by Nancy Gideon
"We're not leaving until morning then?"
"I've got some supplies coming in that I must wait for. And it will give us a chance to reminisce. There's a little café that serves the best ceviche. The hotel isn't much, but it has mosquito netting and cold showers."
"What more could I ask for?"
Behind her, she heard Cobb mutter, “Cable, A/C and a wet bar,” but she pretended not to notice.
"You might wish to rest in your room for an hour or two. The boat ride tomorrow is six hours and not very hospitable."
"I'm not a tenderfoot, Paulo,” she scolded mildly.
The scientist's dark eyes cut over to Cobb. “I wasn't thinking of you."
Cobb supplied a narrow smile and a chilly, “Don't concern yourself over me. This isn't my first jungle tour, and I'm sure it will be a lot more friendly than what I'm used to."
Paulo shrugged and turned away with an indifference that surprised Sheba. She was about to apologize for her friend's rudeness when an innate loyalty held her silent. Cobb wouldn't take such things personally, and she wouldn't hurt Paulo for the world even with such a small correction. She let the matter go, making her own excuses for Paulo's attitude. He didn't know Cobb and was leery of outsiders, even though many would consider him one as well. He would relax once he realized Cobb wasn't a threat.
Their rooms were the best the jungle usually offered. Sagging beds surrounded by a swaddling of net with no luxuries of air-conditioning, television or hot water. Frank was shown to his room first, and as he stood surveying the dingy interior with a stoic acceptance, Sheba leaned close to whisper, “If I were you, I'd plug up those holes in the walls in case they're part of a roach run."
"Terrific,” he muttered, stepping inside and closing the door between them.
Feeling strangely adrift without her abruptly taciturn protector, Sheba sought out the quiet of her own room. Even after her brief nap on the plane, exhaustion weighed heavily upon her. She hadn't enjoyed a decent rest since Paulo's call. She hadn't known an unbroken night's sleep in twenty years. She grabbed for sleep when and where she could find it. And now was a good time, while it was still daylight. Paulo left her with a hug at the door. Then the silence settled in, with only the broken rhythm of the overhead ceiling fan to create a stir of life.
After thoroughly checking the corners and under the bed for potential creature infestations, she stretched out on the lumpy mattress and let the shivers of anxiousness overtake her. She couldn't shake the sense of unease. It was the jungle with its invasive scent of decay and moisture, and another remembered odor that seemed interlaced with the rest even though it wasn't actually present, one that held a metallic bite and a coppery aftertaste.
The scent of blood.
* * * *
Not one for taking siestas, Frank stowed his gear, and after checking to see that Sheba was also safely stowed for the moment, decided to do a quick sweep of the perimeter. It was then he noticed Paulo Lemos seated in an open air café across the street. He hesitated a moment, not exactly eager for the man's company. One of the benefits of his job was not having to mingle or socialize with the client. He was there, in fact, to be invisible. But he had an unfortunate weakness that drew him across the road, one that he wouldn't admit to even as it got the better of him.
He wanted to find out more about Dr. Sheba Reynard.
Lemos regarded him with a steady, somewhat hostile stare, but when it became clear to him that Cobb wasn't going to graciously go away, he gestured toward a second chair.
"Join me, Mr. Cobb?” He waved the waiter over as Cobb sat down. “A pisco sour for my ... friend."
Cobb held up his hand to halt the waiter. "No, gracias."
"Ah. You speak the language.."
"Not much and not well, but I can find the restrooms and cigarettes in just about any country."
Lemos nodded to the waiter and murmured a quick pattering of Spanish, overruling Cobb's objection to Peru's national drink of brandy, lemon juice, bitters, egg whites and sugar. Then he took one of the filter-tips Cobb offered and exhaled a thin stream of smoke in the other man's direction. His narrowed gaze told Cobb that things were about to get sticky.
"So, Mr. Cobb, what do you think of her?"
"Of whom?"
Lemos scowled impatiently at the bland response. “Sheba, of course."
"Dr. Reynard? We only met the other day. I can't say that we've gotten personal enough for me to have formed an opinion of any kind."
"Good,” the scientist muttered under his breath with just enough attitude for Frank to perversely want to taunt him.
"But I've found her to be smart and capable and amazingly strong considering that suitcase she lugs around."
"And attractive?” The question jabbed like a knife point, ready to eviscerate him.
"I suppose, if you like skinny women. I prefer more than a handful, myself."
Lemos smiled thinly, encouraged by that crudely offered opinion. “What she lacks in inches, she more than makes up for in IQ."
"If you like brainy women.” Which he did, but he didn't feel obligated to share that with his forced companion. No sense in antagonizing the man beyond prudence if they were going to be spending time in the jungle with Sheba Reynard between them. Sheba shouldn't have figured into the equation at all, but she was the reason Cobb had joined the rather snotty Lemos in the first place.
"You've known her for a long time?"
Lemos nodded and stated with a territorial intimation, “All my life. And there's no one I'd rather spend the rest of it with."
Now, that was putting it on the line so there could be no misinterpretation. Lemos was either in love with her or had to have her. Either way, the gloves were off, and it wasn't in Frank's best interest to interfere. But he found he couldn't leave it gracefully alone.
"Does she know that you've got her future all neatly planned out?"
That added query brought a degree of tension back between them. “She will soon enough. She still sees me as a childhood playmate. Soon, she will see me as more."
"Congratulations."
Lemos accepted the flat comment with a nod. “Yes, I am a very lucky man. Few women are as versatile and accomplished as Sheba. Or as fragile."
That surprised Cobb. Delicate wasn't how he would have described Sheba Reynard. Troubled, definitely. Neurotic, perhaps. But fragile? “I'm afraid I don't see her as some fainting hothouse orchid."
"That's because you share no history with her. How could you understand without knowing what she's been through."
Now, he was all attention. “What's that?"
"You could ask her to tell you about it, but you see, she remembers none of it. She was found wandering alone in the jungle, in shock and covered in blood."
"What happened?” Cobb asked, dreading the answer.
"She'd witnessed her parents’ murder."
* * * *
Sheba dozed fitfully as the heat of the day turned sultry while the hours stretched into early evening. She stumbled through her veiled dreams, her breath quickening, her hands and feet twitching like a pup chasing rabbits. Only what followed her through the leafy green corridors of her familiar nightmare was nothing so harmless.
She was running for her life.
Moaning softly, she thrashed beneath her sheet, unaware that she was no longer alone in her room. The mosquito netting rippled as an indistinguishable shadow brushed by on the other side. As Sheba ran from imagined dangers in her dream, a real threat drew back the gauzy curtain to peer at her in her restless sleep.
"How much do you remember, Sheba?” the figure whispered in a soft, sibilant hiss. “You will live for only as long as your memory stays blank."
Sheba sat up with a gasp. Her bed curtain fluttered. Through sleep-glazed eyes, she thought she saw something or someone moving in her room.
"Who's there?” Her voice trembled slightly then firmed. “Paulo? Cobb?"
Had someone been there, or was it a lingering fragment
of her dream?
She sat clutching her bed covers as a new horror shivered through her. What if she could no longer tell the difference?
What if her relentless monsters had stepped from the realm of nightmares into the realities of her waking moments?
Wasn't that what she'd been afraid of all along?
That returning to Peru would give substance to her fears and a name to her night terrors.
And then she noticed it. A soft fragrance on the slowly moving current of air. And all the hairs prickled up on her arms and nape.
She hadn't been dreaming.
Chapter Five
"And what are you boys talking about?"
Two pairs of eyes lifted, and Sheba got the uncomfortable impression that they were looking at the topic of their discussion. Paulo had the decency to seem embarrassed, but Cobb's stare was keen and unblinking as he rose to hold out a chair for her. As she settled into it, did she imagine the light brush of his fingertips along the outsides of her arms? A sensual or a sympathetic touch?
What had Paulo been telling him?
Feeling as though her towel had just been yanked off as she stepped out of the shower, she did her best to act unaffected as her question hung in the air.
"Your friend was saying that the two of you grew up together."
"Yes, we did."
Sheba waited, but Cobb didn't follow her succinct answer with another intrusive question. Perversely, she found herself offering more.
"My parents were missionaries. Paulo's family hosted them. His father and my mother were distant cousins. My earliest memories are of this place and these people."
"Your people?” Cobb slipped that loaded question in with a silky skill, a question too complex to answer with a simple yes or no.
As Cobb was probably well aware, or he wouldn't have asked.
"Technically, at least on my mother's side. Her family had moved to the States before she was born, so my grandfather could get an engineering degree. My mama and daddy met during their first semester at a small Bible college in Alabama."
She noted his small smile of discovery. He'd been wondering about the accent. It had hung on tenaciously regardless of the fact that two decades had passed since she'd heard her father's drawling voice reading Scripture aloud each night. She'd tried to breed it out while attending the snobby Eastern schools where she was teased and called a hick. But now she didn't mind so much. It reminded her of the familiar.
"My parents belonged to an offshoot of the Summer Institute of Linguistics program working with indigenous tribes to give their language a written form. The idea was to translate the Bible for them, a noble goal that only earned criticism for their destruction of cultural identity."
"And is that what you think they were doing?"
She didn't try to avoid his penetrating stare but rather matched it boldly. “Their beliefs aren't mine."
"And what do you believe, Dr. Reynard?"
"I believe I'll order the cuy. I've heard it's quite delicious spit-roasted."
Their gazes held for another long minute, then Cobb's eyes crinkled at the corners in appreciation of her deft evasion.
"And what exactly is cuy? Does it involve hot peppers?'
Sheba relaxed into a smile. “No. Did you ever have a pet Guinea pig as a child? If you did, it may seem a little cannibalistic."
Though there was no discernible change in his expression, Frank Cobb was suddenly locked down as tight as the National vault. “The closest thing I had to a pet were rats. And we didn't eat them, spit roasted or otherwise."
He said it so blandly. Was he telling the truth or just playing another game with her gullibility? Something in the flat sheen of his stare told her it was the former, but Sheba had no time to respond to the shocking nature of his claim.
Feeling excluded from the conversation, Paulo announced, “I'll have the anticuchos. That's shish kebabs of beef heart, Mr. Cobb. Something your foreign palate might enjoy. And another drink, perhaps?"
He hadn't looked away from Sheba's gaze, confident that she'd read none of his secrets in the practiced opaque of his own. “No, thank you. I have to eat, but I'm not being paid to dull my reflexes."
And with that blunt statement, he reminded them all of his purpose in South America. It wasn't to socialize or play tourist.
He was there to keep Paulo alive.
That knowledge effectively dampened the mood until another voice intruded.
"Little Sheba? Can this be you?"
Emotions clogging her throat, Sheba turned in her chair, her teary gaze filling with the bulky form of a woman nearly as wide as she was tall.
"Paulo promised me a surprise,” she managed, her voice thick with crowding sentiments.
"It is a good one, no?” The woman grinned, opening up her arms.
Sheba rushed to fill them, losing herself in the fleshy hug and enveloping scent of gardenia and sunscreen. She allowed herself a moment of complete collapse, weeping unashamedly as a wealth of feelings and memories overwhelmed her.
Finally, the rotund elder woman patted her awkwardly and stepped back with the offer of a perfumed handkerchief. Sheba took the big, mannish calico square and noisily blew her nose.
"Better now?"
She nodded, wiping at wet cheeks and blinking away a fresh flood of tears.
"Some welcome. Watery eyes and a dripping nose."
Sheba took the mild chastisement with a weak smile. “I didn't expect to see you."
"You didn't think I'd come to welcome you home?"
Her smile wavered. Home. Filled with nervous energy, she turned to an unflappable Frank Cobb with introductions. “Rosa, this is Frank Cobb. Mr. Cobb, Rosa Kelly, one of the original protestors of anything politically incorrect."
"Now, child,” Rosa chided. “You make me sound like an old hippy ... which I guess is exactly what I am. Mr. Cobb, a pleasure."
He stood to politely offer his hand and was immediately engulfed by her hug. She kissed him loudly on either cheek then directly on the mouth. Sheba grinned at the sight of Frank Cobb totally nonplused.
"And Paulo Lemos, you handsome devil. Come give Aunt Rosa a kiss."
"You've changed your hair since I last saw you, Rosa. It's makes you look younger."
"It makes me look a fright, but I don't mind you lying to me just a little."
Paulo submitted to the same enthusiastic greeting then invited the big woman to join them. As he seated her in a protesting chair, Sheba leaned close to Cobb to tease, “Your mouth is open."
"She gave me tongue,” Frank whispered back, sounding both shocked and horrified.
"Was that a first for you?"
"From a total stranger old enough to be my mother, yes.” He then recovered himself enough to assist her into her seat, vowing to keep a close eye on the randy older woman. That was easy because she certainly was an eyeful. As big and bold and bright as the noisy jungle birds. Her refined features gave away a Mestizo lineage of both Indian and European; her flamboyant manner was definitely not rooted in some subdued Andean heritage. She wore gaudy American thrift shop clothing to clash with her carroty orange hair, a bad dye job that left it bristly and coarse as broom straws. But her deep skin tones and the heavy silver Spanish-influenced earrings she wore fashioned crudely in the shape of crosses, spoke of her local ties. That she had close ties to both Sheba and Paulo was obvious.
"Paulo told me you've come back for a visit,” Rosa was saying. “Can I hope he was mistaken, that you've come back for good?"
Sheba's expression grew tense, her smile strained. “I'm afraid I can't stay long. I have another job waiting for me in the States."
Rosa waved a dismissing hand. “They waste your talents. You are needed here, child. Your family is here."
She could have protested that she no longer had a family but that wasn't exactly true. These two people felt like family, if not by close blood ties, then by strength of affection. They couldn't be blamed for the past trauma that even now
made her want to take the first avenue of escape before the jungle swallowed her whole. Could they be faulted for her wish to remain a long-distance relative? For tonight, at least, couldn't she surrender to the simple joy of being with those she loved and not think about the past?
Cobb was watching her through those inscrutable, all-seeing eyes. She determined not to give him a show.
"So, Rosa, what brings you away from your lobbying?"
"Besides the chance to see you again? Isn't that enough?"
Sheba scolded her with a look.
"All right. I'm going to see that wretched man, Paulo's uncle. Not to see him but rather to try to influence one or two of his guests."
"Uncle Sam isn't going to like that,” Paulo cautioned.
"When have I ever cared what that man thought? And when have you known me to let anything get in the way of an opportunity? Never, that's when. And besides, I am a paying guest, and he would never turn away cold cash. He's still a bandit at heart, what little heart he can claim."
"I'm surprised you haven't been picketing to keep me out of the jungle. Or have you?” Paulo asked shrewdly.
She pinched his chin fondly. “You are one of us, Paulo. Even I am not so crazed by my cause that I can't see the good you are doing. Your heart is here in this place and your thoughts are for our people, not like Peyton Samuels with his fancy resort and clever schemes to rape the rain forest."
"Now, Aunt Rosa."
"Do not ‘Aunt Rosa’ me, boy."
"You'll have to excuse Rosa,” Sheba told Cobb. “She's zealous."
"Don't go making any excuses for me, child. I never apologize for doing the right thing."
"And what is it that you're doing, Ms. Kelly?"
"She fancies herself as the guardian of the forest,” Paulo drawled.
"Don't disrespect me, boy. Mr. Cobb will think I'm some kind of cuckoo tree-hugger."
"Well,” Paulo challenged with a grin. “Aren't you?"
"Well ... yes, I guess I am. But there's nothing wrong with that, is there? I mean, when there's nothing better to squeeze."
Frank grunted as she poked him in the ribs. He attempted a grim smile.
"Rosa lobbies for limits on oil and gas exploration in the jungle,” Sheba explained to make her friend sound less eccentric. But there was little that was normal about Rosa Kelly.
