Girl Undercover 10 & 11: The Abduction & Dante's Inferno, page 9
Parking my car at the side of the road, I jumped out, wondering why the hell there weren’t any patrol cars around yet. Both Ricki and I had called for help, she 911 and I, in lieu of a police radio, had called it in to my division directly and told the operator to immediately broadcast the crime to all responding units. Malibu wasn’t under the jurisdiction of the LAPD, so I had emphasized that it sounded like a gunman was going on a rampage, likely holding dozens of Los Angelenos hostage, to get them to come anyway. This was way too big for the tiny Malibu police department to handle. Everyone knew that. So why wasn’t anyone here? The traffic wasn’t that bad, and surely there had been several patrol cars nearby that could have responded to the call within minutes.
Gazing down the road toward Santa Monica from where I had just driven, I hoped to spot at least a couple of police cars and hear the blaring of sirens. Nada.
I placed another call for help to my division. When the operator picked up, I identified myself and gave her the same codes as before, stressing, in case she was new and needed to have things spelled out for her, that it was urgent, a matter of life and death. Many lives were at stake here if I didn’t get help immediately. She told me she’d see to it that the message was relayed.
Pulling out my gun from the holster I had attached around my hips right before I got out of the car, I scurried across the street toward the fitness studio. From my current vantage point, I had a good view of the main entrance. Dante had said that he was behind the front desk, and the entrance, a big glass door, was only feet away from that desk. But that was more than forty minutes ago. Was he still there? Was he still alive? Oh, God… Again, I tried not to think of that possibility. Since the vast majority of the studio’s windows faced the ocean, and they were beyond the door, I had no choice but to try to get a peek in through the entrance, not only to see where he was, but to assess the situation in general.
Crouching down, the absolute silence bothering me, I started toward the door. Images of dead people scattering the gym floors inside Dante’s studio, blood everywhere, filled my mind. I pushed them away.
The sound of a firecracker followed by screams just as I was about to reach the glass-door entrance made me stop dead in my tracks. Catching my breath in an attempt to calm my racing heart, I leaned against the wall next to the door. Someone had definitely fired a gun with a silencer on it somewhere inside the studio. Throwing a glance to my left, I scanned the highway that ran along the coast for signs of any police cars approaching from any direction. Still nothing.
When I had calmed down, I leaned toward the glass door. I needed to get a look inside to see what was going on. At first I couldn’t see anyone, but then I saw people seated on the floor, lined up against a wall. The ones I could see, both women and men mostly in gym wear, all appeared alive and unhurt. A tall, broad-shouldered man dressed in a tank top and khaki shorts came into my line of vision. He had long, black hair held back by a red headband and his skin was olive, a couple of shades darker than Dante’s. Unlike my friend’s muscular arms, this one had no tattoos covering the skin. I couldn’t see his face well, barely in profile even. I was sure that when I did see it from the front, he would be gorgeous. The man had to be a killer hybrid sent out by The Adler Group for some reason. I highly doubted it was one of Dante’s trainers who had just snapped all of a sudden.
I noticed that he had a small machine gun attached to a strap across his chest then, a handgun in his other. Glancing at the people on the floor, he aimed the smaller weapon at them. He appeared to be saying something because a couple nodded and said something in response. I couldn’t make out any of it; the glass and the walls were too thick.
The gunman didn’t seem to realize that I was there, watching him. I had a good vantage point from where I stood; all I needed to do was raise my gun and fire it. One well-aimed shot would take him out and then this nightmare would be over.
I didn’t need to think about it; raising my gun, I aimed at the man. Right as I was about to squeeze the trigger, something cold and hard was pressed against the back of my skull.
“If you squeeze that trigger, you’re dead,” a smooth male voice behind me said. “Lower your gun.”
Doing what the stranger behind me wanted, I lowered the gun, my heart heavy. Dammit.
“Good girl,” the man behind me said. “Now hand the gun to me.”
Sighing, I didn’t dare not doing what the stranger wanted. Not when I couldn’t get a sense of exactly where he was standing behind me.
Only seconds after I was deprived of my weapon, an arm was around my neck and the stranger behind me hissed, “Now knock on that door. We don’t want to take my friend by surprise. That could result in him being scared and shooting you. You don’t want that, do you?”
“No,” I mumbled. He pushed me forward so I had no choice but to take another step. We ended up standing before the glass door, blocking enough of the light from entering the studio that we created a shadow on the white floor immediately inside.
“Knock. On. The. Damn. Door.”
Shivering with fear against my will, I raised my hand and rapped lightly on the glass, praying silently that the man with the guns inside wouldn’t freak out and start firing at me.
He did spin around, but didn’t seem particularly shocked to see me and whoever it was that held me hostage from behind. As I had suspected, the black-haired man was gorgeous, his features chiseled and covered with the smoothest dark olive skin, his mouth luscious and his long-lashed eyes an electric blue. A corner of his lips quirked up in a grin that made him look evil, but didn’t diminish how strikingly handsome he was. All the people sitting on the floor behind him were staring at me as well. Unlike the black-haired hostage taker, I recognized a couple of them as Dante’s employees.
Definitely a hybrid, I thought. And a new hire.
“Open the door and go inside,” the male behind me said, giving me a light shove. I raised my hands and pushed against the cool glass until the door opened. I walked inside with my captor attached to my body like we were Siamese twins, the mouth of his gun pressed to the side of my skull. Because the man before me was armed as well, I was not about to risk trying to get away from my captor by stepping on his toes hard with my heel or elbowing his solar plexus. Those methods usually worked great to get out of a situation like this one.
As we kept moving deeper into the spacious fitness studio, I used my peripheral vision to find Dante. I found him in a corner away from the others, slumped and with a big towel tied around his thigh that was disturbingly red. He pressed another big towel against the first one. I let out a small gasp at the sight; it instantly made me think of Burt in that house near Philly. Fortunately, Dante looked very much alive still, blinking and trying to smile at me as he noted that I had spotted him.
“Just do as they tell you, Gabi,” he said weakly.
“You have a smart friend,” the man behind me said in my ear, his breath warm. “Just do as we want and you’ll be fine.”
“What do you want?” I asked as we stopped beside his friend, who had turned back toward all the people lined up against that one wall. I finally spotted two bodies lying on the ground, in pools of dark blood that had begun to coagulate in places. One was next to a leg press and the other next to a bench press. I hadn’t been able to see them from the outside. Where the fuck is the police? They should’ve been here a long time ago!
There was definitely no sounds of sirens blaring on the outside, though, consoling me that help was near.
“Money,” the man behind me hissed into my ear. “Lots and lots of money. Ten million dollars in cash to be specific. Delivered to us in two backpacks that we can easily carry out of here.”
He patted me down and found Ricki’s phone in my pocket, which he took. Then he let go of me and pushed me forward so hard that I stumbled and landed on the floor in front of a couple of women with skinny, tan bodies and fake boobs. Both of them yelped loudly as I crashed beside them.
I flipped around so I could get a view of my captor. Tall, muscular and as handsome as his coconspirator but with a platinum-blond crewcut and fair skin, he regarded me where I lay in a heap on the floor. I pushed myself up into a more dignified position.
“And how’s that gonna happen?” I asked. “Does anyone even know that you’re here and what you’re doing with all these people?”
“No, not yet,” the fair man said, smiling wide. A couple of dimples popped up in his cheeks that made him appear endearing despite the gun with the silencer his hand and the machine gun that hung over his other shoulder in a strap.Another hybrid for sure, I thought.
“That wouldn’t be very smart now, would it?” he continued. “If cops were swarming outside—which they will be shortly—it would have been hard for me to get through to my buddy. I had to get here and join him before we alerted everyone. And here I am. I was just parking my car on the highway when I spotted you snooping around. I instantly knew you were up to no good. Good timing, huh?”
I smirked at him.
“What were you doing with that gun anyway?” he asked, indicating my Glock that he’d put in a front pocket on his denim vest. “Are you a cop?”
I didn’t answer, just glared at him.
Taking a couple of steps toward the nearest person on the floor, a small, fit man in his thirties, Blondie grabbed his arm and put the gun to his head. “Answer me. Are you a cop?”
“Yes, I am,” I replied, my heart pounding as I watched fear bloom in the small man’s face. “Please let him go now.”
“Not until you tell me how you found out what’s going on here. We haven’t told anyone yet.”
I debated whether telling the truth would be unwise, if that would result in Dante receiving another bullet that would finally kill him.
“Someone sent me an email,” I blurted before Blondie could shoot the man he held onto.
Blondie scowled. “An email? Who sent you that email? Huh?”
When I didn’t answer quickly enough, he fired a shot into the small man’s head, the silencer on the gun muffling the sound so that it sounded like someone had merely lit another firecracker. The light went out in his eyes, telling me he died immediately. People around him screamed and curled into balls, looking like they wanted to disappear through the floor. Staring at the poor dead man, I felt terrible. My indecisiveness had resulted in his death.
The dark-haired man with the headband waved his machine gun at the terrified hostages. “Shut the fuck up or more people will die!”
Everyone instantly followed his command and clamped their mouths shut.
Okay, they were clearly meaning business here, so I had better tell the truth. I could only hope it wouldn’t result in Dante’s death.
“Tell me who sent you the fucking email!” Blondie demanded, snarling at me.
“I sent the email,” Dante muttered weakly.
Bandana man turned to face Dante. “Ah, so that’s what you were doing on the computer. Sending emails to your cop buddies. I should’ve known taking your cell phone wasn’t enough.”
I glanced at Dante. Well, that explains why there had been no more emails from Dante but that first chaotic one, I thought. The trainer must have spotted what Dante was doing behind the front desk and taken the laptop from him, forcing him to send whatever he’d managed to get down right away. As I’d read Dante’s email, it had seemed not only haphazard, but I should have known he would never have mentioned being shot to his wife unless he could also explain that the wound wasn’t that serious.
The trainer glared at Dante, who stared back at him defiantly.
“Who else did you email?” the man wanted to know. “Did you notify more of your friends?”
“No, I only emailed my wife, who contacted Gabi,” Dante responded. “Check the computer and you can see for yourself.”
“Where’s the computer?” Blondie asked.
The other man pointed at a chair near the entrance. “There.”
Blondie walked over to the chair and opened the laptop. He asked Dante for his login info and was soon in. Dante told him what email account he had used and how to access it.
A minute later, Blondie looked up from the computer screen and at his friend. “The last email he sent was to Ricki Davila and it says to tell Gabi and call the cops.”
“Ricki is his wife,” Bandana man said. Turning back to Dante, he asked, sounding almost sad, “Why the hell did you tell her to call the cops? I told you you’d be okay as long as you cooperated. Don’t you trust me? Come on, how can you not? If I hadn’t meant those words, you’d be dead now, not just incapacitated. By disobeying, I might have to change my mind about letting you live.”
The man aimed at Dante, who didn’t say a word, just kept staring into the mouth of the gun, daring the other to pull the trigger. The air was so full of tension it was hard to breathe. Please don’t shoot him, I begged silently. Please let him live.
As though the man had heard my pleas for mercy, he lowered his gun. “Nah. You don’t deserve to die. You’re a good boss. Besides, we’re gonna call the cops anyway. Your wife mustn’t have called them or they’d be here by now. Way before that sorry excuse for a cop.” He waved at me with his handgun, then guffawed as he turned back to Dante. “Your wife must not be all that worried about you being dead or alive, only notifying her.”
“Okay, that’s enough, Javier.” Blondie said. “Let’s move things along now that I’m here finally. The sooner the mayor can give us the cash, the sooner we can let everyone go.”
I stared at him. The mayor? Which mayor was he talking about?
“Where’s the landline?” the blond man asked Dante. “I need to use it. The cell-phone connection isn’t that good in this neck of the woods.”
“There’s a phone on the wall next to the front desk,” Dante muttered.
Blondie walked over to the desk by the entrance, got the phone from the wall and dialed a number. It didn’t take long before someone at the other end picked up.
“Good afternoon, my name is Tim Dalton. Can I please speak to the mayor?” He spoke in a tone so sweet and smooth, it seemed unreal this man was a criminal and a cold-blooded murderer. But he was clearly of the same ilk as his friend, having just put a bullet in the head of that poor small man that had ended up right beside me. My eyes went to the other two corpses on the floor that were only a few yards away from me on my other side, and I couldn’t help but wonder what they must have done to warrant being shot to death when apparently all these freaks wanted was money. Had it really been necessary to kill them?
“Yes, I know he’s in a meeting,” Blondie said in that same silky smooth tone. “Every second and fourth Monday of every month, the city council has a meeting and the mayor must attend and this Monday is no different. You and I spoke earlier today regarding this. You told me specifically that he’d be there tonight. Now, please let me speak to him. Tell him it’s extremely urgent.” His face darkened when he listened to what the person at the other end of the call replied.
“Listen, Miss...” he began. “What was your name again?” A pause. “Miss Tilton? Right. Please listen to me very carefully, Miss Tilton. I’m currently in Malibu, standing in a fitness studio together with a friend of mine. The two of us are holding twenty people hostage in this facility. Well, twenty-three, but three are already dead, so I’m not really counting those. If your boss can’t get us ten million dollars in exactly one hour, we will execute one person every minute after the deadline is reached. So, unless you want to be responsible for twenty additional dead people, I suggest you get your boss on the line now. I don’t care if he has explicitly instructed you not to disturb him when he’s in a council meeting.”
A pause, longer this time. “Yes, I’ll hold on while you go get him. In fact, if you don’t get him on the line in the next five minutes, I’ll execute one of the hostages right now. Got it? Good. Now off you go.”
His gray gaze found me again as he just held the phone to his ear, not saying anything. Slowly, he shook his head and then rolled his eyes like he couldn’t believe how stupid and ineffective of an assistant Miss Tilton was. Then, “Who do you think I should kill first?” he asked me.
“Me,” Dante wheezed from his corner. “You should kill me and let the others be.”
Tim snorted, looking like he thought Dante was kidding. “You? Let’s be serious here.” He turned back to me. “Who would you like to see dead here? Do you know any of these people? I can recognize at least two of them. That’s Morgan Stanley.” He motioned his handgun toward a bald black man in a yellow T-shirt and gray athletic shorts. Morgan didn’t move a muscle as he returned the blond man’s gaze. “You’re a good actor, man. No, you’re a greatactor.”
Tim’s gaze and gun moved over to a small, shivering redhead in black tights sitting curled up in a ball. “And here we have Lindsey Dash, don’t we? Yes, I think we do…” He glanced at Dante. “No wonder you’re doing so well with all these famous people working out here. Javier told me all about your chichi clientele.” Tim returned his attention to the petite Lindsey. “I used to be a fan of yours until that last movie you did. It was so fucking bad I can’t believe it was ever made into a movie. For being part of that alone you deserve to die. Why did you agree to do it?”
Lindsey blinked a couple of times, her lower lip trembling she was so terrified when he pointed his gun at her. “I... I…”
Tim held up a hand. “Hold on. Let me guess. It was because of the money, wasn’t it? You got a big, juicy paycheck for it, didn’t you?”
“Um…” Lindsey looked like she didn’t know what to say and her wide eyes darted in every possible direction in search of help from someone. People didn’t meet her desperate glances and instead looked away.
“How much did you get paid for… what’s was the name again?” Tim narrowed his eyes as he searched for the name in his mind. He brightened. “A Ripple in Time! Yes, that was the name. A Ripple in Time… Stupid fucking title. I should’ve known it would be a fucking time suck. They should’ve named it Time Suck instead.” He threw his head back and let out a guffaw. Then he looked at Lindsey again, his expression grave. “How much did they have to pay you to act in that piece of shit?”
