I click on the CNN article. A picture of Anna smiling, her arm wrapped around her father, stares back at me. She’s absolutely stunning with long blond hair, sky-blue eyes, and a bright, wide smile. A white play button at the center of the photo beckons me to hit play. So I do.
A brunette anchor appears on screen, filling in all the missing details. “Anna Taylor, the daughter of millionaire businessman turned US senator Josiah Taylor, has been killed during an attempted rescue from Colombian cartel boss Santino ‘The Hammer’ Torres. Taylor, along with four other Americans, had been abducted earlier this week and held hostage in exchange for the release of three Colombian drug dealers in federal custody here in the United States. Sources are reporting that an unknown group raided the compound in the early morning hours and successfully rescued Taylor’s two traveling companions, Stephanie Litton and Jen Meredith, all former students at the Sidwell Friends School in DC, as well as Massachusetts couple Richie and Mila Barcelona. The rescue team was unable to reach Taylor before she was shot and killed. Anna Taylor planned to attend Georgetown next fall. She was just eighteen years old.”
They lost someone. They lost a senator’s daughter no less. My parents rarely lose someone they are trying to save. I can count on one hand the number of people that have died on their watch.
“Oh my God,” I whisper as I feel the gravity of what this could mean for the Black Angels and my parents, the shit storm from the media, the repercussions at CORE. But there has to be more. This can’t be the only thing that happened. There has to be something else that has my parents so petrified.
Tears threaten to climb up the back of my throat but I swallow hard and let my training take over. I take a deep, full-bodied breath and fall back into numbness. Holding this tragedy far away is the only way I can function. I refuse to let it break through my skin, soak into my body, and affect me. Turn off emotions, push away the poison, I hear my mom’s voice in my head. And so I do.
My fingers bang at my keyboard, typing in “Rehenes Estadounidenses” and “Santino Torres.” Several Colombian newspapers pop up. I scan the headlines. The newspaper in Santa Marta, Colombia, called El Informador has a headline that reads “El hijo de Santino Torres se murió en rescate de rehenes.” Translation: Santino Torres’s son killed in hostage rescue.
That’s it.
“Holy shit,” I whisper, raising my fingertips to my temples. I click on the headline and begin to scan the article.
Take-down in Santa Marta.
Unidentified American Group.
Alejandro. Four years old. Shot in head by rescue team.
Died in father’s arms.
Anna Taylor. Forced to her knees.
Cried and begged for her life. Shot execution style.
Her body abandoned. Her flesh set on fire that night. A promise from Torres.
“Venganza, venganza, venganza. Muerte a los Americanos.” Revenge, revenge, revenge. Death to the Americans.
Bile rises up my throat as I realize that Torres must have leaked this entire story in hopes the Americans would find it and heed his warning.
At the bottom of the article, Alejandro’s dark eyes haunt me; his sweet smile crushes me. He was so small. Why did he have to die? Collateral damage. That’s what the Black Angels would call him. He was just collateral damage. But he wasn’t. He was a little boy. They’d justify it and say he’d grow up to take over his father’s drug empire. But how do they know? Maybe he’d grow up and become a doctor or maybe a lawyer or a teacher and do good to offset the evil of his father. He was only four years old. He still had a chance.
My stomach has been tied into so many knots, I feel physically ill. The wall I’ve built around me begins to chip and crumble; my body begins to tingle. My arms, my legs, my feet, my hands feel disconnected from me somehow.
We’re leaving. We’re leaving, my mind taunts. I can feel it in my bones. We’re twenty-four hours away from going into hiding. Forty-eight if I’m lucky. The room spins, dread tightening my lungs, and I can’t breathe. I want to slow the clock that’s counting down the minutes I have left in this house, in this life, but it ticks by at double speed.
My wobbly legs stand up from my desk chair. The walls around me begin to melt, coming closer and closer and a sudden rush of heat blisters my skin. I have to get out of here, go for a run, something.
I tear open the bottom drawer of my dresser, pulling out yoga pants, a sports bra, and a T-shirt. I glance over my shoulder and out the window. The sun is just starting to set, its warmth retreating as our part of the world spins into darkness. I grab my red jacket in case I get cold.