Before I can recover, my head snaps back, the hood is pulled tight, and water drenches my face.Fuck!I can’t stop myself from inhaling when my diaphragm stops spasming, and the lukewarm liquid floods my lungs.
“You wanted water,sí?” a man asks, and the water stops.
Coughing and pulling at the ropes tying me down, I fight my body’s reflexes until I can rasp, “Yeah. Thanks. Next time…ice it…will ya’?”
I’m ready for the second round, and manage to get a healthy swallow in before I have to hold my breath and try to convince my body I’m not really drowning.
“Look,” I manage after the third bucket empties over my head, “I can do this all day. Or night. Whatever the hell time it is.” Another coughing fit leaves me out of breath, but I don’t stop, even though it’s only going to earn me more pain. “I’m…former CIA…fuck face. You keep…waterboarding me…you’ll either…kill me…or make me think…it’s a day at the beach.”
My captor says something that might be “fucker” in Spanish, then rips off the hood.
Bright lights burn my eyes until a shadow falls over me, and I squint up at him. One of Ochoa’s men. The one who manhandled Dani.
Footsteps approach from behind me, General Ochoa’s chuckle smooth and full of confidence I’ll use to strangle him with if I get the chance.
My chair is spun around to face him, and his lips twist into an insincere smile as he leans down to meet my gaze. “Señor Lejune. Or should I say Señor Moana? You are enjoying your stay with us?”
Now that my eyes have adjusted, I scan my surroundings. I’m in one of the cells on the first level. It’s small, but with enough room for Ochoa and the guard to stand inside the door. Concrete walls. Low ceilings. A drain in the center of the floor next to me. A metal electrical pipe runs the length of the cell with a single bare bulb in the center. There’s no cot. No toilet or sink. “Yeah. Barrel of laughs. Five-star accommodations, too.”
“That…will change soon.”
Of course it will.
I say nothing, challenging him.
“You were not my target, Señor Moana. Merely my way to get to Daniella Monroe. However, the lawyers for her newspaper were able to get the charges against her dropped. You, on the other hand, murdered two members of the Venezuelan National Police. Not to mention Gilberto Sosa and half a dozen others five years ago.”
Dani’s safe. Still in the United States. Thank fuck. I’ll die here, but Dani won’t.
“I thought your only use would be as leverage against Daniella. But then I realized there is so much more you can assist me with.”
I snort, the motion tearing at my split lip, and I taste blood. “You obviously don’t know me at all, asswipe. You might as well just kill me.”
He wants to break me, he’s going to have to work a hell of a lot harder than this. I have nothing left to lose. Dani’s safe, and while Dax and Ford might want to launch a rescue mission for me, they’d figure out pretty damn quick it would be suicide. Not even Ryker and his team are good enough to getinsideThe Crypt. They’d need a fucking army.
“All in good time.” Ochoa whistles sharply and three other soldiers loom on the other side of the cell door. “Show thispendejothe finest accommodations La Cripta has to offer.”
I don’t fight as one of the men slices through the ropes. He nicks both of my arms and one leg in the process. I’m in no condition to best anyone at the moment. Instead, I let them cuff my hands in front of me, then drag me out of the room, past three other cells with prisoners huddled under blankets, and into a rickety elevator. With one man holding each of my arms and the other two watching me, their backs to the door, there’s no hope of escape. But I take in everything.
A service weapon at each hip. Slight bulges close to their ankles—backup pieces, likely. Billy clubs. One of the two in front of me pulls a set of keys from his front chest pocket. Do they all carry them? Or just him? I have to find out.
The elevator jerks to a stop, and we’re moving again. Where it was hot and humid on the first level, now it’s freezing, and my thin prison garb is still soaking wet.
The tops of my feet scrape along the rough floor, but my legs are too weak for me to even try to walk. I must have been in that fucking chair for at least five hours.
Another bright hallway. So bright, the soldiers pull sunglasses from their pockets. Squinting, I think I can make out bars. Cells. The occasional hint of movement.
At the end of the row, the soldier with the keys unlocks a cell, and the two dragging me suddenly let go and shove me inside. As soon as I hit the floor, I start to shiver uncontrollably. It’s like lying on a block of ice.
The door slams, and I raise my cuffed hands to shield my eyes. A set of bars has been cemented three feet above me. There’s no way to stand. The most I’ll be able to do is get to my knees. The toilet is just a hole in the floor, and light floods the entire space, making it impossible to tell if it’s day or night.
“You make noise, you starve,” one of the soldiers says before he slides a cup of water and two small cornmeal cakes through the bars, then stalks away.
My stomach twists in on itself as I grab one of the cakes and shove half of it in my mouth. It tastes like shit. Stale, crumbly, and…is that mold on the edge? But I don’t care. I have to keep up my strength as long as I can. If I’m going to die, it’ll be on my terms.
* * *
Dani
