No One Heard Her Scream (30 page)

Yet when reality struck, Becca knew this couldn't be true. Diego stood next to Cavanaugh as a free man. But two men hemmed him in, only waiting for Cavanaugh to give the order to restrain him. He would suffer their same fate, and her heart sank with a deep and pervasive regret. Earlier, Brogan told her Cavanaugh knew about Diego's visits to her and assumed he was talking to the local cops. And her interference with the blackmail attempt on Diego had gotten him noticed by the wrong man. The rich bastard and his obscene disciple had won.

Before she knew it, the words were out of her mouth. "I'm so sorry, Diego. I didn't mean for this to happen."

At the sound of her voice, Diego jerked his head to the right. His beautiful Rebecca. Duct tape bound her to a railing. And her eyes pleaded for him to help, tears shimmering down her face.

"What . . . what's going on here?" he questioned. "Why is she—?"

He looked for an answer in Cavanaugh's face, but the man only smirked, a sickening reminder of his twisted nature. Finally recognizing the scene for what it was, Diego shifted his eyes from Rebecca to the young girl near Brogan. When he saw the face of the blonde, he knew it had to be Danielle. He recognized her from Draper's files.

Oh my God, this can't be! Danielle is alive!

His mind grappled with the shock, but another realization hit with a powerful jolt. Brogan had set this up. Rebecca and Danielle. And Cavanaugh had known about it.
His big surprise.
Brogan's phone calls. The whole fucking dinner had been orchestrated for this vile finale. While they ate, Rebecca had been subjected to a living hell . . . with Danielle only feet away. It all came in a rush. His heart hammered, and his throat wedged tight and choked off his air.

Brogan's torture of these two women spiraled him into a seething rage. Diego shook with it. He felt an angry fist clutch at his heart, threatening to rip it from his chest. Something snapped inside him.

"You pathetic coward!" he yelled.

Diego raced for Brogan. He grabbed him by the scruff of his neck. And with all his weight behind it, he pounded his fist into the man's gut, over and over. Even with Brogan being the heavier man, Diego lifted him off the ground with every punch. Adrenaline fueled his frenzy.

Voices in the dark shouted garbled words he couldn't understand. The mass of bodies closed in, the circle of light growing smaller. Suffocating and oppressive.

"Aarrgghh . . . aahhh." Brogan grunted and moaned. "Get him . . . off!"

No amount of punishment would ever be enough. For Rebecca. For Danielle. For every one of the missing girls. Their faces raced through his brain at a fevered pace. Diego couldn't stop. He battered the man, out of control. The injustice. The years stolen from him because these men bartered with human life as if it meant nothing. Blind rage had taken over. And a dark side of Diego's soul emerged, a side Cavanaugh had fostered.

"That's enough." Cavanaugh bellowed. "Pull him off."

Diego shoved Brogan against a wall. When his fist connected with the bastard's face, hands tugged at his arms. A man shoved into his rib cage with a dropped shoulder to back him off. Two men grappled him into submission, but Diego fixed his eyes on Brogan . . . nothing else.

"It took . . . you long . . . enough." Brogan glared at Cavanaugh, panting.

"Quite frankly, I had hoped you would rebound, Mr. Brogan." The man knew how to twist the knife. No one's ego was sacred. "And the viciousness of Diego's attack, I found it... astounding."

Diego glared at Cavanaugh, his body shaking, still in the throes of his brutality.

Brogan hunched over and spat blood on the floor, heaving with hands on his knees. The aftermath of his beating still echoed through the chamber. But the angry voices had trailed off, waiting for what would come. When Brogan rose, his face swollen and battered, he scowled at Diego with a new scale of hatred.

"I'm gonna—" He spat again and wiped his mouth with a sleeve—"take pleasure ... in killing you . . . real slow, Mex."

"Big talk . . . for such a small insignificant man." Diego wrestled against the men who held him. His rage smoldered, a sustained burn unappeased.

Cavanaugh intervened. The stark light overhead cast shadows across the features of his aristocratic face, giving him a deathlike pallor. A macabre master of ceremonies.

"As you know, Diego, I do not tolerate disloyalty. Clearly, you are working with the police. You know Detective Montgomery quite well." Cavanaugh gestured with a wave of his hand, pointing to Rebecca. "I can only assume your fascination with her would not be in the best interest of Mr. Rivera or myself. So consider what comes next your severance package. Mr. Brogan, he is yours as I promised."

Brogan stood and flexed his shoulders. He torqued his head to one side and popped his neck. Slowly, he walked toward Diego. The men grasping his arms reinforced their grip. Diego steeled himself for the beating, his stomach taut.

"You won't get away with this," he argued, glancing over at Cavanaugh. "Joe Rivera won't stand for it."

"Now there, you are wrong. As Mr. Rivera's new business partner, I am only protecting his interests along with my own." Cavanaugh beamed. "You see—"

Brogan interrupted the man's gloat by taking his first punch. He rammed his fist into Diego's gut, doubling him over. But the men yanked him back up.

"Uurrgh." Diego grimaced and taunted his abuser through gritted teeth, "Is that all you've got?"

Brogan fumed, his eyes dark and menacing. He stepped to one side and pounded Diego's rib cage, each blow aimed to break bones.

"No, please ... let him go," Rebecca screamed. He heard her sweet voice through the haze.

Cavanaugh continued, as if he were at a cocktail party speaking about the weather. "Well, yes, I'm afraid that's going to leave a mark."

Oblivious and smiling, Cavanaugh walked around Brogan as he pummeled Diego with beefy fists, over and over.

"As I was saying, I've planted some very incriminating evidence on a computer at the estate ... and in your quarters. When your employer finds out about it, he will be grateful to me for heading off a disaster."

"Rivera won't ..." Diego forced the words from his mouth. ". . . he won't believe you."

Brogan planted a fist to his jaw, jolting his head back. He saw stars, tasted blood. A warm stream dripped down his chin.

"Of course he will, my dear boy. I've thought of everything." Cavanaugh caught Brogan's eye. Without a word, he stopped the man's assault with a glare. For the time being, Diego had his reprieve. He slumped in the grasp of the two men, his legs wobbly from the vicious beating.

Cavanaugh carried on. "You see, this despicable trafficking business will appear to be all your idea. And you've done splendidly so far, financially speaking. A rather lucrative account has been set up under your name in Switzerland. The Swiss Credit Bank in Zurich. All confidential, of course, but the paper trail will lead back to you. And with the rush on setting it up, the police might assume you intended to leave the country in a hurry. Imagine that."

"But the police..." Diego shook his head to clear the fog. His throat parched. "Rebecca..."

"The police will figure you've been feeding them bad information only to protect yourself. Can you imagine their embarrassment? And, of course, this brave detective over here will try to stop you, getting killed in the process. But not before killing you first. A nice tidy package for the police to uncover. Case open, case closed."

Diego pushed himself to stand. He raised his chin, mustering a defiance he had to fake. "Very clever. Local cops . . . might buy that. But Rivera?"

Cavanaugh grinned and shook his head. "Mr. Rivera will want to make it up to me, for strapping our new enterprise with such a miscreant. Game, set, match, Mr. Galvan. Rather clever, don't you think?"

"It would be . . . except for ... a couple of minor points." Diego gulped air into his burning lungs. He licked the blood off his swollen lip.

Cavanaugh furrowed his brow in question. "Such as?"

Brogan shrugged with a snort. And from the corner of his eye, Diego saw Rebecca stand at attention. During the brawl, Danielle had crawled to her sister. Now she clutched at Rebecca's clothes, her eyes wide and fixed on the unfolding drama.

Diego had nothing left to lose. Unlike the old saying, the truth would not set him free. But it would give him great satisfaction to know he had removed the smug look from Cavanaugh's face with surgical precision. He chose his next words carefully.

"My interest in the local police is purely... personal." He glanced to Rebecca and summoned a painful smile. "But the FBI is... another matter entirely."

"What?" Cavanaugh's jaw dropped, the look on his face priceless and worth all the pain Diego had endured. "You can't be..."

While the man staggered with that bit of news, Diego hit him with a combination punch. "And Joe Rivera is not just... my employer. He's my father. And I assure you, he would not question my loyalty ... in this lifetime ... or any other."

"Oh my . . . God." The old bastard stumbled backward. He glared at Brogan, who only shrugged and stammered, "I d-didn't know, b-boss. I swear."

The men holding Diego loosened their grip. He pretended not to notice but tensed his body to move.

"Let me k-kill him for you, b-boss. I can . . ." Brogan hadn't recovered, but his mouth shifted into autopilot.

"Haven't you done enough, Brogan? Give me some time ... to think." Cavanaugh ran a hand through his hair, his skin taking on the ashen color of his hair. He paced in and out of the light. "I just have to... "

Diego saw it in the man's face. Cavanaugh knew his scheme had backfired. His only prayer for survival would be if the FBI got to him first. Rivera would not be as generous. Even if Cavanaugh walked out of here alive, he was a dead man.

Suddenly, an explosion ripped through the cavernous space. One . . . two . . . three loud booms. Each blast shredded the stagnant air with a percussive shock wave.

"Mooove . . . move . . . Mooove!" Voices bellowed, a distant assault on a level above. Another one sounded closer. They came from nowhere and everywhere.

At the threshold of the garage tunnel to the right, several metal canisters clattered across the cement floor. Diego saw them, but had no time to react. In seconds, each one detonated. A brilliant flash of light. And a deafening blast buffeted his body with a violent pulse and left him dazed. The roar rang in his ears, leaving him deaf.

"Aaahhh." Diego covered his face, too late, and toppled to the floor. His head ached from the jarring concussion. Stars pierced the darkness and spun out of control, a blinding assault. Diego couldn't see. His night vision was gone.

Even in his stupor, he knew what had happened. Police tactical teams used a diversionary device called a flashbang. A fuel-air explosive, the device reacts with oxygen to produce an acoustic pulse and a brilliant flash of light. Anyone within range is dazed, seeing stars and unable to hear.

What followed the diversion played out before his eyes like a horror film in silent mode. Shadowy figures seethed through the maze, ghostlike silhouettes. Hard to tell the feds from Brogan's men. Flashlight beams strafed the walls, creating an eerie strobe effect. Bleary-eyed, he could only watch. Both of Brogan's men clung to him. They fired their weapons into the crowd, not taking aim. Maybe they figured to use him as a human shield.

Diego's ears popped from the repercussion of the explosions, in and out. Angry voices were muffled. He couldn't hear the words. Another series of blinding lights tore through the darkness, sudden bursts of white. Diego staggered with the second assault, his equilibrium shaken. He thought the men holding him had gone, but he felt their grip again. Their faces shaken, the men were unsure what to do.

Shots rang out as Brogan's men recovered one by one and scrambled for cover, firing their weapons. In a flash of recognition, Diego spotted Cavanaugh's white hair across a ramp. The man's face was twisted in panic, and Brogan rushed to his side. Cavanaugh yelled something to Brogan, but Diego only heard the incessant ringing in his ears. A steady numbing hum.

Thud . . . thwack . . . zing.
Bullets smacked against the wall behind him. Diego ducked.

"Stay right.. . stay right.. . Move!" A man dressed in tactical gear shouted to his team. Stacked one behind the other, Draper's men moved as one unit, with weapons aimed and ready. They pressed their advantage, superior numbers and better equipment. But Brogan's men opened fire. Mass confusion and the surge of another standoff.

Diego wanted to shout and urge the feds to take down Cavanaugh and Brogan. Without a head, the snake would wither and die. But Brogan's men shoved him against a wall and forced him to move down another ramp, away from the fight. Diego craned his neck, looking for Rebecca on the level he had left behind.

The captive girls screamed and huddled together in the dark, staying low. The last time he had seen Danielle, she was clinging to Rebecca. Her eyes brimmed with tears and insane fear. But now, the girl cowered in a corner, hands over her head. Close to hysteria. The sharp staccato of bullets covered up her screams.

Now or never. His chance to make a move. Diego shoved into one of the men holding him and knocked the man backward. In the dark, he heard the man's head crack on the cement. Turning, he jammed the heel of his hand into the solar plexus of the other, punching the wind from his lungs. The man doubled over, and Diego finished him with an elbow to the back of his skull. He was out for the count.

Finally free, Diego took a gun from the unconscious man sprawled at his feet and checked his ammunition. He had half a clip. The other guy was nearly empty. He grimaced at his luck.

To help Rebecca and Danielle, he had to go back the way he had come. He shrugged out of his suit jacket, yanked off his tie, and tucked the gun at the small of his back. Crouched at the top of the ramp, he retrieved a knife from the sheath strapped to his leg and waited to make his move for Rebecca, to set her free.

"
Ay
Dios mio."
He sighed, still hearing gunfire. Without thinking, Diego tapped the knife tip shoulder to shoulder, head to heart, making a quick sign of the cross. With a grimace, he hoped God would not be too offended by his irreverent use of the blade. "Sorry. Don't forget, it's the thought that counts."