The next time the car stopped it was gentler than they’d done previously. Gabbie could hear footsteps and extremely muffled voices. She couldn’t discern more than two for sure but knew there could be more. Someone finally came closer to bang on the trunk before it popped open. Pointed right between her eyes was a massive handgun.
Hands took hold of her upper arms and lifted her from the trunk to her feet. A quick glance around showed four individuals, guy with the gun pointed at her head included, all wearing ski masks and gloves. She couldn’t even see their eyes since they all had on sunglasses. Absolutely no discernable traits to identify them with, and they were all of a similar height and build, give or take a few pounds.
The one with the gun shifted around until he was behind her and she could feel it pressed to the depression at the base of her skull. Right where her brain stem resided if she remembered her biology classes at all. Another one waved her forward and pointed to the stairs, and then up. Right, apparently, that’s where she was to go.
“You really don’t want to do this. Seriously, this is bad juju for you to kidnap me. Don’t you know that?” She shook her head at the people before her. “Carla, please tell me that you didn’t hurt her?” Holy Christ, Carla. If they hadn’t killed her she was going to have to run far because of her part in Gabbie getting taken. “I have no idea who the hell you all are but daddy will kill you all for this.”
The guy with the gun prodded her before growling, “Move.” When she apparently didn’t move quickly enough for him he hooked an arm around her waist and hoisted her up in the air to an awkward angle that likely flashed everyone in there her panties. He took long strides to the stairs quickly heading up them two at a time. At the top, he dropped her to her feet and gave her a shove with a hand between her shoulder blades into a room. It had no windows, no other doors, and a single chair in the center she was propelled into. The other three men came in to cut the zip ties on her wrists and secure her to the chair, she noted it was both welded and bolted down to a heavy looking steel plate that was also bolted to the floor. It was a chair made to never move.
“Oh, you are all serious assholes.” She muttered when she was practically chained down to the chair. “You all know that you are going to pay for this. You are all going to die for this if you don’t let me go right now. If it is money you want, you won’t get it, all you will get is a shallow grave.”
Everyone but the guy with the gun filed out. He slipped it into a holster and shook his head. Like before, when he spoke, it was clear he was disguising his voice. “The only thing that will be happening is your father will finally die for his many crimes against the people here, and in other nations. Your fate has not yet been sealed. Take this time to think about what you want to be the final outcome. Know that should you somehow manage to get free from your shackles and break out of this room there are six, armed people in this building and several more outside keeping watch. You will not make it down the stairs but I’m sure you will want to give it a try.” Turning he left the room closing and locking the door behind him. It was then she noticed the one and only decoration in the room. A photo of her father with a target painted on his forehead.
She looked at the photo of her father for a very long time. No, just no. There was no way in hell she was going to let them hurt him. No wonder he was in such a protective bubble now. If someone was willing to take her it had to have been bad, a lot worse than he let on. She then began to take stock of what she had and didn’t have. Okay, so they didn’t take off her shoes so that was good. She clicked together the heels of her Mary Janes and then began to pray. Okay, so she did a lot more than pray that the signal that was hidden in her heels would get out and to her father’s men. She just hoped they came for her and not her father. “Fuckers.” She muttered.
* * * *
Tugging the hood off, Tobias wiped a hand over his buzzed short hair. He tossed the hood with the others and moved to where Cherilyn was watching the feed from the room. “Anything?”
The woman snickered. “Pretty much called you all fuckers. She also activated a GPS chip in her shoes. The system is blocking the signal but I wouldn’t share that fact with her right away. Got a message from Scout. He’s dropped her friend off at the airport with enough money to get gone in a big way, and papers that will keep her hidden.”
“Good.” Tobias knew men like Moreno. He would have had the other girl hunted down and tortured to ensure she’d given them every piece of information before she was killed and dumped somewhere as a warning to others. While he might have some loose morals, he couldn’t sit back while an innocent was murdered if he could do anything to prevent it.
“Rainer, you got the little video montage ready for our guest?”
“Almost boss. Adding in some final touches and adjusting the timing on a few stills to allow her plenty of time to enjoy it. I’m thinking about adding some background music too, you know for effect and all.”
“Keep it simple and stark, no music.” There were days he really had to work not to strangle Rainer when he went all creative. The video was basically every clip they could find documenting Gabriella Moreno’s father’s shady dealings. Most were in Columbia and found through shady sources who’d gotten them from even shadier officials in Moreno’s pockets. The guy apparently loved to be filmed doing his disgusting and various deeds, but it was fully understood that if anything got out the individual who released it would live long enough to see every member of his or her family tortured and torn apart by Quan. And the man could keep someone alive for days.
Going to the fridge, he grabbed some water. The bottle for himself he chugged down quickly. The other bottle was for their guest. He had a feeling she would need it after viewing the video Rainer was compiling. Even Tobias, who had witnessed some foul assed shit during his military years and done a few things he’d never admit to when he got out couldn’t stomach to watch any of it. There were limits to what brutality he could heap on another individual but in the case of Moreno, he was willing to go all the way. The monster deserved to pay for every single victim, man, woman, and child, who he’d killed in one way or another. Not all the deaths were by his hands but they definitely were on his head.
Rainer popped up from his seat and came over with the laptop. “It’s loaded and ready to play. Lift the lid and hit the spacebar. I have the volume set on high so you don’t have to do any fiddling around. Be ready to get it out of her line of fire if you would.”
He nodded in understanding. The girl, Gabriella, was soft and didn’t fully understand the monster that was her father. It was a sound bet she would lose whatever she had in her stomach within minutes of the video beginning to play.
Tugging on his hood again, he slipped on the gloves and pushed his sleeves back down to hide the tattoos. With the laptop under his arm, water in one hand, and a folding table in the other he headed back upstairs. A minute later he entered the room and threw her a look. She still had a mutinous expression on her face, full of defiance. He liked that about her. She believed in something and was sticking to her guns, even if she was one hundred percent wrong.
Quickly, he set up the table, laying the laptop on it. Uncapping the water, he held the bottle out to her and waited to see if she’d accept any. He’d undone it in the room specifically so she could hear it was a new bottle, the cap giving the distinctive snap when the seal had broken. Now to see how far her stubbornness would carry her.