The woman stepped close and examined her face. “You are his sister, no?”
Mary Beth nodded, afraid to ask her million questions, afraid not to.
Nick spoke. “This is the man your uncle spoke of?”
“Sí, por cierto. Hair the color of honey. Is he well?”
“When was the last time you saw him?”
“He came looking for Capitán Daniel. I told Juan—that is his name, Juan Marcos—the news. That he had been taken by the terrorists.”
“What did he do?”
Isabel blushed. “He did not stay.”
“Why was he looking for Capitán Daniel?”
“He did not say. But he…”
“What?” Nick prompted.
“It is a feeling only, señor, but I thought he would go after el Capitán.”
“What made you think that?” Nick’s voice sounded oddly tight.
“He asked for a radio and listened to the news about the Primero de Mayo. The reports spoke of ransom demands. He was very quiet. Very intense. Not the same.”
Mary Beth remembered that same Mark, the Mark who had intimidated Paul Martens into admitting that he’d sold information to the Russians all those years ago.
“Did you hear from him again?” Nick asked.
“No. He said I probably would not.”
“Gracias, Isabel,” Nick said.
Isabel turned to walk away, then swung back quickly. “Señorita, the cross you wear—it is a family thing?”
“My brother gave it to me.” Mary Beth touched the warm gold.
“Juan had one like it, but in silver. For luck, he said. He wore it always.”
Mary Beth prayed he still wore it and that his luck would hold out.
***
Nick closed the barn door after Isabel left.
“So Mark and your cousin met here. Often.” Mary Beth sat on a bale of hay.
He shook the blanket they had slept on and laid it on another bale. “Twice a month.”
“Twice a month,” she repeated.
He turned to meet her gaze, the sudden knowledge clear.
“That’s it, isn’t it?” she asked, grabbing her bag off the floor and rummaging until she pulled everything they’d taken from Mark’s safe deposit box. She flipped the will’s folder toward what little light came through the small window. “Roughly every two weeks. They’re the dates of their meetings,” she said, handing it to him.
Nick took the folder. Next to some dates were check marks. The last entry was dated a week before Daniel was captured.
A small piece of paper fluttered to the ground.
“What’s that?” he asked.
Grabbing it from the scattered hay, she held it up. “More numbers,” she replied. “Different numbers.”
Nick took the paper, yellowed and torn from a notepad, and held it up to the light. “Anything you recognize? Telephone numbers?”
She examined it again. “No.”
“They have letters and they’re too long anyway,” Nick said, wondering if the numbers were a code. He handed back the will. “Anything else we might have missed?”
“No.”
“Are the dates in Mark’s handwriting?”
“Yes.” She sounded sure.
He held the small piece of paper out for her to see. “What about these numbers—are these Mark’s writing?”
“I don’t… No. Mark makes his eights upside down. The middle never quiet meets.”
Nick angled the note so he could see it better. What he saw shook him. “That’s Daniel’s handwriting. He crossed his sevens as is the custom here, but he had the habit of curling the top.”
“If these dates are the dates of their meetings, then the numbers must mean something too.” She took the paper and studied it intently.
He agreed—but what? What could Daniel Vargas, Ranger captain, have to do with Mark Williams, engineer, living in rural San Mateo pretending to be Juan Marcos, carpenter? “Yes, they must.”
The only explanation Nick could come up with was not a reassuring one: serial numbers. Weapons.
“Where is this place Isabel talked about? This mission?”
“It’s about a two-hour drive, if we stay off the main road. North of here.”
“On the way to the Río Hermoso Valley?”
“Yes.”
“We could stop there, see if it really was Mark, find the proof that will make everyone quit accusing him of things he didn’t do. Otherwise, once I pay the ransom, he’ll be running from soldiers and government agencies.”
If he was still alive. If terrorists were really holding him hostage. Nick had to know what Daniel had been up to. There would be no way to protect him from this unless he did. No way to keep the childhood promise he’d broken.
As they gathered the papers and drove the Land Cruiser away from the barn, Nick couldn’t stop questioning himself. Did he really have so little faith in Daniel that he’d already found him guilty of gunrunning? Was he projecting what he knew about the general onto his brother?
Hands steady on the steering wheel, Nick stretched his shoulders and shook off the possibility. It couldn’t be true.
But that led him to another concern. How he’d managed to keep himself from taking what both he and Mary Beth wanted made him wonder at the emotions he felt tangled deep inside. He loved women in general, the softness of them, the beauty. And, of course, sex. But Mary Beth was different.
She was grace and polish and vulnerability. Something he couldn’t hope to touch because he had nothing to offer except a life based on a lie. He cursed the fates for allowing him to know her, taste her, because he would go to his grave wanting her. He’d selfishly told her she had the final say about their relationship because he couldn’t fight the want or the need. The only way to fight it was to empower her. She’d already been able to guess too much about him. He’d too easily admitted the truth about Alex. God help him if she somehow got any closer.
Driving across the cold Andean plateau in search of her brother and his mysterious connection to Daniel, Nick realized the enormity of his mistake. Should she decide to take their relationship further, he wouldn’t be able to walk away. Because if she took his body in passion, she would want more. And more was something he didn’t have to give.
“What’s this place like, this mission?” she asked.
Thoughts jolted back to the present, he replied, “It’s run by a priest. I suppose it’s like your Peace Corps. He runs a sawmill and helps the people farm. There’s a school, run by an order of nuns, and a small clinic for women and children.”
***
An hour later, when Nick stopped beside a large lake, Mary Beth got out of the Land Cruiser. A small herd of vicuñas grazed in the distance while a local shepherd, dressed in typical Andean clothing, kept watch close by. Deep, dark, reflecting the blue of the sky, the lake was freezing cold, something Mary Beth learned when she washed her hands. But it felt so good that she washed her face, too, only to realize she didn’t have a towel.
“Use this,” Nick said, holding out a large white handkerchief.
She took it and dried her face, then her hands, and folded it again.
“You missed a spot.” He took the kerchief from her and blotted at her temple.
Mary Beth closed her eyes against his touch and the shiver it elicited. It did no good, only brought home how inept she was at handling the physical draw he represented.
The next thing she realized, she was encompassed in his warm embrace, a sob of frustration bursting for release.
“It’s okay.” Nick’s soothing tone rumbled against her ear. “We’ll find your brother. We’ll do what it takes.”
She looked up into eyes the color of the bright highlands sky and realized she was doing something she hadn’t done in years.
She was risking her heart.
Chapter Seven
Mary Beth adjusted the outback hat Nick had insisted she wear, saying her blond hair looked too out of place i
n this rural part of San Mateo. They’d left the lake and driven for about an hour before stopping. He left the Land Cruiser in a thick grove of trees, positioned between boulders in an attempt to hide the vehicle before beginning their walk to the mission.
The temperature on this eastern descent of the Andes, at around six thousand feet, was warm and dry with a blazing sun and a nice breeze. All around were cattle and horse farms. As they approached the mission, a small market spread out in disorder from the church.
Dusty and tired from the long afternoon walk, she wanted a drink of water—and answers about Mark. A older nun, habit stiffly in place, directed them to the sawmill down by a fast-flowing river no wider than twenty-five yards across. A priest, dressed in black, white collar dangling from his neck, waved them over.
“Nicholas. ¿Qué haces aquí? Te están buscando.” He looked at Mary Beth and nodded. “They are looking for you also, señorita.”
Nick embraced the priest after quickly introducing him as Padre Franco. “Who’s looking for us?”
“Americans and a group of our Rangers. The Americans say they are here to save Miss Williams from danger.”
“What about the Rangers?”
“They speak nonsense about our great diplomat and the terrible mistake you have made by trusting a gringa gunrunner.” He glanced apologetically at Mary Beth. “A million pardons, señorita.”
“What did you tell them?”
“The truth, of course, Nick. That I have not seen you. Now I must think of another truth.” He winked at Mary Beth. “The Americans are searching the area. Yesterday, the Rangers go to the Río Hermoso Valley.”
“We are looking for someone. A man named Juan Marcos.”
“Oh?”
“We think he worked here as a carpenter.”
“Would you remove your hat, señorita?”
The priest’s polite words made Mary Beth glance quickly at Nick. When he nodded, she removed the hat.
“Ah, Juan Marcos,” the priest said. “A very good man. You look very much alike. Your brother?”
With a quick nod, Mary Beth asked, “Where is he?”
“He is gone. He left without a word … more than two weeks ago. This is not like him at all. He always tells me he is going.”
“You have no idea where he went?” Mary Beth jammed the hat back on her head.
“No. And the man who buys his work looks for him often.”
“Man who buys his work?” Nick echoed.
“Sí, Nick. Juan carves animals. Beautiful animals. He sells them to a man who deals in artesanía, then he gives the money to the mission.”
“He carves animals?” Mary Beth echoed.
Padre Franco nodded.
“Not my brother.” She was sure of it. Mark couldn’t sit still long enough to do anything like that.
“I will show you, yes?” He led them into the dark interior of the sawmill.
Mary Beth’s shoes kicked up sawdust as they wound their way through machinery and lumber on their way to a small office. Inside, on a rough wooden table, stood three figures, each no more than four inches long. One was a llama, one a vicuña and the last, a jaguar much like the one she’d bought.
She took it and turned it over, looking for the artist’s signature. And there it was, exactly like the one she’d seen on her jaguar. J.M. Juan Marcos. John Mark.
Could Mark really have carved those exquisite figures?
“You recognize his work?”
Staggered to learn she knew so little about her brother, Mary Beth put down the jaguar and picked up the vicuña. “They’re beautiful.”
“Mary Beth,” Nick said, “is this his work?”
“No.” She looked from the vicuña to both men. “Maybe. I mean, I don’t— I didn’t know he did this. I bought a jaguar the other day, in the city. It’s a lot like this, with the same signature.”
“Señorita,” Padre Franco said, his voice kind, “Juan has many talents.”
“Talents I didn’t know about.” Oh, Mark. What else don’t I know about you?
“It is difficult to know one’s brother, no?” He looked from Mary Beth to Nick. “You should be proud to be his sister.” Franco nodded. “You look very much alike.”
“You said that before,” Nick commented.
“Very much alike,” the priest repeated.
Mary Beth started to explain, but Nick had picked up the figure of the llama.
“This is good work.”
“I tell you, Nick, this man has a gift,” the priest said.
“How long have you known him?”
“He has come to the mission, on and off, for … perhaps three years.”
“Is he politically involved?” Nick asked.
“Politically?”
“Any strong opinions?”
“No, not that I know. Juan is restless,” Franco said.
Mark, Mary Beth knew, was always ready for another adventure, another foray into the unknown.
“He is very capable, works very hard. Then he disappears. But he always tells someone that he is going.”
“Was he here when Daniel died?”
Franco looked at him sharply. “No. He was not. He was here when I got back from Daniel’s funeral.”
After a moment’s pause, Nick asked, “Did he say where he’d been?”
“No.”
Mary Beth listened with mounting apprehension as Nick asked, “Did he stay?”
“Only one day. He said he had business. I did not see him again until I went to Daniel’s Río Hermoso house to get his things for you.”
“He was in the valley?”
“He was along the river, downstream from the house,” the priest answered.
Nick shook his head. “Did he say why?”
“He said he was looking for wood for his carving, then he helped me gather Daniel’s things.”
Mary Beth put her hand on Nick’s arm. “We have to go there.”
“You cannot go now. The rains. They are very strong. There are huaicos—how do you say, Nick?”
“Mud slides.”
“Yes, mud slides,” Padre Franco nodded. “The only road to Los Desamparados is blocked. You cannot go until this is cleared. The Rangers, they are trapped on the other side.”
“Can we stay here until the road opens?” Mary Beth asked.
“We must hide you well, no?” He smiled at her and clasped Nick’s arm, leading them both out into the sunlight again. “You will stay in the small house, downriver. No one will look there. Where is your car?”
“I left it hidden. It’s an hour’s walk away.”
“Good. Good,” the priest said with a smile. “You must do something to look less like yourself, no? Perhaps do not shave?”
“What about Mary Beth? What do we do about her?”
Mary Beth had listened to the exchange in silence. Now, she felt compelled to talk. “I’ll keep the hat on.”
“Not good enough,” Nick said. “They’ll spot you in a minute.” He pulled her hat off her head and looked up at the sun, shading his eyes. “Does Rosario still work for you?”
“Sí, of course.”
“Ask her for her hair coloring.”
“What?” Mary Beth said, trying to stop such a crazy idea. “I’m not dying my hair.”
“Would you rather be identified and turned in?”
She looked at him. His beard wouldn’t take long to grow out. After only two days of not shaving, he already looked like an outlaw.
But he was right. She was too easily identifiable. “Ask her for the dye.”
***
Black hair made Mary Beth look dangerously sexy.
It was the last look Nick wanted for her.
Against the black of her hair, her light brown eyes looked golden green. Rosario had also provided a long bright-blue skirt and a white peasant blouse that belonged to her daughter. When Mary Beth put those on, Nick wanted to groan.
He’d felt her breasts when he’d held her, seen t
heir shape when he’d looked—a temptation he’d been unable to fight. But in the stark white of the simple peasant blouse, a single tie closure at her cleavage, Mary Beth’s breasts were perfect. With the fabric too thick for him to see through, he caught himself thinking like a teenager. Did she wear a bra?
“No, I don’t,” she said, shaking her head.
“What?” He nearly jumped up from the chair in Franco’s small office.
“I don’t want to wear the sandals.”
“Oh.” He’d asked if she wanted to wear the sandals Rosario had given him. Embarrassed by his juvenile thoughts, he struggled to clear his mind.
“Tennis shoes are more comfortable.” She gave him a puzzled look. “Are you okay?”
Never better. “Fine, I’m fine.” He had to control his mind. His body. Parts of his body.
“What can we do about your eyes?”
“My eyes?” That wasn’t where the problem was.
“They’re blue.”
It took him two full beats to understand. To tamp down desires that were wreaking havoc with his thoughts. “Yes, they are.”
She put her hands on her hips and looked at him, a frown on her face. “You thought my hair was too light. Well, your eyes are too blue.”
“I’ll keep the sunglasses on.”
“Better wear a hat, too.”
“Why not a bag over my head?”
“Good thinking.” She smiled, on the verge of laughter, until she saw his frown. “What’s wrong with you?”
For one improbable moment he felt tempted to grab her hand and make her feel what was wrong, but Franco opened the door.
“Very good, señorita,” Franco said, admiring her hair.
“Mary Beth, please.”
“Oh, that will not do. You must answer to María, now.”
“It’s too close to her own name.” Nick’s cross words surprised even him.
Franco frowned at him. “There are so many Marías, one more will not matter.”
“What about Nick?” Mary Beth asked.
“He will be Manuel.”
“Okay. So we’re María and Manuel,” Nick said.
“You are my new carpenter.” Franco beamed.
Mary Beth looked at Franco. “But Nick can’t—”
“You would be surprised at what Nick can do—no, Nick?” Franco laughed.
To the Limit (Shadow Heroes Book 3) Page 10
