by Beth Ciotta
“So they backtrack while you go on alone?” Gordo asked. “That’s insane! Oh, wait. Oh, shit. You’ve got the fever. You’re not even in the mountains yet and you’re possessed.”
“I’ve never had a clearer head.” It was true. At least without that chakana and map in hand.
“Then why take River at all? Spare her the physical anguish. Charm her out of the map and sweet-talk her into staying behind. If anyone’s capable of casting a spell over a woman, it’s you.”
“Gee, thanks. But I won’t manipulate her, Gordo.”
“Worried about fumbling the discovery of your career?”
He was worried about losing River’s affections. “I need you up here.”
“About time.”
He filled Gordo in on specifics, then hightailed it back to the parked vehicles. Cy was adjusting the straps of the backpack Spenser had purchased for River in Ambato. Aside from her turquoise jacket and orange scarf, everything River was wearing, down to the flowery cotton bra and panties, he’d purchased. She’d insisted on paying him back. He’d said they’d fight about that later. He figured they’d fight about a lot of things later. Why that made him smile he had no idea.
“Good news?” River asked with a suspicious frown.
“Just thinking about how cute you look in those boots.” He’d managed to find her a pair of pink knee-high Muck Boots, whereas his and Cy’s were standard black.
“One thing’s for sure,” Cy told her, “all those bright colors will make you easier to spot when you lag behind.”
“I won’t lag.”
Cy raised a bushy gray brow. “We’ll see about that.”
Clearly perturbed, River nabbed Spenser’s phone. “May I borrow this? I need to check in with Ella. I don’t want her to worry.”
Spenser eyed the mid-morning sun, a hazy ball in a dreary sky. If they were lucky it wouldn’t rain, but they had a lot of territory to cover before dark, and time was ticking. “Make it quick, angel.” She trudged off and he looked to Cy. “You armed?”
“You have to ask?”
Spenser checked his own sidearm, then holstered it beneath his coat.
“Expecting trouble, boy?”
“Possibly more than usual. Just make sure one of us has River in our sight at all times.”
“Expect you’ll fill me in when you can,” Cy said as River turned back their way. “Feisty thing. That’l serve her well, but did you notice her labored breathing?”
“I noticed.” Spenser shouldered on his own backpack, containing fifty pounds of gear. Cy’s looked to weigh about the same. River’s pack weighed far less but he anticipated she’d tire within the first couple of hours.
“Guess we should take it slow.”
Spenser shook his head. “Let’s try to reach Brunner’s first camp by nightfall.”
“She’ll never make it,” Cy said.
“That’s the plan.”
Frowning, River approached and passed Spenser his phone.
“Bad news?” he asked.
“No news,” she said, avoiding his gaze. “Let’s get this show on the road.” She pulled her new GPS unit from her pocket. “Which way is north?”
Brows raised, Cy pointed.
She thumbed in coordinates. “Great. Let’s go.”
Chuckling, Cy took the lead.
Spenser pulled River into his arms. “I’ll find your dad, angel.”
“You mean we.”
He brushed a kiss over irresistible lips. “Let’s go.”
FOR THE FIRST HOUR, River easily kept up with the men. They were navigating a valley, skirting a river at a very brisk clip, but she was a runner. She had strength, stamina. Yes, she was a little out of breath, but deep thoughts and churning emotions fueled her footsteps.
David hadn’t called.
Not even to casually ask how she was weathering their breakup. Ella had checked her phone messages both at home and work. He hadn’t written. Ben had kept track of River’s mail. In order to get that information out of her assistant, River had lied. It couldn’t be helped. Ella had been under the impression River had flown straight to Peru, to David, to patch up their relationship.
“I decided to treat myself to a spa experience at a four-star resort before seeking out David,” she’d said. “I’m gearing up. Physically and spiritually.”
“Uh-huh.”
“It’s been great, except my purse got stolen. I need you to cancel my credit cards.”
“Okay.”
“I’ll get the bank to wire me some money. And I’ll pick up a phone card and check in with you when I can. I just don’t want you to worry if you don’t hear from me for a week or so.”
“I’m not worried.”
“You’re not?”
“River, Kylie McGraw called here a few times. She said she asked her brother to see you around. Told me not to worry. I watch Into the Wild all the time. Spenser McGraw’s a hottie and a flirt. Too old for me, but probably in the ‘sexy older man’ zone for you. I’m thinking you’re shacked up in that four-star resort having your own kind of extreme adventure.”
River blushed head to toe. “I’m not—”
“So is Spenser as sexy in person as on TV?”
“I haven’t seen him on TV.”
“Drool worthy?”
River sighed. “You have no idea.”
Ella squealed. “This is so cool! Wait until I tell Ben!”
“No! Don’t tell Ben. Don’t tell anyone. There’s nothing to tell!”
“Uh-huh.”
“Ella—”
“Everything’s fine at Forever Photography. Don’t give us a second thought. Call me when you come up for air. Spenser McGraw.” She whistled low. “Talk about the ultimate revenge. Take that David.” Ella’s parting statement slammed River like a nervous bride’s tirade. She hadn’t slept with Spenser out of spite, had she? She wasn’t capable of such a thing, was she? When she’d handed Spenser back his phone she hadn’t been able to look him in the eyes. The mere possibility that she’d slept with him just to hurt David struck her with shame. Within the first half hour of the hike she’d gone though a quarter bottle of her pocket sanitizer to wash away the icky feeling.
Thirty minutes later the trail turned muddy, knee-deep in a few places, and even as she fought not to slip, she still obsessed on her motivation. She wasn’t the vengeful type. If she were, she could’ve stuck it to David financially. She could have bad-mouthed him all over Maple Grove. Or as Ella had mentioned, bought a voodoo doll or hired a hitman. But then the thought niggled, what if she’d slept with Spenser to fill some insecure need? Reassurance that she was indeed desirable, even with her quirks? That possibility made her feel pathetic.
Two thoughts dogged her as they left the clearing and broke into dense forest.
One, I don’t have indiscriminant sex.
Two, I don’t want to die.
Certain there was an anopheles mosquito with her name on it, she doused her body, clothes and all, with a cloud of bug guard.
“What’s that stink?” Cy asked, then sneezed three times in succession.
“It doesn’t stink.” The first words River had spoken aloud in over an hour. “It’s laundry-fresh Skin So Soft Bug Guard.”
Cy stopped in his muddy tracks, sneezed again. “Did you have to pollute the air with the entire bottle?”
“I didn’t—”
He pulled a machete from his belt.
River stumbled back. Alberto had been stabbed to death. In Baños. Cy lived in Baños.
The older man rolled his eyes, “Christ almighty,” then turned and hacked through thick vegetation.
Spenser thumbed up the brim of his hat, regarded her with a tender gaze. “River, there are no malarial mosquitoes here.”
“What?”
“Unlike the lower rain forest, the higher jungle is slightly safer. No anopheles mosquitoes. No deadly snakes. The biggest threat is the damp cold.”
Good news, sort of. Two thoughts do
gged River.
One, Spenser’s cowboy hat was incredibly sexy (unlike Cy’s dorky fedora).
Two, at least she wouldn’t die of malaria.
“Ready to talk about it?” he asked as he followed Cy’s hacked path.
“What?” Her childhood? Her parents? Her vengeful, pathetic use of sex?
“There are dozens of antimalarial medicines. You’re cautious, methodical even. You would have consulted a physician, researched. Primaquine’s not a preventative as much as a treatment. You’ve had malaria. You’re worried about a relapse.”
River’s pulse accelerated as they pushed through the sun-deprived forest. “Working the puzzle?”
“How am I doing?”
“Your deductive skills are amazing.”
“You provided ample clues.”
Which meant she hadn’t been as private about her past with this man as was her norm. She couldn’t contemplate that. Not now. Brain full. “It was a long time ago. Back when we traveled as a family. An expedition in Africa. I don’t remember any of it. I was only two. But my parents brought it up several times over the years, as did my grandparents and assorted friends in my mom’s artistic circle.”
“Your mom was an artist? What medium?”
“She specialized in charcoal sketches and watercolors, although she often experimented with primitive paints. Whatever was available. She traveled with Henry. Visually documented his expeditions.” River followed Spenser as he wielded his own machete, widening Cy’s path. He seemed intent on protecting her from the lash and sting of branches and pricklers. She was intent on avoiding his gaze.
Even though she’d agreed to talk about the “bad stuff,” it was far from her comfort zone. “I almost died, or so I’ve been told. The beginning of my ‘lightning rod for disaster’ life.”
“Calculating the years,” Spenser said, “even then there would have been reliable preventative measures against malaria.”
“Are you suggesting my parents were irresponsible?”
“Just working the puzzle, angel.”
“According to Henry it was a tribal shaman’s fault.”
Spenser stopped cold, turned.
“You know. A witch doctor.”
“You’re kidding.”
River died a thousand deaths. “This is why I don’t talk about my past. It’s embarrassing. My father, a highly educated man, believes I, his only child, was cursed with a delicate constitution. Low tolerance to germs, prone to infection. An inability to function in primitive conditions.” Still Spenser stared.
“According to my grandpa, who got it from my mom, Henry got carried away on one of his expeditions, stepped on a shaman’s toes and that shaman retaliated by cursing his unborn child. That would be me.”
“Losing time!” Cy bellowed from ahead.
“You’re not cursed, River.”
“Over the next five years, I developed countless viruses.”
“Most kids do. Hell, I contracted measles, chicken pox and mumps, all before I was seven.”
“I got severe sun poisoning in Egypt and was attacked by fire ants in Thailand. The fire ants I remember. The pain. The blisters.”
Spenser gripped her shoulder. “Those things could’ve happened to anyone.”
“But they happened to me. They wanted a boy, a scrappy boy suited to their adventurous lifestyle.
Instead they got a wimpy girl who proved a heartache and a hindrance.”
“I’m sure they didn’t—”
“They did.” She cringed at the sympathy in his eyes, looked around his strong and capable body. “I can’t see Cy anymore. We need to catch up.” She’d told Spenser more than she’d ever told anyone about her childhood. If she kept going, she’d be telling him how they’d decided she’d be safer in the States. How Henry refused to give up his travels and how her mom refused to give up Henry. Spenser was wrong. She didn’t feel better for spilling her guts. She felt like an idiot. Exposed. Raw. She felt like a freaking freak of nature!
When Spenser didn’t move, she grabbed his machete and whacked a tangle of vines. It felt good. Like punching something. She whacked again, exerting energy, expelling anger.
Not a wimp.
Not cursed.
Whack!
Rescue and closure.
Whack, whack, WHACK!
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Somewhere in the Cloud Forest Altitude 12,000 feet
“SHE’S LAGGING, but she’s not giving up.”
“I know.” Spenser stood at the face of a steep incline alongside Cy. River was coming toward them, moving at a snail’s pace, but moving. Surprising, given they’d been hard at it for close to four hours.
Navigating the dense forest was no cakewalk. Even though Spenser was experienced and fit, he still felt a burn in his thighs, a tightness in his chest. At times he’d had to stoop, hunch or angle to squeeze through thick jungle and narrow tunnels of vegetation. Although the incline was sometimes subtle, they were constantly gaining altitude.
More than once Cy had thrown him a look that said, let’s stop. Not that he or Spenser needed a lengthy breather, but River would’ve benefited. Spenser didn’t want her to benefit. Didn’t want her to rejuvenate. Call him an ass, but he wanted her to cry uncle.
River, damn her, was not only tougher than she looked, but stronger. Spenser expected her arms to give out after five minutes of swinging his heavy machete. She’d brutalized gnarled vegetation for close to thirty. She wasn’t nearly as effective as Spenser would have been, but he recognized the need to burn off anger.
While she’d hacked, he’d reflected on her story. He’d be resentful, too, if his dad had drummed it into his head that he was somehow inferior. Even though Spenser had disappointed Dewy McGraw by not following tradition and running the shoe store that had been in the family for four generations, the old man had been his staunchest supporter. Obviously, River felt unloved and unwanted by her dad. He didn’t know about her mom, but he knew there was more to the story. As much as he wanted to press, he’d held silent. Asking River to speak at length would have been cruel. She was struggling to keep up, struggling to breathe. He kept waiting for her to ask him about his “bad stuff.” Kept waiting for her to succumb to her phobias, to admit defeat, ordering them to stop or turn back. But she’d yet to utter even one request or complaint.
“I’ve had a bad feeling the last mile or so,” Cy said.
Spenser nodded. “Like we’re being watched, only I haven’t seen or heard anyone.”
“Could be the altitude messing with our heads.”
“Could be we’re being watched.”
Cy shoved his fedora back on his head. “Still waiting to hear what I’ve gotten myself into, aside from the obvious treasure hunt and associated curse. We’re looking for River’s dad, but who’s on our tail?
And why?”
Spenser offered select details.
“So you’re attributing a couple of loosely linked deaths and near-death incidents to the map in River’s possession.”
Spenser had only studied the partial map for three minutes tops, but the damned thing was branded on his brain as distinctly as Valverde’s guide or Brunner’s map—charts he’d studied for years. His pulse spiked as he envisioned the discovery of a lifetime. A secret hidey-hole crammed with gold and silver Inca and pre-Inca handicrafts. Sculpted birds, animals and life-size human figures. Pots of jewelry and the sacred Indian corn.
A king’s ransom.
“I’m just saying, Cy, what if?”
“Then I’d say, holy freaking miracle, and quickly add that River would be safer if you or I had that map.”
“She’d be safer out of the equation, period.”
“Almost forgot,” Cy said. “You want her to peter out and turn back. Guess you expect me to return her to Triunfo while you track down Professor Kane and the treasure.”
“That’s the preferred plan.”
“She won’t like it and neither do I. I’d tick off a half
dozen reasons, but here comes your gal.” Spenser’s heart hitched as River lumbered toward them, muddy from the knees down, hair mussed beneath her rolled-brim hat, face flushed and sweaty.