Jurado wasn’t sure about that. But if Casas wasn’t going to fight, what could he do?
“Lock the doors.” He wasn’t just going to go out there and let these people take him prisoner. He surely didn’t want to let them have Maria. She might not be the brightest young woman, and she might occasionally be tiresome outside of the bedroom, but he still cared for her. He didn’t want to see what might happen to her if she fell into these men’s hands.
But Casas shook his head and started to open his own door. “Then they will kill us all.” He swung the door open and called out, “We surrender!”
Jurado lunged across the seat and tried to grab him, cursing, but it was too late. Casas stepped out of the vehicle with his hands raised.
A burst of gunfire cut him down, slamming him into the open door. He left a bright smear of red on the inside of the armored glass as he slid lifelessly to the ground.
Maria screamed again, and the driver, a wiry little man named Escudero, cursed and grabbed for his Uzi. But he was too slow. A dark figure appeared in the open door, standing over Casas’ corpse, and shot him through the head. Blood and brains spattered off the window and the ruin of Escudero’s skull bounced off the steering wheel before resting between the dash and the door, dripping gore onto the floor.
Jurado froze, staring at the rifle muzzle pointed at his face from a mere three feet away. Maria was shrieking in sheer panic, made worse when an arm reached in around the other gunman and unlocked her door. She was suddenly and roughly dragged out, still screaming until a hard blow knocked her to the ground, where she huddled, whimpering in pain and fear.
Another man lunged into the back of the vehicle and grabbed Jurado. The mayor of San Tabal tried to struggle, but he’d never been much of a fighter, not even in his younger days. A hard punch to the jaw drained all the fight out of him.
The gunmen dragged him out onto the ground and one of them shone a light in his eyes. He squinted against the glare and tried to lift a hand to shield his eyes. A boot slammed down on his arm, pinning it to the roadway.
“It’s him. Bring him.” The voice was cold and emotionless.
“What about the girl?” Jurado thought he could hear a leer in the other voice, but right then he couldn’t do anything about it.
“Bring her, too. Maybe he’ll be more cooperative if the alternative is watching us gut his whore in front of him.”
Rough hands grabbed him under the armpits and dragged him to his feet. A savage blow to his solar plexus finished off any vague idea he might have had to fight back. Then he was dragged toward an old five-ton truck.
Just before they threw him in the back, they pulled a sack over his head. The last thing he saw before darkness descended was one of the gunmen, grinning from ear to ear, dragging Maria by one arm toward the truck.
***
Dawn had only been a few hours away when they’d been ambushed, but it felt like time had stopped while Jurado waited, his hands tied with zip-ties, the bag still over his head and leaving him in complete darkness. As near as he could tell, he’d been imprisoned in a room by himself. There was no other sound after the door slammed. He waited in darkness and silence, as his imagination started to run away with him, painting increasingly gruesome and vivid pictures in his mind of what these savages might have in store for him and his wife.
Finally, the door slammed open, and he heard boots on the concrete floor. Hands grabbed him under the arms and yanked him to his feet.
“What is happening? Who are you people? Where are you taking me?” Another punch to the stomach shut him up. He wheezed in pain as they dragged him out of the room.
He was in too much pain to keep track of direction and distance as they hauled him through several turns. He was fairly sure he was still inside, but he couldn’t tell much beyond that.
They dragged him up a couple of flights of steps, and he stumbled repeatedly, since he couldn’t see the steps. The next stretch was on carpet, and then doors opened ahead, they went through, and he was forced to his knees. The bag was yanked off his head, and he squinted against the light, though the room was not particularly brightly-lit.
He was in the entertainment room, which opened onto the balcony that faced the Grand Plaza. And he was not alone.
Three men stood by the balcony, watching him. The small one in the center he recognized at once.
Ramon Clemente had been a general in the Ejército Nacional de Colombia, the Colombian National Army, before he’d been forced to resign in disgrace two years before. Increasingly credible accusations of corruption and drug trafficking had finally become too loud for the government to ignore, and he’d been offered the option of resignation or prison. He’d resigned, but not gracefully. The last anyone had seen of the small, unassuming, mustachioed man standing in front of him now, he’d been cursing every member of the government and vowing bloody revenge.
Now he was standing in Jurado’s house, dressed in camouflage trousers and a dark green shirt, a pistol belted around his middle. And the stare he leveled at Jurado was as cold and dead as a shark’s.
Jurado looked at the two men who flanked Clemente, but he found no comfort there. One of them he knew.
