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CHAPTER 1

The prisoner’s six-foot frame was bent over the stainless-steel table, exposing the flesh of his naked buttocks. His arms were bound to the two far table legs, spreading his body wide across the cold steel. He knew he was being tortured by the brutal Servicio Bolivariano de Inteligencia Nacional, or SEBIN, the premier intelligence service of the Venezuela government, because of the unit patch on the shoulders of their black-and-gray camouflage battle dress uniforms. He believed he was still on the Isle de Margarita, but he wasn’t sure. The SEBIN soldiers had taken turns tormenting him, and he’d lost track of the days he’d been in prison and the number of interrogators.
A man in BDU pants, combat boots, and a black T-shirt with a thin black balaclava over his head tapped a cattle prod against the palm of his hand and shouted in Spanish, “You are an American spy!”
“No,” the man said weakly, knowing what was coming. It was always the same. When he refused to answer a question or gave an answer they didn’t like, they touched the twin metal prongs of the prod to his skin and racked his body with electricity. He had the sudden picture in his mind of the blue electricity arching and sparking as it jumped between the prongs. Just the thought of it made the prisoner’s testicles shrivel, and his whole body quivered. The interrogator touched the prod to the prisoner’s buttocks, sending waves of agony through his body.
Able to speak Spanish, but unable to form words, the prisoner again shook his head. Blood pooled in his mouth from where he’d bitten his tongue. It drooled from his lips and puddled on the table. He rolled his eyes up to see his tormentor then let his gaze drift to the blood spatter marring the man’s polished combat boots. It gave the prisoner a small measure of satisfaction.
“I will know the truth.” Interrogator bent close enough for the prisoner to smell his sour breath and see his hard-brown eyes. “You will tell me everything I want to know.”
Interrogator made a motion, and the captive braced himself, knowing something was coming. The shock rippled through his body, and he flopped on the table like a gasping fish out of water, legs spasming straight before his knees buckled. All his weight sagged onto his belly. After a moment, his feet scrabbled for purchase on the slick concrete, trying to push the knife-edge of the table from his stomach.
“Tell me the Norteaméricanos’ plan of invasion.”
“I don’t know,” the prisoner croaked.
His throat was raw from thirst. The only thing he’d drank lately was his own blood. When not being tortured, they kept him in solitary confinement. The room was just wide enough to accommodate a threadbare mattress tossed on the floor, and he either peed in a bottle or crapped on a piece of old newspaper, which the guards removed when he was out of the room. Two lightbulbs wrapped in wire cages bathed the tiny cubicle in harsh light twenty-four hours a day, throwing off his natural circadian rhythm.
“Did they send you to Margarita to scout our military installations?”
The prisoner shook his head.
“Are they going to use Margarita to stage an invasion of Venezuela?”
The prisoner turned up his head to look at his masked tormentor again. He spat a glob of blood and smiled. He knew what he was about to say would piss them off, but he had to poke them in the eye. “All they have to do is park a carrier task force off Caracas and land some Marines. Your pathetic military wouldn’t know what to do.”
The blow came just as lightning quick as he’d expected, and the table kept him from turning his head to absorb the hit. His face arched and he probed a tooth with his tongue to see if it had loosened further.
Interrogator rubbed his knuckles. “Do not be insolent. It is disrespectful.”
More blood pooled in the prisoner’s mouth. His cheek was raw and split from being slammed against his teeth.
“Why are you here?” Interrogator demanded.
“I came to repossess a sailboat.”
“Why didn’t you go through customs?”
“It was late when I arrived. I had to wait until the office opened in the morning.”
“How did you get here?”
“By boat.”
“There are no ferries running between here and the mainland. Did you come by a private yacht?”
“No, by a panga.” The craft was like many the local fishermen used; a wide-beamed twenty-foot wooden boat powered by a one-hundred-horsepower outboard motor.
They’d been over this dozens of times, and he’d explained why he had come to the Isla de Margarita. He wished he’d taken his friends’ advice when they’d told him not to come to this hellhole off the northern coast of Venezuela, but it had all seemed so simple. Get in, get the sailboat, and get out.
Interrogator laid a passport on the table. “Is this you?”
The picture was him with shaggy brown hair, green eyes, and a handsome smile. His grandmother had always said it was one his nicest features. However, his name was wrong. It read David Brockhoff.
“Yes,” he replied. He tried to think of what his real name was. Who was he when not strapped to this table or going crazy in the blinding cell lights?
“I don’t believe you. Any fool can see this is a forgery.”
The prisoner remained silent.
Interrogator slammed his hand down on the table beside the passport, and the table shuddered from the impact. “Are you an Americano?”
The man nodded.
“What is your real name?”
“David.”
“Mojónes!” Lies.
The lightning fire of electricity sizzled through the American’s body. He tried to keep his teeth clenched, and tongue pulled back, but the pain made him scream. Interrogator pulled the prod away, and as soon as the prisoner had relaxed, the sadistic SEBIN intelligence officer shoved the prod into his inner thigh. Searing pain rippled through the prisoner’s scrotum.
Interrogator grabbed a handful of the American’s hair and wrenched his head off the table. Through clenched teeth, he commanded, “Tell me your real name.”
Exhausted beyond endurance and tired of being zapped, the American tried to form words. His lips trembled as he tried to speak, his jaw working open and closed. After a long moment, he said, “Ryan Weller.”
“Good,” Interrogator cooed. “Ryan Weller, are you a spy for the CIA?”
“No.”
“Who do you work for?”
“I’m a private salvage contractor, and I came to Margarita to get the sailboat that belonged to Pammie Walcott. Her father was paying me to retrieve it from the man who stole it.”
Kent Walcott had wanted Barefoot back and asked Ryan to find it. When Ryan learned Billy Ron Sorenson had made port in Porlamar on the Isla de Margarita, he had foolishly agreed to go after it, and had been dumb enough to secretly hope that he could trap Billy Ron aboard and extradite him to the U.S. to stand trial for the murders he’d committed.
“The man you shot on the dock was a boat thief?”
“Yes.”
“You change your name, but you stick to your story.” Interrogator tapped the end of his cattle prod against the table near Ryan’s face.
Ryan licked his bloody lips. “Call Kent Walcott in Los Angeles, California, and he’ll verify my contract with him.”
“Why didn’t you take the boat and leave?”
“Because it burned in the marina fire.”
In an act of revenge, a fisherman had set a boat ablaze that had run over and cut his trawling net. The fire had spread rapidly and burned not only Barefoot but many other boats in the marina.
“Why did you kill the man?”
Ryan’s mind replayed the tangled web of events that had brought him to Margarita. He’d been working a commercial salvage job with the crew of Peggy Lynn when he’d heard Mango Hulsey report over the cruiser’s radio net that someone had stolen his sailboat. Ryan had sailed to Martinique and met Mango and his wife, Jennifer. They’d searched for their boat, Alamo, and when a fellow cruiser reported the steel-hulled Amazon 44 anchored in the lee of Petit Tabac in Tobago Cays Marine Park between St. Vincent and Grenada, they’d discovered the dead bodies of Archie Dearing and Mike Walcott lying in the locked cabin.
Billy Ron Sorenson had killed them and kidnapped Pammie Walcott before stealing her boat, Barefoot, and sailing to Trinidad. There, Billy Ron had sold Pammie to a Jamaican named Linford, who in turn had sold her to a man running a sex cruise operation. Ryan and a band of former special operations troopers had stormed the luxury yacht, rescued the women, and killed the owner. Then he learned that Billy Ron had made landfall in Margarita and he’d come after him.
Unknown to Ryan, the same night he’d snuck onto Margarita to get Barefoot, seventy prisoners had escaped from the island’s prison, and the police along with a contingent of sailors from the Venezuelan Navy had been guarding the docks to prevent their escape.
Ryan had seen Billy Ron sneaking out of a hotel near the marina in the dead of night. He’d followed him, and the two had fought on the docks with the police and sailors witnessing Ryan’s execution-style shot to the back of Billy Ron’s head.
“Answer me!” Interrogator slammed the cattle prod down on the table. “Why did you kill him?”
Ryan finally said, “He killed at least three people that I know of, and when he started shooting at me, I defended myself.”
“Take him to his cell,” Interrogator ordered two other SEBIN soldiers.
“Please, no. I answered your questions. Please, let me go.”
“Cállate, pendejos.” Shut up, asshole. The interrogator waved his hand, and the room door opened with a squeak on rusty hinges.
The soldiers marched him to his tiny cell, unchained his hands, and tossed him unceremoniously to the ground before slamming the door closed.
During his time in the interrogation room, someone had delivered a meager tray of beans and rice to the cell. The guards had knocked over the cup of water, and Ryan lay on his belly, lapping the liquid from the filthy concrete. He didn’t move to get onto the mattress, but stayed on the floor, cradling his head, trying desperately to shut out the ever-present light. Then the blaring music switched on, and he could barely hear himself think.
He was rotting in a miserable hole in a country ready to tear itself apart at any moment. His friends had no idea where he was, but he hoped they would find him and negotiate his release if not facilitate his escape. He clung to that hope as he tried desperately to shut out the lights and sound.

Publisher: Third Reef Publishing, LLC
Publication Date: December 25, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-7365521-7-9
Print Length: 296
File Size: 1MB
Language: English
Series Information: The Ryan Weller Thriller Series
Book: 6 of 15
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FIC002000 FICTION / Action & Adventure
FIC022090 FICTION / Mystery & Detective / Private Investigators
FIC027260 FICTION / Romance / Action & Adventure
FIC031010 FICTION / Thrillers / Crime
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