I turn my face away from his rancid breath and the body odor emanating off him. I close my eyes, refusing to answer. The slap to my face makes me see stars. My whole face is on fire, stinging from his big hands. Kami and Jacinda cry out, with Kami sobbing, praying to God.
He roughly jerks me up to his face, his fingers digging into my arm. The pain makes me suck in breath. Spittle splatters my face as he barks, “El Jefe doesn’t want you hurt, but maybe I’ll hurt you in ways he won’t see.”
The implied threat is there. Rape. I open my eyes. A part of me wants to cower, but I refuse to let him see me scared, even though my stomach is twisting. “You already know who I am. They already told you, so stop playing games.”
He squeezes my arms harder, and I bend my back, hating that my hands are bound.
“Brave little bitch. My brother must really want your cunt.” He pinches my nipple.
I catalogue everything I’ve learned so far.El Jefe. Brother.
He lets my arm go, and I inhale rapidly so I don’t focus on the pain. The smirk on his face looks clownish. I take it back, he’s ugly.
The second man laughs and starts speaking to our stinky captor. I recognize that he’s speaking Spanish now. I turn to Kami, and I can see she’s eagerly listening. They both laugh, and funky man eases back and climbs out of the truck before slamming the doors shut again, leaving us in the dark once more.
“What did he say?” I whisper to Kami.
Her voice is hoarse, too. “I can only understand the ones that are speaking Spanish, but I think others are speakingMandarin and Russian, and another dialect I can’t figure out. It sounds French. Maybe French Creole. He said something about collateral. That he will come and get you. They are scared of someone called El Búho. The owl.”
The name tickles something in my brain, but everything is so foggy.
“Great. The UN of kidnappers,” Jacinda murmurs. Her attempt at humor makes me smile a little, but not enough to forget that we were in serious trouble and I had no idea why.
We strain to listen more, and Kami’s eyes widen as she listens to them through the metal.
“They are going to feed because the boss doesn’t like skinny bitches and he won’t be able to sell us if we look sick.”
“Sell us?” I utter in disbelief.
A tear falls down her cheek. “We are going to be sold.”
“Sold?” I screech. What the fuck?
“Yes. As sex slaves.” Kami says, her voice so small and terrified.
Jacinda promptly vomits, and I cringe. “Oh my god.” Jacinda harshly whispers, panting. The smell of vomit is strong in the hot interior. I look down at her, and she looks paler than before.
Turning to her, I look at her face. “It’s going to be okay.” I’m not sure if it’s true. How can I? But fixating on what we just heard is not good for any of us. I’m liable to vomit as well. “How are you? Do you know how low your blood sugar is?”
She shakes her head and sighs deeply. “I don’t know the actual number, but it’s low.”
Kami asks the question I was thinking. “What happens if it gets too low?”
Jacinda closes her eyes. “Seizure, loss of consciousness.”
She looks scared but accepting, and I’m more determined than ever, racking my brain for a way. She turns into me, and her arm pumps mine. Her monitor.
“Does your monitor have GPS?”
She blinks, and then awareness comes into her eyes. “Yes. My phone. It will have my location. It has emergency hypo-alerts with a GPS locator to notify my contact in case of an emergency.”
“Do you think it’s working?” Kami whispers to us, hope in her voice.
Jacinda smiles for the first time. “My brother is connected to my account. Thank God he annoyingly checks it religiously since I crashed my car when it went too low.”
Something shifts between us. The energy is different now. There’s hope, something connecting us to the people who care about us. My mind pictures Stone wondering if he’s one of the people who know we’re in trouble.
Chapter 71
