“I said get in the car.” He pulled a pistol from a shoulder holster beneath his flowered short-sleeved shirt. “Now.”

Gage’s jaw hardened. He urged Abby forward, and they climbed into the back seat of the SUV.

“You drive, Tomás.”

The guy with the goatee, Tomás, got in behind the wheel, and Paulo got into the front passenger seat. The guy with the mustache and the guy with the scar walked halfway down the block and got into an old blue beater.

Paulo turned and tossed them a pair of black canvas bags. “Put these over your heads.” He kept the gun fixed on Abby.

As she pulled on the hood, she didn’t look at Gage. She knew how hard it was for him to give up control. She heard the bag rustle as he pulled it over his head.

“Drive, Tomás,” Paulo instructed, all of them now speaking Spanish.

The engine rumbled to life, and the SUV backed out of the driveway. Gage reached over and took Abby’s hand, and his warmth and strength seeped into her. She held on tightly as the car made a series of turns, pulled onto what she thought must be a freeway, and speeded up. She prayed Edge and the others would be able to follow.

They rode for what she figured was probably half an hour, though it seemed far longer. The SUV drove off the main highway, made a series of turns, and finally pulled to a stop. She could hear the other car pull in behind them.

The rear door opened. “Get out,” Paulo commanded, and they climbed out of the car. They were guided up some stairs and across a wide porch. As they walked through a doorway, her footsteps echoed on the surface of the floor. Tile, Abby thought.

Paulo removed their hoods.

Abby turned to survey her surroundings and was struck by the opulence, a crystal chandelier above the entry, a gilt mirror on the wall. The ceilings were twenty feet high, and marble columns lined a single long corridor with arched doorways off each side.

As Paulo led them forward, she could see into a large salon, elegantly furnished with carved rosewood tables and a sideboard, and a lovely pair of settees, though the green velvet upholstery was fading.

The house was at least a hundred years old, probably a lot older, one of the many haciendas in the Yucatán.

Paulo knocked at the first door down the hall, then pulled it open and led them into a room lined with tall mahogany bookcases. This room was elegantly done, with gilt-framed paintings on the walls and a graceful antique mahogany writing desk with a silk-shaded lamp on top.

A man rose behind it. He was trim and perfectly groomed in a tailored black suit and white shirt. He had a narrow, pointed face and shiny black hair that gleamed in the lamplight.