Total pages in book: 138
Estimated words: 126823 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 634(@200wpm)___ 507(@250wpm)___ 423(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 126823 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 634(@200wpm)___ 507(@250wpm)___ 423(@300wpm)
“Like I said, we’re just investigating every possibility. Scorpion hires mercenaries, and he often disposes of them and their families once he no longer has a use for them.” Cormier turned his full attention on Shabina. Both men did. She could feel their gaze piercing her. These men were used to interrogating others. They hadn’t expected Raine there. “What happened that night? You had to have seen whoever killed those men.”
Shabina took another breath and pressed her fingers to her mouth. “I’m sorry, this is really difficult to talk about. I try not to look back on that time. I was in very bad shape. Close to death. They had whipped the skin from my back. I’d been raped multiple times. I had deep stab wounds in my thigh. A raging infection. I was sliding in and out of consciousness most of the time. Scorpion had demanded they keep me alive before he left, and someone set up an IV with antibiotics. I do remember that much.”
Shabina paused and stroked her fingers down her throat, appearing to struggle to bring up memories. “I think they gave me some kind of painkiller. I vaguely remember someone coming and whispering to me to stay quiet; that’s hazy like a dream. He just wrapped me up in a sheet and gave me a shot of something. I woke up later in a safe house with a doctor attending me.”
The two men exchanged a frustrated look. They asked her several more questions, but she made it clear she had little memory of that night, and as far as she knew, everyone was alive when she was removed from the camp. The man taking her out had whispered the need for silence. To her that meant he feared they would be caught.
Shabina watched the gates swing close after their car exited her circular drive. She leaned against the door and looked helplessly at Raine.
“They said Scorpion often killed the men he hires to aid him when he’s massacring entire villages. That means some of the men who were good to me might be dead. They weren’t in the camp that night. Are they dead, Raine?”
Pressing one hand to her temple, she thought about the two guards who had risked their lives to try to aid her.
“I’m sorry, Shabina,” Raine said quietly.
Shabina turned away from her, not wanting to face her. Not wanting to see the compassion. Of course, Scorpion would have to kill the men aiding him. He wouldn’t want to pay them or risk any of them identifying him.
“I’ll have to do quite a bit of work to pull all the feed from the café,” Raine said. “But I’ll get it done as soon as possible. I’ll come to the café just before closing, and we can go over anything then. I will tell you this though. Those two men aren’t Interpol agents,” Raine announced. “I don’t know who they are, but those IDs are fake. Good fakes, but they’re fakes.”
Chapter Nine
Trail crews camped in Yosemite, and oftentimes supplies were brought to them. Rehabilitating the trails took time and a tremendous amount of work. The distances were long, so it made sense that the crews stayed in camps until they had days off. Many of the young men and women working on the trails came back each summer. All of them had a love of the outdoors and a passion for maintaining the beauty and nature of the Sierra.
Shabina had met most of them. Often, before they went to Yosemite to camp for weeks on end, they would drop by the café, laughingly calling out to her that they were eating their last great meal for a long time. They usually ordered double portions in order to pack another dinner with them to eat later.
She missed the laughter and good-natured camaraderie of the younger crowd before they made their way to their campgrounds. She needed their joy and upbeat personalities in her café after the long night she’d had with no sleep.
Not only did she have to worry that Bale was setting her up as a murderer, but she had to worry that if he wasn’t, he planned on killing her dogs and burning down her beloved café. She had no idea who the fake Interpol agents were, but she was afraid they were trying to uncover Rainier’s identity. She didn’t know for who or why. Then there was Scorpion. Did he have spies watching her every move?
She looked around the large room. It wasn’t that the café was empty, in fact, it was absolutely full and had been since she’d opened, but there seemed to be mostly tourists, and she was so paranoid she could barely function, let alone talk to strangers as if nothing were wrong. It was her way to go to each table and welcome everyone, to ensure they enjoyed their meal. It was part of the experience in her café. She just wasn’t able to do that and hadn’t during the first shift either. She knew Vaughn had noticed because it was so out of the ordinary for her.