Abducted. Dana Mentink

jumped, and Jett leaned against the wall of the truck, bound feet and bound hands.

      Bound heart, she found herself thinking, looking at his handsome face, so quick to flash the arrogant smile against the hurt she knew was inside him, a hurt rooted deep in his past. Those brown eyes, the tint of coffee, had sparkled with tears when she’d broken up with him. It was the only time she’d ever seen him close to crying. He’d proudly told her he never cried, even when his father, fueled by alcohol, would get out his wooden stick. No tears from Jett, but she’d cried oceans for him.

      His lips were dry, she noticed, and she wanted to ask Miguel for some water, but she knew he wouldn’t provide any and Jett wouldn’t drink it anyway.

      Again she closed her eyes, let the anger and fear settle as best she could, and resumed her prayers. The truck interior was stifling, but the jostling eased off half an hour into the journey. She gathered from the angle of the floor and the grinding of the truck gears that they were headed up a slope, ostensibly toward Beretta’s mountain compound.

      Facts about Antonio Beretta were mixed with the local storytelling. Depending on the storyteller, he was either the son of a deposed Mexican president or perhaps a farmworker who had taken on the mantle of a drug lord by murdering anyone who got in his way. He provided gifts and favors to certain people, and he also arranged for the abduction and murder of his rivals and their family members. What was the truth? Sarah and Jett were about to find out. She swallowed, a painful motion against her parched throat.

      A sudden lurch made her bang the back of her head on the truck’s metal siding. She grabbed hold of Young’s stretcher to hold it steady as the vehicle bucked and shimmied.

      “Flat tire?” Jett suggested to Miguel. “You guys know how to change one? I can show you, if you don’t.”

      She beamed Jett a hard look, which he returned with a lazy smile. She wished he would not antagonize the man with the baseball bat who craved an excuse to beat him senseless.

      Miguel said nothing, and the truck rolled to a stop. He marched to the back, reaching for the handle when the door was suddenly rolled up from the outside. Sunlight streamed in, blinding them. Trying to shade her eyes, Sarah caught a glimpse of a gloved hand snatching Miguel out of the truck.

      Jett struggled to his knees and crawled to Sarah.

      “What’s happening?” she breathed.

      There was a sound of shouting.

      “Don’t know. Can you cut me loose?”

      She searched her medical bag. “They took my scissors.”

      “Use something else. Anything sharp. Fast.”

      She pawed through her bag until a gunshot split the air. Then another.

      Jett tensed, leaning close to her. She could feel the warmth emanating from his body, but it brought her no comfort.

      Outside, the noises died away until all Sarah could hear was the sound of her pulse roaring in her ears.

      “Who is out there?” she whispered, still searching for something to cut his restraints. She found a small blade in a plastic case. With fumbling fingers, she freed it.

      “I can make out two men. Three, maybe.”

      “The police?” Her heart leaped as she sawed away at the bands around his ankle. “Rodriguez must have figured out what happened and sent help.”

      Jett stared into the sunlight. “Uh-uh.”

      Sarah worked frantically with the blade, freeing his ankles. “Jett, what are you thinking? Who are those men?”

      “EODs have a motto,” he said slowly. “Always Prepare for the Worst.”

      “How could this situation get any worse?”

      Jett put his bound hands on her shoulder and held on, as if he could somehow anchor her there away from the danger. She reached for his hands to try and release them from the zip tie. “Jett?” she asked urgently. “What is it?”

      “I don’t know, but I’ve got that feeling.”

      “What feeling?”

      “The kind of feeling I get right before something blows up.”

       FIVE

      Jett waited until his eyes adjusted to the light pouring through the back of the delivery truck.

      “Come out,” said a figure silhouetted by the sun. The voice spoke in unaccented English—an American as far as he could tell. That was a good sign. Wasn’t it? Jett’s legs were now freed, but Sarah had not had time to cut loose his wrists.

      “Stay behind me,” he said to her as he climbed out of the truck. She followed, and he offered his bound hands to help her.

      They were on a remote stretch of dusty road, hemmed in on all sides by immense trees, thick as living walls. The shadows and the incendiary temperature indicated it was late afternoon. Jett exhaled in deep satisfaction as he took in the sight of Miguel lying on his stomach, hands bound behind him. A man wearing fatigues kept Alex at gunpoint while another forced him to his knees and tied his hands, as well. Alex’s other man was not visible, but presumably had been dealt with, too. Out of the frying pan...

      “My name is Tom,” said the man who was clearly in charge. Jett could see now that he had crew-cut blond hair. He was shorter than Jett by a good six inches, but strong, tough, with a military bearing. Jett figured him to be in his late forties. “Are you hurt?” Tom inquired, his tone polite, cold.

      Sarah shook her head. “But there’s a man inside the truck. His name is Del Young. He’s gravely injured and he needs to be taken to a hospital right away.”

      “We are aware, ma’am.” In fact, one of their rescuers had already hopped into the back of the truck and was checking Young’s pulse.

      “Who sent you?” Jett said.

      Tom didn’t answer. Instead he spoke into a radio unclipped from his belt. “Ready.”

      Was he radioing another vehicle?

      Sarah hugged herself. “Thank you for rescuing us. They were taking us to Antonio Beretta’s compound. He is desperate to get his hands on Mr. Young.”

      “We are aware of that, too.”

      Sarah blinked in surprise. “How did you know that?”

      Tom did not reply.

      “So you’re well informed,” Jett said, “but I didn’t get an answer to the question. Who sent you?”

      “Does it matter?” Tom said, flat blue eyes fixed on Jett. “You would have been executed shortly when Beretta got what he wanted.”

      “I like to know who I’m dealing with.”

      Tom kept his gaze on Jett and Sarah as he bent to listen to a whispered report from the man who had been tending to Del Young.

      Sarah tucked her fingers against the small of Jett’s back, thumb through the belt loop of his jeans. The gesture touched him. It was the way she’d kept him close when they’d been in crowds in the long-ago days when she’d loved him.

      Don’t you know I’d never let you get lost? he’d said. And he wouldn’t. At the tender age of eighteen, he would have sacrificed anything to keep her from harm. Back then, he hadn’t known that love could end so abruptly, like an exploding mortar. He saw her body had relaxed; she leaned her head against his arm, sagging in relief. He wished he could feel the same.

      “I can’t believe they found us in time.”

      “Yeah.”

      She caught the tone, raising her eyes to his. “What’s wrong? They’re friendly, aren’t