Midnight Shadows

by Nancy Gideon

  The three of them were about to head out into the forest together. They could go as companions or as rivals. With what they might be facing, she would just as soon it be in partnership. They would need to be able to depend upon one another.

  So she decided to do what she did best—tell it like it was.

  She sighed. “Oh, Paulo, I've made the most dreadful fool of myself over that beastly Frank Cobb."

  She had his attention now. “How so?"

  "I had a bit of a scare last night, and he took me to his room until I could calm down."

  She could almost hear her friend's molars creaking as his jaw ground down on that image. So she laughed bitterly at herself and continued.

  "I thought he had romance on his mind, and he was only interested in his paycheck. I feel so stupid. Thank goodness he was gentlemanly enough to set me straight the second he saw where I was heading ... down the wrong road, obviously."

  Enough of her humiliation seeped out to color both her admission and her cheeks. Paulo sat back, restraining a satisfied smile as he asked, “So nothing—"

  "Nothing at all, unless you want to count my self-confidence taking a nose dive."

  Paulo's arm stole about her shoulders, tugging her up close against him. She felt his kiss against her brow and tried to whip up some of the delightfully confusing sensations she experienced when Frank had held her near.

  But there was nothing.

  "The man's obviously a moron not to realize what he was throwing away. But thank goodness for that, right? I mean really. Think about it. What future could such a relationship hold? You have nothing in common. What place in your life would there be for a man like Cobb?"

  "May I join you?"

  Cobb's cool interjection had Sheba jumping free of Paulo's embrace. Had Frank heard Paulo's snide summation? She couldn't tell from the bland front the other man presented if the words had hurt, or indeed pierced his thick skin. With Cobb, one would never know unless he chose to reveal it. This morning, he was a blank slate and Paulo was writing cruel things upon it without fear of reprisal. Sheba bit down on her annoyance with him. When had Paulo developed such a mean streak? She remembered him as a shy, kind boy who would trap a creature to release it unharmed outside rather than step on it. With Frank, he was grinding his heel without mercy. And she didn't find this trait at all attractive.

  She gestured to an available chair. “Help yourself."

  "Not that it will do you any good,” Paulo muttered under his breath.

  Sheba wanted to smack him but instead she bestowed her sunniest smile on their third wheel. “Have you got everything ready to go?"

  "Tooth brush and bug spray,” he drawled out. “What more do I need? How many are going on this little safari with us?"

  "I've got a group of five research interns going with me and a guide."

  Sheba covered Paulo's hand for a squeeze. “Like you need someone to show you around in your backyard."

  "Our backyard, Sheba. You know it as well as I do."

  Her smile thinned. “Not anymore.

  "It'll all come back to you,” he assured her.

  Wasn't that what she was so afraid of? Her teeth clamped together. Paulo lifted her hand to kiss her knuckles, totally missing the anxiety behind her pinched smile, but she could feel Cobb's all-too-knowing gaze upon her, gauging her weakness, wondering if she could tow the line.

  She'd show him.

  "I can't wait,” she proclaimed, to convince herself as well as the others. “I've been away too long. It's time to get back to the things I know and love."

  "Yes,” Paulo all but purred. “About time."

  Cobb may have been clearing his throat, but to Sheba it sounded like a comment. A raspberry.

  "If we start off at once, we should be able to reach the highlands by late tomorrow. Then we'll see my grandfather and put an end to your suspense, Sheba."

  "Yes.” Was her response as faint as her heart at the thought of that confrontation with the past.

  "If he has something to tell us, that is,” Cobb amended with a dampening reason. “Or if he'll tell us anything."

  Paulo turned on him, eyes blazing. “You think we waste our time?"

  "It's your time,” he drawled.

  "Our time and our money, and don't you forget that. My priority is getting Sheba well. What's yours, Cobb?"

  Cobb's gaze never faltered as he met the other's fierce glare. “My priorities are bought and paid for."

  That's not what Sheba wanted to hear. She wanted him to make some grand declaration in the face of Paulo's antagonism. She wanted him to damn his duties and take up her cause. But then, that wouldn't be the truth and she knew it. And that truth hurt.

  Wanting to strike back, she smiled sweetly at Cobb and said, “Mr. Cobb is here on a vampire hunt."

  There was no accusing stare of a confidence betrayed. Cobb looked right through her with a stoicism that blamed worse than any words could.

  Paulo crowed incredulously. “Really? How delightfully colorful, Mr. Cobb. I wouldn't have thought of you as a true believer in such things even though you'd admitted to it. You seem so ... grounded in reality."

  "Realities change, as do perceptions,” was Cobb's cool rejoinder. “I'm here on Harper Research's dime to protect you from whatever threats are waiting."

  "And you are very good at that, aren't you, Frank? What's your success rate in keeping your clients safe?” Trying to pry an honest reaction from him, Sheba goaded where she knew she shouldn't go. “Ninety-nine percent? But it's that one percent failure that always gets you, right?"

  "One learns from one's failures and moves on."

  "And moving on is what you're best at, isn't it?"

  "You should know, Dr. Reynard."

  His quiet parry and attack effectively quelled her own rather childish offensive. Ashamed of her unworthy attempt to wound the impervious Frank Cobb, Sheba stood and faced the inevitability.

  "I'm going to say good-bye to Sam."

  "We leave in an hour, Sheba."

  She nodded glumly at that news.

  In an hour, she would confront her greatest fear, the fear that lived inside her, as big and dank and smothering as the rain forest.

  Would she be strong enough to face it?

  * * * *

  Sheba heard voices as she approached Peyton Samuels’ office. She paused, not wanting to interrupt some business wheeling dealing and then, just as she recognized the other speaker, she heard the words.

  "What are you going to tell her when she finds out the truth?"

  Sheba crept closer to the closed door. What were Peyton and Rosa Kelly discussing with such fierce intensity? Usually, their meetings involved tones raised high in heated and opposing opinion, but this morning, they were prophetically hushed, almost conspiratorial.

  They were talking about her.

  "She won't find out.” That was Samuels. His words were forceful. And fearful.

  Find out what?

  "How are you going to prevent it now that she's here? Considering where she's going?"

  "You worry too much, Rosa. I've already taken care of that."

  "How? Like you took care of the other problem?"

  Sheba barely heard the sneering sarcasm in that demand. She was reading between the lines.

  She was a problem to be dealt with. Like her parents? Was that the other problem the two of them discussed so passionately? She clapped a hand over her mouth to silence the agony of that possible discovery.

  Peyton Samuels, her benefactor and Rosa Kelly, her mentor. Had they schemed together to hide the fact that they were involved in the death of the Reynards? By seeing she was taken care of? By pretending to be like family? Because they were guilty of destroying the family she once had?

  No, it was too awful to consider.

  She leaned against the wall, pain surging inside upon a brutal sea of suspicion. How could matters get any worse than to doubt the love and nurturing of those who'd known her since the cradle
?

  "This time, I've turned it over to a professional,” Samuels continued, firm in his reassurance. “Frank Cobb came highly recommended. He'll see she stays in the dark while salvaging our interests at the same time."

  She was going to be sick. Bile boiled up in the back of her throat as her knees went weak.

  And then she saw the doorknob turn.

  They were coming.

  They couldn't know what she'd overheard.

  She managed to straighten and paste on an expectant smile just as Peyton pulled open the door. Damn him, his features registered only pleasure at seeing her standing there.

  "Sheba, there you are. I was hoping you'd stop by before heading out with Paulo on your expedition. Like old times, eh, the two of you?"

  She couldn't respond. She could barely breathe. Then Rosa enveloped her in her fleshy, scented embrace. Her head swam with the smell of gardenias.

  "Oh, sweet child, how I envy you the adventure ... and the company of those two lusty young men. Do I detect a little jungle romance for our little girl? Ah, to be thirty years younger and have knees that would support such a hike. In my youth, I would have given you a run for your money."

  Sheba's eyes squeezed tight to hold in the tears of anguish and betrayal as she listened through new ears to the familiar bawdy talk. This was not the playful banter of a dear, oft-emulated friend. It was the clever spinning of lies to create a web of deceit and self-preservation. And Cobb was tangled up in it, too. The one person she'd wanted so desperately to trust.

  "We won't be gone long,” she finally managed in a voice that was almost normal. “I'll keep them both on their best behavior, don't you worry."

  She stepped out of Rosa's smothering hug to confront the tenderness in Peyton's gaze. Oh, the misery of seeing through that benevolent care.

  "But I do worry, my dear."

  How kindly and sincere he sounded, how genuinely emotional over her well-being.

  Liar!

  "I'll be careful, Sam. I'm a survivor, remember?"

  And she would survive this, too. If for no other reason that to see her family and her shattered trust avenged.

  Chapter Fifteen

  They followed the river by boat for the better part of the day. In the soggy heat of twilight, they turned up a silty tributary and around the first bend, were confronted by bright slashes of blue and yellow tarp roofs where mining dredges labored between canyons of solid green. Wooden shacks on steel pontoons rode the lazy current, lashed together to form a community of noise and lights. Rafts cluttered with pumps and sluice boxes provided homes for miners, drilling platforms for endless lengths of pipe, a gas station, restaurant, cabaret and even a powder blue whorehouse that sagged in the middle like most of its patronesses.

  "They're dragas,” Paulo explained in answer to Cobb's curiosity. “Primitive factories that work around the clock to strip minerals from the river bottom.” He made a scathing noise that voiced his opinion even without words. “Gold miners are like an AIDs epidemic. When they leave the area, there'll be nothing alive on the land or in the water."

  They approached the floating city cautiously. Shirtless men, their shoulders heaving like pneumatic drill operators, worked long-handled electric mixers to churn the mercury, silt and hopefully gold. As the outsiders drew notice, the frantic activity slowed then stopped all together as they were assessed as a possible threat.

  "No need to worry,” their Indian guide Manolito assured as he stood at the bow of their boat, waving his arms. “My brother-in-law and his family run the restaurant. Just keep your eyes and your tongues still, and there'll be no trouble."

  "Trouble?” Cobb posed casually. “Is this an illegal operation?"

  Manolito pretended not to hear the question.

  Paulo shrugged. “The government has lost control over such endeavors. For every ton of gold mined legally, four are smuggled out. Environmentalists are constantly protesting about the water and air damaged by mercury pollution. Many of these dragas launder cocaine money. Do you want to go up and ask them if they have a permit?"

  "I'll pass. None of my business."

  A sinewy Indian with an apron and a half dozen children of varying ages swarmed the edge of the nearest platform, waving and shouting to Manolito in the language of their people. Manolito turned to them with a grin.

  "We've been offered a free meal and a place to sleep for the night. I guarantee you've never had cooking so good."

  Paulo sighed impatiently, glancing at Sheba to gage her response. “We really should push on. We've got lots of ground to cover."

  Manolito listened to a rather urgent entreaty from his brother-in-law, then passed the information on in English. “He says we would be fools to go into the jungle after dark and bids us to stay here in the lights where we'll be safe."

  "Safe from what?"

  After a moment's pause, Manolito translated his question. A long, tense silence followed. Finally, the wiry Indian on the platform shooed his children away and faced them nervously. He spoke briefly, fearfully.

  "The Ancient One,” Sheba interpreted, speaking up for the first time since they'd left the lodge that morning.

  "Native superstition,” Paulo scoffed. “Right, Sheba?” When she didn't answer, he looked in turn to the others on their boat. All nervously evaded his gaze. “I say we continue on. We've another hour of good travel time."

  A ripple of anxious muttering swept through Paulo's indigenous students. Cobb glanced from them to Sheba's still features then announced, “Thank your brother-in-law for his hospitality, Manolito. We'll be staying."

  Paulo turned on him in a fury. “And just what gives you the right to make that decision?"

  "Common sense. And if you had any, you'd agree without any further tantrums."

  Sheba stepped in to halt the potential battle of wills. She quieted Paulo with a hand on his arm. “We should stay. I'd like to speak to Manolito's relatives and find out why they're so afraid, if it's nothing but superstition."

  "All right, Sheba,” the scientist relented at last. “You win. But we leave at first light.” With that command to make him seem still in charge, he tossed a mooring rope to Manolito's brother-in-law. His students were quick to scramble off the boat and into the welcoming pools of light.

  Cobb turned to Sheba, offering his hand. “After you."

  She ignored the help and the man with a brusque, “I don't need a baby-sitter."

  Cobb dropped his hand and watched her climb out of the boat, appreciating as she did the way her khakis hugged her slim hips and rounded bottom. As much as he would have liked to give her a boost, he restrained himself. Wisely.

  The restaurant was little more than a square of corrugated metal walls with uneven planks for tables and wire spools and kegs for chairs. Insects droned about the naked bulbs strung overhead, but to the credit of Eddie Chala's family, the place was scrupulously clean. From out of the back kitchen, deliciously spicy scents emerged. Their party was quickly seated and served by a youthful staff that was always ready to bring piping hot estofado stew—with its mainstay of chicken, corn, carrots and tomatoes—along with chicha morada, the white corn beer that helped cut travel exhaustion and the tension after the second glass.

  Since they were between shifts, Eddie was able to join them at their table, bringing a large pitcher of beer and a near-toothless smile, along with his bevy of children. It was with pride that he ticked off their names and ages as well as their culinary specialties. While the others ate the mild and filling fare, Eddie and Manolito exchanged familial news. But when the children were sent back to the kitchen with empty plates and compliments, talk turned to serious topics once more.

  "Safe from what?” Cobb repeated. “Have you been having problems out here?"

  In broken and labored English, Eddie explained, “It come at night, taking ones who leave the light."

  "What comes? Has anyone seen it?"

  "My daughter, Phillippa she saw this thing take one of the working
girls up into the sky."

  "Up into the sky,” Sheba interrupted in her cool, clinical tone. “How do you mean?"

  "This woman was standing on the platform outside the ... the—” He broke off, looking embarrassed.

  "Yes, we know where you mean,” Sheba said impatiently. She switched to Spanish to hurry the story along and so as not to miss any subtle nuances of the tale in telling. Cobb could pick up what he could follow, and she would translate the rest later. “Go on."

  "One minute, she was smoking a cigarette and the next, she was gone, lifted straight up into the air without any sound. My Phillippa ran to tell us what she had seen. She was very frightened."

  Sheba nodded empathetically, well imagining the child's terror. “And was this woman ever found?"

  "No, senorita. No trace of her. The bosses, they say she was a restless girl and that she simply ran away. Ran away to where? To what? There is nothing within a day's journey afoot. They said my Phillippa was making up stories so that we would have more customers. What child creates nightmares for herself? All she can talk about is the red eyes glowing in the night coming after her. She cannot sleep alone at night. She has been in my bed between me and my wife since it happened."

  "And when was this?"

  "Two months ago."

  Two months ago. Shortly after the tomb robbers uncovered death in the jungle, opening the way for what to escape? Red eyes. Cobb's vampire, or legend's Ancient One?

  Or were they one in the same?

  "Have there been other attacks?"

  "Several of the women who entertain the workers have been found wandering as if in a dream. They have strange marks on their necks and no memory of what happened to them. We are to believe that one of the miners has particular habits.” Eddie snorted. “That's not what we believe at all."

  "What do you believe?"

  "We believe that the Ancient One was made uneasy in his rest. He hunts the night, devouring the unwary and will continue to do so unless he is put back where he belongs."

  "And where is that?"

  "In his temple. Only the sacrifice of a royal one can make him return to his home to sleep for another generation."