Chapter 5
Thomas found himself wedged into yet another uncomfortable chair; waiting. The air was less stale, but tinged with a clinical antiseptic taste.
She was alive.
He'd not really heard anything else Jack had said. He hadn't made much sense. The phone call brief.
So Thomas had not left the city after landing. Just taken a taxi straight to the hospital. Nikki and Jack were on their way. Something about exposure, burns, dehydration.
The dehydration he understood, but exposure? She'd been under the ground. And he had no idea where the burns had come in. The cartel were burning their victims. Using it as torture. He shuddered.
He sat.
An image of her face swam into his mind. She was an attractive woman. He shuddered again.
He waited.
He didn't even know if they were arriving by ambulance. But he'd paid money to make sure a bed was ready and medics on hand, when they arrived.
Now there was nothing more he could do.
To keep himself busy he'd called Clarissa. She'd known more. Jack hadn't found Nikki. He'd found all the other missing people Nikki had become involved with. Clarissa explained what Nikki had done. But Thomas's logical but exhausted mind was not registering the full sequence or significance of the events.
Clarissa spelled it out for him.
She'd sent Jack to get the others.
She'd known the consequence.
Her life for theirs.
Thomas sighed.
Is that what she'd really wanted?
Was she just following the example of her beloved mentor?
Was she looking for a way to get back to Leo?
Had Leo ever kissed her on the cheek and put her on a plane?
Thomas scratched a hand across his face, the heat and dust and sand had irritated his skin. It felt dry, itchy.
All Clarissa knew was that Nikki had freed herself and then been picked up somehow by a driver from the cartel. She'd been flung out of the moving car half dead to land at Jack's feet as he stood at the front of the mission.
Thomas felt cold despite the heat.
Something must have been done, that he knew nothing about.
What had made the cartel of all people, be the ones to bring her back?
Jack?
