She whipped around when her peripheral vision caught someone approaching. The intruder made no sound. Her adrenalin skyrocketed at the thought of being captured a second time. She remembered the man’s pistol and began digging at the mound she had just made.
“Eve?”
Jake! With a sob she ran to him and flung herself into his arms.
He held her so tightly she could hardly breathe. “I was afraid I’d lost you.”
“There’s another man—”
“It’s okay. I took care of him.”
“But there are more . . . and a ship. I—” She stepped back and looked at the mound, then at Jake. “I—”
“What happened?”
“He fell. I set a trap. He followed me up the tree and I . . . I couldn’t let him get me.”
“It’s okay.” He took her hands. “You were defending yourself.”
Her chin and lower lip trembled uncontrollably. “Where . . . where’s the other man?”
“Back up the trail a ways. I left him unconscious and tied up.”
“There are more,” she repeated herself. “They came on a ship, probably into the cove. What if—”
She stopped, unable to voice her horror. What if Crystal had been playing on the beach? What if she and Betty had been captured?
“Let’s find out what we can from our friend up the trail.” Jake’s voice was grim, clearly sharing her anxiety.
He took her hand and led her to the second man. He was covered with ants. Jake groaned. It was obvious from the number crawling in and out of the man’s open mouth that he was dead.
“Now what?” She stared dispassionately at the body. For all her championing of life and justice, she found herself glad both scumbags were dead and she and Jake were alive.
“We’ll have to go through the garden to check out the cove. If we go downstream, they’ll see us.”
They sped upstream, and, at the other side of the garden, crouched behind the last bit of outcropping rock to gaze down at the cove. She blinked at finding not a fishing craft or a logging ship, but a sleek, white yacht anchored in the middle of the cove. To the right of the inlet, where the stream emptied, a small motorboat was pulled onto the beach. Except for two tiny figures moving on the yacht, there were no other signs of human life.
“Do you think there are more than those two?” she asked.
“More could be below deck.”
Including Crystal and Betty. Were they with the Boss? Her stomach punched bile into her throat.
Jake pulled her to her feet. “Let’s go. They’re waiting for the men to return. They won’t do anything until they realize they’ve got a problem on their hands.”
“What about Betty and Crystal?”
“That’s what we’re going to find out.”
“Oh.” She knew what that meant. The tunnel through the burial cave. Where snakes sought refuge from the heat. Her stomach looped into a series of knots. She couldn’t go in there.
They paused for a drink at the garden’s tiny waterfall. The water was warm and tasted like she’d licked a boulder. On the other side of the garden, thousands of insects swarmed the python’s carcass. Gulls fought the flies to get a share of the meat. At their approach, the birds flapped away with shrill caws.
“What’s this?” Jake pointed at the rocks piled on the serpent’s head.
A thrill washed over her. She’d been so consumed by her captors she’d forgotten about telling Jake her good news.
She took his hand. “It’s my grave. The old me.” She laughed at the surprise widening his eyes. “Before the python squeezed out my last breath, I called to God. I don’t remember all that happened, except that I woke up different . . . alive . . . believing.”
“Believing what?”
“Everything we talked about all these months. Jesus, faith, God’s forgiveness . . . all of it. I’m a new person.” Her heart was crammed so full she couldn’t separate the treasure into its pieces, didn’t know how to explain the radiance inside her.
Why did he look so startled? She grinned. “What, you don’t believe He could save a sinner like me?”
Jake frowned. “It’s just . . . you were so adamant. So dead set against His choices, how He runs things . . .”
Grasshoppers . . . or mousemeat? God . . . or the Boss? A deep contentment spread to every cell in her body. “I want Him in control, Jake. Even . . . even when it hurts.”
A painful smile twitched Jake’s lips. “I’m glad.” The smile broadened, and he swept her into his arms. “Or as Betty would say, Halleluiah!”
She wanted to laugh with him, but couldn’t. Not when Betty and Crystal might be in trouble.
Chapter 57
One glance down the steep hole connecting the Japanese garden to the burial cave tunnel undid Eve. Her lungs locked. Her knees buckled. “I can’t go in there without a light, Jake. That’s where the python must have come from. It hadn’t been in the garden when I arrived.”
He took her face into his hands. “I can’t bear to leave you here. If anything happened to you . . .” His voice choked.
She closed her eyes. Focused on the warmth of his palms against her cheeks, the strength of his fingers. Jake loved her; she loved him. She could go anywhere with him, do anything for him. The vise clamping her lungs loosened, and she took a deep breath. “All right, I’ll go.”
He kissed her soundly and released her. “You can pray, you know.”
Huh. She gave a half laugh. Weird to think that was available to her now.
Holding the katana sword and the confiscated pistol in front of him, Jake crawled on his stomach into the hole. She followed, stretching her hands forward, one flat against the wall, the other grasping Jake’s foot.
The blackness swallowed her. So completely, she could see nothing. Not even her elbows brushing against her hairline with each movement forward. The heavy odor of her armpits clogged her nostrils. She shivered and began praying. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for You are with me.
She followed Jake around the sharp curve into the tunnel leading directly to the burial cave. Her heartbeat quickened. She tried not to think about what awaited them.
The passageway enlarged, and they shifted from their stomachs to their knees. The stagnant smell of death and decay grew heavier. Her stomach tightened. Why hadn’t she thought to dig up her captor’s pistol? Or look for her bayonet? What help was she to Jake without a weapon?
“Okay, we’re at the chamber.” Jake’s voice echoed eerily in the open room. “I’m staying on my knees and going for the opposite wall rather than feel my way around the perimeter. Hang on.”
“No worry.” The words shook out of her throat. “My fingers are permanently attached to your foot.”
Cinders dug into her knees. Every two crawls forward, Jake stopped to sweep the katana sword in front of him. Each time, he braced for the possibility of the blade encountering something. Each time, she ceased breathing. When he resumed crawling, her lungs were good for two more swallows of air.
Would they hear a snake? The scrape of leathery scales on rock? The python had made no noise in the garden. No warning until the monster grazed her foot.
The sword clanked against something solid, and she jumped. The reverberation shot down Jake’s leg to her hand. He reached back and squeezed her fingers. “We made it. We’re on the other side.”
“Attaboy.” She leaned forward and kissed his fingers. They were icy cold against her lips.
The air outside the burial cave proved burning hot, insufferably humid, and incredibly sweet. She inhaled it in hungry mouthfuls. The cacophony of gulls and crashing ocean waves topped every concert she’d ever attended. Was there a way to hug God? A simple thank you didn’t seem adequate.
Jake waved her to his side against the wall of the trench. “Still just two guys showing on the boat.”
“There wouldn’t be anybody inside the cave, waiting for us, would there?”
>
“Their bad luck if they are.” He crawled to the door and lay flat on his stomach, pistol at the ready. “Betty, Crystal, can you hear me? It’s Jake. Are you in there?”
When there was no answer, his jaw tightened. “I’m going in.”
“Me too.” She crawled over to him.
“I’m opening the door slowly so it won’t be noticeable from the yacht, even with binoculars. Just a crack, enough to get inside on my belly.”
He inched the door up and she held it while he squirmed inside. A moment later, his hand appeared and he held the door for her.
They waited for their eyes to adjust to the muted light. The room was deathly quiet. The fire was out. The cooking kettle was gone.
Jake stood up but motioned her to stay where she was. She understood: if there was trouble, he wanted her near the door so she could flee. Her heart thumped against her chest.
He flattened himself against the left side of the sleeping hall. Then he jumped across the opening and flattened himself against the other side. Her heart jumped with him. He had just made himself a target to anyone in the hallway.
Silence greeted his effort. He crouched and slipped into the dark passageway.
Time stood still. She pictured him checking out each sleeping ledge. There were ten. Any one of them could hold a man with a weapon. She held herself rigid, focusing herself as an ear. Even her heart seemed to cooperate. Tension muzzled the cave with empty echoes.
Then the noise came. Cries. Female voices. She jumped to her feet and dashed into the hallway. Jake had found Betty and Crystal.
* * *
The four of them laughed and hugged and talked all at the same time, until finally Jake took control. “Okay, one at a time, tell us what happened.”
“I saw them first.” Crystal said. “Aunt Betty and I watched them sail into the cove. She said we had to stay hidden.”
“Good.” Jake squeezed Betty’s shoulder. Ten to one Crystal would have run to greet the boat otherwise.
“When two of them landed on the beach, we moved the kettle to the back of the sleeping hall,” Betty said. “I was afraid they’d smell the seafood cooking if they came close enough, and they’d know we were somewhere around.”
“Good again.”
“And when we heard someone come in, we were scared to death till we saw it was you,” Crystal exclaimed.
“Next time, use the clevis pin to lock yourselves in.”
“Next time? Aren’t we leaving on the yacht?”
“Betty, those aren’t good guys down there.” Eve crossed her arms in a tight squeeze. “Those men from the motorboat found me and took me prisoner.”
“What happened to them?”
Jake grunted. “I took care of one of them; Eve, the other. They’re both dead.”
“You killed them?” The question shivered out of Crystal’s throat.
Jake and Eve looked at each other. “Not on purpose, but yes,” Eve answered. “It was them or me.”
“I’m glad it wasn’t you.” Crystal ran to Eve and hugged her. “They must be bad men.”
“I suspect they’re thieves. Modern-day pirates,” Jake explained. Crystal’s eyes widened. “They probably stole the yacht.”
He left them inside while he went out to check for activity on the boat. Betty dished up soup for them. No one had eaten since last night.
Eve brought him a bowl. “Jake, not that it matters now, but what was your answer going to be last night in the garden?”
He grimaced. “I went to the garden to say no to you; I left saying no to God.”
“I don’t understand.”
“When you were alive, I could tell you no because I had hope—hope that things would change.” The blackness he’d stuffed back into his heart in the garden seeped out like boiling tar. “But when you almost died, my hope died. I couldn’t lose you. Couldn’t give you to God. I love you—I didn’t want to be alone.”
The stunned look on her face tore him. He had failed not only God, but her as well. He took her hand. “I’m sorry. I thought I was strong. I discovered I was weak.”
Her face crumpled. “That’s what I wanted, Jake, to win out. I’m sorry I did that to you.”
“You only showed me what was already there. I’m responsible for my decisions, not you.”
A splash from the cove silenced them. A swimmer, headed for the beach.
Jake pushed Eve toward the cave door. “I need you to stay with Betty and Crystal. This guy is either retrieving the motorboat or he’s hunting for the other two men. If he heads into the jungle, I can go after him.”
“Can’t we wait them out in the cave?”
“We’ve left signs all over the place—trampled grass, packed earth. They’d follow a trail straight to our door. The opportunity to pick them off one by one is too good to pass up.”
“Then I want to come with you. Be your backup.”
“Thanks.” He brushed his lips over hers. “But I’m afraid your guerilla warfare skills are a bit rusty.” He eased the cave door open. “Eve’s coming in. Use the clevis pin to lock the door until I return. And, no matter what, no one leave the cave!”
He shut the door on their protests.
Already the swimmer had reached the shore. He looked Filipino, but much shorter and slighter in build than the other two. The man pulled a pair of glasses from a shorts pocket and put them on, then pulled out another item and unwrapped it. A pistol, protected by waterproof wrapping.
Jake ducked and ran halfway down the trench. Two gunshots pierced the air. At him?
He popped his head up high enough to see over the trench. The man was wading upstream toward the rain forest. He fired again, twice, the gun pointed straight up at the sky.
A signal to the other two men to return to the beach, no doubt about it. Jake’s adrenaline spiked. He plunged into the burial cave tunnel. If he could race through fast enough, he’d exit the tunnel that ended at the stream and intercept the man, out of sight of the yacht.
Chapter 58
Eve jumped as the echo of two gunshots bounced off the cave door. She, Betty, and Crystal stared wild-eyed at each other.
“They’re shooting Jake!” Crystal’s scream ricocheted like cannonballs on the cave walls.
“Stop that!” Betty clapped her hands over her ears. “Goodness, child, maybe he’s shooting at them. You don’t know what’s happening.”
A second pair of shots followed. Eve’s lungs crumpled as if they had been hit. Crystal broke into tears. Betty, seated between them, put her arms around them and began praying. She whispered, as if afraid the pirates might overhear.
How could you pray for something when you had no information about it? Eve stood. “I’m going to see what’s happened.”
“No! Jake said to stay here.”
“I am, Betty. I’m not leaving. I’m just going to take a peek.”
She was out the door before Betty could stop her. Jake was nowhere in sight. At the sound of a motor, she peered over the edge of the trench. The swimmer was taking the boat back to the yacht. Jake was not with him.
She sat down hard. Four shots and the man was returning to the yacht. Alone. It wasn’t hard to guess what had happened. He had shot Jake and left him.
Stifling sobs, she raised the door a crack and told Betty and Crystal.
“Jake’s dead!” Crystal wailed.
The words smashed Eve flat. “We don’t know that. I’m going to look for him.”
“But Jake said—”
“Betty! What if he’s bleeding and needs help? Are we going to let him lay there and die?”
Betty groaned.
“I’ll be okay. Don’t worry. All the men are on the yacht.”
She lowered the door. Sobs hiccupped from her stomach to her throat. Jake couldn’t be dead. Couldn’t.
At the hump of land between the trench and the stream, she flattened to the ground and wriggled over the rise. There was no cover at the top, and it meant exposing herself if anyon
e was watching from the yacht. But it couldn’t be helped. She needed to find Jake—and fast.
She scanned the bare terrain from jungle to beach. No sign of Jake. No body crumpled on the ground. She got to her feet and ran. Too bad if anyone saw her! She would be in the jungle in another minute, and that was where she would find Jake. If anyone came, she knew a dozen hiding places where the two of them could be safe.
She hadn’t even reached the trees before the guttural sound of the motorboat started up.
“Jake!” she screamed. Once the men landed, she wouldn’t be able to yell without disclosing her whereabouts. She had only minutes to find Jake before the men tried to find her.
* * *
Jake emerged from the tunnel at the stream and hid in the bushes. For one crazy moment, he thought he heard Eve scream his name. But it couldn’t be. He had left her in the safety of the cave. Upstream, monkeys shrieked an intruder alert. That’s what he’d heard. The man must be up there, invading the monkeys’ space.
He raced upstream toward the noise, pistol in hand.
* * *
Eve entered the tangle of brush and trees marking the edge of the rain forest. Jake could be hiding anywhere, his body concealed by the dense overgrowth. It made more sense to hide in the vegetation than to stay on the path where he could be spotted.
“Jake! Jake, answer me!” He had to be injured, even though she’d seen no blood in her hurry. Maybe he’d gone to the Japanese garden. He could hide in the tunnel.
The growl of the motorboat halted. She fled. Heart pounding. Ribs pressing. Breath shortening. Until she had no choice but to veer off the path and hide.
* * *
Jake arrived at the scene of commotion. He’d had to leave the stream bed to enter the rain forest proper. Why would the man leave the path? As the underbrush left off and the ground became bare beneath the giant trees, he slowed to guard against being seen.
The howl of the monkeys boxed his ears. He looked up. Specks of daylight sifting through the canopy revealed the object of the monkeys’ wrath. A python, wrapped around the petite, lifeless body of an infant monkey.
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