The Mule

Chapter 33

The next day was Braxton's weekly appointment with his therapist. He considered cancelling as he did not want to deal with Brayden's attitude toward Marissa. He knew the psychologist would not approve of him talking to Gael and he was sure he'd be very disappointed in him for taking Marissa's sweater to bed with him.

He wasn't wrong. "How do you feel about your backsliding?" Brayden asked him when he told him about it.

"I'm not sorry", Braxton replied, defiance in his eyes.

Brayden tried to hide his annoyance. He did not like it when patients went against his advice, but it was their right. "Didn't you come to me for help in getting over Marissa?" he asked.

"I did, but at that time, I thought there was no hope that I'd ever see or hear from her again. Things have changed."

"Have they really? You still don't know where she is."

"If I had got the message the day it was left, I'd have been able to talk to her. She disappeared the next night. I am hopeful that she will be found soon." The last sentence was a bit of a lie - he was hopeful, but realistically, he didn't know what the chances were of Marissa being found alive.

Brayden decided to drop it for now and they talked about Braxton's decision to break up with Amber and why he'd been with her in the first place until their time was up. Braxton was glad to get out of there, and was considering stopping therapy.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Gael and Irene lay awake in their bed. They had had little sleep since Marissa had been kidnapped four days ago. None of the family had. Besides being restless with worry, they were being kept awake by Charlie's bawling. The poor steer was missing Marissa as much as they were, but he didn't have the capacity to understand what had happened. All he knew was that strangers had been there and she was gone.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Marissa drifted in and out of it. Dr Cardenas came to see her a few times and emptied her catheter bag. She was no longer able to drink, so he brought a bag of IV fluids and stayed while it ran into her, once again hoping that none of his bosses came down and saw it. He did this a couple times, but he had to take the IV cannula out each time just in case. He put it in her arm just below the crook of the elbow, so that it would be less likely that someone would see the needle mark. He wished he had tubing to put in her nephrostomy to drain her kidney but it was something that had never been needed here at the compound, so they didn't stock it.

He couldn't wait until he had a night off. He'd been on call for a week now, as the other physician had gone somewhere, presumably doing something for the Cartel. He hoped his colleague would be back soon. Marissa didn't have much time left if she didn't get advanced medical care in the next day or so.

Victor Cardenas had worked for another cartel for a number of years before he defected and came to work for this one. They kept him at the compound as his former bosses wanted him killed for leaving. This cartel treated it's people better than most of them did - as long as they co-operated and did as they were told. However, they could be ruthless when they were crossed or when someone ran away. He didn't like a lot of what he saw down there in the cells but he had to keep his mouth shut. He had earned the trust of the top tier in the organization and was free to move about in the compound. He was allowed to leave for short excursions, but he didn't do it often as he knew there was a risk of someone connected to the other cartel seeing him.

Victor hated working for the Cartel. He had allowed himself to get sucked into the first one when they promised him more money than he'd been making working in a hospital's ER. After the first beating victim he'd patched up, he asked to leave but was told that if he did, the cartel would kill his young daughter, who lived with her mother. But she and his ex wife had died in a car accident a few months ago and he had no other immediate family for the Cartel to go after. He was just looking for the right time to make his break. That time might be imminent as Marissa needed more intensive care than he could give her on the sly at the compound.