A Marriage of True Minds: A Sasha McCandless Novella (6 page)

Sasha took two
steps then hesitated. Aroostine pulled up short beside her, and Naya bumped up
against Aroostine’s back.

“Why’d we stop?”
she hissed.

“I’m not sure which
way to go.”

The resort’s
reception hall formed a long L, with the dressing room nestled in the angle
where the two arms met.  At one end was the ballroom, which looked out
over beach. At the extreme opposite end was the kitchen—an inefficient layout
that, according to Chalotte, made sense for its proximity to the gardens and
the path the local fishermen took when they hauled up their daily catch to sell
to the chef. Whatever the reason, it meant that guessing wrong would place them
as far as possible away from Connelly and his captors.

Aroostine spoke
in a voice so low that Sasha barely heard her. “Don’t you think he and Hank
would have headed for the ballroom at the first sign of trouble?”

Sasha considered
it. “Hank, yes. But Connelly would have come looking for me.”

“He obviously
didn’t find you. So he could be anywhere,” Naya offered helpfully. She pointed
back toward the dressing room and the ballroom beyond it.

“Including the
kitchen,” Sasha said, pointing the other direction.

They looked at
one another for a long moment.

Finally, Sasha
said, “Kitchen.”

If the leader
had found Connelly in the ballroom, surely he’d have sent someone to fetch the
women from the dressing room by now.

But neither
Aroostine nor Naya pressed her for her reasoning.

“One way’s as
good as the other,” Naya conceded. “Let’s go.”

They crept along
the wall as quickly as they dared, which wasn’t very fast at all.

As they drew
closer to the kitchen, the sound of angry male voices rose from behind the
door. Several men were speaking loudly and in unison. A cacophony of English
and Spanish spilled out into the hall.

Aroostine put a
hand on Sasha’s shoulder to stop her from moving forward any farther.

“What’s wrong?”
she whispered in Aroostine’s ear.

“Shh.” Aroostine
cocked her head to the side and stood perfectly still. She closed her eyes and
listened. “He’s in there.”

“How can you
tell?” All Sasha could hear was a din of yelling voices.

 “I can
make out his voice. He’s there; so is that leader guy; and at least one more
guy. There may be two.”

“I don’t hear
anything but noise,” Naya said.

Aroostine
shrugged. “I grew up tracking wild animals. I can distinguish the sounds. Leo
is in there. But we’re probably outnumbered.”

Naya bit down on
her lower lip, thinking. “Okay, I have an idea. We need a distraction.”

Sasha nodded.

“You two hide.
I’ll pretend to fall and yell for help. Someone will come running, when they
do, you jump them.”

“That’s a
terrible idea,” Aroostine informed her.

Naya’s nostrils
flared.

“It really is,”
Sasha agreed. “But, I don’t have a better one. Do you?”

“No,” Aroostine
admitted.

“Where are we
supposed to hide?” Sasha asked.

Naya pointed to
a door on the opposite wall.

Sasha gathered
her skirts in her hands and raced across the hall.

She turned the
handle, bracing herself to find an armed bandit on the other side. Locked.

She moved on to
the next. The voices in the kitchen grew louder.

She tried the
handle, and the door opened to reveal, not a room, but a closet.

She peeked
inside. In the gloom, she could make out shelves stocked with cleaning rags and
bottles of cleansers. A supply closet.

She turned back
and motioned for Aroostine to join her. As Aroostine crossed the hallway in a
rapid, fluid motion, Naya crept closer to the kitchen and stopped directly in
front of the door to the closet.

Aroostine wedged
herself into the space with Sasha and looked around. Sasha pulled the door most
of the way shut, leaving it open just a crack. She pressed her eye to the
opening.

“Cleaning
supplies,” Aroostine whispered to herself.

Naya met Sasha’s
eyes. “Show time?”

“Wait,”
Aroostine hissed. She pawed through the shelves.

“What are you
doing?”

“Looking for
poison.”

Sasha shook her
head. “This is an eco-resort, remember? I’m sure everything’s all natural, no
chemicals, including the cleaning fluids.”

Aroostine
ignored her and continued to scan the shelves. She squinted at a label. “What
about oxygen bleach?”

“Hydrogen
peroxide and baking powder,” Sasha told her. “I don’t even think it would burn
someone’s eyes. You’ll have to test drive my mom’s hairpin some other time.”

Aroostine
sighed.

Sasha wondered
about Aroostine’s background. The night had the potential to get ugly and, in
all likelihood, violent. Did Aroostine know what she’d gotten herself into? And
would she be of any help? She was clearly brave, but Sasha could only hope she
was battle tested.

“Now?” Naya
stage-whispered.

Sasha nodded her
head. “Go.”

Naya threw
herself to the ground with a loud yelp. Sasha pulled the door nearly closed,
and she and Aroostine squinted through the crack.

“Somebody help
me!” Naya shouted. “
¡Ayúdeme!
”

The door from
the kitchen banged open, and heavy footsteps sounded in the hallway. Naya
clutched the shears in her right hand and twisted her body to conceal them from
the men advancing toward her.

There were two.
One, stocky and out of shape, breathing hard but running fast. The other looked
to be in much better shape. They wore the same uniform as the boy who was
currently tied up in the dressing room.

The heavier one
reached Naya a moment before his companion.

“I twisted my
ankle. I need a doctor,” Naya said loudly in slow English.

She stretched
out her left hand, and he reached for it. He pulled her to her feet, roughly,
and, as he did, she lost her grip on the shears.

They clattered
to the floor.

His eyes
followed them, narrowing in surprise and fury.

Watching from
the closet, Sasha felt her stomach lurch.

“
¡Puta!
”
he roared.

At the
expletive, Naya’s eyes flitted toward the closet door.

Sasha didn’t
think Naya could see inside, but she tried to convey a look of calm, just in
case.

The man wrenched
Naya’s arm behind her back at an awkward angle. His friend drew near, laughing
and leering.

“Oh, crap,”
Aroostine whispered.

“Time for Plan
B,” Sasha whispered back. “On three. One, two, three.”

They burst from
the closet.

Sasha plowed
into the back of taller man, aiming for his knees.

He toppled over
and landed on the ground on his stomach.

She scrambled up
and straddled his back. Then she grabbed a fist full of his dark hair with one
hand, lifted his head, and drove his forehead into the floor with a
bang
.
With her other hand, she reached around to his hip and relieved him of his
machete.

Aroostine
retrieved the scissors and advanced toward the big guy, who had twisted Naya
around to serve as a partial shield, although he was much wider than she.

“Let her go,”
Aroostine said.

He laughed and
tightened his grip on Naya.

As he leaned to
the right and fumbled with his sword, Aroostine lunged forward and drove the
shears into the left side of his belly in a fast, stabbing motion. She pulled
them out and plunged them back in again.

He bellowed and
released Naya. She sank to her knees near the wall. Blood sputtered from his
stomach like a fountain.

Aroostine dropped
the scissors and clamped one hand over the man’s mouth. With the other, she
pulled him by his shirt into the closet. She stuffed a cleaning rag in his
mouth and used another to bind his wrists.

Sasha followed
with the tall man, who moaned wordlessly as she dragged him unceremoniously
across the floor by his feet. Aroostine gagged him with rag and then bound his
hands as well.

They shoved both
men into the space, arranging them under the shelves and squishing them
together so that the door would close. It would be tight quarters until someone
found them, but Sasha could muster no sympathy.

She did,
however, have a great deal of concern for Naya, who sat still in the middle of
the floor, now clutching the shears and taking fast, shallow breaths. Her eyes
were pinned on the kitchen door, unblinking and dilated, waiting for someone
else to come through it.

Sasha squatted
beside her.

“Hey, you did
great.”

Naya didn’t look
at her.

Aroostine joined
them, crouching on the other side of Naya.

“You sure did.”

“So much blood,”
Naya managed, letting her eyes flick down toward the stain that had formed on
the floor.

“There
is
a lot of blood,” Aroostine agreed. “But, it’s a superficial wound. Those bleed
a lot. He’s going to live.”

“Is that true?”
Naya demanded of Sasha.

Sasha didn’t
have the slightest idea if that was always true. She knew that when Wally
Stewart severed her artery, she’d gushed gallons of blood and that certainly
hadn’t been superficial.

But she looked
at the pain filling Naya’s almond eyes and lied. “Definitely. Just like a
nosebleed.”

Naya exhaled
shakily and let the shears fall from her hand as a wave of relief washed over
her.

Sasha helped her
to her feet and Aroostine tried to hand her the fallen scissors.

“You’ll want
these,” she said.

Naya hesitated
then reached for them. She turned to Sasha, ashen-faced. “Mac, I can’t. I can’t
hurt anyone. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t
apologize. Don’t you dare. Can you get back to the dressing room by yourself or
do want us to take you?”

Naya swallowed
hard, fighting back tears. “I’m fine. Go. Just ... do what you need to do to
get rid of these monsters.”

Sasha and
Aroostine watched her make her way back to the dressing room, clutching the
shears to her chest. They waited until she tapped lightly on the door. She
called softly to the women inside, and the door opened. Naya disappeared
inside.

“Are you still
up for this?” Sasha asked Aroostine.

Aroostine nodded
grimly.

Sasha handed her
the tall man’s machete and holster. “Let’s get this over with.”

Up close and
personal violence was messy and stomach-turning. Even for someone as steely as
Naya. The sight of the man’s stomach pumping blood all over the sustainable
bamboo flooring hadn’t made Sasha upset or uneasy, but she’d had plenty of
experience—too much experience, to be honest—with violence, and even death.
Apparently, Aroostine had a similar history.

“Thanks.”
Aroostine tightened the belt around her lace-trimmed cocktail dress and secured
the weapon.

“How do you want
to do this? If we give it a few more minutes, maybe the leader guy will come
out looking for Dumb and Dumber.” She cocked her head toward the supply closet,
and the two injured men inside.

“I think that
only works in horror movies.” Aroostine flashed her a smile. “You’re confident
that between the two of us, we can take down one guy, right?”

“Yes.”

“Me, too.”

She sure seemed
calm. Sasha decided the younger attorney definitely fell into the
grizzled-veteran-of-violence category.

“What if he’s
not alone in there?” Sasha asked.

“Let’s jump off
that bridge if we come to it. Do you want to save your man or not?”

Sasha nodded.
“Okay, let’s do it.” She reached over and touched Aroostine’s arm. “Thank you
seems inadequate—”

“Thank me later.
So, I’m thinking we set up on either side of the door and then knock. He’ll be
expecting his guys to come back. If he’s stupid enough to stick his head out,
we’ll grab him and use him as cover when we go in.”

“And if he’s
smart? Just burst through and start throwing punches?”

“More or less.”

“
That
is
a terrible plan.” Sasha smiled. “But I don’t have a better idea, so let’s go.”