Page 80
One of Father’s trusted men had approached his chair and lowered his voice. I’d been standing nearby with the serving plate and caught most of the report.
Someone had traced one of the companies tied to Father’s jet, an airport handler at Comalapa had stopped answering his phone, and foreign security men had started asking about private flights arriving from the United States.
I could still see Father’s angry expression.
“Volkov.”
Everyone at the table had gone silent, waiting to hear his instructions.
“Double the men watching the airport and the roads leading northeast,” Father ordered. “I want every foreign vehicle and private aircraft reported. Find out who questioned the handler and who else they spoke to.”
The news had struck me so sharply that I’d almost lost my grip on the serving plate.
Lachlan’s people were already searching in El Salvador.
He hadn’t promised me an impossible rescue simply because he needed my help. His men were tearing apart the trail exactly as Lachlan knew they would.
I’d carried the remaining cake around the table, serving it to the men without letting any of my excitement reach my face.
Finally, Doña Teresa and I reached my bedroom. I’d never been so eager to be locked inside.
She unlocked the door and waited until I stepped through.
The lock turned behind me. I stood there for a moment, listening to her footsteps fade, before my body finally relaxed.
My recipe basket sat beside the bookcase where I’d left it this morning. I added antiseptic, salve, two clean cloths, and a folded towel to help me tend to Lachlan’s wounds.
Then I waited.
The men remained on the veranda across the broad central courtyard from my window for what seemed like hours. Their voices carried over the tiled paths, thick garden beds, and trickling fountain, growing louder as the rum flowed. Chairs scraped across the tile as someone started an argument, and another man answered with a loud, slurred challenge.
I slipped off my shoes and left them beside the bed so my bare feet wouldn’t make a sound in the hidden passage. Then I paced between the locked door and the vanity, chewing my thumbnail as I imagined what condition Lachlan might be in when I finally reached him. Every burst of laughter from the veranda tightened the knot in my stomach. He was trapped below, and the men outside showed no sign of ending their night.
One by one, the voices faded. Doors opened and closed along the guest wing. The last burst of laughter ended somewhere far away.
No sound rose through the grate the entire time I waited, which only made me more afraid of what condition I’d find Lachlan in.
When the main house finally settled into silence, I lifted the basket and entered the wardrobe. Behind the hanging clothes, I opened the false panel and stepped into the narrow passage.
The water, bread, bananas, and wrapped paring knife I’d hidden earlier waited in the shallow niche, and I added them to the basket.
Then I gathered the skirt of my dress and started down.
Each bare foot landed carefully on the old steps.
At the bottom of the stairs, I stopped behind the secret door and listened.
Nothing.
No guards speaking in the corridor.
No chains rattling.
No furious Irish curses.
I pressed the small, hidden release stone. The latch clicked, and I eased the disguised section of wall inward.
Chapter fifteen
