She'd been kidnapped.
The realization had come somewhere between the twentieth and thirtieth minute of driving.
Before then, Reina had been counting turns, trying to memorize the route—left, right, straight for what felt like ten minutes, then another left. They'd left her neighborhood, passed through the city center, and kept going. The buildings had grown sparser, the streets rougher, until they were driving through industrial areas she'd never seen before.
Then the patrol car suddenly lurched to a stop.
The door had opened, and before Reina could react, rough hands had grabbed her. She'd twisted, tried to pull away, but with her hands cuffed behind her back, she was helpless.
"Hold still," the female officer snapped. And then everything went dark.
A bag—a rough fabric that smelled like dust and something chemical—had been yanked over her head, and cinched tight around her neck. It wasn't tight enough to choke, but tight enough that she couldn't shake it off.
It was then she knew they weren't real police officers. Or if they were, they weren't taking her to any station. Real cops didn't hood their suspects.
"Get it off—" she'd started, but the door had already slammed shut, and the car started moving again.
From then, the rest of the drive had been an eternity of blind terror. She'd demanded to know where they were taking her, threatened to report them, and then swore to physically attack them as soon as the opportunity presented itself. Her voice had grown hoarse, then raw, then finally silent as she realized they weren't going to respond.
Now, as the car finally stopped and the engine cut off, Reina's heart was a wild thing in her chest, slamming so hard she thought it might burst.
The door opened. Hands grabbed her arms—not gentle, but not brutal either. They were professional and efficient.
"No! NO!" She kicked out blindly, her foot connecting with something solid—someone grunted.
"Grab those damn legs!" One of the male officers commanded.
More hands were on her. Reina thrashed, screamed, and threw her weight around like a wild animal. But there were three of them and only one of her, and her hands were still cuffed behind her back.
They lifted her bodily from the car. She kept fighting, kept screaming, even as they carried her across what sounded like gravel, then concrete. A door creaked open—metal, heavy, the sound echoing like they were entering somewhere vast and empty.
The temperature dropped immediately. The air that filtered through the bag was cold, stale, carrying scents that made her stomach turn—rust, old blood, something organic and rotting.
"In here," the female officer said.
Another door opened, and this one sounded heavier, more industrial. As soon as she was carried through it, the cold intensified dramatically. Her breath, already coming in panicked gasps, turned to visible fog even though the bag.
They shoved her down into a metal chair that was freezing cold even through her clothes. She tried to stand, but hands pushed her back down. She heard the rattle of chains, felt metal closing around her wrists as they uncuffed her from behind only to immediately recuff her to the arms of the chair.
She was trapped, and then the bag yanked off her head.
Reina blinked rapidly, her eyes adjusting to the dim light. For a moment, she couldn't process what she was seeing. Then, slowly, horribly, the details came together.
She was in a cold room—an industrial freezer, massive and old. The walls were metal, rusted in places, covered in a thin layer of frost. The ceiling was high, maybe fifteen feet up, crisscrossed with pipes and meat hooks.
Hanging from those hooks were carcasses of cows, pigs, what might've been a deer—all of them butchered, split open, frozen solid. They hung like grotesque ornaments, their dead eyes glassy and vacant as their split bodies revealed frozen organs and bone. The hooks they hung from were old, some of them rusted brown with what could only the old blood.
The freezer wasn't running—not yet. The air was cold but not unbearable, far below freezing. But that meant the carcasses were beginning to thaw, and the smell—God, the smell—was a mixture of old blood, meat, and something rotten that made her gag.
"Look at me."
Reina's head snapped toward the voice. The female officer stood directly in front of her, arms crossed, expression cold and professional. Behind her, the two male officers flanking her like sentries.
One of them was holding a laptop.
"Look at me," the woman repeated, and Reina realized she'd been staring at the exit, her mind trying desperately to be anywhere but here.
She forced herself to focus on the officer's face. Sharp features, cold eyes, a mouth set in a thin line. She looked like someone who'd done this before. Many times before.
The male officer with the laptop stepped forward, setting it on a small metal table that Reina hadn't noticed before. He angled the screen toward her, his finger hovering over the track pad.
"Pay attention," he said.
The video started playing.
It was a security footage from Club Pita—black and white, grainy, the timestamp in the corner reading a time from much earlier that morning. Reina recognized the back entrance immediately, the same door Franco had held open for her.
And there she was.
Her disguise had been good—the fake mustache, the eyebrows, the wig under the baseball cap, the baggy clothes that his her frame. She looked like a young man, maybe nineteen or twenty, the kind of person who might be meeting friends at a club.
The footage showed her brief interaction with Franco. Him holding the door, her slipping inside. The whole exchange lasted maybe ten seconds and then the video stopped.
Silence filled the cold space, broken only by the sound of Reina's ragged breathing and the occasional creak of swaying carcass.
"Was that you?" The female officer asked.
"Why? Are you blind?"
"Just answer the damn question, smart mouth." her jaw clenched.
"Go straight to hell," Reina replied with a voice that was steadier than she felt.
However, the slap that followed was so fast, she didn't see it coming. The officer's palm cracked across her cheek with enough force to snap her head to the side. Pain exploded across her face, white-hot and shocking.
"Was. That. You?" The woman enunciated each word carefully, her voice still calm, still professional.
Reina turned back slowly, tasting copper in her mouth. She glared at the officer, eyes blazing with rage, fear and defiance.
She said nothing.
Another slap came, harder this time. This one caught her other cheek, and stars burst behind her eyes. Her ears rang, and her eyes itched with tears but she blinked them back furiously.
"Oliveira's boy already confessed," the woman said, leaning in close enough that Reina could smell coffee on her breath. "He told us everything. How you asked him to help you get into the club. How you disguised yourself as a waiter, walked into the VIP section with a gun and shot Ruiz Souza."
Franco. Franco had confessed. . .Or was it his dad? Oliveira had after all, eavesdropped on their conversation and inserted himself into the matter. Franco might be upset with her, but he was no snitch.
"Admit it," the officer pressed. "You shot Ruiz Souza."
Reina stared at the woman for a beat longer, then shook her head like disappointed parent.
"So," she began. "As opposed to a police precinct, you brought me here for questioning? Am I even under arrest or have you taken me from my home to kill me? Is there a grave dug up for me somewhere?"
"What do you think?"
"I think you should go fuck yourself!"
The woman's hand drew back for a punch this time, fist clenched, and Reina braces herself. But one of the male officers stepped forward quickly, catching his colleague's wrist.
"That's enough, Vasquez." he muttered, voice low. "Not too much."
The female officer's jaw worked, fury flashing in her cold eyes. For a moment, Reina thought she might hit her anyway, orders be damned.
Then, slowly, the woman lowered her fist.
"You're right," she said softly, and something in her tone made Reina's blood run cold.
She stepped back, smoothing down her uniform with deliberate movements. The two male officers moved with her, the three of them backing toward the heavy metal door.
"I'll be doing something far worse," the woman added, and there was something almost like satisfaction in her voice now.
"Hey—" Reina started, pain spiking. "Wait, where are you—"
The door swung shut with a boom that echoed through the vast space. She heard the sound of heavy locks engaging—one, two, three separate bolts sliding home.
"LET ME OUT!" Reina screamed, straining against the cuffs that held her to the chair. "YOU CAN'T LEAVE ME IN HERE! LET ME OUT!"
The was response. Just the echo of her own voice bouncing off metal walls, and the gentle creak of frozen carcasses swaying slightly on their hooks.
She pulled harder at the cuffs, ignoring the way they bit into her wrists. The chair was bolted to the floor—she could feel it, immovable and solid. She tried to tip it, to drag it, to do anything, but it wouldn't budge.
She was trapped. Completely, utterly trapped. And then she heard it.
A low hum, barely audible at first but then got louder, mechanical—the freezer was turning on.
She heard the faint high whistle of air being forced through vents and her head whipped around, searching for the source of the sound. She found it—a large industrial unit in the far corner, its compressor beginning to rumble to life. Frost that had been melting on the walls prepared to be crystallized again as the temperature, which had been cold but bearable, started to drop.
"HELP!" she screamed again, and with more urgency she added, "SOMEBODY HELP ME!"