Deadly Promises (Tracers #2.5)(38)
Surely someone was looking for her. They had to be looking for her, right? Only how would they ever find her?
She clutched her hands together between her breasts, wishing she hadn’t been so thorough in her research. Wishing she didn’t know that this country formerly known as Burma was the largest country in mainland Southeast Asia—260,000 square miles, much of it the dense, mountainous rain forest surrounding these mines. Wishing with all her heart that she’d listened to her family and Wyatt when they’d begged her not to go to this fascinating yet frightening place, where military rule was often arbitrary and brutal.
260,000 square miles.
She bit back a sob.
How could anyone possibly find her?
The sound of a struggle and angry voices jarred her head up just as the cell door swung open and her captors shoved a Burmese man inside. A dozen faces—their eyes dull, their hope gone—glanced up, then away from the new captive, who landed in a sodden heap on the muddy ground.
Only a week into this “adventure” and she got it. They didn’t see the old man as one of them. They saw him as one more invasion of precious little space, one more belly in need of precious little food, one more soul doomed to suffer and eventually die in this godforsaken work camp.
As she stared at the pathetic lump of humanity curled into a ball at her feet and reached out a tentative hand—an offer of comfort, of human kindness—she finally accepted the brutal truth.
She could die here.
A bone-wrenching shudder ripped through her. For certain, they were going to make her wish she was dead, long before starvation or the elements or some virulent infection finished her off.
Suddenly her father’s voice echoed in her mind.
“You’re a scrapper, sugar doll. That’s what’s gonna see you through this ol’ life.”
She’d heard those words all through her life whenever she’d run up against seemingly unbeatable odds.
She drew a deep breath, finding a new well of resolve. Her father was right. She had a choice. She could lie down like a lamb and die here or she could stand like a lion and fight. It was up to her—only her. No one else was going to save her. Her fellow captives had their hands full keeping themselves alive.
That was the operative word. She was still alive, and as long as she had breath she was going to stay that way.
Tomorrow or the next day, no matter what, she had to attempt an escape. While she still had the strength to run.
HOT, MUGGY AIR, pungent with the scents and sounds of the bustling streets of Mandalay, blew through the open driver’s-side rear window. The black sedan that the Tatmadaw military commander had arranged to transport Cav to the ruby mines near Mogok shot recklessly through heavy traffic. Though Yangon was the country’s capital, Mandalay, a city of more than a million people, was the last royal capital of Burma, the capital of the Mandalay Division, and Upper Myanmar’s main commercial city.
Cav had arrived on a charter flight from Jakarta for an early morning appointment with the commerce minister, who had been the key to setting his plan in motion. Once he’d been wheels down on the tarmac at Mandalay International, there was no turning back.
He was proceeding on blind faith now, counting on Wyatt to put everything into play from Georgia to ensure that Cav could get Carrie out of the country once he rescued her from her abductors. If he managed to rescue her.
Cav watched the action fly by outside the car window. Men on small bicycles and motorcycles wove through streets glutted with battered taxies and city buses, while women on foot carried big bucket baskets filled with produce on the ends of long poles balanced on their shoulders. Colorful umbrellas covered merchandise lining the crowded throughways. City police wearing blue uniforms and carrying assault rifles stood on every corner.
If their presence alone hadn’t announced absolute military rule, the huge murals painted on the sides of buildings, depicting soldiers in front of a backdrop of the red, white, and blue Myanmar flag, would have.
Cav let it all pass by in silence, his relaxed bearing as bogus as his cover story. As far as the CIA was concerned, he had a family emergency and was on personal leave. As far as the Junta government of Myanmar was concerned, Frank Windle was here, representing the interests of Horizons, International.
Windle’s false but well-known reputation as an unscrupulous player, willing to do business with oppressive military regimes, had placed him and HI on the International Dirty List—and, consequently, high on trade-agreement lists with corrupt military regimes.
Would the CIA be happy to find out Cav was freelancing using his CIA cover? Not so much. Uncle would never sanction an official op to find one lost American. But by the time his handler discovered he’d gone off the grid it would be too late to stop him.
Cav had counted on the Windle name to open back doors in the dirty underbelly of unethical international commerce. And since the military government backed all the unethical commerce in these parts, he had figured the trail would lead to Carrie Granger.
He’d figured right. Carrie Granger, it seemed, was the victim of a bungled arrest, and the Myanmar government hoped to cover up its blunder simply by making her “go away.”
No evidence, no crime, no complicity.
And no chance in hell was he going to let them get away with it.
He glanced at the driver, who wore an olive drab uniform with a red patch on the upper sleeve. His matching helmet was standard military issue. Another soldier with an assault rifle rode shotgun. Cav’s personal “security guard,” who had been assigned as “protection” by General Maung Aye, the commerce minister, sat on the far side of the backseat, eyes forward.