The Wrong Hostage Read Online Free PDF Page A

safer than football. Now she was glad she’d allowed her son to compete head-to-head with other healthy young males. Like his biological father, Lane was a natural athlete.
    Lane zigzagged deeper into the attacking zone, playing the ball like an extension of his body. Suddenly defenders raced at him from all directions.
    My God. They’re so much bigger than Lane. Older, stronger .
    Even when his own teammates fell back, Lane pushed ahead. A defender wearing a red bandanna rolled into a sweatband threw himself in a sliding tackle that was clearly aimed at Lane, not the ball. Lane leaped, but the other “boy” stuck out his feet, tripping Lane in midair and slamming him to the ground.
    Grace was reaching for the car door when the referee’s whistle sliced through the air. While his teammates gathered around Lane, the referee drew a yellow card from the hip pocket of his shorts and waved it at the tackler. The player came easily to his feet and loomed above Lane, daring him to get up.
    Lane rolled over onto all fours, shook his head, and scrambled to his feet. He stepped around the referee, trying to get at his attacker. Standing face-to-face with Lane, the tackler was clearly older and bulkier. His redbandanna held his black shoulder-length hair from his blunt, handsome mestizo features. He could have been a warrior as easily as an athlete. His smile was calm and cold.
    The referee stepped back between the two players, waving his arms and speaking quickly.
    After a moment Lane turned and jogged away, joining his teammates to wait for the corner kick that had been called.
    Grace felt herself begin to breathe again. Her son had a temper. It made him brave but not always smart.
    Like Joe Faroe.
    As play resumed she heard a gentle tap on the passenger-side window. She looked over and saw the genial brown face of Carlos Calderón. He grinned around his customary black Havana cigar and gestured for her to unlock the passenger door.
    More men with more weapons—long guns slung over their shoulders or submachine guns held casually, muzzles toward the ground—flanked Calderón. They had the same easy insolence and edgy eyes as the gate guard.
    Do they have federal police badges too?
    But Grace didn’t say anything aloud. She touched the switch that unlocked the vehicle doors and picked up her purse from the passenger seat. When Calderón opened the door, she thought about asking him to leave his cigar outside. Then she decided to keep her mouth shut and be the deferential female Calderón expected in Mexico. It grated, but not nearly as much as seeing Lane illegally tackled, tripped, and slammed to the ground.
    She extended a cool hand to prevent the more intimate Mexican greeting. “Hello, Carlos. How are you?”
    “So nice to see you, Your Honor,” Calderón said in unaccented English.
    With a nod of his head that was just short of a bow, he took her hand in his own soft, well-manicured one. He held on to her fingers moments longer than necessary. It could have been an accident. It could have been a silent reminder that he was a man of power.
    He set the limits of politeness, not her.
    “I’m very disappointed that you couldn’t persuade Ted to come with you,” Calderón said.
    Grace withdrew her hand. “I told you that Ted is away.”
    Calderón gave the graceful shrug that was the hallmark of the Mexican male. He lived freely on both sides of the border, but he’d been born in America. He and Grace had even gone to the same private high school in Santa Ana. Yet here, south of the line, he was todo mexicano, formal in the way a Mexican businessman might be.
    Grace preferred the American version of Calderón.
    “I’ve been very busy,” she said evenly. “I haven’t spoken to Ted in quite a while. I haven’t had any chance to pass on your message.”
    Calderón puffed on his cigar. “How disappointing.”
    “You’re a very important client of Edge City Investments,” Grace said. “Why don’t you just call