The Ninth Day (13 page)

La Valle said something in Spanish to Serena. Whatever it was, it calmed her. She sat down on the couch, grabbed the hookah’s tip, and once again leaned her head back with eyes closed as she inhaled. La Valle looked back at Raoul.

“Take her with you and the shipment. If you cross the border successfully, she can use Tico’s lab in the mountains.”

Emma felt her stomach plummet in fear. It appeared as though she was going to get up close and personal with the shipment. She only hoped that packing it in plastic and behind the false vehicle walls would be enough to keep it from contaminating all of them.

Raoul was already barking into a walkie-talkie. He herded her toward the exit. As Emma turned to go, Perez grabbed her arm.

“You may be in the States again, soon.”

“If we make it out of here, and if we get to Tico’s lab, and if we don’t get infected on the way,” Emma said.

“The odds are slim, aren’t they?” Perez said. She walked with Emma, out toward the pool area. Once they cleared the trees a breeze played around them. Emma shivered. Her clothes were wet with sweat from the run, and the night air had cooled.

“Tell me about the lab, is it what I need?”

Perez shook her head. “It’s a meth lab in the Arizona mountains. Tico likes to experiment with mixing chemicals, so he keeps a minimal amount of equipment there. It’s rustic and simple. Nothing sophisticated, and I doubt he’ll have the tools you’ll need.”

A crack pierced the air. Perez’s body dropped into a heap. The back of her head was blown away. Emma stared at the mess in horror and dropped to her knees next to Perez.

“Go now! To the huts. The cars are there,” Raoul screamed. He held his gun out in the direction of where the shot originated, but all Emma could see was darkness. She pushed off the ground and started running in the direction of the huts. Oz pulled up on her right, running alongside her. Carlos ran on the other side of Oz. Raoul followed them all.

An exploding noise came from behind them. Emma looked back, and saw that the hacienda’s roof had a large, gaping hole in it. The screams that followed were evidence that the partygoers were now fully aware of the danger. Three more blasts rang in Emma’s ears. She kept running, praying that a bullet wouldn’t hit her in the back. She heard the reports of rapid shots and return fire. As they neared the migrant huts, they saw the workers running in all directions. Most disappeared into the trees. Octavio appeared on Emma’s left. He turned toward the migrant huts as well. They reached the gate where the guard usually sat, and found it open. The guard was gone. The converted ambulance, SUV, and BMW sat parked in a row, along with two other Mercedes and a long black limousine.

Emma was running toward the BMW when she heard the hissing of a rocket, a sound she had heard before, and hearing it again sent chills through her. It was a rocket-propelled grenade, heading toward them.

“Down!” Emma yelled. She hit the dirt just as the grenade struck the first hut. It burst into flames.

Emma scrambled upward, with Octavio next to her. Another shot pierced the air, and Octavio flew forward. Emma turned to catch him in her arms. She staggered with the added weight, but managed to lower herself to her knees while still holding him. His chest was against her arm and his back faced up. Blood hemorrhaged from a hole there. Emma watched it surge out, the flow increasing and decreasing with each pump of his heart. She put her hands over the wound and pressed.

“Octavio, can you hear me?” she said.

He coughed once. “Turn me over.”

“I can’t.” Emma’s voice cracked on a welling sob. She swallowed and tried to pull herself together. “You’re injured and I’m pressing on the wound. We need to get you to a hospital.”

“Turn me over. I want to see the sky when I die.” He started to struggle and Emma released him, helping him to roll onto his back. She laid him down. Her vision became blurry as the tears welled in her eyes. She blinked them away. Oz knelt next to her, and she heard him say, “Oh no.”

Octavio looked pale, but he stared up at the night sky. He turned his head to look at her. Emma heard the fizzing of another rocket, heading their way. She gritted her teeth and focused only on the man lying in her arms. She couldn’t outrun it anyway. Octavio frowned at her.

“Run. Go.”

Emma shook her head. “Let’s go to the ambulance. I can bandage the wound and slow the bleeding. Then we’ll get you to a hospital. Come on. It’s only a few feet away, you can make it.”

Oz lowered himself on the other side of Octavio and slid his hands under the man’s shoulders in preparation to lift him. Octavio shook his head. He groaned, closed his eyes, and opened them again.

“It’s better. I can see heaven.” He smiled, exhaled with a rattling sound, and then was still.

Emma stared at him, not quite believing that he was gone. She felt Oz wrap a hand around her arm.

“Let’s go. We’ve got to get out of here.”

Emma said a short prayer and left Octavio lying on the ground, his face to the stars.

Chapter 16

E
mma ran next to Oz, headed for the line of vehicles. Gunfire rang all around them, peppered with loud explosions. The migrant huts burned, the flames meeting each other in a conflagration. Emma thought about the patients. She doubted any of them managed to get out alive. She could only hope that they still were sedated when the grenades hit. Raoul waved Oz and her into the Escalade. Two more grenades hit the surrounding trees. The healthy field burned with billowing black smoke. Ash floated in the air. Emma inhaled, and the pungent smoke hit her lungs with a searing feeling. She started to cough. Oz joined her, coughing and holding his hand to his face.

“I’ll take the BMW. Follow me,” Raoul said. He yanked the driver’s-side door open.

“Do you have a gun?” Emma yelled to Raoul over the noise of gunfire and crackling flames.

“You don’t get a gun,” Raoul said. “Headlights off. Drive slow.” He paused for a moment and stared in the direction of the hacienda, watching the compound burn. Emma looked, too.

The night sky glowed orange, and the rapid, staccato sound of assault weapons filled the air. From out of the bushes came La Valle, Chando, Serena, and another man. The last was ringed by several guards, who swung their heads from side to side, scanning for danger.

Ginoa, Emma thought. The man carried himself with an air of power. This last group piled into the limousine, with the two guards jumping in the front. The rest of the guards climbed into the ambulance, and two hopped into the Mercedes.

Emma crawled into the driver’s seat of the Escalade, and Oz climbed into the passenger side. “They made us drive the biggest damn target there is,” she said to Oz. “With the possible exception of the ambulance.” She turned the car on and it responded immediately. “At least it runs. Remind me where the leaves are.”

“In the glove compartment, behind the fake radio, in a dummy panel between the sides of the car and the footwell . . .” Emma pulled her leg away from the side panel. “. . . and under the bench cushions in the backseat.” Oz ended his speech in a coughing fit.

The BMW moved out, and Emma followed. They wound their way down the frontage road. The darkness made it difficult to stay on the path, but Emma breathed a sigh of relief when they entered a short stand of trees. It lent a feeling of security. A false one, Emma knew, but it still felt better than being out in the open. After a couple of minutes of driving, during which Oz said nothing and the reports of gunfire faded, they reached the beginning of the fields.

Raoul slowed, and then stopped. Emma braked as well. Behind her the limousine idled, with the ambulance next and the Mercedes last. The lights on the BMW switched on without warning, and Emma heard the wheels squeal as Raoul must have pushed the gas pedal all the way down. The BMW shot off in a fog of smoke and flying dirt.

Emma flicked her own lights on and the Escalade responded, albeit somewhat slower than the BMW, but it still managed to reach a decent speed quickly. Emma glanced in the rearview mirror and she watched the sky glow red with fire and flashes. She turned her eyes away and drove into the night.

Chapter 17

“E
mma Caldridge is missing.” Edward Banner held the phone to his ear and tried to process what Carol Stromeyer, the vice president of his company, Darkview, was saying. “I’m sorry to bother you on vacation, but I thought you’d want to know,” she said.

Banner sat up on the edge of the bed, doing his best not to disturb the sleeping woman beside him. Her long brown hair flowed over the pillow. A quick glance at the bedside clock told him it was four in the morning. He got up and left the room, closing the door behind him and stepping into the living area of the suite. He flicked on the light by a desk and settled into the chair.

“No, you’re right to call. What can you tell me?”

“Not much, unfortunately. She failed to appear for work in the morning. The lab didn’t think much of it. She was on an excursion to find some plants in the desert, and they assumed that she had camped out overnight.”

Banner yawned. “Sounds reasonable. So why the worry now?”

“They’re not worried, I am. She sent a text that she’d seen a group of people being smuggled over the border and gave the coordinates. But the coordinates were located in Arizona.” I just got back in town and checked the status on that GPS locator watch you gave her. Its last transmission came from Ciudad Juarez.”

Now she had Banner’s full attention.

“Kidnapped?”

“I think we have to assume so, yes.

“Who would she tell them to call for ransom?”

“My bet is on you. Or Cameron Sumner.”

Banner ran a hand through his hair. He was due to fly home later that day, connecting through Miami.

“Is Sumner back in Key West?”

“Yes. He’s conducting a training session there. I thought I’d arrange a quick charter to the Keys for you instead of to Miami. This way, whichever one of you they call, you’ll be together and can coordinate something.” She rattled off the flight information. “How’s the vacation? Did you get some rest?”

“I did. I want to thank you for insisting on it. I’m going to insist on the same for you when I get back.”

Banner and Stromeyer had been working eighteen-hour days repairing the damage done to Darkview by a congressional probe into an earlier matter undertaken in conjunction with the Department of Defense. While Darkview’s actions were ultimately determined to be appropriate, it had taken months to acquire additional DOD assignments. They’d been unable to pin down the source of the lies that started the probe, but put that goal aside while they rebuilt the company’s balance sheet. As a result, Banner was exhausted, and once the company regained its footing, Stromeyer had insisted that he take a break. For a brief moment he’d almost forgotten himself and asked her to join him, but pulled back in time. She was his colleague, the request would have been inappropriate, and he didn’t know if she had any thoughts about him that went beyond friendship. Not to mention that he needed her at the helm in his absence.

Now Banner hung up and pondered the situation for a moment. He sighed, switched off the light, and walked back into the bedroom, navigating his way to the bed. He carefully lowered himself down onto it again.

“Let me guess, that was the wife calling.” Her voice came out of the gloom. Banner smiled in the dark at the idea of Stromeyer being his wife. Once again, he pushed the thoughts aside.

“I’m not married,” he said. “And you should have asked me that long before this.”

He heard her give a small laugh. “I was busy.”

“The whole week?”

“You were there,” she said. “Besides, you never asked me, either.”

Now it was his turn to laugh. She was famous the world over. With paparazzi following her slightest move. He knew everything about her, not because he read the tabloids, but because information about her was so ubiquitous that even he couldn’t escape it. He knew she wasn’t married. Had never been.

He’d met her the first day of the vacation, when he’d gone to the resort bar to relax after the long flight. She’d been surrounded by people; the curious stared at her, the bodyguards kept close. Through it all she’d sat, gazing into her drink, looking pensive. He knew from the tabloids that she’d just ended a relationship, so he wasn’t surprised that she was alone, but what did surprise him was that she’d managed to use a trip to the ladies’ room to slip away from the bodyguards. He’d thrown his money down on the bar and followed her into the dark, keeping his distance as she walked the exclusive and empty beach alone. His position as CEO of Darkview made security second nature to him, and he didn’t like to see her taking such a risk. He assumed she’d hired the guards for a reason, and shaking them to be alone wasn’t a wise move.

He’d tailed her easily, enjoying the soft night breeze and listening to the waves lap against the shore; giving her plenty of space, but watching for any signs of threat. At the turnaround they’d met, and he’d simply nodded and turned with her, saying nothing and strolling along. She’d spoken first, commenting on the beach’s beauty, and they’d walked and talked the length of the return and then two more laps. By the end of the evening he’d asked her to have lunch with him the next day.