Page 3 of Hammer’s Fall

Hammer didn’t answer but stood and stepped back as she swung her legs over the edge and got out of bed.

“Can I have some privacy to change?”

“Sorry. No can do. I can’t let you grab a weapon or hit an alarm. I will have Goliath turn around, though.”

“But not you?” she asked.

Hammer just shook his head.

“Can I turn my back?”

“That’s fine.”

She went to a dresser against one wall, pulled out several items and set them on top before pulling open the neck of her nightgown and letting it fall to the floor. Hammer blinked. She had a mass of bruises and possibly welts from her waist to below her underwear as well as several dark bruises on both upper arms. He wondered what had happened but didn’t want to ask, not now. Every second they were in the house clicked in his mind as if it were the countdown on a bomb that would destroy them all. Questions could wait until they were back on US soil and safe.

Chapter Four

Camila ignored the way her hands shook as she pulled on a shirt and reached for a skirt. She had no way of knowing if these men planned to hurt her, but they hadn’t yet and she could hold on to that. Her father would have dragged her out of bed by her hair. How did she know? He’d done it more than once.

She had no way of knowing if going with them would be getting out of one problem only to find herself in a worse one, but the way she saw it, she didn’t have a choice. All she could do was make the best of it and hope they were better men than Papá.

“Don’t you have jeans? Or at least pants?” The stranger who’d woken her spoke from behind her.

Camila didn’t answer but dropped the skirt and went to the closet. She reached way into the back to where she’d hidden the jeans her father didn’t know she had. She was careful to never wear them around him, but they were great for when she could get out of the house and ramble around the countryside, or the rare occasion when she got to ride a horse. She tugged them on, then turned to face the two men.

One still had his back turned but she’d seen him before he’d turned around. Both were huge, at least a foot taller than her five feet and probably twice her weight, if not more. They were dressed in black with paint streaking their faces and weapons that weren’t legal in their hands, but she’d seen enough automatic weapons that they didn’t bother her.

“Shoes?” the first man, the one who woke her, prompted.

She didn’t respond but grabbed the socks she’d gotten out and her running shoes and sat to put them on. When they were both on, she stood again.

“Is there anything you can’t live without? Do you have any medications?”

She glanced around the room thinking that if she never came back, what would she miss? Nothing.

Camila shook her head.

“Then come on,” the stranger who seemed to be in charge said. “Let’s retreat.”

The man facing the door glanced over his shoulder—she wasn’t sure if it was at her or at the other man, not that it mattered—then he went to the door and opened it. The house was quiet as they left, and she had to wonder what they’d done to Maria. She didn’t care about her father’s goons, but Maria had been nice to her.

Inside the front door they met two more men dressed like the ones with her, but they were alone. No Maria. Camila hoped that once Maria figured out she was gone, she would leave too. That she would be far from here before her father figured out she was gone.

They exchanged a few words, all in English and while she understood the words, she suspected it was some kind of code because she had no clue what they were saying. When one of the new men opened the door and headed out, they all followed, the man who’d woken her falling behind her, so she was in the middle of the group.

She wondered what they wanted and if they would hurt her. They hadn’t yet. That was more than she could say for her father. Besides, what good would fighting them do? They were all big enough to toss her over their shoulder and take her wherever they wanted, no matter how hard she fought. Especially since her father told her that any kind of combat, even self-defense, was unbecoming in a woman. Then again, he didn’t want her to be able to fight back, not when he was the one who’d hurt her the most.

Camila kept her mouth shut as they moved out across the desert. She struggled to keep quiet as she tried to keep up but the third time she stumbled, this time falling to her hands and knees, the man who’d woken her sighed and picked her up.

“Come here. You’re louder than my whole club.” He picked her up and cradled her against his chest before continuing on. Not wanting to give them a reason to hurt her, she remained silent, but watchful. She wasn’t sure what they were watching for, other than her father’s men. And maybe the policía, but she didn’t want either to catch them any more than the men around her seemed to.

****

Camila didn’t know how long they walked or where they were going but she knew when they went into a building then someone pulled up a hidden door in the floor that they were crossing the border. These men were taking her into the US? What would they do to her there?

She walked on her own now, and the man who had carried her said he didn’t want to hurt her. But what did he consider hurt? Papá didn’t think that whipping her was hurting her, but she knew otherwise. She didn’t know if these men were as bad as Papá, but she was pretty sure they weren’t on his good side. Or maybe it was the other way around, and somehow Papá had crossed them. That she could believe.

She forced herself to keep her breathing slow and even. That was the only way to keep from panicking. She could handle the darkness, but the tiny space and the darkness? That was too much.