to run, I will shoot the entire group. Do you understand? I expect an answer.”
About half of them said, “Yes,” and the other half mumbled some version of “I understand.” But everyone answered, and no one said, “No.”
Tyler gripped Annie’s hand in his own left, while a sweaty fat guy did his best to crush his right. Tyler nudged the guy and said, “Lighten up, that hurts.”
When the guy failed to respond—he just kept his eyes locked to the front—Tyler rattled the guy’s hand to get his attention. When Hand Crusher’s gaze shifted, Tyler whispered, “You’re hurting me. Ease up.”
This time, the pressure eased.
“No talking,” the invader snapped, and Tyler felt a surge as someone pushed the group forward.
The doors from the lobby bar led to the expansive veranda with its slate floors and gorgeous wicker furniture. Only five hours before, Tyler and Annie had enjoyed evening cocktails before dinner there. Two hours before that, the maître d’ had sheared the neck off a bottle of Dom Pérignon as part of the resort’s famous evening ritual.
Tyler found himself walking in shuffling half steps amid the crowd, the only way to keep his balance.
The veranda led to a wide flight of five steps that grounded out at the perfectly manicured lawn, where earlier in the afternoon, hotel guests dressed all in white had engaged in a rousing croquet match. The pretentiousness of the Crystal Sands Resort made Tyler’s skin crawl. But the ladies loved it, and it was free. Pretty high cotton for an unemployed nineteen-year-old.
A hundred yards ahead, there’d be another short flight of stairs down to the beach, where there’d be another hundred yards of flawless sand, and after that, a 100-mile swim through the Pacific Ocean to the western coast of Mexico.
Twenty-five yards short of the steps to the beach, their captor ordered a hard right turn. Linked as they were in a circle, some stumbled at the pivot, but no one fell. More gunfire ripped the night, this volley coming from far away, well on the other side of the clubhouse and the pool. Tyler thought he might have seen flashes.
“None of your concern,” the leader said. “We are heading for the pool deck.”
That meant another hundred yards or so of difficult footing. The circle of strangers navigated erupting palm roots and fallen coconuts as they made their way through the shadows cast by tastefully suspended lights that had been installed in the treetops. And because God had a wicked sense of humor, the in-ground sprinkler system was throwing water everywhere. Though the air temperature was likely still eighty degrees, the water and the slight breeze combined to make the night feel frigid. Within seconds, Tyler’s khaki shorts and polo shirt were soaked, as was Annie’s slinky little dress. He felt like a pig for noticing that she wasn’t wearing a bra, and that, well, she was cold, too.
“Why is this happening?” Annie whispered.
“Just keep going,” Tyler whispered back. “I don’t know.”
“Are they terrorists, do you think?”
“I don’t know that, either,” he said. Listening to the news, you’d think there was a very specific definition for what a terrorist was, but if these thugs didn’t meet a commonsense definition, he didn’t know who could. “Just do what they say.”
The pool at the Crystal Sands Resort was unlike any community pool Tyler had frequented as a child. No rectangular construction and swimming lanes here. This was a pool that wanted to be a lagoon. The complex was actually a series of pools, split among four different levels, each linked by elaborate waterfalls and separated by flowers and palm trees. A lazy river circumnavigated the whole area, providing opportunities for guests to float on rafts through the bar and restaurant areas. The water in the river was dormant now, but the waterfalls still flowed. The normally soothing sound of rushing water provided no solace tonight as Tyler marched like a gulag prisoner to his death.
More gunshots in the distance.
As his cluster of hostages made their way up the gradual hill to the concrete lagoon, Tyler saw more of the guests being herded into the same spot. They, likewise, moved in clusters, hands joined as they shuffled along. The smallest group he saw was four people, the largest looked to be ten. Everyone wore varieties of nearly nothing, clearly having been rousted from sleep.
Terror and dread manifested differently among the terrified. Some people were crying—men and women alike—but most moved stoically, eyes wide and darting from compass point to compass point. Tyler saw the Rabinowitzes, the older couple from Indiana that he’d crossed paths with late in the day yesterday. Mr. Rabinowitz—Jacob, if Tyler remembered correctly, an ego-fueled executive with a trash company—was bitching to the poolside bartender about the blandness of his Bloody Mary. When he’d caught sight of Tyler watching, the old guy had said, “Mind your manners, shithead.” The wife—Tyler didn’t catch her name—rolled her eyes, his clue that this was common. It must be tough going through life living with an asshole for a soul mate. The enormous rocks adorning her fingers and ears were clues, Tyler thought, to the price of tolerance.
Tyler saw Zach Turner and his wife approaching, as well. They were a nice couple from Virginia. He’d spent over an hour with them at the edge of the lazy river chatting about Zach’s tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. Tyler had found the story of the IED explosion that took Zach’s leg off below the knee particularly fascinating. Now he found it fascinating that the terrorists had allowed him to put on his prosthetic leg, but not a shirt. In this dim light, his burn scars seemed somehow more prominent than they had in the full light of day. Both of them looked shaken.
Annie gripped Tyler’s hand ever more tightly as they scaled the shallow steps that led to the upper pool area. It was entirely possible that her fingernails were drawing blood from his palm, but he didn’t want to complain.
“There are no children,” Annie whispered.
Tyler didn’t know what she meant at first, but then he saw it, too. The Turners had eleven-year-old twin boys, but they were nowhere to be seen. Ditto the two girls who belonged to the Severances.
Annie’s grip tightened even more. “You don’t think they—”
“No,” Tyler said, cutting her off before she could say the unthinkable. “The parents aren’t upset enough for that.” He didn’t know if that was true, but that was his story and he was sticking to it.
At the top of the steps now, on the upper pool deck, their conductor said, “You can let go of each other now. If you can find a seat, take it. If you try to leave, you will be shot.”
Tyler was happy to be shed of the sweaty guy’s hand, but he was happy to keep hold of Annie’s. Even if he’d wanted to let go of it, he didn’t think she’d let him. “Let’s grab a chair at the back, near the bathroom,” he said. He didn’t know why, exactly, but that seemed like a good place to be. Certainly, he didn’t want to be in the front, where they would be most visible. The chairs near the restrooms offered them the added benefit of being near the bar and the back gate.
He didn’t wait for an answer from Annie. Rather, he guided her past the pool’s wheelchair ramp and toward the rank of chairs that nobody wanted during the day because they offered nearly full shade—the very opposite of why most people came to a resort like the Crystal Sands. The chaises he selected were constructed of the same canvas and heavy wood as all the hundreds of others, but theirs lay against one of the elaborate white ceramic planters
