Mary Beth shook her head.
"He's Elena's oldest sister's son. He influenced Nick more than anyone, other than Elena. When Nick left the Rangers, Carlos introduced him to diplomacy. Nick is very, very good."
"I've read some of the stories."
"There's a lot that doesn't get into the newspapers. Nick's been sent all over the world. He's had more success in more areas than anyone, always able to find a compromise. He's a master at it."
"What am I the master of?"
Mary Beth turned. Nick stood in the doorway, leaning against the frame. He'd put on his jeans, but he wore no shirt or shoes. The bandage at his waist was the only reminder of why they'd come here. His dark beard seemed to fit now. He looked lean and dangerous, as far from a diplomat as anyone she'd ever met.
"Compromise," Jean repeated.
Nick walked into the kitchen and pulled out a chair. "Sometimes compromise is failure."
Did he blame himself for his cousin's death?
Jean spoke quickly. "It wasn't your fault—"
"There is always fault, Jean. You know that."
"I've seen too much suffering to believe that."
"I've seen too much not to."
Both men fell silent. In the charged stillness, her own voice sounded tight, "I'll, uh, go—"
"I have to finish a new supply list," Jean said as he left the room.
Nick lowered himself to a chair, holding his stomach. "Jean has few complications in his life."
Mary Beth could think of one complication—whatever Jean felt for Elena Vargas. But this was not the time or the place to mention it. Instead, she leaned back against the sink, trying to relax the knot of tension in her stomach.
"I don't want it on my conscience that I hurt you," he said, his eyes steady on her.
"You won't."
"I already have."
"You're giving yourself too much credit."
"Ah." Nick smiled his urbane smile. Behind the beard it didn't look the same as it had at his formal party. "Mary Beth Williams is back." He placed his hands on the table. "Cool and in control."
"It's who I am."
"Yes," he said, his voice dropping. "It is."
She stood without looking at Nick again.
As she walked out of the room, she thought she heard him say, "And I'm who I am."
Nick woke suddenly. He'd dreamed of Daniel again.
Across the room, he could hear the even sound of Mary Beth's breathing. The nearby clock said it was just past 4:00 a.m. He'd spent the day aware of the distance Mary Beth had placed between them. A distance that had to be maintained.
He wanted to curse at the heavens.
Jean had said he was the master of compromise. But he could find no compromise that would overcome what made Mary Beth unreachable. Just as he hadn't been able to find a compromise to save Daniel. It was the general's fault, but he was at fault, too. He could have saved Daniel if he'd admitted sooner that compromise was out of the question. That only violence would free Daniel.
If he'd allowed himself to be what he was, instead of denying it, he could have picked off the terrorists and freed his brother.
And he could have Mary Beth if he was willing to ignore her need for honesty.
He rolled to one side, surprised that the wounds barely hurt. Pulling on his jeans, socks and a shirt, he made his way quietly across the room.
Bright moonlight lit the kitchen. The single window, its curtains slightly parted, served as a conduit for the intense beam. Nick didn't bother to turn on the light as he made his way to the refrigerator.
He should send Mary Beth back to the city. Back to the States. She didn't belong here.
But she wanted to help her brother, just as he wanted to help his. And he hadn't solved the dilemma of what he'd do if helping one precluded helping the other.
The sound of a car's engine came through the window. It intensified until it was obvious that the driver was coming toward the clinic. One quick look outside at the vehicle confirmed the identity of the occupants. Careful to avoid the window, Nick hurried back to the room he shared with Mary Beth. He picked up the bag that held his guns and spare clothes and moved toward her.
She woke with a start, struggling against his hand as he held it over her mouth.
"Shh!" When she nodded he removed his hand. "Get dressed. Rangers are coming."
He barely registered that she'd slept clothed. He pulled his Glock and holster from the bag, pocketed a box of ammunition and tied his boots as quickly as possible. In the shadows, he saw her bend to tie her shoes just as someone began knocking on the front door.
From the next room, Jean yelled a reply as he stumbled out of bed to answer what had now turned into pounding.
Nick signaled to Mary Beth to follow him. He pushed aside the curtains and opened the window. From the front of the clinic he heard Jean's mumbled words.
Then suddenly there was shouting and the sounds of the front door crashing open.
Chapter 11
« ^ »
Mary Beth had barely had time to gather her wits when she heard the crash. Nick grabbed her arm and propelled her toward the window.
"Go!" he whispered against her ear. "Head for the Rover."
Stumbling, she rushed to do as he ordered. At the last moment, she remembered the bag with her clothes, the ransom money and Mark's papers.
"I'm right behind you," he said, turning away briefly.
She ducked to fit through the small opening. The bag hung on the windowsill, but she jerked it free. She turned to see Nick maneuvering his much bigger body through the window, gun in his right hand, his bag in his left.
Bright moonlight glowed off the yellow dirt-filled yard. To her left stood a chicken house, to her right a dilapidated barn.
The Ranger search party would look in both places first. They had to get to the cantina, which stood past the dirt track behind the barn. She only hoped she could outrun them. That Nick could in his condition.
"Which way?" he whispered, his breath frosty in the cold, Andean night air.
Pointing, she answered, "The cantina, past the barn."
He grabbed her hand and started running. Her bag bumped against her legs. She was too scared to look back, too scared to look forward.
They made it to the barn in time to hear a man yell from the clinic. "¡Encuéntrenlos!"
Find them! he'd said. They would. There was no way out of this.
Nick swung her against the outside of the rough-hewn barn. Dust and particles of hay drifted up as they walked along the side of it. She tried not to breathe hard, not to make noise.
He led her around to the back of the barn, careful to stay in shadows. Sounds of running feet broke the silence of the night.
A loud bang reverberated through the old building. She held her breath. Nick froze in place. Two men spoke quietly to each other as they passed through the center of the barn, only yards away from them. More men approached. Her heart pounded in her ears. She wanted to close her eyes and make this nightmare go away.
Nick pressed her against the coarse wooden boards. Beams of light from several flashlights streaked past, missing them by inches. He pushed harder, his heart beating against her, and winced slightly as their bodies pressed together.
She felt the ridiculous urge to jump out, to tell the men she was here, to tell them to quit looking. Flashlight beams skirted around them again, never penetrating the deep shadows.
By the time they moved on, her knees were so weak, only the force and heat of Nick's body kept her upright. She dared a look over his shoulder and saw the backs of the search party as they spread out. Two of the men headed for the cantina.
With icy fingers, she tugged at Nick's shirtsleeve and pointed toward the men.
"I see," he breathed into her ear.
His warm breath pierced the cold dread and she relaxed a bit.
"Wait," he said.
The minutes dragged; he stepped away slightly. "Where's the car?" he w
hispered.
"In the copse of trees across from the cantina."
"Let them move on."
Mary Beth discovered she wasn't patient. The moments lasted an eternity. In the shadows of the barn, she couldn't make out Nick's face. Only his scent and the knowledge of his presence kept her sane.
"Let's go." His softly spoken words startled Mary Beth.
Taking her hand, he led her, ducking and running, out of the shadows and across the open ground toward the cantina. Mary Beth felt like a moving target. Despite the awkwardness of the bag, she tried to match his long strides, but she had to skip a little to keep up. By the time they reached the bushes surrounding the cantina, altitude and exertion had robbed her of breath.
Nick stopped and looked around. The Rangers had taken the small dirt track back toward the central road in town, the one directly in front of the clinic. From inside the cantina, sounds of music and laughter poured into the night.
Moonlight glinted off Nick's hair as he pulled her across the road into the trees.
Jean had taken the time to cover the Rover with hay. Mary Beth supposed he thought that would keep light from reflecting off it and make it less noticeable. Nick began brushing off the car, leaning in and stretching. She saw a small hesitation as if something hurt him, but he kept at it. She knew it would be useless to tell him to stop, so she hurried to help.
But when she started to open the passenger side door, he stopped her by grabbing her hand.
"Wait," he whispered. "Let them move toward the other side of town."
On wobbly legs, she rubbed her nose, still itching from the particles of hay she'd inhaled. Nick sat gingerly on the front bumper.
"Are you bleeding?" she asked, also whispering.
"No."
"You need to be—"
"We have bigger problems than my stitches right now."
"I thought Padre Franco said the Rangers had gone on to the Rio Hermoso Valley and that the road was blocked."
"Maybe the road is open, or this is another contingent of Rangers."
A door slammed in the distance and a dog began barking.
They waited. Mary Beth hugged herself against the cold and wondered how they would get away. The search party continued through the tiny town, their movement made obvious by the sounds of the dogs and more slammed doors.
Finally Nick whispered, "Let's go." He opened the driver's side door, climbed in, then put his bag next to hers at her feet before placing one of his guns on the seat between them. In the dim morning light, the glow from the dash seemed bright and intrusive.
The rumble of the Rover's engine filled the early morning. He threw the car in gear and inched forward between the trees toward the back of the cantina. Before pulling out of the cover of woods, he looked back over his shoulder, then his gaze rested on her.
"Hang on," he said.
She did, her hands gripping the armrest on the door.
While the cantina was alive with sound, no one else seemed to be awake at this early hour. The wooden building loomed between them and the main road in front of the clinic. The wide-open plain would provide little cover for their escape. They could only hope that surprise and early dawn would let them outrun the Ranger search party.
The Rover broke from the trees.
Minutes later, Mary Beth could see the poor excuse for a town falling behind them, but her relief was short-lived. A Jeep lunged from behind a mass of boulders.
"They've seen us!"
"Get down," Nick said, checking first the rearview mirror, then the side view.
She felt the Rover accelerate at the same moment she heard shots.
One shattered the rear windshield, spraying bits of glass on them.
"Get down!" Nick shouted.
The shooting continued as he pushed the car across the dusty, bumpy road. One shot pinged on metal and almost immediately the Rover lurched to a sudden stop.
Nick reached down onto the floorboard and grabbed the other gun from his bag. Mary Beth looked around them in panic. They were on the open plain. No place to hide. The only cover, an enormous boulder, lay more than a hundred yards away.
Behind them, the soldiers quit shooting.
"Stay down," Nick ordered, carefully tucking one pistol into the back waistband of his jeans. He grabbed the other, holding it down on the seat next to him. "Don't move until I tell you to."
The rapidly approaching Jeep held his attention. Finally, it pulled to a stop behind them. Numb, Mary Beth waited, half turned in the seat, her attention on Nick's tense body. He seemed to be moving easily, his wounds causing no problems.
Elliot Smith and three heavily armed soldiers materialized from the blinding headlight beams. They surrounded the Rover, rifles aimed and ready.
"Mr. Romero, Ms. Williams," Smith said, his voice so pleasantly menacing that Mary Beth's heartbeat accelerated. "Please get out and throw down your weapons."
"You're in San Mateo, Smith. You have no authority here," Nick replied, still holding his gun out of sight.
"Be realistic, Romero, we have you surrounded. The Ranger search party in town could be here at any minute."
"You wouldn't want that, would you?"
"Don't waste my time. We simply want to talk to Ms. » Williams."
"What about?"
"Her brother."
"What about Mark?" Mary Beth asked.
"Throw out your weapons and move away from the car," Smith replied.
Nick tossed out the gun in his hand. It skidded across the dirt road. Then he took her hand and pulled her across the seat toward him. "Watch my face. When I tell you to fall, do it."
He opened his door and stepped out, hands in the air. "Tell them to lower the rifles."
Smith nodded at the soldiers. They lowered the rifles, but the biggest of the three kept his attention on Mary Beth.
Nick nodded and Mary Beth stepped out. "What about Mark?" she asked again.
"We have to find him, Ms. Williams. He's in danger. I'm afraid he's gotten involved in a gunrunning operation."
"It's not true—"
"If we don't find him soon, San Matean Rangers will capture him. I don't think I have to tell you what conditions are like in the jails here, if he lives long enough to see the inside of one."
"Mark wouldn't do anything like that."
"Ms. Williams," Smith said with exaggerated patience, "I know this must be difficult for you, but you have to trust that the embassy is doing all it can to find your brother before anything happens to him."
"Why did you ask me to leave the country?"
"I was trying to keep you out of this," Smith replied. "Your persistence in staying, in trying to find your brother, has made it necessary for me to come after you."
"What about the—"
"We didn't know this involved gunrunning," Nick interjected, his arms lowered. "If we had—"
"Romero, I wasn't born yesterday. You know exactly what's going on." He smiled. "The question is, how much does Ms. Williams know?"
"I know you're wrong about Mark," she retorted.
"Your loyalty is commendable, Ms. Williams, but your friend here has an interest in seeing your brother dead."
Mary Beth kept her gaze on Smith, but in her peripheral vision she could see Nick, unmoved by Smith's accusation.
"Romero is only interested in preventing the public humiliation of his family. All he has to do is find Mark and kill him in order to eliminate any question about his cousin's involvement in this gunrunning operation."
"Mark isn't a gunrunner," Mary Beth insisted. But she had her doubts and knew Nick wanted to prevent anything about his cousin from coming out. She'd thought of it herself. His family would always come first.
"No arguments, Romero? No defense of your cousin or your own sterling character?"
"Why aren't you working with the Rangers?" Nick asked, ignoring Smith's question.
"The State Department has decided to work it this way."
"They assigned thes
e men to you?"
Mary Beth noticed a pause before Smith spoke again.
"I'm not here to explain the actions of the United States government."
Turning to his men, he ordered, "Check them for weapons."
One of the soldiers started toward Nick just as the heavy one approached her.
"And mind your manners, Wyatt, Smith warned as the soldier reached out to her.
Mary Beth's skin crawled at the look in the man's eyes. If he was an American soldier, he'd escaped from prison to enlist. Despite Smith's warning, Wyatt rubbed his thumbs down her breasts as he frisked her. Repulsed, she jerked away.
"Get your filthy hands off her," Nick said, stepping toward the soldier ready to search him.
"Unless you want a bullet in your head, I suggest you stand still, Romero." Smith's voice brooked no argument. "Wyatt, don't provoke a situation. Get away from her."
The man obeyed, but not before running one hand across her bottom.
Nick responded immediately. "Stay away—"
The soldier standing beside Nick used the butt of his gun to strike Nick across the left cheek. He fell and didn't move.
"What are you doing?" Mary Beth asked, rushing toward Nick.
"Don't do anything foolish, Ms. Williams." Smith grabbed her. "You're in no position to help him."
"You could have killed him!"
"He's not dead. I wouldn't waste any sympathy on him."
"Have you lost your mind?" she asked, trying to wrench her arm from his grasp.
"Ms. Williams," Smith replied. "Stop, or I'll have you bound and gagged."
"We have to help him!" She looked at Nick, still on the ground, immobile.
"He'll be fine. We don't need him."
"You don't understand. Mark—"
"Your brother is why I'm here. We have to find him. He's in danger."
"Of course he is. The Primero de Mayo is holding him for ransom. If I don't get the money to them in two days, they'll kill him."
Smith laughed. "You believed Vargas?"
"Vargas? What do you mean?"
"General Vargas, the man in charge of the operation to catch Mark. He had you called, lured you here."
"I don't understand."
To the Limit Page 15
