Show No Fear Page 7

  Soldiers at the camp, mostly bedraggled teens, meandered out of a lean-to to eye the gringos as they staggered with relief toward the burning campfire.

  “Are the hostages kept here?” S¸ukruye whispered, betraying her ignorance. Still suffering the effects of altitude sickness, she held her head in her hands.

  “Probably not,” Fournier replied, sweeping the area with a practiced eye.

  Lucy met Gus’s eye. She was certain they were not. The camp had an air of restfulness about it. With several targets standing on one end of the clearing, it appeared to be a training camp, only there was no training going on now.

  “Who’s that?” Carlos asked as a light-skinned gentleman ducked out of a leaf-covered bungalow to approach them. He wore the same camouflage as the rebels, but his fair complexion and hesitant demeanor set him apart. Nor was he armed with any weapon.

  They all converged by the fire where Comandante Marquez made introductions. “This is Señor Álvarez,” he explained, which told them nothing. “He was brought in to represent the FARC in this negotiation. You may begin the process at once.” He gestured to a brick and clay structure with a screen door. “Step into the officers’ quarters.”

  The clatter of a generator and the light shining inside made the hooch a welcoming sight. Lucy’s confidence edged aside her misgivings. This was why she was here in this godforsaken jungle. Gus might have the advantage with his knowledge of the environment, but no one was better at reading people. She could interpret the smallest of nuances, the flicker of private thoughts, the flutter of eyelashes—details most people overlooked. It was a gift that couldn’t be taught, inherited from her father, making her the best.

  Once inside, Fournier insisted on more personal introductions. The thin, dapper Álvarez turned out to be an Argentine businessman with pipelines in northern Colombia. He explained that he was being forced to play middleman between the FARC and the UN or risk having his pipelines attacked.

  Lucy’d had no idea a middleman was needed, but it made sense. The FARC’s front commander, Rojas, wouldn’t want to show his face to outsiders.

  As they helped themselves to mismatched chairs around a worn table, she and Gus took stock of the single room, seeking items that might offer clues as to Barnes and Howitz’s location.

  The only other furnishings besides the table were a desk and a set of bunk beds. Stacked on the desk were several books of Marxist leanings, a worn notebook, and a pen. A shortwave radio had been left on the windowsill. Catching Gus’s eye, Lucy made certain he’d seen it.

  With tact and consideration for Álvarez’s unwilling involvement, Fournier got the meeting under way. “Have you seen the hostages?” he inquired.

  “No, no,” said the Argentine. “I arrived here only last night. Before that I was at my home in Buenos Aires.”

  “Then please take our request for proof of life to the FARC leader—I believe his name is Rojas? When will you see him?”

  “Soon, I suppose,” said Álvarez.

  Lucy slid a casual glance at Gus. This business of negotiations could take weeks, even months to accomplish. They had to find Howitz and Barnes before the batteries for their phone ran out—before Howitz and Barnes succumbed to the cruelty of their captors.

  “We cannot proceed, you understand,” Fournier insisted, “until we have proof of life.”

  “I understand,” said Álvarez, looking gloomily overwhelmed.

  With nothing else to accomplish, they basked in the luxury of electricity until Marquez leaned into the doorway, suspending conversation. “I will take you to Rojas,” he said to Álvarez.

  “How long will that take?” Fournier dared to ask.

  Marquez didn’t answer. As the screen door banged shut, the UN team members stood uncertainly, trailing Álvarez out. “Deputy Buitre will assume command till my return,” Marquez announced as he swung a pack onto his back. “In the meantime, you will sleep there.” He pointed to the bamboo-and-thatch bungalow from which Álvarez had emerged earlier.

  Leaving Buitre with last-minute instructions, Marquez marched off with the Argentine, plus a small detachment of soldiers, back the way the UN team had just come.

  Had they passed Rojas’s camp on the way here? Lucy wondered. What about the hostages? Maybe they’d walked right by them without even realizing.

  Buitre swaggered toward them, suspending her thoughts. A ripple of unease ran through the team members as he hitched his trousers in a gesture of self-importance.

  “Oigan,” he commanded. Listen up. “If any of you cause mischief, I will lock you in there.” He pointed to a shed standing some distance from the camp. It appeared so rotten and dilapidated that it might collapse at any moment. “It is filled with hornets and rats. Stay out of my way,” he added. With a dark look, he turned and stamped into the building they’d just evacuated to enjoy his electricity and, presumably, to rest.

  The UN team members looked at one another.

  “What shall we do?” the Italian asked.

  “Let us have a look at our accommodations,” Fournier suggested, leading S¸ukruye by the arm. Bellini followed them, but the three Spaniards—Carlos, Luna, and Gustavo—remained outside, braving the drizzle to confer out of range of anyone’s hearing.

  “Where do you think we are?” Carlos murmured.

  “The eastern side of La Montaña,” Gus replied, “at an altitude of maybe ten thousand feet?” He lifted his gaze to peer through the thinned trees. The mountain’s twin peaks were just discernable in the drifting mist. Somewhere up there was the radio station broadcasting the Voice of the Resistance.

  “I agree,” said Carlos.

  “Why don’t we ask the kids?” Lucy suggested, nodding to the handful of youth wandering toward a small field, passing a soccer ball between them. While the female rebels stayed busy cleaning utensils and toting firewood, the boys had broken away to play Latin American fútbol.

  Carlos sent them each a measuring look. “How are your soccer skills?” he asked.

  Gus gestured to Lucy. “She can play. I have two left feet.”

  “Let’s suggest a game,” said the Spaniard with a twinkle in his eyes. “Two against five. You think they’ll go for those odds?”

  “You’d better be good,” Lucy countered, gesturing for him to lead the way.

  “I’m not bad,” he said with a modest shrug.

  GUS WATCHED CARLOS AND LUCY walk toward the field. The ball rolled to a stop as the four teens noted their approach. As Carlos issued the invitation to a match, they glanced in unison at Buitre’s brick hooch.

  The deputy was evidently resting. Regarding one another, they shrugged. Sure, why not?

  “Come on, Gustavo. We need another player,” Carlos called, waving him over.

  Gesturing that he couldn’t see to play, Gus put his back to the trunk of an orange tree and waited to see what a soccer game could accomplish in the way of recruiting young informants.

  The goals were marked by Russian-made AK-47s placed on either end of the flattest terrain. Lucy opted to defend the backfield and play goalie. Carlos played forward. With a nod, the game began.

  Gus frowned in bemusement as the Spaniard let the ball slip away from him. It was up to Lucy to defend against three fleet-footed youths.

  Then he couldn’t help but smile a little. PTSD or no PTSD, she was proving an uncomplaining and resourceful partner. With her long legs and quick feet, she held her own against the practiced youths, stealing the ball out from beneath a young man’s feet and passing it up to Carlos, who immediately let it go again.

  Gus chuckled at her look of pure annoyance. Her temper, as daunting as it had been eight years ago, intrigued him as much as her cutting awareness. Regardless of his extensive training, no matter how hard he paid attention to what was going on around him, he tended to overlook the details, to lose himself in abstractions. Lucy, on the other hand, was a pro. He may have thought he could handle this op alone, but he couldn’t. He was glad she’d insisted on acc
ompanying him, despite the risk to his heart.

  Stealing the ball away a second time, she yelled at Carlos to hang on to it. In that same moment, the door of Buitre’s quarters creaked open, and there stood the disagreeable deputy, glaring at them from his porch stoop.

  Damn, thought Gus, wondering if the man would interfere.

  Back in the game, three rebels swarmed the Spaniard. All at once, Carlos went into high gear, dribbling past all three astonished defenders as he worked his way up field. He then sent the ball straight between the goalie’s planted feet.

  From the corner of his eye, Gus saw Buitre hang his keys on a nail, hitch his trousers, and step off his stoop. Was he going to break up the game? Gus wondered as he strode onto the field. But then he saw the players take their places. No, he was going to join it.

  Suddenly, Gus didn’t want Lucy playing anymore.

  With Carlos outnumbered by four defenders, the rebels took possession. Buitre kept the ball for himself, dribbling toward Lucy, who attacked him warily.

  Wedging a foot between his, she managed to steal the ball, kicking it back to Carlos, who once more weaved through his opponents to storm the goal.

  The score was Spaniards two, Colombians zero.

  Carlos sent Lucy a surreptitious signal to let their opponents score. No need to make the rebels unhappy.

  Once more, Buitre brought the ball up field, circumventing Carlos. Even with two men open, he kept it for himself, bearing down on Lucy, who put up a half-hearted defense as Buitre deliberately teased her, showing off his dribbling skills.

  Suddenly, and without any forewarning, he slipped in the mud. Lucy watched in surprise as he landed hard on his back. His four teammates guffawed. Marshaling her own smile, Lucy nudged Gus’s respect to a whole new level by offering Buitre a hand.

  Maybe you could fight fire with fire, he marveled.

  But then Buitre viciously slapped her hand away.

  Biting her lip, she stepped back, squared her shoulders, and raised her chin.

  Gus saw red. He found himself stalking onto the field, battling down the illogical impulse to bludgeon Buitre’s ugly face.

  Carlos headed him off. “Easy, easy,” he said with a firm hand on Gus’s shoulder. “It’s just a game,” he added.

  It took Buitre several more minutes to roll to his feet. He sent Lucy a murderous look, as if she were the reason he had fallen. Shit, thought Gus. This was just what they didn’t need—an enemy in the rebel ranks.

  Turning his back on his team, Buitre limped toward his hooch to nurse his injured pride.

  Back on the field, the rebels shyly approached their opponents. By humiliating Buitre, the Spaniards had unwittingly won them over. One youth trotted off, returning minutes later with hard-boiled eggs for the winners.

  Lucy accepted her egg with relish, peeling off the shell with hands that shook. As she stuffed it in her mouth in one bite, she swung a guilty look at Gus, who hadn’t been given an egg.

  “Go ahead,” he told her, ignoring the rumble in his stomach. “You’re the one with a runaway metabolism.”

  He spent a second memorizing the names of the young rebels: Julian, Estéban, Manuel, and David, all of whom were eager to tell their tale of woe. Two had been kidnapped by the FARC and forced into service. Manuel had been sold by his family for three bags of rice. David, who wore the insignia of a squad commander, admitted that he had dropped out of college to join the rebel cause. His father had been a white anthropologist, his mother an Arhuacan Indian.

  Gus held his intelligent brown eyes a moment, reading both caution and youthful idealism in their depths. As the product of disparate social classes, he had chosen to identify with his mother’s people, the downtrodden indigenous, whom the FARC allegedly represented.

  Lucy startled Gus by throwing out the million-dollar question. “Do you know where the American hostages are kept?”

  The younger boys shook their heads with credible ignorance. Manuel joked that he didn’t even know where his own home was. As an illiterate campesino, that likely was the sad case. David merely shrugged and said, obliquely, “¿Quién sabe?”

  Who knows?

  And Gus realized Lucy was a step ahead of him. She’d already ferreted out their best informant. Question was, would the kid confide in them, or would he hold out?

  Just then, Buitre burst from his shelter, disrupting the congenial conversation.

  He stalked toward Manuel, who’d been the one to dole out eggs. “Why do you waste our food on these strangers?” he raged. Seizing the youth by his collar, he shook him forcefully. “Our own people are starving. We have no medicines, no way of looking after ourselves. Do you think they are here to help us? They are friends of the American spies.” He began pulling Manuel toward the dreaded shed, the keychain on his belt loop jingling.

  Lucy shook off Gus’s arm as she trailed after them. “Excuse me, Deputy Buitre,” she called out, her voice surprisingly strong. The guerrilla leader stopped and turned, eyeing her incredulously. “I’m the one who made you fall,” she added, taking the blame for his slip, “Perhaps you should take your anger out on me, chamo.”

  She snapped her mouth abruptly shut, and Gus’s antennae for danger went straight into the air. What had she just called him? Chamo. What was that? Even Carlos looked perplexed.

  Buitre cocked his head to one side. “Chamo?” he repeated. “You talk like a Venezuelan bitch.”

  Lucy’s face struck Gus as suddenly pale, the confidence she’d displayed only moments ago all but gone. She gave an awkward shrug.

  Buitre released Manuel abruptly. “You wish to take his place?” he threatened, marching up to her even as Lucy bravely stood her ground.

  Gus stepped between them, pushing Lucy behind him. “Careful,” he warned, staring the man down. “The eyes of the world are upon the FARC at this moment,” he reminded him quietly.

  Buitre sneered, pretending Gus’s gentle reminder made no difference to him. But then he spat on the ground at Gus’s feet and stalked off, slamming into his quarters seconds later. The rest of the rebels drifted away.

  Gus turned toward Lucy, including Carlos in his questioning look. “What does chamo mean?” he asked her as he led her toward the low burning fire in the fire pit.

  “Buddy, pal,” she translated into English. “It’s Venezuelan slang. Sorry,” she added, rubbing her forehead with obvious self-recrimination. “I forgot where I was.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Gus said, putting a reassuring hand on her shoulder. “No damage done. Come on, let’s check out the sleeping accommodations.”

  They all faltered at the sight of Fournier standing at the bungalow door, looking harried. “Is there a problem?” he asked.

  “No, no,” Carlos assured him. “Buitre’s a sore loser, that’s all.”

  “Ah,” said Fournier, but his troubled gray eyes remained locked on Lucy.

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  CHAPTER 6

  We’ll sleep here,” Gus decided, choosing the cubicle at the far end of the building, adjacent to a rear exit.

  The long, leaf-covered bungalow consisted of cubbies divided by bamboo blinds. The alcove Gus had chosen had probably been passed over by the others because it brushed up against the jungle.

  “Then I’ll take this one,” said Carlos, disappearing into the cubicle beside them.

  Lucy noted the sparse accommodations without reservation. Each team member had been given a thin mat, a blanket, and mosquito netting. She’d slept in worse conditions in urban settings, and with Gus to keep her warm at night she had nothing to complain about.

  Dragging her gaze up from the mat, she found him watching her with a hint of amusement. “Take your clothes off,” he told her in Spanish as he unbuttoned his own jacket. “Jungle ticks,” he reminded her, zapping any erotic images before they had a chance to fully form. “Leeches. We need to search each other daily, when there’s plenty of light to see by.”

  “Oh.” She fumbled to re
lease the buttons on her jacket, sneaking a peek at him as his T-shirt came off. Light slipped through the leafy ceiling to dapple his bare chest. All that chest hair and rippling muscle must have made him irresistible to women. She wondered how many there had been, whether he’d ever been as close to any of them as he’d been to her.

  “Boots, too?” she asked as he bent over to scrabble at his laces.

  “Everything,” he said.

  Everything? She complied, watching curiously from the corner of her eye to see if he would remove his boxer briefs. She wasn’t sure if she was relieved or disappointed when he didn’t.

  “Okay, pay attention,” he said, inspecting their cubicle. “Set your boots over here where you can find them, even in the dark. Never put them on without turning them upside-down and shaking them first.”

  She wasn’t sure she really wanted to know, but…“Snakes?” she guessed.

  “Bats. Rodents. Beetles. Could be anything.”

  “Of course.” She shouldn’t have asked.

  “There are several venomous snakes in the jungle, but you’ll probably never see one. Different story with the other creatures.”

  As she placed her boots in the corner, he pointed to her clothing. “Never leave your clothes on the floor,” he instructed. “Hang them up. Right there.” He pointed to a hook hammered into the crossbeam.

  She followed his directions to the letter, her awareness notching several degrees as they brushed against each other while hanging up their clothing.

  “Step over here,” he instructed, drawing her into a patch of sunlight. “Hold your arms up,” he added, running an all-seeing gaze over her torso.

  Lucy’s breath caught as he hooked a finger behind each panel of her bra and peeked inside. “Do you mind?” she sputtered. “I think I’d know if a tick or a leech was in there.”

  “Check the undersides of your breasts every day,” he said, ignoring her and spinning her around.

  “Don’t—”