by Carolina Mac
The jungle road was dark and narrow and there was always the chance that Sanchez had guards posted a couple of miles from the house to keep visitors out. Almost guaranteed if the guy had half a brain. If he was king of cocaine in Columbia, he must have some gray matter.
Up ahead, brake lights flashed on and the big truck swayed, slowed, then stopped. Two men with automatic weapons had jumped out of the jungle and confronted Enright.
Blaine stopped, rammed the Rubicon into park and yelled, “Hand me my rifle.” He grabbed his Remington—the one with the new Nightforce scope—from the guy in the back seat and hollered, “Stay put, I’ve got this.”
Blaine hopped out and ran around the big truck, using it for cover. As he passed the driver’s door, he could see over the hood of the truck. He fired on the run and took the guards down with two consecutive head shots. He rolled their bodies off the road with the toe of his Harley boot, picked up their weapons and signaled to Enright to go ahead.
Enright leaned out the window and said, “Nice shooting, kid. Didn’t know you were a sniper.”
“My Mom taught me,” said Blaine as he ran by.
After those two, no more sentries. The next ones would be at the gate of the compound. Enright hung a half mile back in the trees waiting for Travis to arrive in the chopper and do his thing.
TERROR FILLED FABIANA as night fell in the jungle. She’d been in semi-darkness all day because of the canopy, but now without the benefit of the filtered rays of sun lighting her way she was frozen. She’d never been afraid of the dark, but deep in the jungle, ‘dark’ took on a new meaning. She sat motionless against the trunk of a tree and listened. That was the only way she could tell if an animal or reptile was coming near her. Should she climb a tree for safety? Her hands shook as she pulled her phone out of her pocket to see if she had any battery life. Two bars, but would anyone receive her?
Overhead she heard the helicopter again. This morning, and now at night? No one would be searching for her. Zahn never answered her call for help. Her boss had burned her. She hated working for Marwood. The slimy prick wouldn’t try anything he might fail at in case he looked bad in the eyes of his superiors. He knew there would be too many casualties if he tried to take Lucho down, that’s why he kept postponing and saying it wasn’t time. He was weak and a coward. It would have been a fantastic bust—one she worked the best part of a year for. A year of her life, but what did it matter now when she might not survive the night?
Her only hope was Enright. He was her contact in Columbia. The DEA’s man on the ground who supplied what they needed. He had nothing to do with her assignment or her
safety, but during the time she’d been in Columbia the two of them had become close. Enright had feelings for her. He made no secret of it, and he treated her well. He was a good man.
Enright wanted her to love him back, and she tried. She was fond of him, but Blaine still filled her heart. She wasn’t over him and never should have left him. Another costly mistake. One that would cost her her life.
The chopper dropped lower and passed over her position. She couldn’t see it, but she could hear the direction it was headed—back the way she’d come. A day’s worth of walking—how far would she be from the compound? Jungle travel was tediously slow, the undergrowth so heavy and daunting. Maybe five or six miles? How far was the road? Without food or water, the road better not be too far away. She’d never make it.
She stood still and listened. The sound of gunfire in the distance made her smile. Someone had balls big enough to attack Sanchez. That meant somebody hated him as much as she did.
MORE HYPED THAN he’d ever been in his life, Farrell geared up for the first run over the compound.
“Ready, partner? I’m heading in,” said Travis. The
chopper banked and swooped low over the storage sheds. A couple of pole lights were all they could see through the canopy as they approached. Travis flew from memory of the morning recon more than anything else.
Farrell double checked the buckle on his seat belt, then leaned out the open door and threw the first fire canister. “Yeah,” he hollered when he saw the explosion. Adrenaline surged through his veins as he threw the second, third and fourth, all with deadly accuracy. This is where the training and coolness under pressure that Annie had drilled into him, took over and paid off—in spades.
He flipped into emotional overdrive and it felt fantastic. He’d never been on a high like this one. “Hit them where it hurts,” he hollered as he threw the last one. Flames shot out of all the storage sheds and lit up the sky. At first no one seemed to comprehend what was happening, but soon men were running with automatic weapons trying to shoot them down.
“Three good fires,” said Travis into his earwig. “We’ve got some dandy blazes going, boss. Go now. Go for the house. Most of the soldiers are trying to save the product.”
“Phase two,” said Blaine.
“Roger that,” said Travis. To Farrell: “The other sheds will catch, we just can’t hang around to watch the fun.” He reversed the chopper’s path and swooped low over the line of trucks parked near the gate.
Farrell yahooed as he pulled the pins on the four grenades, one by one, and fired them down at the trucks.
“Good job, partner,” said Travis. “You made every fuckin one count.”
“Night, night, boys,” said Blaine in the earwig. “Get on home now.”
“Roger that, boss,” said Travis. “Good hunting.”
ENRIGHT LED the way through the gate with the big cattle truck. He parked quickly, and his men spilled out of the back. In a panic, when the fires started, Sanchez and his men had all run to the storage sheds to try to save their precious crop of coca.
Swiftly, Enright’s men cleared the house room by room. “She’s not here,” said Enright to Blaine. “She’s gone.”
“Okay, good,” said Blaine. “Torch it, and we’re gone too.”
As they left the burning house, a half dozen of Sanchez’ soldiers ran towards them firing automatic weapons. As they ran for the truck, Enright’s men returned fire and cut down as many as they could.
The mission was successful as far as eliminating the drug source, and throwing a wrench into the Sanchez Cartel, but the plan to rescue Fabiana didn’t come to fruition. She was gone. Had she escaped? Was she already dead and buried?
Where was she?
EXHAUSTED FROM her day of running and fighting against mother nature, Fabiana tried to sleep leaning against a tree that smelled a lot like chocolate. It was comforting to a tiny degree, but hunger, thirst and fear were winning out.
With her eyes closed and her head resting on the tree trunk, she tried to relax, but sleep wouldn’t come. The
absolute darkness amplified the voices of the jungle night hunters and kept her awake. The low, gravelly growling of the iguanas was a scary sound, but they were the least of her
worries. It was the snakes and the vipers that terrified her.
“I shouldn’t sleep on the ground. I’m sure they can smell me. I’d be better in the tree, if I could get up there.” No one could hear her, so it didn’t matter if she talked out loud to
herself.
She grabbed onto the lowest branch, and for the next twenty minutes, she blindly struggled up the tree. The rough bark scratched her arms and more than one small branch poked her in the eye. Finally, she laid her hand on a wide, flat branch that might hold her weight. She straddled the limb and skootched close to the trunk, so she could lean and be fairly certain she wouldn’t topple off. With her petite body wedged into the vee she tried to forget about fear, hunger, thirst and the threat of nocturnal predators. She willed herself to relax and dozed off.
BACK IN RIONEGRO in the hour before dawn, Blaine bought breakfast for Enright and his men in a twenty-four-hour diner. “Well, Blaine, she wasn’t there,” said Enright. “What do you make of that?”
Blaine shrugged and added cream to his coffee. “Honestly, I don’t know what to think. There
are only three possibilities. She could already be dead, and Sanchez buried her. She could have been hiding in the house and we missed her, although we searched thoroughly, or she could have run off into the jungle.”
“I’d hate to think she got away from Sanchez and ran into the jungle,” said Enright. “She wouldn’t have much of a chance in there against the viper population and the guerillas, unless she has a weapon.”
“Any suggestions?” asked Blaine.
“Not one.” Enright spread jam on a slice of toast and cleaned up what was on his plate. “The Darien is the most dangerous jungle area in the world—bar none. And that’s where she is, if she ran from Sanchez.” Enright looked up with his eyes slightly glassy. “If I thought there was one chance in a thousand of finding her alive in there, I’d be there now. There isn’t.”
Jesus, I didn’t need to hear that.
BLAINE PAID THE CHECK and drove to the airstrip to pick up Travis and Farrell. As he sat in the Jeep and waited for them, he checked his messages. Missed one from Annie.
“Jackson had an accident. At the hospital with Race. Call me when you get this.”
“I wonder what time it is at home?” He called anyway, and Annie answered on the first ring.”
“Hey, baby. I hope you’re safe.”
“I’m okay, just tired. What happened to Jacks?”
“He tripped over a straw fork at the barn and opened up the calf of his little leg. The gash bled a lot and they transfused him.”
Blaine felt his heart skip a beat. “But he’s okay? Mom, tell me he’s okay, I’ve had a shit day.”
“Yes, sweetheart, he will be okay once he heals. He’s sleeping in a baby crib here at the hospital and they’re
watching him closely. He might go home tomorrow.”
“Are you alone there, or is Jesse with you?”
“Race is with me. He’s asleep too. Thank God he was here to donate the blood.”
“Oh, yeah. He passed on the rare one to Jacks.”
“Did you find Fab?”
Enright is convinced she’s already dead.
“Not yet, but we’re close.”
“Get some sleep, sugar. You sound beat.”
“Going to the hotel shortly. Can’t wait to hit the pillow.”
Farrell was on a high when he jumped in the back of the Rubicon. “Best night ever, boss. I could do that every fuckin night of my life and die happy.”
“Yeah, it felt good,” said Travis as he settled in the shotgun seat, “but now I’m tired and hungry and I need to sleep.”
“We’ll get y’all breakfast and then y’all can sleep until
further notice,” said Blaine. “Now that the raid is complete, and we know for sure that Fab wasn’t there, I haven’t decided how far I’m taking this.”
THE FIRST RAY OF MORNING SUN shot through the
canopy and projected a shaft of light across the branch
Fabiana perched on. “Thank God, its morning.” She sucked in a little gulp of air wondering what the day would bring. First order of the day, she needed to find something to eat, and even more pressing was her need for water. The bathroom situation presented no problem unless you objected to monkeys watching you.
She shifted slightly on the branch, figuring out the best way to get down, and that’s when she heard it.
Hiss.
She risked a glance to her left and held her breath. There it was slithering along the branch towards her. Blending in with the bark and almost invisible in its camouflaged skin. About three or four inches thick and how long? She stared into the branches and couldn’t see the end of it. She knew nothing about snakes except Columbia had more than their share and most were poisonous. She was terrified.
A little mewling sound escaped her lips as she panicked and jerked away from the snake too quickly. Off balance and not taking the time to position her legs correctly over the branch, she dangled in the air, feeling around with her foot for the next branch lower down.
The snake slithered closer, it’s tongue flicking in and out of its mouth. It had almost reached her right hand and she still couldn’t feel the branch below her.
She screamed, jerked her hand away from the snake and let go of the branch. Fabiana plummeted downward and heard herself scream as her pantleg caught on one of the lower branches. She hung upside down for what couldn’t have been more than a few seconds before the branch broke and she continued her fall. Rough bark on the tree trunk ripped her jeans apart and dug into the flesh underneath. Searing pain shot through her brain. “My leg,” she hollered as she hit the ground with a thud.
Tears flooded from her eyes, blinding her, as she tried to straighten into a sitting position to examine the damage to her leg. The tear in the denim stretched from her knee up the side of her leg almost to her hip. Gritting her teeth, she pulled the fabric away from the wound and forced herself to take a good look.
“Jesus, Mary and Joseph,” she whispered. “I’m as good as dead.”
She looked around for something to wrap her leg with and found nothing. She whipped her t-shirt over her head and tied it around her thigh as tightly as she could manage. Holding on to the trunk of the tree, she tried to stand. Ignoring the pain that redoubled when she put pressure on her leg, she dragged herself onto her feet and paused to catch her breath. Looking to right and left she had no idea which way to go.
“I’ve got to get to the road before they smell the blood.”
Through sheer force of will, she dragged herself away from the tree she had slept in. With each step she took, she could feel her lifeblood gush out of the hole in her leg. Her white t-shirt was no longer white.
“I’ve got to keep going.” Fabiana felt herself growing weaker and she sat down on a log to rest. Her vision wasn’t as clear as it had been when she woke, and she felt dizzy and sick to her stomach.
After a short rest, she stood and tightened her t-shirt around her leg. “I can make it. It can’t be much farther.” She limped along for another hour and the jungle seemed thicker and hotter than ever. Was she making any progress?
Behind her she heard a grunting noise. “Oh, not one of those wild pigs. Can he smell me?”
Trying to ignore the pain in her leg, Fabiana tried to run. The grunting and snorting behind her grew louder. She picked up the pace as much as she could and crashed through the trees. Risking a glance over her shoulder, she saw the ugly snout of the thing galloping towards her. With a scream, she tripped over a fallen tree and crumpled to the ground.
Juan Sanchez lost his shit when the six storage sheds went up in flames. Thirty men died fighting the flames, trying to save the coca, and more who angered him with their cowardice were executed.
The two men guarding Fabiana were shot. Angelique was killed for distracting the guard. The housekeeper was killed because she did nothing to stop Fabiana’s flight.
And this morning after losing everything, Juan Sanchez would not lose face. He would find Fabiana and bring her back. All men who remained loyal to him were called together and organized into a search party.
He divided them into groups of ten and sent them off in four directions into the rainforest. She could not have gotten far. She was a woman in the jungle, after all.
While the men were searching, Sanchez sat on what remained of the front porch of his burned-out home and smoked a cigar. As he smoked, he planned his revenge on the DEA and Enright, in particular.
He knew of this man and his efforts against the cartels. If he couldn’t kill him, he would make him go home to his own country and never come back to Columbia.
BLAINE SLEPT FOR A couple of hours after he and the boys returned to their hotel room, but then woke with too many things on his mind. He tossed and turned, and couldn’t go back to sleep. He slipped out of bed, dressed quietly and left the room in search of coffee. He closed the door behind him on Travis and Farrell’s loud snoring.
A few minutes later he returned with two large containers from the restaurant downsta
irs. Sitting at the table in the corner, he wondered if there was anything else he could possibly do to find Fab—aside from searching the rainforest—an unthinkable task, according to Enright, and not feasible near the Sanchez property. Even though it went against his grain to leave any job unfinished, he needed to let this go.
His place was at home with Annie. Jacks was seriously injured, and Annie needed him.
ENRIGHT WOKE with a start in late afternoon thinking he heard a vehicle in his laneway. Impossible. He had stopped to lock the gate on the way in. He trudged to the front door in his boxers, peered through the window and there was no one in sight. He opened the door, stepped onto the tiny porch and his heart almost gave out.
Fabiana’s bruised and bloodied body lay at his feet. Her right arm torn off by a predator, her dead eyes staring up at him.
“No.” He couldn’t stop himself from screaming as he ran to the kitchen sink and vomited. After splashing cold water on his face, a dozen times, he managed to stop shaking and get dressed. An almost empty bottle of Glenfiddich sat on the kitchen table with a dirty glass beside it. Enright tipped up the bottle and finished it.
He sat beside her body on the porch for a long time trying to come to terms with her death and organize his thoughts. So beautiful. Such a tiny, perfect woman, and he loved her so much. She knew the risks. They’d discussed the danger she was in many times in the past months.
An hour passed before he could bring himself to dig a grave behind the house. Tears rolled down his face the whole time he dug in the hard, sun parched earth. When he was ready, he yanked the sheet off his bed, brushed the flies away from her and wrapped her small body carefully. His heart broke in two as he carried her to her final resting place.
