I look around. Naomi is nowhere to be seen.
Neither is Vasily.
Daniel’s friend has re-stolen Daniel’s sister. Oh no. My heart sinks.
“We need a blood transfusion,” someone yells up ahead, and I forget about everything but Daniel. Clutching at Mendoza’s shoulders, I don’t relax until I’m in the clinic with Daniel.
And then I can do nothing but watch as Mendoza’s doctor goes to work on the man I love.
Twenty-six
Daniel
“SERGEANT HAYS , YOU HAVE A Red Cross call.”
I look up from the picnic table where I’ve got a ten and a five. Rubens, one of the direct assault troops in my squad has a face card and a four. Do I hit or stay?
“Wait,” I say. “Did you say Red Cross?”
The lance corporal delivering the news nods his head stiffly. A Red Cross call is an emergency call, a special number that connects families of troops with deployed soldiers no matter where they are. I’ve never had one in the eight years I’ve been in—not even when I was in theatre and my old man had a heart attack. It was a minor one, but I learned about it an email four days after I’d come back from a mission in Beirut assisting the Lebanese in ferreting out a leading member of Al Qaeda. The U.S. military is enjoying using its Middle East staging ground from Afghanistan to launch all kinds of Special Forces missions. “Hit me,” I tell the other recon sniper assigned to my squad. He lays out an eight. “Fuck.”
“Busted,” Rubens crows and drags in the cigarettes we’re using as currency. Three of them break and the tobacco leaves a trail on the scarred and cracked wooden surface. “Sergeant?”
I jerk my head around. Nothing good comes from a Red Cross call, but I go and lift the phone up like it weighs more than a 50 cal machine gun.
“Your sister’s been kidnapped. You need to come home and find her.” My dad’s voice is hoarse, as if he spent the whole night crying or, more likely, shouting at people. I stagger on my feet, looking for a chair and can’t find one. I slide to the ground.
“When?” I ask. I need details, but there’s silence on the other end. Finally, my dad sighs.
“Two days ago.”
“Two fucking days ago and you’re calling me now?” I scream down the line. My heart is pounding so hard and fast now I fear it will jump out of my chest. This is my fault. All my fucking fault. I was the one who encouraged her to take this spring break trip. I had almost bullied her into going, telling her she needed to spend time with people her own age.
“You need to come home, Daniel.” It’s my mom’s voice, so quiet I can barely hear her. She’s crying and her tears remind me of Naomi. “Daniel, come home.” More tears. Lots of tears.
“Save me, Daniel.”
I see those words in a thousand faces. The hunt for Naomi started in Cancun, but it has taken me everywhere. From the Philippines to Dubai to Russia to London. Girls are being sold everywhere. Their red mouths and tiny hands reach out to me, but before I can reach them they are shot, one by one. I turn around to stop the shooter, but no one’s there. A heavy weight drags down my arm, and I see a smoking gun. I throw it away with a scream.
There’s a fire in my shoulder and another in my waist. I’m burning up. It’s the fires of hell, I think. I’m in hell and being burned for my failure. For my sins.
“Daniel. Stop.” It’s Regan.
“Fighter. Wait for me,” I tell her. “I’m coming for you.”
Wetness falls on my face. “You promised not to leave me,” she screams. Her screams are so loud. I see Hudson above her, his whip hand reaching back to strike again. Grabbing it, I pull him away, but there’s another man and another and I can’t reach her. “Regan,” I scream. “I’m coming. Hang on.”
Arms try to hold me down, but I have to get to her. I’m not leaving her behind. I’ve got to keep my promise.
“Don’t come home until you find her.” The stern face of my father appears next to me. My mother lies in pieces at his feet. Someone’s shaking my arm.
“I’m coming, Regan, wait for me.” They’ve immobilized me, but I’m not being held back. “I won’t leave without you!” I roar. And then a blow across my face renders everything black.
Twenty-seven
Regan
I CLUTCH DANIEL ’S HAND IN mine for hours. He’s asleep, due to the heavy duty drugs they’ve given him, and isn’t aware that I haven’t left his side. I still hold his hand anyhow. They’ve pumped blood into him, and his color is better, his wounds are stitched up, and they assure me he’ll be fine. But I won’t believe that he’s going to be all right until he wakes up and smiles at me and calls me “fighter.” Then, I’ll know he’s okay.
Then, I can tell him that his sister’s gone again.
Vasily has disappeared. Mendoza sent some men to hunt him and try to stop him, but both he and Naomi have vanished without a trace. Mendoza thinks that Daniel will know where Vasily has taken Naomi, and I hope so.
I worry he’s going to be furious at me because I didn’t do enough to stop Vasily from taking her again. And I worry that Daniel will look at me with loathing because I’m still here and Naomi’s gone again.
Mostly, though, I sit and worry.
One of the favela doctors swings in and checks on Daniel. Daniel has a new bruise on his face from when Mendoza came in and clocked him in the jaw to get him to stop yelling. The doctor smiles at me; I think he’s impressed that I never leave. He checks Daniel’s vitals, switches an IV bag, and starts to leave again.
“Is he going to wake up soon?” I ask softly.
The doctor doesn’t look concerned. “Soon. How are your feet?”
“They’re fine,” I say flatly. I have bruises all over, and my feet are torn up from all the glass I had to have extracted from them, but it’s unimportant. Daniel’s all that matters. “How soon is ‘soon?’”
The doctor shrugs and turns to leave. He looks so unconcerned. Maybe he’s used to patching up bullet-holes far too often. He nods at me. “Soon.”
And then he leaves again.
I press my mouth to the back of Daniel’s hand. He’s so still in bed, so lacking that vibrancy that I’m used to seeing. I never realized until now how very alive Daniel is and how much I ache to see that devilish smile of his again.
Instead, I’m here, listening to every breath he takes and hoping it’s not his last.