“A resort? You mean the one Manuel mentioned?”
He aimed a mental curse at the hope he saw springing into her face. Another at himself for putting it there.
“I’ve no way of knowing for sure, but I’d guess that it is.”
She turned back to the cover page and took a second look.
“Cartagena. I can make out that much. This place is in Cartagena.”
“It’s a few miles up the coast from Cartagena, almost four hundred miles north of here. From those photos of what look to be swinging singles lounging on the beach and in the bars, I don’t think the place is a family resort. I’d guess it’s aimed mainly at well-heeled South American businessmen looking for a place to unwind without the missus and kids.”
“Didn’t Pereira tell you that Tommy had been seen there only two days ago?”
David nodded reluctantly.
“So there’s a chance he might still be there.” She showed the first vitality he’d seen in her all morning. “A chance I might finally be able to confront him.”
The frown that hardened David’s mouth pushed up from deep inside him. Maybe his personal sense of honor gave him no choice about passing the information along to her. It didn’t follow that he had to make acting on that intelligence easy for her.
“This isn’t just any resort, Cara. Our going there involves serious risk. Indications are that drug money is tied up in the place. There isn’t any doubt now that Tommy is protected by powerful friends who don’t take kindly to our efforts to contact him. Manuel’s death proves that.”
“But last night you said that it—” She shook her head and waved away the objection. “Never mind. I guess I really knew that you were only trying to make me feel better.”
“I figure the kid got it because he started asking pointed questions of someone a lot closer to the center of the drug trade than we did.”
Cara laid a pleading hand on his chest.
“Try to understand, David. It has taken me so long to come this far, I hate to give up when I might be close to finding Tommy. There’s so much I’ve got to know for sure. If he’s still on heroin. If he actually was behind what happened to Manuel, what happened to us. I’ve got to know that there’s no hope for Tommy Grant before I can walk away from him.”
“Walk away?” David erupted, throwing up his hands. “No one could ever accuse you of walking away from anything. I’ve had no luck whatever in getting you to walk away from this.”
“You’re wrong, David. I’m ready to do that. I’ll make this one last effort to reach Tommy. If he’s at the resort and I’m able to speak to him, I’ll urge him to come back with me and enter the special treatment facility I told you about. If he refuses, that’s it. This has nothing to do with guilt, David. If anything, what I feel for Tommy now is sheer rage at what he’s done, for throwing his life away.”
She spoke with more conviction than he’d ever heard in her voice before. Maybe if she cleared this last dangerous hurdle, she might truly free herself of her obsession with her former fiancé.
“It’s not just for his benefit that I want to go to the resort, David. Frankly I loathe the idea of letting those horrible people send me packing. Even if I don’t find Tommy there, at least I’ll have the satisfaction of putting an end to what you call my mission by myself. It infuriates me to think of having that decision forced upon me.”
David marveled at the fire in her eyes, the boldness in her voice. How could a man help but admire a woman like that, even if she was making life difficult for both of them?
He wasn’t about to let that admiration show. Further encouragement was the last thing she needed.
“That’s a nice, neat script you’ve presented there, Cara. But nobody tangles with Colombian traffickers and comes out unscathed. The last time I tackled drug lords on their own turf I was fully armed and backed up by a team of well-trained men.” He paused to let that frightening observation sink in, then slapped his damaged thigh. “As you can see, I came out of that confrontation in a lot worse shape than when I went in. I won’t expose you to that danger.”
“Come on, David. My going to the resort to see Tommy is not the same as what you did. I’m not trying to hinder anyone’s drug operations in any way. I couldn’t if I wanted to.”
“An Avianca flight leaves for Cartagena this afternoon,” he said brusquely. “I’ll investigate the place without you and report back.”
“That’s not going to work. If Tommy is there, he won’t speak to you. He doesn’t know you. I’ll have to talk to him personally. I’m the only one who has a chance of convincing him to come back to the States.”
“If my own disastrous experience with these guys doesn’t make any impression on you,” David said grimly, “maybe this will. A couple of years ago an American reporter tried to reach Dan Kane for an interview. The reporter’s body was found shot through the head and dumped on a barrio garbage heap. He’d been to that same resort only a few days earlier.”
He was happy to see Cara pale.
“It was that incident that prompted our people to look into the ownership of the place and make the connection to a drug consortium. Although they haven’t been able to prove it to the satisfaction of the legal types yet.”
“All right, David, you’ve succeeded in scaring me. But it doesn’t change my mind. You’re quite willing to accept danger. You knew that great personal risk came with being a SEAL. Do you think I can’t do something of the same because I’m a woman?”
“Of course not. I’ve known military women who’ve made it their business to deal with personal danger.”
“Then why not me?”
“Because I—”
He chopped off the astonishing words about to spill out of him unbidden.
“Call me overly sentimental,” he drawled with more than a hint of sarcasm. “But I wouldn’t much like to have to haul you out of a filthy stream like we did Manuel.”
The way her jaw firmed and her chin jutted upward told him even before she spoke that he’d lost the battle.
“I’ll be on that flight, David. You can’t stop me. But you didn’t sign on to tackle drug lords on their own turf, as you put it. I don’t want you to come with me. I have good reason to take the risk. You don’t.”
His eyebrows shot up. “I’ve no reason to take the risk? My dear Dr. Merrill, in case you haven’t noticed, I hold a deeply personal interest in traffickers. They wrecked my body and my life. They attacked you. They killed a man who was working for me. How many more reasons would it take to make it my business?”
“But there’s really no need for you to go. If Tommy’s there, I’m sure our relationship is more likely to protect me than to harm me. To put it bluntly, David, there’s no reason for him to protect you. Another thing. Aren’t you overlooking the possibility that perhaps these people aren’t after me at all? Maybe they found out who you are and they’re after you for whatever you did to them.”
“Not likely. The names of my team haven’t exactly been plastered on billboards around the world. If you go, I go. And if you think I couldn’t find some way to stop you then, lady, you don’t know me.”
He advanced to crowd her toe-to-toe and stared icily down into her eyes.
“Here’s the deal. I’ll only allow you to get on that plane with me if you promise two things.” He stabbed up a finger in front of her face. “First, this is going to be no more than a quick overnight trip. Since they don’t know about Manuel’s note, they won’t be expecting us, and if we don’t meet Tommy, it should take a little time for whoever’s in back of all this to find out we’re there. If we do run into Tommy, I’m relying on your instincts that he wouldn’t cause you any harm, and his presence might afford you some protection. So far, their aim doesn’t seem to be to take us out for good. But we don’t know what the hell’s going on here.”
A warning glare came with the reminder.
“I’m also hoping,” David continued, “that the resort management would frown
on anyone opening up on us on sight with automatic weapons fire that’s liable to take out other paying guests and result in some very negative advertising. But I don’t care if the guy meets you at the damn plane and falls into your arms, we’re taking the first flight out tomorrow morning.”
He threw up a second finger. “Second. I want your solemn word that if we don’t find the jerk there, you’ll put him and his problems behind you once and for all and go home.”
She snapped her hand to her shoulder in a Girl Scout salute. “Fair enough, David. I promise.”
“Make no mistake, Cara. I intend to hold you to that pledge.”
Under the gruffness he took pains to project at her lay the maddening suspicion that if this woman asked it of him, he’d parachute naked into the vicious green maw of the deepest Colombian jungle.
Drug money had transformed a wide crescent of white sand fronting the turquoise waters of the Caribbean into a tropical garden of Eden steeped in sun.
The resort pampered its high-rolling guests in sybaritic splendor. One side of its massive lobby opened on a waterfall cascading amid artful plantings of coconut palms and masses of jungle foliage. Gilded reproductions of spectacular pre-Columbian masks and artifacts glinted from whitewashed walls reaching to the vaulted ceiling. A South American contingent of jet-setters reclined on plush oversize chairs and sofas covered in fabric as brightly colored as the live parrots perching among the branches of the aged ficus trees planted in the marble floor.
All this beauty and opulence was bought at the cost of death and tears and untold numbers of ruined lives. That she had to be part of it for any time at all turned Cara’s stomach.
David wanted one of the separate villas that would afford them more privacy and a secondary means of escape, rather than the single entry of a hotel room that could be easily blocked. Hearing the cost of the only one available made Cara’s eyes bug out. She could very well find herself in hock to David Reid for the rest of her life.
He’d made it clear she wasn’t to have a room of her own. He intended to stay within shouting distance, he’d told her. And she could see for herself that the women accompanying the other male guests weren’t likely to be sleeping apart from their escorts. True, too, that the svelte, perfectly made-up women hanging on their arms didn’t look much like wives. Insisting on her own room would only draw unwanted attention to the two norteamericanos.
Hoping to run into Tommy and get their difficult meeting over with, she’d screened every man she saw in the lobby and on their way to the villa. David was right about the place catering mainly to Latino businessmen, along with a smattering of Japanese tourists. She heard no English being spoken.
From its higher elevation, the lavish bungalow afforded a breathtaking ocean view, which David barely glanced at. No sooner had the bellboy left, than her careful partner sat down to pore over the detailed layout of the resort he found on a desk. He then made a circuit of the house and its surroundings.
“Could be worse,” he pronounced when he returned to her. “The place is heavily landscaped and not easily accessible. If any unwanted visitors show up at the door, we’ll have another way to make it out of here. There’s a narrow access road that runs to the back of the resort. The dirt driveway passes by this villa at the bottom of a fairly steep slope. To get to it, we’d have to pick our way around trees and shrubbery, but so would anyone following us. No way out through the back, but the front end of the road leads to the marina. If the need arises and we can’t make it to the rental car, we can head for the marina. If we’re very lucky, we can pirate one of the motor launches docked there.”
To her, that seemed like a major if. “Hopefully we won’t need any of those options.”
She and David dined by themselves on the patio of their villa. Their fish fillets sautéed in coconut milk was served by their personal waiter. The fish—only hours out of the ocean — was delectable. The atmosphere was spoiled, though, by the surly waiter who made little effort to contain his animosity, or perhaps his resentment, toward Americans. After he’d cleared away the remains of the meal, she wasn’t sorry to see the last of him.
“You stay in the bungalow,” David ordered, “while I reconnoiter the place to try to find out if Grant and Robert are still here. I’ll have to be a lot more careful with my inquiries than we were in the city, and I can do that better without you. I know the language. You don’t. If I don’t spot Tommy in the lounges or dining rooms, I’ll wander the casino and see what I can pick up.”
David’s choice of phraseology didn’t cheer her. She didn’t think he’d have too much trouble gleaning information from any woman who had some to give. Nor would he be too fussy, she suspected, about using whatever romantic techniques were necessary to elicit the information. Simply a means to an end, he’d assert, rightly. Just business.
She still didn’t like it.
“Come back and let me know the moment you find out anything,” she said. “If you do see Tommy, don’t try to talk to him without me. You might scare him away.”
“If he’s here, you’ll know it two minutes after I do. The sooner you see that bast—The sooner you see Grant,” he said, backtracking, “the sooner I can get you away from here. After I leave, lock the door behind me. I have my key.” He frowned down at her. “Believe me, Dr. Merrill, if you so much as stick your pretty nose out of this villa without me tonight, I’ll pack you out of this place so quickly it’ll make your head spin.”
He could make her head spin with a lot less than that, Cara admitted dolefully. Just looking into his eyes could rob her of equilibrium, and that was nothing compared to what his lips could do to her.
Dutifully following instructions, she shot the dead bolt after him.
Which left her all alone in a villa definitely built for two. Judging from the bedroom’s overripe decor, David had engaged the honeymoon suite. A triumph of pink satin, garlanded in red silk roses, was borne aloft by a dimpled flight of gold plaster cherubs. The circular bed beneath the canopy was enormous enough for the two of them to get lost in.
The living room boasted a large, camfortable-looking couch.
She couldn’t help but wonder what sleeping arrangements David had in mind. If he insisted on the two of them sharing that colossal bed, she was afraid she’d make it very easy for him to find her.
Spending the rest of the evening watching Spanish-language TV on the giant screen in the air-conditioned bungalow didn’t appeal to her. She left a light on at the front of the villa to guide David back and clicked off the other lights in the house before wandering out to the darkened patio.
After the frenetic clamor and chill of the city, she savored the calming stillness and languorous warmth of the Caribbean evening. She kicked off her shoes and stretched out on one of the thick-pillowed chaise longues.
With David deep in her thoughts, she smiled to herself. He’d proven that she hadn’t been mistaken in placing her complete trust in him. If he hadn’t told her of the advertising brochure, she’d never have known about it. He must have had to call on the self-control of a saint to overcome his natural instinct to take command, and instead, to allow her to make her own decision about coming here. The respect his action showed her only strengthened what she already felt for him.
Not that those feelings made a whit of difference. It was only a question of time until he walked out of her life and back to his mountain, or to his Richmond home.
There was no point in brooding about a situation she couldn’t change. More intelligent to try to enjoy the moment in a location specifically designed to afford her every comfort and pleasure.
Crimson bougainvillaea climbed the trellised arbor roofing the patio, and baskets of purple and white fuchsia hung from the rafters. Lovely terraced plantings of exotic flowers, many of which she’d never seen before, tumbled down the gentle slope to an inviting private pool.
Small mushroom lamps illuminated the half-dozen stepping-stones leading down to the pool, and threw soft was
hes of light over lush mounds of white and pink blossoms bordering the way. Their saucer-size blooms emitted a heavenly fragrance into the humid air. On the far side of the pool, another lamp, hidden among foliage, played over the narrow jet of water spurting in a crystal arc from a clump of ferns. The fountain splashed a gentle rhythmic music into the night.
A huge, two-person whirlpool tub waited for her use in the villa’s palace-size bathroom. But she found the pool, its waters shadowed purple in the darkness, much more tempting.
What could ten minutes in the pool hurt, anyway? She was really fed up with allowing nameless hoods to dictate her every moment, her every move. A quick dip and she could be dressed and back inside before David returned.
She hadn’t packed a swimsuit. This trip was far from being any sort of vacation. But the pool was naturalized amid greenery thick enough to screen her from prying eyes. From the high ground of the patio, she could spot only a corner of the red-tiled roofline of the villa next door. The pool, at its lower elevation, was even more secluded.
Feeling adventurous, she pulled the combs from her hair and let the golden strands fall down her back. She unzipped her dress, stepped out of it and tossed it on the couch. Bra and panties followed. She needed no more than the small puddles of light displaying each step to make her way down to the pool.
Set amid a narrow swale of perfectly manicured grass at the bottom of the steps, a curved ledge of smooth granite formed a kind of bench giving easy access to the water. She folded herself down on the large rock that still held some of the sun’s warmth and slipped naked into the darkened pool. The water was pleasantly warm and deep enough for her to swim lazily around its circumference.
In contrast to the frantic pace she and David had set in Bogota, the quiet, seemingly isolated surroundings, the whole indulgent ambience of the place began to soothe her frazzled nerves. She flipped herself over on her back and closed her eyes, moving her arms and legs only enough to keep her afloat.
She wasn’t sure how long she’d luxuriated in the pool, but she wanted to spend just a few more relaxing minutes here. She made another lazy pass under the jetting fountain. And another.
Unbroken Vows Page 17
