Next To Die

by Marliss Melton

  With panic threatening to close off her airways, Jordan instructed her little troop to hold the rickety banister and follow her. She took her first step into the bowels of the earth and then another. A spiderweb brushed her cheek as dank coolness swallowed her. Shivering, she clutched Miguel closer while shaking off her fear—for his sake, and for the others’. Down, down into the black hole they went until they reached a floor of hard-packed dirt.

  As she gazed up at the light, tremors rippled through her. What if she never saw the sun again? A scurry of footfalls heralded the approach of Sister Madeline.

  “I caught sight of them,” the nun divulged in her no-nonsense voice. “They’re a horde,” she added with typical British understatement.

  An angry horde, Jordan thought, cold sweat matting her shirt to her back.

  Madeline bustled down the steps. “Whom do we have with us?” she inquired.

  “The orphans,” Jordan murmured.

  “We should let them go,” Madeline suggested, glancing up at the priest.

  “No,” whispered Jordan, clutching Miguel more fiercely.

  “Their cries might betray us,” the nun argued.

  “It’s too late to send them up,” Father Benedict pointed out, as he, too, descended. “Besides, who would care for them? They would end up on the streets again. Pedro,” he called to the hovering teen, a youth hoping to join the priesthood, “close the door and lock it. Put the rug over the hatch and hide the key. Tell no one where we are. When the guerillas leave, let us out again.”

  “Sí, padre,” answered the boy. With reluctance and apology wreathing his indigenous features, he gently lowered the door. It wasn’t so dark, not with rays of sunlight slipping through the cracks. But then the rug was tossed over the hatch, dousing them in blackness so deep and thick that it paralyzed every muscle in Jordan’s body.

  “Let us light a candle and pray,” recommended Father Benedict, his voice swimming out of the darkness. It unlocked Jordan’s frozen joints.

  She stiffly put Miguel down, eager to drive back the void. But the task of lighting a candle, given her shaking hands, proved virtually impossible. The flare of her trembling match revealed the pale faces of her adult companions and the gleam of four sets of children’s eyes. They feasted their gazes on the wick, then looked around once it was lit.

  Their hiding space was perhaps ten by seven paces, laced in cobwebs and peppered with holes that housed bottles of sacramental wine. We have plenty to drink, Jordan thought, swallowing a hysterical giggle.

  The priest sat, folding his long limbs to make more space. Jordan hunted for a place to put the candle, out of reach of the children. Finding a crack in the wall, she wedged it in like a torch. “Sit down,” she instructed the children, doing the same.

  Miguel scrambled into his customary seat—her lap—and his thick hair tickled her nose. Jordan’s eyes stung with remorse that she couldn’t shield him from harm any better than this.

  “Beloved Father,” began the priest, his lank hair falling over his forehead, “look down upon us and cast your mantle of protection over us, we pray you . . .”

  As his sonorous voice droned on, Jordan’s thoughts wandered. She hushed Fatima, who whimpered in fear as she burrowed into Jordan’s side. Prayers couldn’t hurt, Jordan acknowledged, but they wouldn’t necessarily help. God knew she’d expended many a prayer to keep from losing her pregnancy and then her marriage.

  Unlike the priest and the nun, Jordan wasn’t in Venezuela to save souls. She was here to continue a healing process that had begun last summer, only to be cut short when her teaching job necessitated a return trip home. This summer, she’d come back—not so much for healing, but for the love of Miguel, who’d helped fill the void in her heart. In doing so, she’d turned a deaf ear to government warnings. Her stubbornness and sheer refusal to acknowledge the dangers could well end up getting her killed.

  The rat-tat-tat of semiautomatic gunfire suspended Father Benedict’s prayer. They all listened, holding a collective breath. Had the guerillas killed one of the villagers visiting La Misión? Or had they fired those shots to announce their fearsome arrival? And what was their intention—to march east toward Caracas, joining up with other supporters of the ousted populist regime?

  Jordan didn’t involve herself with politics. She’d taken up mission work for the children. Even more than her students at home, they needed the love she longed to offer.

  She touched each child, rubbing their narrow shoulders to comfort them. She would fight to the death to ensure their welfare. Especially Miguel, small and defenseless, who was exactly the age her baby would have been. He had found a special place in Jordan’s heart. Come hell or high water, she was going to take him home with her.

  THE DISH

  Where authors give you the inside scoop!

  From the desk of Amanda Scott

  Dear Reader,

  Resolving the problems an author puts in her own path can lead to unexpected places. That’s exactly what happened when it came to providing a hero for Lady Sidony Macleod in KING OF STORMS (available now). The youngest of eight sisters, Sidony had been a shadow child—quiet, obedient, a follower rather than a leader, becoming a woman who rarely acted on her own initiative, incapable of making decisions.

  In fact, she was the antithesis of my usual outspoken, action-oriented heroines, and, therefore, she needed a man who could ignite fire in her. So I made a list of potential heroes that included a few John Wayne characters, the Bruce Willis character from the Die Hard movies, and some others of their ilk.

  The result was Sir Giffard “Giff” MacLennan, a Scottish Knight Templar tasked with moving Scotland’s Stone of Destiny to safety in the western Isles. Giff approaches everything (sex, life, sailing) zestfully, impulsively, and with total commitment. He makes decisions quickly, needing little fore-thought. Even his most admiring friends call him reckless, but when a thing needs doing, Giff does it, and he has no patience for anyone who questions or criticizes his judgment, let alone a dangerously beautiful woman who dares to do so.

  If his actions are occasionally abrupt, even out-rageous, so what? Tasks that others deem impossible have long provided him with activities interesting enough to keep his mind from dwelling on the reason he cares so little for his own safety.

  Nevertheless, when his cocksure world and Sidony’s placid, predictable one collide, all bets are off.

  I hope you enjoy KING OF STORMS.

  Sincerely,

  http://home.att.net/~amandascot

  From the desk of Marliss Melton

  Readers always ask me where I get ideas for my books. Sadly, the tragedy my story NEXT TO DIE (available now) is based on was real. But the book itself is pure fiction, founded on the following strange coincidence:

  I needed a real SEAL to edit my action scenes since I wanted them to be as true to life as possible. But where could I find a SEAL with any interest in helping out a romance author? I went to NavySEALs.com to post an inquiry and found myself staring at a picture of my hero, Joe Montgomery. There he was in all his golden-boy glory!

  Actually, it was a photo of Commander Mark Divine, co-founder of NavySEALs.com. Not only did he look just like Joe but, to my amazement, he had written a tribute to the nineteen warriors to whom my own book is dedicated. In his tribute, Mark wrote about the survivor, “What if it were me?” That single line got my mind churning.

  What if a commander had taken the place of a sick chief in order to see a critical mission succeed (and for one last thrill in the field), and the worst possible outcome occurred? Wouldn’t he blame himself for what happened? Taking off with that premise, I came up with the hero—the officer who had it all, looks, brains, and women, until one fateful decision brought him face-to-face with his shortcomings. Ironically, the woman who restores his self-confidence is his next-door neighbor—ordinary and nurturing Penelope Price. Penny, whose life is at risk for exposing her father’s murderer, is in desperate need of a hero. While struggling to
rise to that challenge, Joe finds himself falling in love for the first time in his life.

  Thanks to Commander Mark Divine, I had my story idea. But that’s not all. He volunteered to read my action scenes, not just for Joe’s book but for subsequent novels. Mark Divine is professional, helpful, encouraging, and timely—serious, serious hero material—and I am so grateful that our paths collided, though they never would have if not for Danny Dietz, Michael Murphy, and James Suh, warrior angels in God’s great army.

  www.marlissmelton.com