To her surprise, the wood between her fingers lifted, separating from the rest of the wall. She looked down into an eight-inch-wide, perhaps twelve-inch-deep hole.
“Knew it,” Cole said as he crossed the room to stand at her side.
“Something’s in here. I can just see the edge of it.” Reaching in with her other hand, she felt around and withdrew a typical white envelope. “Just this. No boxes, no dragons.” Madalina tried to hide her disappointment that the artifacts weren’t within. At the same time, she was insanely curious about the contents of Walcot’s letter.
Cole withdrew a small flashlight from his vest and shone it down on the envelope as she opened it. “I’ll read it aloud,” she said, unfolding a sheet of paper.
Dearest Madalina,
In the spring, the view of the lake from the window is one of the prettiest sights I’ve ever seen. Blue flanked by snowy mountains and a vista of green greeted me every day I stayed here. I could have chosen a unit closer to the water, but then I would have lost the fields of flowers and meadows between this house and the lake. Many hours I spent here in contemplation of my life, of the choices I had made.
It may have been a simple life, but when I look back, other than spending more time with you and your mother, I have no regrets. All a person can ask for is to wring every second of pleasure from every single day, and I did that to the best of my ability. It is my hope that you learn to do the same. Pause and enjoy the gifts nature has to give.
I could ramble on all day about the scenery and my love of travel, but I know you’re following the trail I have laid out for you and want to know where to go next. I’m nostalgic, frankly, because this is the next-to-final letter you’ll receive. I wish I knew whether you’re sad or relieved—have you enjoyed the little journey? Has it been pleasant or stressful? So many questions will go unanswered for me. The doctors have diagnosed me and now my time is short. I do not even have a year left.
On the back of this paper, there is a map that will lead you to the very last spot on your journey. It will not be easy to reach, but will be rewarding once you get there. Take good hiking shoes and a walking stick—and someone to enjoy it with.
The resting place of the final two objects resembles the plateau in Tibet where I used to sit with my friend. It’s located at the base of the mountain behind this house. Like my friend before me, I found a charming niche to stash the dragons, surrounded by the mountain itself. The view from there is unlike anything you’ve seen yet.
Enjoy the trek, Madalina.
I’ll be with you every step of the way.
All my love,
Walcot
Amid a tidal wave of emotion, Madalina flipped the page over. A map drawn in faint pencil covered more than half the surface. It was a rather crude map, but usable. “Think we can find it?” she asked Cole, who was looking over her shoulder.
“If we study it hard enough, yeah. There aren’t any road names except for this one.” He used a finger to touch the map at a certain spot not far from the unit. “At least it’s not in the heart of the city. We won’t have to worry about people watching what we’re doing.”
“And we know that the mountain is the last place we have to go. It’ll be over after this.” She folded the paper and handed it to Cole. “Keep it for me, okay?” The envelope went back into the hole beneath the window ledge. She closed the sill.
Cole took the page, folded it over once more, and slid it into his back pocket. “We need to pretend like we found nothing in here. It’s better to have Lance’s men think we came up empty. I don’t know if they’ll believe that or not, but if—when—they get loose, they can waste a few hours searching in vain, thinking we just missed it. That should buy us time to retrieve the dragons from the mountain and cross the border into China. Might as well have Thaddeus make arrangements with the Chinese agents since we’re so close.”
“That works for me.” Madalina slanted a look through the room, then turned toward the door.
Cole gently grabbed her arm.
She glanced back and up, one brow arching in question.
“You okay?” he asked.
The low timbre of his voice sent pleasant shivers over Madalina’s skin. “I’m all right, yes. Just . . . you know? It’s almost over. I’ll be happy to be out of danger, but sad to receive the very last letter ever from my grandfather. This is it. One more stop. I can’t help but be nostalgic about it.”
Cole’s thumb smoothed over the bend of her arm; the sensitive inside crease sent a fresh shudder down Madalina’s spine.
“I don’t blame you for being nostalgic. I know it’ll be hard to let go.” He brushed a kiss across her brow, then opened the door to allow her to exit first. “Put your acting face on, Madalina, and let’s sell these men a story.”
No matter how rough the road or how hard a situation could be, Cole always knew how to lift her spirits. She smiled briefly, then exited the house.
By the time she reached Damon, Brandon, and Lance’s men, she wore a look of disturbed solemnity. She found the expression wasn’t too difficult to conjure, considering the circumstances.
Brandon sat upright and seemed to be more coherent than when they’d left him. He raked a hand through his hair, then shook his head as if to clear any remaining cobwebs.
While Cole took Damon aside, Madalina crouched next to Brandon’s knee. It was no great secret that she had a soft spot for this particular brother. “How’re you feeling?”
The corner of Brandon’s eye crinkled when he slanted a look her way. “Better, doing a lot better. Feel like I got my bell rung pretty good, but I’ll be okay.”
“I’m glad to hear it,” Madalina said, keeping her voice low. She saw the curious interest in Brandon’s expression and added, “I’ll explain what we found later. If you start to feel sick or dizzy, you should tell us and we can get you medical treatment. You might have a concussion. I’m sure Damon, Cole, and I can continue on our own.”
“Mad, I wouldn’t miss out on what comes next for the world.” He winked as if to prove he was, and would be, fine.
The chirp of a cell phone cut through the conversation. Madalina watched Damon approach the “leader” of Lance’s men—as she’d thought of him since he did most of the talking—where the noise seemed to emanate from.
Damon searched the man’s pockets with impatient, deft sweeps of his hand. He liberated a black phone, screen glowing with an incoming call. Damon flashed the front of the phone toward her and Cole.
The name across the front read: Lance.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Answer it. You so much as hint at what’s happened or if I think you’re passing code through speech, I’ll bust both your kneecaps.” Cole took charge, seeing an opportunity to find out where Lance was and what he was doing. Clearly, Lance had escaped his ties sometime ago. The only way these men could know Walcot’s address was if Lance had worked his way free and made the call while he and Madalina were in the air. It made the most sense.
Damon pressed “Answer,” put the call on speaker, then held the phone close to the leader’s ear.
“Yeah?” the man said, eyeballing Cole with a wary expression.
“Where are you and what’s your status? Have Cole and Madalina shown up?” Lance asked.
Cole tilted his head and gave the man a warning look. Don’t do it.
“We’re still searching. Haven’t found anything. And no, we haven’t seen them yet,” the man said.
Cole examined the tone, the speech, the level of wariness in the man’s reply. Any little thing might set Lance off, let him know all wasn’t right. Even having the call on speaker was a risk, but Cole needed to find out just how far Lance had come in his escape.
“Good. I don’t know what’s taking them so long. Keep a close watch; they’ll have to arrive soon,” Lance said. “We’ll be there to back you up and help look within the hour.”
Cole felt Madalina stiffen beside him. Within the hour. Lance had gotten fre
e just as he’d thought, shortly after takeoff, and had probably been given a private plane to do business with by the Vietnamese.
Lance was right on their tail. Much closer than Cole was comfortable with.
“Excellent,” the man said.
Damon ended the call before Lance’s man could say more than that.
Cole jutted his chin toward Lance’s lackeys; Damon knew what to do. Cole herded Madalina away from the group as Damon and Brandon pistol-whipped Lance’s men into unconsciousness.
“Let’s go. We don’t have much time.” Cole led Madalina into a jog along the road toward the Jeep.
“How did Lance get free so fast?” she asked in a breathless voice. Being the stubborn woman that she was, he saw her glance back.
Cole tried to block her view with his body. It wasn’t like she didn’t know his brothers had to sometimes do uncomfortable things like pistol-whip people, but he attempted to spare her the violence of it. She’d seen plenty of violence so far, and perhaps it was useless to shield her from more, but if given the choice, he would choose to distract her every time.
Then they were around the curve, out of sight, and he jogged forward to open the back door. “Probably had sympathetic men in the woods nearby. That place is crawling with the Vietnamese army. We knew it wouldn’t last long. Talbot’s team might have had to move your parents to a safer location to wait for the plane, which means the man they had watching Lance likely got pulled from duty. That’s why we didn’t get a phone call or a text warning us in advance that Lance was loose. Sometimes you have to do what you have to do. Talbot’s first job was to keep your parents safe, and I have no doubt he did that.”
Madalina climbed inside and plopped into the seat. She stared back at him with wide eyes. “Do you think Lance will figure out where we’ve gone? From here, I mean?”
“Let’s hope not. No one but you and I have seen the map, and I’m pretty sure it’s the only one in existence.” He closed the door as Damon and Brandon jogged up and got in the Jeep. Cole pulled himself into the driver’s seat and started the engine, making a U-turn on the muddy lane. He knew they needed to backtrack to a specific fork in the road, get higher into the foothills. Digging Walcot’s letter from his pocket, he handed it across to Damon. “Map’s on the back.”
“So you did find something,” Damon said.
“Just another letter from Walcot. Although this will lead us to the last two dragons. He had all four from the beginning,” Cole said.
“Sly bastard—sorry, Madalina,” Brandon said.
“It’s okay. He was a little sly about the artifacts,” she replied.
“What’s the plan if we find them?” Damon said.
“We bring them down from the mountain, call Thaddeus when we get cell reception—we won’t have it up there—and make arrangements to cross the border into China and meet up with the agents,” Cole said. “Get the dragons off our hands once and for all.”
“Sounds like a plan. Take a left up here,” Damon said, studying the map by flashlight.
“It’ll be daybreak in another hour, maybe two at the most. That should help in case we have trouble finding the ‘niche,’ as Walcot calls it.” Cole took a hard left, gearing down when the tires hit deeper ruts than the previous road. He had a feeling that they would have to go on foot part of the way when the lane became too treacherous to navigate. He didn’t dare get the Jeep stuck in a mud pit.
Fifteen minutes later, that was exactly what happened. He spun the wheels after a particularly muddy patch, and barely got the Jeep back to solid ground.
“I hate to say it, but we’re going to have to go the rest of the way on foot. The rain has made a mess of these smaller trails. Madalina, it’s a good thing you changed shoes with your mom before we left the islands.” Cole pulled the Jeep into a small clearing and cut the engine. He estimated they had a twenty-minute hike to reach the dragons.
As his boots hit the ground, he cast a look back along the road.
To the others, he said, “Let’s get going.”
Madalina’s pride in conquering the sloping hill vanished in the face of hiking up the base of a mountain. Here the terrain was much more treacherous, with rocks, downed tree limbs, and a steady incline that made her thighs burn and her lungs ache. The incline at this low altitude was subtle, but still brutal. Pausing to get her breath, she felt Cole set a hand on her back and appreciated his support.
“Okay?” he asked, behind her.
Brandon and Damon were forging the trail ahead. They paused to glance back.
“Yeah, I just need a second,” Madalina admitted. “My lungs are on fire.”
“I think we’re almost there. It’s not too bad of a climb,” Cole said.
“Maybe not for you. But then, you can leap tall buildings in a single bound, too,” Madalina retorted.
Brandon cracked a laugh.
Chuckling, Cole said, “I can carry you the rest of the way if you’d like.”
“No. It’s not that bad.” She began picking her way past a large boulder. “I need to get out and do this more often.” Madalina didn’t mind admitting it. She knew the brothers tackled physical challenges all the time in their profession. The extent of her exertion at work was moving clothing-filled boxes from one room to another. Once this was all over, she intended to change that. She viewed it as another step forward in this new life she planned to lead. One where the boutique played less of a role.
“We can go hiking on weekends when I’m home,” Cole said, following in her footsteps.
Madalina could have had a whole excited conversation about what would happen after this, when she spent more time in his job pursuits and less in her own. But she saved her breath and climbed, taking care to note Damon and Brandon’s footing. They navigated the terrain like goats, rarely off balance or unsteady.
Minutes later, the winding trail led them to a flat area before another sharp incline. The sheer vertical face of the mountain flanking the space was imposing. Madalina knew they would have to find a less hazardous way up if the trail continued after this. However, something about the flat area . . . which could be considered a small plateau . . . triggered memories of Walcot’s story about his time in Tibet. When he used to sit on a plateau with his friend.
Even from the base of the mountain, they were high enough to see the entire city and the large lake beyond. In darkness, with glittering lights shining throughout the town of Pokhara, the view was stunning. She could easily imagine what it would be like in the daytime.
“All right. This should be it. Somewhere along the smaller cliff face, we should find a cave or deep crevice. We’re at the end of the map as far as I can tell,” Cole said, examining the map beneath his flashlight beam before casting the light ahead to the rock wall.
Brandon shone his light as well, flicking the beam over the surface.
“This has to be it,” Madalina said. “Look at the view. And remember the story Walcot told in his letter, about where his friend hid the dragons? It was in a small cave not far from the plateau where they would meditate and observe the city. This isn’t the same country, but it’s the same setup.”
“Right. Watch your footing. Let’s get closer to the mountain and start looking.” Cole stepped past, flashlight leading the way.
Madalina noted several deep crevices in the rock, shadows that were deeper than the night. Using the glow from Cole’s light, she investigated one that proved to be too shallow and narrow to hide much of anything. In fact, she discovered over the next several minutes that there were many crevices and nooks in the cliff face. She examined four that seemed like good hiding places, but each turned up nothing. Feeling the passage of time, worried that Lance would find them, she moved on to the next deep cut in the cliff.
“Here. There’s an entrance half-hidden behind another rock, and I can step all the way inside,” Damon said.
Madalina abandoned her search and made her way to Damon, as did Cole and Brandon. She followed him around
the dull edge of a rock, using her hands as guides. Beyond was the opening to a cave, or crevice, that stood six feet wide and seven to eight feet tall.
Damon’s light penetrated the cave, exposing somewhat jagged walls and a rough ceiling. The ground, surprisingly, was relatively smooth.
“It’s hard to tell if anyone’s ever been here,” Damon said, reaching a small cavern at the end of the short tunnel. The cavern couldn’t have been more than ten-by-ten, with a few rocks sitting against the walls and only one “niche,” which was too small to hide anything.
Madalina spread out to examine the floor, the walls, the boulders. She checked behind and around each one, seeing nothing that resembled a box or cloth.
“Find anything?” Cole asked, coming to stand at her side. He flashed his light over the rocks.
“Nothing. The dragons aren’t behind the boulders, and the boulders are too heavy for one person to move. So they’re not beneath. It’s so bare in here that I don’t see where else they could be,” she said.
“Unless someone else found this place and took them,” Brandon said.
“That’s a possibility.” Madalina’s heart sank at the prospect. If they couldn’t find the dragons, they couldn’t return them to the Chinese agents, which meant she would forever be at risk for abduction or questioning. People who wanted or needed the dragons for their own purposes might never believe she didn’t have them or have solid leads to their whereabouts.
Standing, she brushed her palms off and glanced up. In the wall, perhaps seven feet above the ground, she thought the shadows deepened in ways they didn’t along the rest of the rock. “Cole, shine your light up here for a minute, will you?”
He swung the beam around and up, following the point of her finger. “See something?”
A Dangerous Tryst (The Inheritance Book 3) Page 14