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Emilio watched my face carefully, as I clutched my stomach and fought the urge to throw up. I really didn’t want to be sick. I was pretty sure the pellets wouldn’t make their way up as easily as they’d gone down, not that they went down very easily. Still, I could imagine them getting stuck, banked up in my throat, bursting, killing me. No, I definitely did not want that.
‘That’s enough,’ he said, pulling the plate back to his side of the table. He handed me a passport and the stack of papers he’d been fidgeting with. ‘Memorise these details. You will be flying with my associate today. I expect you to stay quiet and act normally. Accept a meal on the flight, but do not eat anything. Sip water, but not a lot. When you get to the other end, further instructions will await you.’
My head spun as I looked at the photo in the passport. The girl looked nothing like me. ‘How is anyone going to believe this is me? The guards at the airport will laugh in my face.’
Emilio shrugged. ‘I own the guards. I own the airport. I own everyone. This is merely for show. It would look odd if you walked right through without a passport, cholita.’
I opened my mouth to protest. Murphy strode in right on cue, tossing a full plastic shopping bag at me. I glanced down into the bag to see a jumble of reds and blacks, gaudy lace and polyester.
Great. He was going to dress me up like a hooker. That didn’t bode well.
‘The girl did good,’ Murphy said, seeming genuinely impressed with the almost-empty plate on the table.
‘Just like sucking dick, right?’ I said to him. ‘Looks like it’d come naturally to you.’
He flashed me a wicked grin. ‘Your words, not mine,’ he said, laughing.
He sobered immediately as Emilio cleared his throat.
‘How many, boss?’
‘Nineteen,’ Emilio answered. ‘One for every year of her pathetic little life. Right, cholita?’
I chose not to respond.
‘Right,’ Murphy said, rubbing his hands together. ‘Let’s go on vacation, little lady.’
I rolled my eyes, and he laughed.
CHAPTER NINE
MARIANA
The travel arrangements were nauseating — more nauseating than the fact that I had nineteen plastic-wrapped pellets full of pure cocaine powder in my stomach. According to my passport, I was Maria Reyes, wife of Danny Reyes, also known as Murphy. We were checked in express and I was acutely aware of the heat Murphy was packing underneath his gaudy Hawaiian shirt. I was mortified at the outfit he’d picked for me — a black skin-tight dress that hugged me in all the right (or wrong) places with a plunging neckline that stopped barely above my navel. That was only a slight exaggeration. He ever so graciously let me pack a grey zip-up hoodie in my carry-on bag (again, purchased by him, tacky and cheap) and I hugged that jacket tightly around myself as we took to the skies.
It didn’t erase the cold terror that was growing in the pit of my stomach, though. With each moment that passed, as we got closer to our destination, thoughts of what Murphy might do to me once we were on land and alone plagued me. I talked a brave talk, and I snapped back at these men in conversation, but I already knew Murphy was bigger than me, stronger than me, and if he wanted to pin me down and force himself on me, I’d be pretty fucking useless to stop him without some kind of a weapon.
Oh, how I longed for a weapon.
The plane ride was bumpy at first, as we flew through storm clouds that were common in the tropics. I was used to flying back and forth from my stateside college a few times a year, but I still hated flying. Hated not being in control. This time, however, I lifted up the window shade and watched jagged streaks of lightning spark between clouds, thinking I was safer up here than I would be once we landed. After the pilot managed to divert the plane from the bad weather, we levelled out and the air hostesses started rolling food trolleys down both aisles.
‘No thank you,’ I said sharply as the air hostess tried to hand me a tray. She was distracted and continued to push it in my face, so I pushed it back towards her. ‘I’m not hungry,’ I said, louder this time.
The air hostess looked affronted, and was about to withdraw the foilwrapped tray when a hand shot across mine and grabbed hold of it.
‘She’s watching her weight,’ Murphy said to the air hostess, charming her with his fake smile and candy-sweet tone. ‘I keep telling her she’s beautiful just the way she is, but she keeps on with these silly diets.’ He shook his head for effect and took the tray from the air hostess.
The air hostess moved on and I felt a hand grip the back of my neck.
I tried to wrench my head away, but Murphy was surprisingly strong. With his other hand, he unlatched my tray table and let it fall into my lap, pushing my meal in front of me.
I recoiled as he brought his mouth close to my ear. ‘Take the foil off,’ he said, his nails digging into the soft skin on my neck. ‘Move the food around, put some in your mouth, and spit it back into your napkin.’
He pulled at my neck, forcing me to meet his gaze.
‘No,’ I replied. I knew I should just do what he said, but I’d always been the stubborn, hot-headed girl who hated being told what to do. This was all I had — a small chance to defy him, to defy someone. A tiny choice that I could make in a reality where I was no longer in control of anything.
His jaw tightened. ‘You know air marshals carry guns, don’t you, Ana?’ he threatened.
