The Edge

by Catherine Coulter

  It got darker as we ran, the green over our heads forming an opaque canopy. Only the thinnest slivers of sunlight managed to get through. No wonder everything rotted so quickly—there was no sunlight to dry anything out. People would rot too, I thought, and there were a lot of creatures to help them. This was not a good place to be.

  We ran another twenty feet into the jungle and came to a dead stop. We couldn’t go farther without a machete after all. It was impossible to pull away the branches and vines that were in front of us, an impenetrable wall of green. I’d never imagined anything like this. We stopped and listened. For a few moments, we didn’t hear anything, then I heard a man shout. It was in very fast Spanish and I couldn’t make it out. I heard men crashing through the dense foliage, not paying any attention to where they stepped, just coming toward us.

  “It’s time to try to hide,” I said. We went exactly ten big steps to the right, careful not to leave any signs of our tracks to this spot, and hunkered down behind a tree. I looked up and saw a frog staring me right in the eye. At least this little guy wouldn’t try to eat us. He looked like he belonged on that old Bud commercial.

  We were ill equipped, just our clothes and guns. There was no way we could survive for any time at all in this alien place. I didn’t want to think about it. I had no intention of staying here any longer than necessary.

  The men were close now, not more than twenty feet away from us. Two of them were arguing about which direction to take. Ants were crawling over my feet. Laura swatted the back of her hand. A coral snake, its beautiful bright bands announcing that it could kill you fast, slithered by not six feet from Laura’s foot. I wrapped my arm around her shoulders.

  I realized I was so hot my blood seemed to swell in my veins. Sweat pooled under my arms and at the small of my back. I hated the heat. Why couldn’t drug runners deal out of Canada? A lovely little insect the size of a fifty-cent piece dropped from a branch above my head onto my forearm. It took a good-sized bite out of me, then lightly dropped to the ground where it scurried off to hide beneath a leaf.

  Finally, the men fanned out, several coming our way. It made sense. I would have done the same thing. I listened carefully to every boot crunch.

  Only two men were coming our way. I raised two fingers to Laura and she nodded, readying herself.

  I pointed to the guns and shook my head. She nodded again. A minute later they were not a foot from us, sweeping their guns around, swearing at all the bugs, all the dripping leaves overhead, all in Spanish. If they found us, I knew we had to be fast and quiet as the dead. One of the men yelped. Maybe the insect that had just bitten off half my forearm had gotten him.

  Then one of the men looked down and we stared at each other. Without a sound, I reared up and smashed the butt of the AK-47 under his jaw. It cracked real loud, but he only let out a whiff of a yell before he fell.

  Laura moved fast. She butted the other man in his gut, then raised her weapon and slammed it down against his temple.

  We stood over the two men, trying to control our breathing.

  We heard men calling to one another. They apparently hadn’t heard these two go down, thank God. Of course they’d be missed soon enough. We quickly stripped the man Laura hit, because he was very small. Laura pulled on his pants and his boots and threw the pants and boots she’d been wearing into a bush that, I swear, quivered when the boots struck it. We relieved both of them of their weapons.

  It took three minutes, no longer. We began to make our way due west, going by small glimpses of sun. Every dozen or so steps, we wiped away the marks of our passage. Our progress was slow. Both of us were dripping wet, so thirsty our tongues felt swollen. We heard the chattering of monkeys high above our heads in the interlocking tree branches, and the constant calls and shrieks of animals we’d never heard in our lives. We heard a low, warning growl. A puma, Laura whispered. They knew we were there and were announcing it loudly to their cousins.

  Birds checked in—squawking louder and more ferociously than Nolan ever had even at his crankiest.

  “Just listen to them,” Laura said. “They’re all around us and loud as can be. Oh, Mac—what do you think the ice acid does to animals? Like Grubster and Nolan?”

  I stopped cold and stared at her. “I hadn’t thought about them. Doesn’t it make sense that they’d sleep just like we did? That they’d wake up, just like we did? That they’d be all right?”

  I thought she was going to burst into tears.

  “That was a stupid question,” I said without hesitation. “I’ll wager my AK-47 that they’re just fine.” The panic calmed in her eyes. “Maggie’s probably feeding them. Don’t worry, Laura.”

  We kept walking, looking carefully down and around before we took each step. To walk a mile would take three hours, I figured, cursing at the boots rubbing my heels.

  Then, suddenly, with no warning, it started to rain. We just looked at each other, tilted our heads back, and opened our mouths. The water tasted wonderful. Suddenly, something with a dozen skittering legs landed on my cheek. I shook it off, cupped my hands together, and drank.

  The rain was so heavy, even coming through the dense canopy of green overhead, that in just a minute or two we weren’t thirsty anymore. We were also sodden and nearly steaming, it was so hot. It felt miserable. God, I couldn’t wait to be on a ski slope, puffs of cold air streaming out of my mouth.

  I raised my hand and rubbed my fingers over a dirty smudge on Laura’s cheek. “You know, Laura, when I flew from Washington just a week ago, I never imagined ending up in a rain forest with the woman I love, someone I had to come three thousand miles to meet.”

  “This isn’t anything I’d anticipated either,” she said, and kissed my fingers. “We’d better get to work on finding Savich and Sherlock.”

  I laid my weapons on the ground and buttoned her shirt up to her neck, then raised the collar. It touched her chin. “Let’s keep as much covered as we can,” I added, and buttoned my own shirt up to my chin. Our sleeves were fastened at our wrists. At least our fatigues were tucked inside our boots and the boots were sturdy. It was good protection from all the creatures that slithered close to us.

  We started walking northeast, roughly parallel to what looked like clear-cut land just outside the rain forest, not more than a hundred yards distant. We wanted to stay hidden until we were well beyond the compound. After another hour, we turned south again. It didn’t take more than twenty minutes to reach the edge of the rain forest. The thick foliage suddenly thinned. The sun was bright overhead, the air immediately drier. The difference in the landscape couldn’t have been more dramatic. The lush, dense forest simply gave way to an indistinct barren patch.

  I figured we were at least a hundred yards northeast of the compound.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  There were mountains in the distance, their tops shrouded with clouds.

  There was no sign of people, of any habitation at all. We’d stepped out of a green world filled with more creatures than anywhere else on the planet into desert terrain. The sun dried our clothes in less than fifteen minutes. It also made us thirstier than hell.

  “We need water,” Laura said. “Then some shelter.” She pointed toward a copse of trees not too far away. The copse was on a small hill. From there we might see some sign of life, perhaps even the compound.

  “Listen,” Laura said. She pointed up. Above, a small plane was coming closer.

  It was then I saw the empty airstrip a few hundred yards from where we stood. A four-seat Cessna was coming in.

  We ran back into the rain forest until we heard the plane land, then slowly eased out on our bellies. We could barely make out three people getting off the plane, walking to a jeep, and getting in. Men or women, we couldn’t be sure. The jeep drove off, due east from the airstrip.

  To my disappointment, the Cessna was in the air and gone beyond the mountains in a matter of minutes.

  “I wish,” Laura said, “that the plane had hung arou
nd. We could have persuaded the pilot to get us out of here.”

  “All we need is Savich,” I said. “He’s got a license. He can fly anything.”

  Laura and I walked slowly out of the rain forest again. The dry air felt wonderful on my face. I saw Laura raise her face to the baking sun high overhead.

  “It’s around midafternoon,” I said. “At least four and a half hours until it gets dark.”

  “We can scout around, try to see the best way to get back into the compound.”

  “I’m hungry,” I said, and rubbed my fist against my belly. My hand stopped. I saw her eyes follow my hand, then widen with alarm. Coming from nowhere, just suddenly upon me, I felt a bolt of incredible lust. I was almost instantly as hard as the rocks I was standing on. Jesus, I was losing it. Laura was staring at me.

  “Mac, what’s wrong?”

  I grabbed her, flattened my hand over her mouth, and said in a raw voice, “Laura, there’s time for us to make love. Let’s do it right here, right now. I’ve got to—”

  “Mac, stop it!”

  I heard her voice, but what she said made no difference. There was only one thing I wanted, only one thing I was going to do. I was trying to pull her shirt off and unzip my pants at the same time. I didn’t even think about touching her, no, I just had to get inside her, right that instant. She twisted away from me.

  I grabbed a moment of reason and choked out, “It’s hit me again, Laura. I don’t know if I can control it. I’ll hurt you. Get the hell out of here, now. Run!”

  “Mac, you can control it, you did it before!”

  “Please, Laura.” I was on her again, knocking her backward. She hit a tree but didn’t fall. Instead of running, she stepped forward and kicked me in the balls. My breath whooshed out. The pain blanked anything in my brain. And I stood there, bent over like an old man, knowing the pain was going to get worse, much worse. And it did. I moaned, clutched myself, and folded over. I waited for the god-awful agony to lessen. I simply tried to breathe and not fall on the ground and weep like a baby. Laura was standing not three feet in front of me, not saying a word.

  “Good shot,” I said when I could get the words out.

  Neither of us moved. I just stood there, still hunkered over, trying to get hold of myself.

  “It’s not so bad now, thank God,” I said, slowly straightening. “Jesus, I can’t believe a drug can do that. You feel like an animal in pain, and just have to get out of it. You might have had to kill me to stop me if you weren’t so smart. You knocked every thought, every urge, out of my brain.”

  “I didn’t know what else to do. You sure you’re all right, Mac?”

  “You don’t have to kick me again, at least for the moment. I’m back together again. It was just there for a moment that I wanted sex more than I wanted life. Hell, I thought having sex at that very moment was life. How can there be people who would pay for this drug?”

  She lightly touched her fingertips to my mouth. “Just let me know if I have to kick you again.”

  “I don’t think so,” I said slowly. We sat down and leaned against a scrubby tree I couldn’t identify. It gave about as much shade as a single leaf on one of the trees I couldn’t identify in the rain forest.

  “They didn’t kill us, Mac. They brought us down here and they haven’t done anything but play with us, ugly games, but no torture. Drug dealers don’t do that. Drug dealers eliminate anyone they perceive as a threat to their operation. When they fired on us at Seagull Cottage, they weren’t trying to kill us. They just wanted us under wraps, inside the cottage, so they could use the ice acid and bring us to wherever we are.”

  “Maybe they took us because they wanted guinea pigs for the drug.”

  “They can pull people off the street to experiment on. They wouldn’t take four federal agents to do that.” She took my hand. “I know this is tough, Mac. But someone gave them orders not to kill us. The only person I can think of who cares whether or not you live or die is Jilly. If you weren’t involved, I think we’d be dead.”

  “No,” I said. “It had to be Paul. He gave the order because he knew how much Jilly would be hurt if I was killed.”

  She swatted an insect off her knee. “I’m sorry, Mac. But you’ve got to think objectively about this. Four federal agents are in Edgerton, Oregon. Things are getting too hot. It’s Jilly, Paul, Molinas, and Tarcher whose butts are on the line. They’ve got to buy some time so they can shut things down and clear out before the cops come to get them. There’s another guy I told you a little about: Del Cabrizo, the head of the Maille cartel. We believe he’s the kingpin behind the development of this drug. John Molinas is just one of his flunkies. He probably used Molinas just to get to Tarcher and to Jilly and Paul. As to Alyssum Tarcher’s exact role, I’d say he cut himself in by getting Paul and Jilly out to Edgerton.

  “But I do know that Jilly is the only one who has the power to keep us alive. She’s the only one with the leverage. We’re kept alive or the problems getting the drug ready for the streets won’t get solved.

  “She left the hospital to get away from you, Mac. She knew you wouldn’t stop pushing. She had no choice but to leave and hide out, and hope you just went home.”

  “My sister, no matter whatever else she possibly could have done, wouldn’t drug me and set me over you like a dog in heat. She hates you because you betrayed her, not me.”

  “Jilly doesn’t have a clue what they’d do to us. She’s in Oregon, not here. But I’ll tell you, Mac, she knows what kind of people they are. She had to have guessed they wouldn’t treat us as valued guests.”

  She knew I didn’t want to hear this. Bless her, she didn’t say anything more about Jilly’s role in all this mess. She knew I’d think about it.

  “Who is that bald man in the compound?” I asked.

  “I’ve been thinking about that. From your description, I’d say it has to be John Molinas. In the photo I saw of him he had a lot of thick black hair.”

  “I guess he thinks the shaved head is more intimidating.”

  Laura said, “If it is Molinas, I think he’s here to make sure no one kills us. Maybe Jilly demanded insurance, insisted he be here to run the show. She wanted to make sure that Del Cabrizo wouldn’t just have our throats cut. Maybe it was her way to protect you.”

  I rested my head on my crossed arms. I felt a huge wave of fatigue wash over me. No sex in this, no prodding lust, just sudden, utter exhaustion. “Laura,” I said, trying to raise my head. “Laura, what the hell am I feeling now?”

  I heard her voice, thin, far away, calling my name. I tried to look up but I didn’t have the strength to lift my head. I clearly saw the terrorists in Tunisia, heard their voices, wondered if I would ever escape this mess alive, then there was the car, driving toward us, only there was no driver, and then it was a ball of flame and I was gone. Unholy fear ate into me. It seemed stronger, more corrosive now than when it had actually happened.

  It was the effect of the damned drug again, I thought, but it didn’t make any difference. The sun grew hotter, the air even drier. The heat was inside me, filling me. There was desolation everywhere and I was part of it. I had flown to the sun and fallen in.

  “Mac!”

  Laura’s voice was high, terrified.

  I tried to look at her, but her face blurred, then faded into a strange sort of gray whiteness that seemed endless and cold, but it wasn’t any of those things, and on some level I knew it. I just didn’t know what it was, and I didn’t care.

  I was floating now, and it was very strange to be staring down at a large man, and I knew the man was me, only he was just lying there, his eyes closed, his chest heaving with the effort to breathe. Then I knew he was me because suddenly I couldn’t breathe. I was dying.

  Then there wasn’t any more pain, just a gray-white void that didn’t go anywhere. I was cold. That made sense, I was naked. I wanted covers but couldn’t seem to move my arms.

  I felt fingers on my forearm, soft fingers, lovin
g fingers, fingers so gentle I wanted to see who they belonged to. It became more than that. I had to know who was touching me like that. I forced my eyes open, forced myself to look through the gray-white, to find the person whose fingers were so gentle, so tender.

  I saw Jilly standing over me, looking both frightened and angry. Why would she be frightened? Or angry? It made no sense at all. I had to know. I concentrated with everything in me and whispered, “Jilly? You’re all right. Thank God. I’ve been so worried about you. Why are we here, Jilly? Where are we?”

  She just smiled down at me and lightly touched her fingertips to my cheek. “It’ll be all right, Ford. Listen to me now. You’re coming out of it, very soon now. No, keep your eyes open, Ford, listen to me. You mustn’t drink or eat anything. Do you understand me? Don’t even drink out of the tap. Nothing.”

  “Laura, Jilly? Where is she?”

  “It will be all right, Ford. Laura’s here. Get strong, Ford. Just lie still and get strong.”

  And then her fingers left my arm. When I looked up, she was gone. The gray-white void thickened around me until I disappeared into it, just eased into it and let it swallow me. I wondered why I wasn’t cold any longer.

  I opened my eyes and realized that no one was standing over me. I felt clearheaded, but so hungry I could have eaten just about anything. I shook my head. What had happened? “Laura?”

  I saw her lying on her side on a folded blanket on the floor beside the bed I was lying on. She was naked, just like I was. I was down on the floor next to her in an instant, panicked. “Laura?” I lightly pressed my fingers against the pulse in her throat. It was strong and steady.

  I knelt over her, wondering what the hell to do, then wondering where we were. Something was very wrong here but I just didn’t get it yet. I lightly stroked my hand over her shoulder and turned her onto her back.