Page 24 of Depths of Destruction
I pull out a bright-yellow suit in her size and hand it to her.
The girls all go into the tent to change, and Vanessa sits down next to me. "Not going?"
I shake my head and hand her the last suit in the bag. It's royal blue. "No. I need to figure out why the U.S. wants me."
"I've been trying to figure it out as well."
"Any ideas?"
"The cartel kidnapped me eight months ago, so I'm behind on current politics, but dissect your secrets. What, or who, would the U.S. be interested in?"
"I'm trying, but I can't figure it out."
"We have a question," Andre's deep voice booms behind me.
"What's that?" Vanessa asks.
Hunter and Andre sit down on the ground across from us.
"What do you two both know? Maybe if we look at what is different, we can figure out why Vanessa is supposed to return to the Belizean government and Naomi isn't," Andre says.
Vanessa twirls her blonde hair around her finger. "I already know why they want me back."
"Why?" Hunter asks.
"Carlos Garcia. He isn't going to let me go. He wants to marry me and won't stop until he does."
Hunter's jaw clenches. "But you told him no?"
She looks down and quietly says, "He didn't take the rejection very well."
"What did he do to you?" Hunter growls.
Vanessa jumps. Her eyes widen and her hands shake, but she quickly looks at the ground.
"Sorry," Hunter says.
She traces her finger in the dirt as she quietly says, "Nothing I want to talk about. But if I was with him, I would have been forced to marry him by now."
Rage emanates off Hunter. His breathing is a snarl.
Vanessa shifts uncomfortably but doesn't look up.
"Is he the one you have information to take down?" I gently ask.
"Yes."
"I'm assuming it's the same information I have on his relationship with the drug cartels?"
"That and other things."
My pulse increases. "Santiago Gómez kidnapped you because of these things?"
"He wasn't the original kidnapper."
"If it wasn't him, who was it?"
"The Guatemalan guerillas."
