Uncaging Bunny/LT Fanfiction

Chapter 37 - The Hunt for Manny

Manny Sandoval woke with a start near dawn the day after he'd fled his rented luxury Villa heading to a rustic remote cabin in the Nicaraguan forest. He looked around the small space having momentarily forgotten where he was.  Though there was nothing but pitch darkness all around him, he could just make out his surroundings. He was in the cabin.  He remembered.

He sat up in the single bed, groaning at the pain in his back made worse by the duffle bag, brief case, and his laptop satchel he'd lugged the near mile and a half distance before he'd finally reached the all-terrain vehicle he had hidden away under a green tarp.  The bed he was on was uncomfortable, which didn't help his mood or his back.

He was made even more uncomfortable having slept in his pants. As yet, he hadn't dared make himself even more vulnerable by taking a shower, no matter how quick, until he was sure he hadn't been followed to his remote hideaway. He'd planned to rectify the matter of his hygiene once the sun came up.  His naked chest, now somewhat sticky from dried sweat, clung to the sheets despite him doing a cursory wipe down in the small bathroom sink. 

It would be at least another hour, hour and a half before the sun made an initial appearance. Manny didn't want to turn on any lights. He didn't want to draw attention to a light shining in the distant forest, so he'd have to bear his current unhygienic condition a little while longer.

Manny sighed.  He was now wide awake. His mind was racing trying to come to terms with what was happening and to figure out his next move. First and foremost, he needed to get out of Central America. He was too well-known here, and with his face now surely plastered all over the news, he was also ripe for capture.

He'd soon understood Consuela's and his guards' reactions to him.  No doubt news about his compounds and his camps being raided had began to spread in the towns and villages surrounding the Villa long before it had gotten to him. There would be few places nearby where he wouldn't be recognized. From here on out, he'd have to be careful where he went in the surrounding area until he could get out of the country. For now, the remote cabin would have to serve as his home.

Manny started to think of who he could trust to help him relocate, but even then where was he going to go?  He had to admit, it angered him that he hadn't fully thought things through once he'd returned to Nicaragua, and this wasn't at all like him.  Why hadn't he fully planned for this?  He'd been so successful over the years he now realized he'd indeed relaxed his usually suspicious guard. He'd become complacent. Operating and managing his businesses from a distance had been both a blessing and a curse.

Living and working in the U.S. while trying to manage and oversee his growing businesses he now realizes had given him a sort of, you can't touch me bravado. He'd welcomed the security, the anonymity, but it had loosened the preferred hands-on approach being in Nicaragua full-time had once afforded him. But now, he couldn't go back to the States, at least not as Manny Sandoval.

Yesterday, not long after he'd arrived at the cabin, he'd accessed the news from his laptop. He needed to assess the damage. Because of the raids on his camps and his main compound, he and his operations were all over the news.  Footage of the now video-recorded raids then in progress flashed across his laptop screen and had been on heavy rotation in the national and international newsfeeds for the past day and a half, with no signs of letting up.   Thank goodness he'd thought to add a source of Wi-Fi to the cabin, a convenience that had been a big expense but worth every penny, otherwise he'd be lost as to what was happening all around him.

Through the small radio he found in the cabin, and the news he found online on his laptop, he was able to learn that, simultaneously his camps and compounds in Nicaragua, El Salvador, and Costa Rica, had been raided by hordes of FBI agents and local police. His main compound, here in Nicaragua, was dismantled. Manny watched through online news as all he'd built over the years was ransacked and torn apart until there was nothing left but trash. Evidence of  human consumption items were strewed all about the grounds.