“What happened?” Jack asked, moving toward Pilar with a hand on his hip.
She couldn’t speak. Her eyes watered as she sat on the edge of her bed, fear flooding every vein in her body.
“What the hell is that?” Jack asked.
“It’s a cactus flower,” Pilar said, finally finding her voice.
“What’s a cactus flower? And why is it in your drawer?”
“Carlos,” she whispered. “He used to bring them to me. He always told me they reminded him of us. Something beautiful from something ugly. I never understood why he said that. Not until I found out who he really was.”
“Fuck,” Jack breathed. He looked around the room. “We need to get out of here, Pilar. As soon as possible.”
She nodded and slammed the drawer closed, leaving the offending flower, and all her underwear, behind. She couldn’t bring herself to pack anything in that drawer. Not when Carlos could have touched any of it. She couldn’t bear the thought of him ever touching her panties again.
“I can’t,” she stammered. “I don’t know what to bring.”
“Tennis shoes. Sweatpants. T-shirts. Comfortable clothes. It’s going to be really boring.”
She nodded, realizing he had no clue what she was talking about. She went to the next drawer and grabbed the first few t-shirts, barely seeing which ones they were, then snatched pajamas and tossed in a few pairs of socks. She hated going without panties, but she preferred that to wearing anything Carlos might have had his hands on.
Pilar grabbed the book from her nightstand and her Bible from the shelf, then on instinct, grabbed the book Juan gave her for Christmas. She hadn’t read it yet, and if she was going to be locked up for a week, she had time.
She added a charger for her phone and her toothbrush and a bag of stuff for the shower and decided she was ready. She zipped up her bag and threw it over her shoulder. She was really looking forward to sinking into her bed after the day she had, but she knew she wouldn’t sleep. Especially after finding Carlos’s flower.
Jack grabbed her bag and led the way out of the building, pausing before every corner and acting like someone was going to jump out at them. The sad thing was someone might.
Pilar stayed close to Jack and was more than a little relieved when he walked her to her door and stood there until she was closed inside the shiny black SUV. He jogged around to his side and tossed her bag in the backseat before he started up the vehicle and drove off.
“Are you okay with one stop before we go?” he asked after a minute.
Pilar nodded. The urge to laugh bubbled up inside her. She was at his mercy, literally. She blindly put her trust in a guy she met on the street and was allowing him to take her to a safe house. He was driving her around, had been inside her home, and was protecting her. Now, he was asking if she minded if they made a stop. What if she said no?
The laugh inside Pilar popped out of her mouth with a muffled snort. Jack glanced sideways at her, his eyebrows narrowed. The look made another bubble pop.
She tried to push it down, but it kept coming. One little burst led to two and six and twenty, and before long, Pilar was heaving for breath as she rocked with her laughter.
“Are you okay?” Jack asked. His voice was concerned, and when she looked at him, he looked terrified.
Which only made her laugh harder.
Pilar couldn’t talk. She couldn’t even breathe. The entire day had been a complete mindfuck, and she was sitting in an SUV with a complete stranger who thought she was unhinged.
She probably was. And the whole thing made her start laughing all over again.
Jack finally pulled the SUV to a stop and turned in his seat. “Pilar? What’s so funny?”
She shook her head, unable to explain it to him. But the longer he looked at her, that crease between his eyebrows and his down-turned lips, lips she wanted to kiss, the less funny the whole thing was.
Then reality came crashing down on her again. She was the least trusting person on the planet, and she put all her faith in a man who insisted he could be trusted. She was doing the same thing with Jack that she did with Carlos. Buying all his lines without finding out for sure if he was the good guy he claimed to be.
She saw the way Jack looked at Mr. Dunn. He said he was his boss, but what person spoke to their boss the way he did? Were they really Carlos’s people? Was he leading her into a trap?
Everything came down on her at once, and she went from laughing to panicking. She struggled to draw a breath. The events from the day flashed through her mind. Juan’s smile. Carlos’s sneer. Jack’s narrowed eyes. The flower. The conference room. The SUV.
“Pilar?” Jack said again, his voice louder but muffled.
She glanced at him. That crease was deeper. His mouth opened, but no sound came out. He reached for her, but she couldn’t let him touch her. She didn’t know him.
She scrambled for the handle and threw herself out of the SUV. She nearly smashed her face on the asphalt in her rush to get away from him. The handle. It was still in her hand. She let go and pushed away from the vehicle. She had to get to safety. She had to find Juan. Stop Carlos.
Lights. She saw lights and moved toward them. People. Shopping carts. Red. She liked red. She went toward it. He couldn’t get her with so many other people around.
Except Carlos took Juan in the middle of a parade. A fucking parade. How did someone get kidnapped at a parade? Unless he was working with Carlos again. He went willingly.
No. She shook her head. Juan wouldn’t do that. He said he was done. He wouldn’t lie to her. He knew how important it was to her that he not lie. After Carlos, she couldn’t handle lies. Juan wouldn’t lie.
Pilar wandered through the store, barely seeing anything as she went. Food. Yes, she was hungry. She grabbed something frozen and clutched it to her chest. She needed to eat. An umbrella. It was going to rain tomorrow. And sneakers. She needed sneakers, but she couldn’t remember why. They were pretty. Pink and sparkly. She liked them.
She went to the front door and stared at it. There was something else she was supposed to do, but she couldn’t remember what it was.
She walked outside again. Now what?
Jack followed Pilar through the store. She was in shock. He understood it. She wasn’t someone used to the things she faced that day. It was only a matter of time before she broke.
He should have gone straight to the safe house when she started laughing, but he didn’t realize how bad she was until she ran from him.
He didn’t understand why she picked up the things she did, but he didn’t question it. He grabbed a sweatshirt from a rack on their way in, then saw a pair of basketball shorts in their lap around. He could wear his jeans for a few days if he had something to sleep in. There were clothes at the safe house, but he wasn’t sure exactly what. Thankfully, there were baskets with multipacks of underwear near the walkways. He grabbed one for each of them, hoping he got the right size for her. He’d never bought a woman underwear before.
When she headed for the door, he grabbed a cashier and asked her to scan everything before Pilar left. Thankfully, she was quick on her feet and grabbed one of the things people used for a gift registry. Jack added the few things he picked up and paid cash for the whole thing, leaving the change behind when Pilar walked outside alone.
It was only a matter of time before she passed out completely. Jack managed to get her to the SUV and into the front seat. He buckled her seatbelt and slid into his seat.
She stared straight out the window at the blackness surrounding them. Jack stayed quiet. He didn’t know if she was afraid of him or just overwhelmed, but he had to assume it was both. If she heard his voice, she could freak out again.
He drove north, away from the city of Niagara Falls and into the quiet country town where the safe house was. Everything was dark, but Jack knew the way well. Every week, one of them was up there to check on the house. They all knew how important it was to keep a safe house safe, but that meant they had to make sure no one was there who shouldn’t be.
Jack pulled onto the road cut in the middle of the trees. It was small enough that if you didn’t know it was there, you’d miss it. The trees closed in around them, swallowing up the bright headlights as Jack drove away from the highway.
A mile down the road, a small cabin came into view. It was rustic and looked worn down, but both were by design. The security system surrounding the cabin was state of the art, as was the solar system that ran it. They couldn’t take a chance with the house being on the grid, so they created their own power supply. The cabin also had well water and satellite internet. The only TV was a collection of movies and an old DVD player.
When Jack first went out there, he never imagined the cabin would feel small. He loved being surrounded by nature and the cozy feel of the place. He grew up on his parents’ soybean farm in a huge home that always felt like it was for show. Behind closed doors, his parents were simple people, but they had appearances to keep up. Jack never understood it and got out as soon as he could.
Jack shook off thoughts of his parents as he grabbed Pilar’s stuff and his shopping bag from the backseat. He left the lights on so he would be able to unlock the front door, then turned off the truck and climbed out. He ran to the door and jammed his key in the lock. He turned it just in time, the door opening as the SUV’s lights blinked off, plunging them into darkness.
Pilar’s scream was audible from outside the truck. Jack tossed their stuff inside and ran back to get her. He yanked open her door, but she fought him, pushing away from him and kicking at him. She landed a blow to his stomach and got in a good slap on his jaw before he managed to wrap her up in his arms.
“Shh,” he whispered in her ear, his lips pressed against the shell. He tried hard not to breathe her in, but failed. “I’m here, Pilar. You’re safe, honey. Shh.”
She stopped fighting him after a second, slowly going limp. He held her, rocking her back and forth until she was weightless in his arms.
Jack scooped her up and grabbed the things she was holding on her lap during the drive. He kicked the door closed and locked the SUV, then headed for the house.
He took Pilar straight to the bedroom after locking the front door. He eased her onto the bed where she immediately curled onto her side. He debated taking off her shoes or covering her up, but eventually decided against both in case the movement woke her up. She needed her sleep.
Jack left the bedroom, closing the door enough that she would have privacy and quiet but leaving it open a crack just in case. He put away the things they picked up at the store and dug out his phone.
More missed calls and texts. Fuck.
Before he could listen to messages or reply to texts, his phone rang again. “Yeah?”
“If it wasn’t for English, I’d think you were dead. What the hell is going on?”
Jack sighed. He knew Dunn was just doing his job, but the guy had lost it since Williams turned on all of them. They used to trust each other to get the job done. Now, Dunn was constantly questioning all of them like he was waiting for the next betrayal.
“She freaked out. All of this finally hit her. She walked around Target like a damn zombie and walked out without paying for things. And that was after she laughed hysterically for a good five minutes.”
“Shit,” Dunn breathed.
“Yeah.”
“How is she now?”
Jack glanced at the door. “Passed out finally. She tried to kick my ass.”
Dunn snorted. “Did she succeed?”
Jack huffed a laugh. “No, but she got in a few good blows.”
“You probably deserved it for something,” Dunn joked.
Jack nodded, knowing his boss was right. A few hits were the least of what he deserved for his sins.
“Are you in for the night?” Dunn asked.
“Yeah. I’m going to grab one of the meals in the freezer and cook some dinner, then a movie and try to forget I’m in the middle of nowhere and standing guard over a woman who doesn’t trust me.”
“Sounds good.”
“Hey, did you find anything at the apartment?”
“Not what we need. They tore the place apart, though. I’m guessing since we don’t have a body, they didn’t find what they were looking for.”
“So, what’s next?”
“Try to find him,” Dunn said, sounding more than a little pissed off. “We have no leads. Cameras in that area didn’t show anything with all the people around. They blocked Juan from every view we had.”
“Almost like someone knew?” Jack asked.
Dunn drew a breath. “Yeah. We have to consider it. We’ve been at this for months and he hasn’t given us much to go on. Never enough to bring them down.”
“We’ve stopped a few shipments,” Jack defended.
“Yeah, but not in over a month. And stopping shipments is small compared to everything else. They can re-route trucks and we have nothing. We need the rest of the info from him.”
“All he wanted was a guarantee of safety for his sister,” Jack growled. “Even if he died.” At the time, he was one of the ones who debated if it was worth it. Juan said he had enough information to take down the cartel and their US aid, but making guarantees was tough when there was no proof.
“Well, now he has it,” Dunn said.
Jack sucked in a breath and glanced at the door to the bedroom again. Dunn was right. Juan got exactly what he wanted. Pilar was in protection.
“We don’t know what’s really going on. She seems like she’s in the dark, but if she had proof about Carlos, she probably knows more than we realize. If Juan is gone, she’s our new lead. You have to keep her safe.”
The thought of anything happening to her made Jack squeeze his fist shut. He would protect her with his life.
“I got it.”
“Yeah, I know you do. We’ll keep you posted. And Slade’s on call tonight. He’ll be watching you all night. Keep the monitors on.”
Jack looked at the desk set up in the living room. It ran the security for the entire property, from sensors at the road to motion detectors through the woods surrounding their cabin. If anything moved out there, they’d know about it.
“Got it,” Jack said. “We’ll be fine.”
“I know. And thanks, Jack. I know this is the last job you wanted, but you’re the best option.”
Jack nodded. “Hooyah.”
