think she’s coming to check on us, don’t you?”

“I don’t think they’re going to let us just sit here and snooze all night, Sherlock,” Savich said. “They’re going to come for us.”

“Interesting how they got off at least a dozen shots at us, Laura, and missed. Don’t you think that’s strange?”

“They don’t want us dead for some reason?” Savich said, a dark eyebrow hoisted up an inch.

“Maybe not,” I said.

In the next instant, all three windows across the front of the cottage imploded, spewing in shattered glass, tattered bits of curtains, and heavy metal canisters that struck the floor and rolled. They made loud popping noises and gushed out smoke. The smoke was something caustic, bitter, something that burned the very air, something that burned the breath in your mouth.

There was no time. I looked at Laura, who was staring down at one of those small egg-shaped gray cylinders that was releasing a steady stream of the pale blue smoke not six feet away from her.

“It’s ice acid,” she said. “I’m sorry, guys. I’m very, very sorry.”

I wanted to tell her it wasn’t her fault. I opened my
mouth, inhaled some of the ice acid, and thought my tongue would burn off. I wanted to yell with the pain, but my throat was burned closed. I was shutting down and it was the strangest feeling. I was beginning to feel cold, my mouth was numb, my teeth chattering. That’s why they called it ice acid. It did that to you before it laid you flat.

Before I closed my eyes, I saw Savich holding Sherlock tightly against him, his head against the top of hers. Laura was on her side on the floor, her legs drawn up. She wasn’t moving. I tried to get to her. Then I couldn’t see her. My eyes were freezing shut, tears seeping out, ice cold on my cheeks. I wanted to tell Savich that we had to get out of here.

Then I didn’t feel a thing.

I
knew I was awake because I heard myself moaning. But there wasn’t any pain. Laura was calling my name, over and over. “Mac, don’t do this. Please, please, Mac, stop. Wake up!”

I opened my eyes and stared down into Laura’s face. “Oh God, you’re awake. Mac, you’ve got to stop.”

For a moment I didn’t know what she was talking about. Stop what? “Mac, please, get away. Stop it, Mac.”

No, I wasn’t feeling any pain, but what I was feeling was harsh and real. It was shattering me. I didn’t understand it.

“Mac, wake up!”

I was on top of her. She was naked and I was naked as well and between her legs. I was poised to come into her. I felt such overwhelming lust, I didn’t think I could stop.

“Laura, my God, Laura.”

“Mac, stop!”

“Oh, God, I don’t think I can.” I was panting, trying to slow the movement of my body. The urge to come into her was killing me. I locked my muscles and yelled. I
wasn’t going to rape her. I wasn’t. The need to do just that was beyond what I could understand. It was pushing me, driving me, and I yelled again, trying to get hold, to get my mind, my will, back. I could feel her flesh against me and I didn’t think I could hold back.

I looked down at her, saw she was crying, tears rolling down her cheeks.

“NO!” I yelled, my head thrown back.

I jerked myself off her, falling beside her on the wooden floor. I lay there panting, cursing, feeling the urge to come inside her pounding through my body.

“Mac.”

Her voice seemed a long way away, but I knew she was lying beside me.

“Are you all right?”

There wasn’t any more fear in her voice, just relief. I turned onto my side to face her. She was looking at me, and she was smiling. It was then I saw that her hands were tied over her head, her legs open and tied at the ankles. She was helpless. I wasn’t. I wasn’t quite naked. I still had on my running shoes and shirt.

I took deep breaths, over and over, just kept sucking in air and blowing out, trying desperately to clear my mind.

I reached out my hand to touch her, then pulled it back. I wasn’t strong enough yet.

Tears were still on her cheeks. I couldn’t bear it. I touched her then, wiping the tears away with my fingers. “I’m so sorry, Laura. What happened?”

“They drugged us.”

I made the mistake of looking down her body. I gritted my teeth and rolled away. I was still hard. I jumped to my feet, grabbed my clothes off the floor, and quickly pulled my shorts and pants on.

I felt more normal now that I was dressed. Fight it, I said to myself over and over. Just fight it.

I came down on my knees beside her. Her legs were wide apart, her ankles tied to small rings fastened in the floor.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “God, I’m sorry. I didn’t realize, didn’t know—”

“You weren’t the one who tied me down, Mac. I’m all right. You managed to stop.”

My hands were shaking. It took awhile for me to untie the knots around her wrists and ankles. Slowly, she pulled her legs together and sat up. She was rubbing her wrists. “Thank you, Mac.”

“Where are your clothes?”

“I don’t know.”

I stripped off my shirt and handed it to her. As I watched her pull it on and fasten the buttons, my mind started to feel heavy and dull. The urge to have her was receding now. I could control it.

She rose and walked to the narrow bed in the corner of the small room we were in. My shirt came down to her thighs. She sat on the side of the bed, rubbing her wrists.

I sat beside her. I wasn’t about to touch her. I was afraid that if I did, I’d lose it again. “Tell me what happened. Where are we?”

“I don’t speak Spanish so I don’t know what they were saying.

“You were awake but still very groggy. I watched them inject you.” She shuddered.

I pulled her against me, holding her tightly. “We beat them,” I said as I rubbed her back, “we’re both all right.”

She said against my shoulder, “I think it was all a game to them. They wanted to have some fun. They took my
clothes and tied me down. Then they set you on me like a stallion over a mare. They put your face between my legs. When they pulled you back, they were laughing. Then one of the men, probably the leader, said something and they left us alone.” She was silent again. I kissed her hair, kept rubbing her back. “It’s all right,” I said.

“Only because you came out of it enough to see what you were doing. I didn’t think you’d be able to stop, Mac. Oh God, it was awful.”

She’d been tied down, naked, helpless. I closed my eyes a moment against the enormity of it. If I hadn’t been able to stop myself, then— “They wanted me to rape you?”

“Apparently. Funny thing, knowing it was you but that you weren’t really there made it worse. You weren’t my Mac. You were a stranger who didn’t care who I was. You had my scent, knew I was female, and that was enough. That drug was in control.”

“The drug,” I said slowly. “Remember you told me the drug had some effect on sex?”

“Yes. This had to be it, what we’ve been looking for. They used it on you to see what it would do to you.”

I wanted to kill them. They’d treated us like animals. We’d been used for sport to see what the damned drug would do.

“They probably gave you a lot more than one would inject for a sex high.”

“That figures. I didn’t really feel like I was having the time of my life.”

I felt her smile against my shoulder. I squeezed her. “Did they hurt you?”

“Not that I can tell. I don’t know how long we’ve been out. But they brought me out of it with smelling salts.
They wanted me fully awake when they set you on me. God, Mac, it was awful. I couldn’t do anything and you were gone. Then I saw you come back, just a bit, and that’s when I talked to you until finally you got control back.”

“Do you know where we are?”

“No. I’ve just been clearheaded for about an hour. It’s night, I do know that much. My watch says it’s just a bit after ten.”

There were no windows in the small room. It was nearly square, not more than twelve by twelve. There was just the one single bed, an ancient rag rug beside it, and a toilet and sink in the far corner.

“It was about eight at night when they threw the ice acid into the cottage,” I said.

“So how much time has passed? Hours? A day? I don’t know, Mac. But I’ll tell you one thing. Right now if I had my gun, I swear I’d blow off the head of the first man who came through the door. I just can’t believe what they did. And they laughed about it.”

“How many?”

“There were three men, then the man I think was their leader came in and made them leave.” She paused a moment, then added, “They were all speaking Spanish. I doubt we’re still in Oregon.”

“Mexico, maybe,” I said.

“Could be,” she agreed. “Or Colombia. Remember the DEA agent who was tortured and murdered in Mexico some years ago? And nothing at all happened?”

I held her away from me. “Listen up, Laura. Don’t think like that. It does no good. You haven’t seen Sherlock or Savich?”

She shook her head. “When I woke up, I was alone.
When they brought me here to this room, it was empty. I don’t know where they were keeping you, but two of the men half-dragged you in here. It was like you were in a stupor. They tossed you on that bed and injected you. Five minutes later they put you on me. They’re animals.”

“I wonder what would have happened if I hadn’t gotten control? The way I felt, I would have kept at it until I was dead or the drug finally wore off. Maybe that’s what they wanted to see. I wonder if they were laying bets.”

She pulled back. “But you stopped yourself, Mac.”

I kissed her mouth. I smoothed back her hair, lightly ran my thumb over her eyebrows. “I finally realized it was you. I love you, Laura. I couldn’t have hurt you.”

“Well then, let’s take care of this mess and then get married. Can we do that, Mac?”

I couldn’t believe it had taken me until I was twenty-nine years old to find this woman. I kissed the tip of her nose. “In exactly that order.”

I looked over to the small rings screwed into the wooden floor. Had they done this before? Brought in some women and taken turns, enjoying the hell out of it? The drug was something. I was still hard.

I looked at Laura again. Her hair was curtaining her face, hanging long and loose, real shiny. I couldn’t believe it. “They combed your hair?”

“Yes,” she said, not looking at me. “More than that even. They bathed me, washed my hair, and sprayed some perfume on me. They let two women do this while they watched. Neither of the women spoke any English. Then they brought me to this room. I got the feeling that they’ve done this before with other women.”

I pulled her close again, and this time I really smelled the musk on her. I felt a wave of lust. It wasn’t
overpowering, but I didn’t want to test myself. “I’m thirsty,” I said. Just having a bit of distance between us made it easier. I walked to the sink. It was as ancient as the rug by the bed, cracked and rusted. But the water was cool enough and clear. I washed my face. Laura’s scent was gone. The heavy feeling in my brain was easing. I could think more than one thought at a time now, glean more than one impression. But my only thought was that I wanted to kill them. I couldn’t seem to get beyond that and I knew I had to. We had to get out of here.

Laura stood up. “Did you walk away because the drug hit you again?”

“Yeah, but it’s better now. Don’t worry about me.” Then I shook my head and said, “No, forget that. If I start looking at you funny, or talking funny, anything that isn’t right, you get away from me, fast. If you can’t, knock me silly. Protect yourself. All right?”

She studied my face for a long time, then nodded. When she walked toward me, I took an outside route back to the bed. I said while she was cupping water in her hands, “We’ve got to figure out how to get out of this bloody room.”

We both looked at the one door, no windows.

“Do you think they’ll feed us?” I was starving, my stomach nearly beyond the growling stage, but that wasn’t the point. “If they bring us food, we’ll have a chance to get out of here.”

They fed us, not ten minutes later. The door simply unlocked, very quickly, and a young boy carrying two big plates in his skinny arms walked in. Behind him stood another man holding an AK-47 at the ready. He didn’t come into the room, just stood there in the doorway, aiming his weapon at my belly, watchful and ready.

I don’t even think I heard them close and lock the door. My eyes were on the food. There were stacks of soft tortillas and beans, strips of beef, and thick pepper-and-onion-filled potatoes. I was so hungry it tasted as good as anything I’d ever eaten.

They left a large pitcher of cold water. We drank the whole thing since the peppers were hotter than pitch. There wasn’t a bit of food left. Laura looked down at the empty plates and said, “I hope we don’t get sick from stuffing ourselves.”

“Not a pretty thought,” I said, remembering the Montezuma’s revenge that had me dehydrated and ten pounds lighter a couple of years before when I’d been fishing off Cozumel. “One guy with an AK-47. I think we should move over by the door so that if he comes alone again, we’ll have a chance at the guy with the gun.”

Laura nodded. “There’s only this one skinny pillow and the blanket. I’ll mold them under the sheet. Maybe for an instant they’ll think we’re on the bed, asleep.”

We did that and stood back to look at our handiwork. “Not very good,” I said, “but hopefully it’ll work. Which side of the door would you like?”

I ended up on the side of the lock, Laura behind the door. She’d taken off the heavy porcelain toilet lid and held it against her chest.

“They must know that we won’t be sitting here idle,” she said. “They’ll expect us to try something. It’s even possible that they’re watching us even now.”

I’d thought the same thing. I got up and went over that small room, inch by inch. I didn’t see anything that remotely resembled a camera lens or a peephole. I sat back down. “I sure to God hope that Sherlock and Savich are all right.”

“Maybe Sherlock’s sitting by the door as we speak, a toilet lid hugged to her chest.”

We waited. For a very long time. We slept. We awoke early the next morning. My watch read about 6:30
A
.
M
.

We took turns using the toilet and washing up. At exactly seven o’clock, we heard them coming.