Finally, we pull up outside of a motel.
“Keep your mouth shut while I get a room. I’m locking the car. If you try to get out, it’ll trigger the anti-theft device. If you scream or shout, you will wish for death when I’m done with you.”
I watch helplessly as she locks me in the car. I can see people outside, but nobody is looking at me. I only have minutes to act.
I write Iacopo’s phone number on the window of the car with my fingers. I’m hoping that the finger oil will still be there when the car is covered in dew in the morning and people will realize that something’s wrong. It’s the best I can do right now. If only someone were looking inside of the car…
Chapter Twenty-Five
Failure
Iacopo
When my men have secured the house where we tracked Kelly, nobody besides the security team is inside. One of my men who used to be a combat medic is making sure that the scumbags don’t bleed out. We’ll take them in for questioning.
I can see a strand of Kelly’s hair on the white sheets of a bed in a small room. There’s no handle on the inside of the door. But she’s not there.
“Smell this, sir.”
One of my men brings me a tray. It has a bowl of rice on it. It smells strangely sweet.
“It’s drugged,” I say. My muscles clench when I think about them drugging her. Another man interrupts my thoughts.
“We think that they took her out the tunnel.”
“Show me.”
Then we’re running down a tunnel which leads to a garage. There a
ren’t any cars here, although there are a few drops of oil on the ground. They haven’t been gone that long.
“Find her,” I tell my men. “Find my fiancé.”
“We’ll do it, sir.”
I don’t pay attention as my men strategize on how to track her and get her back. I think of her being drugged and helpless in Mateo’s power. It makes me want to put my fist through a wall.
But anger cannot save her now.
“Sir…I think we’ve found which vehicle they took.”
In a frame, one of my men is holding a shot of two people standing in front of the garage. There’s a single car in it, a green SUV. Part of the license plate is visible.
“Find out where the car went,” I bark.
“Already on it, sir.”
I can see that they’re relaying the pertinent information through their phones. Wherever they’ve taken her, I’m going to find them. And I will make them pay for stealing someone on whom they never should’ve laid a finger.
Two hours later, I’m pacing like a caged tiger. Not knowing where she is, knowing that she’s drugged and in danger, is making me insane.
“Sir, we think we know where she went.”
“Where?”
“There’s a small town in the desert where there’s a motel.”
“There are a lot of small towns. Lot of motels.”