“Roger that. Be ready.”
If I could risk a reaction, I’d laugh. I was ready to get out of here exactly point-oh-one seconds after I walked through the door.
“I am.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Trevor
The soldiers tookLuis maybe thirty minutes ago. I don’t know where. I just know they haven’t brought him back. Another patrol comes through, and heavy, booted feet stop outside my cell.
I squint up at the two meanest of Ochoa’s soldiers—the ones who go off shift just before we’re fed—as they unlock my cell and drag me out by my arm. Sparks of pain race down my fingers as the cuffs dig into my wrists.
That’s good. It means my hands haven’t lost all sensation in the cold.
“Where are you taking me?” I ask. The words are slow and unwieldy. It has to be close to mealtime again. The constant frigid air blowing over my skin means there’s no fucking way a single cup of water can keep me from dangerously severe dehydration.
They don’t answer.
Dani. I don’t know how I can be so certain, but I am. She’s here. And if she’s here, I hope to God she’s not alone.
Thoughts of rescue and escape help me focus, and though I only open my eyes to slits, I take in everything around me. The code one of the men enters on the electronic keypad next to the elevator: six-seven-two-three-nine. Where on their belt they clip the cell door keys. Each of the cameras we pass, including the one inside the elevator.
“Your eyes, ears, and brain are the three best weapons you have.”My instructor at Langley used to repeat that bit of wisdom every fucking day. After the first week of training, we all joined in every time he said it. And he was right.
“You’re taking me out for dinner, aren’t you? Or to the spa. You shouldn’t have.” Joking with these assholes isn’t going to end well for me, but their reactions are valuable intel.
Two swift punches to my gut follow in rapid succession, but I’m prepared, and while they hurt, they don’t do any real damage. As the guards let me fall to the floor, I force out a hoarse chuckle. “A massage then. Great.”
The guard on the left tenses like he’s going to hit me again, but the other one stops him. “Not yet.”
They don’t want me to be a complete mess. Either Dani’s here or she’s demanding to see proof of life. Either way, it still means I’ll have some sort of contact with her.
The guards stop just outside a closed door and remove the belly chain. “Stand up,” one of them barks.
I try, but my legs won’t hold me. “Fat chance of that. Should have gotten me that massage first.”
General Ochoa emerges from the elevator with a look of pure excitement on his face. “You are a fortunate man, Señor Moana. To have someone who cares for you as much as Daniella? It is a wonderful thing.”
I want to punch him in his smug face for calling her by her first name. But I can’t. “What did you do to her?”
“Nothing she did not volunteer for. I give you my word.”
Fear snakes cold tendrils around my heart. If he’s hurt her...I won’t be able to live with myself.
“She’s the best of all of us, you know that?”
Austin’s words from so long ago haunt me. She is. She always has been.
The general rests his hand on the door knob. “You have five minutes with her. After that, you will give me the information I require, or I will be forced to have her moved to Sublevel Five as well.”
“You evenshowher Sublevel Five, asshole—“
“Watch your tone,pendejo,”he snarls. “You have no power here, and unless you want Daniella to become a permanent resident of La Cripta, you will not speak to me that way again.”
Ochoa punches in the code for the door, and the two guards shove me inside.
“Trevor! Oh, God.”
