by Linda Turner
“You came to my rescue? The way I remember it, you had your back to a cliff and a dozen Uzis aimed right at your gut. If I hadn’t taken you over that cliff, you’d be pushing up daisies right now.”
A snort told him what his friend thought of his version of the story. “All right, let’s hear it. What do you need?”
“I’ve got a plane to catch in an hour and I’ve got an errand for you to run.” He told him what he needed, then made arrangements to meet him at the information desk. “Don’t be late, man. I can’t wait for you.”
“Twenty minutes,” Josh promised. “I’m already on my way.”
Ace hung up as excited feminine chatter from the back of the shop caught his attention. Glancing up, he immediately spied the stylist he’d left Maddy with grinning broadly at the woman before her in the chair. A woman who, he thought in shock, was Maddy. Dear God, what had she done to herself?
He’d expected her hair to be shorter, of course—he’d told the stylist not to hold back with the scissors—but he hadn’t expected the woman to chop it all off, either. The long mousy mane that had once trailed halfway down her back now barely brushed her chin and had been permed into short, flirty, becoming curls. Curls that were, unless his eyes were playing tricks on him, now reddish brown!
Stunned, Ace couldn’t take his eyes from her. She’d put some kind of rinse on her hair, something that brought out the reddish highlights that he hadn’t even realized were hidden in the dull brown mop. And the color looked damned good on her. In fact, she was more than a little pretty.
The thought snuck up on him unaware, surprising him. Frowning, he searched her face, telling himself it was a trick of the light and his imagination. A new hairstyle and rinse couldn’t change the fact that she was still the same brown wren he’d pulled from Cement Johnny’s car. If the angular lines of her face appeared softer, more delicate, it was only because the short curls that framed her features were such a stark change from her previous style. Sure she looked better. Considering how old-fashioned and plain her hair had been before, anything would be an improvement.
That didn’t mean he was attracted to her, he assured himself as he started toward her. She was a job to him, nothing more. Someone he’d had to bring along because he’d had no other choice. Miss America beautiful, or ugly as a mud fence, it made no difference to him. He still didn’t trust her and looked forward to the day he could wash his hands of her and turn her over to someone else.
In the meantime, however, he had to deal with her. Stepping up behind her, he studied her as she stared at her reflected image in wonder. He wanted to believe that it was an act just for his benefit, but she hadn’t taken her eyes from the mirror since he’d walked in the door. Like a young girl who had just discovered she’d turned into a fairy princess overnight, she touched her hair, the nape of her neck, the sassy curls that brushed her ears and cheeks.
Perversely irritated by the soft, awed smile that played around the corners of her mouth, he said, “Okay, glamor queen, time to cut and run. The party’s over.”
“Ace…” Whirling in her chair, she jumped up, her eyes alight with happiness. “You’ve got to give this wonderful woman an incredible tip! Look what she’s done to my hair! Isn’t it great? I never knew—”
“Yeah, yeah,” he said dismissingly as he jerked his credit card from his wallet and handed it to the stylist. “It’s a work of art. Now let’s get out of here. We’re running out of time.”
A blind man couldn’t have missed the hurt that flared in her eyes, but dammit, what was a man supposed to do? They weren’t best buddies—he didn’t want to be someone she turned to when she was excited or happy or sad. The brutal truth was he didn’t want to be anything to her or any other woman. They’d been thrown together by chance and now had to endure each other’s company by necessity, and that alone created a bonding he intended to avoid like the plague.
Because of Sandra. His ex-wife. The woman he had at one time trusted with his life. The same woman who had an affair with his best friend and only came to him with the news because she was pregnant and he’d been gone too long on an assignment for her to claim the baby as his.
The old familiar rage that always stirred to life whenever he thought of her betrayal lodged like a ball of ice in his gut. Even after she’d stabbed him in the back, he would have probably found a way to forgive her if she’d come to him in tears and openly admitted she’d made a mistake. Instead, she’d blamed him for her infidelity! Because he was always off somewhere playing James Bond, it was his fault that she turned to another man out of loneliness. If he’d been home like he should have been, she’d claimed, nothing would have ever happened.
God, what a fool he’d been! All those times when it had torn him apart to leave her, he’d never once worried about what she was doing while he was gone. Like a naive idiot, he’d trusted her—and got his teeth kicked in for it.
Never again, he promised himself, his blue eyes hard and uncompromising. He’d sworn the day she came to him with the truth that he would never again leave himself open for that kind of betrayal, and for the past three years, he’d stood firm by that vow. Oh, there’d been women—he wasn’t a monk—but he always kept things light and steered clear of ladies on the wrong side of thirty. It wasn’t that he had a thing for sweet young things, it was just that the older a woman got, the louder her biological clock ticked. And the louder her clock ticked, the more she fantasized about the man of her dreams riding to her rescue while she still had time to conceive a child.
And that was something he wanted no part of, especially with a woman like Maddy. She might or might not be partners in crime with Sneakers, and that didn’t begin to describe the complexities of the lady. For weeks now, he’d watched her from across the street from the newsstand, and night after night, she’d had her nose stuck in a book—an Ace Mackenzie book. And that told him everything he needed to know about the lady. She was a romantic, a lonely woman who looked for excitement and a man in the pages of a book. As far as he was concerned, that spelled trouble…big trouble.
Muttering a curse under his breath, he signed the credit slip after adding a generous tip for the stylist, then stuffed the receipt in his pocket. Without a word, he took Maddy’s elbow to escort her out into the concourse.
Blinking back stupid, foolish tears, Maddy promised herself she wouldn’t let him make her cry. The man was a cretin, a caveman with the sensitivity of a rock. In a matter of hours, he’d turned her life upside down and changed her so that she didn’t even recognize herself anymore. Before he’d walked into the salon, she hadn’t been able to stop staring at the pretty stranger in the mirror. She knew it was her, of course, but it was a her she’d never seen before. Her eyes looked bigger, her cheeks more sculptured, her eyes darker.
The new Maddy Lawrence would never be described as plain and ordinary, and that thrilled and amazed and petrified her. Suddenly, she didn’t know herself. She didn’t know this woman who looked at herself with Ace’s eyes and wondered if he thought she was pretty. He made her feel…things. Things she’d never felt before. Things she didn’t know how to deal with. Things that made her heart race and her palms sweat with panic. Things that made her want to run.
“I want to go home.”
He heard her—she knew he did—but he just kept on walking, his grip on her elbow hurrying her along until it was all she could do to keep up with his long legs. Frowning, she repeated loudly, “I want to go home! Don’t pretend you didn’t hear me—I know you did—”
“Half the people in the place heard you,” he retorted in a voice pitched deliberately low. His grip tightening on her elbow, he didn’t so much as check his stride. “Quit acting like a child. You’re not going anywhere until we find Sneakers.”
“Yes, I am. I’m going home! Just stick me on the first flight out of here—I don’t care where it’s going as long as it’s back to the States. I’ll worry about getting a connecting flight to New York later.”
“With what? Your looks? In case you’ve forgotten, sweetheart, you haven’t got two cents.”
“But you do. You could book everything from here and pay for it—”
“I could but I’m not going to,” he said flatly. “Not until we find Sneakers.”
He was so stubborn, Maddy wanted to scream. But she didn’t, of course. For all of her life, her mother had drilled self-control and manners into her, and she cringed just at the thought of calling attention to herself. “But why?” she asked in bewilderment. “Why are you doing this to me? I told you I don’t know anything about Mr. Lazear’s illegal activities. Why can’t you just let me go?”
For a minute, she thought he wasn’t even going to bother to answer her. His jaw rigid, he didn’t look at her as he hustled her down the concourse, the matter apparently settled as far as he was concerned. Then, just when she was beginning to think that she was dealing with a man who didn’t have an ounce of compassion in that rock-hard body of his, he pulled her to a stop at the information booth, which was deserted at that hour of the morning. His sharp, knowing eyes searching hers, he said quietly, “It’s not that simple. Don’t you understand? If you really are an innocent in all this—and that’s still a big if as far as I’m concerned—then there’s no way I can let you go.”
“But I don’t know anything!” she cried. “I told you—”
“I know what you told me,” he said patiently. “But you saw Sneakers stuffing stolen jewelry from that hidden warehouse in his pockets the same as I did. That makes you a witness, honey. And Sneakers doesn’t like witnesses who can put him away for ten to twenty.”
Maddy paled. “What are you saying? That he’d try to shut me up before I can talk to the authorities?”
“The man’s got an international fencing operation set up behind that newsstand. Do you really think he’s going to just sit back and let you expose that?”
“But he’s on his way to Caracas. He doesn’t know we’re on his trail.”
At any other time, Ace would have laughed at her naiveté, but if she was for real, that kind of innocence could get her killed. “Wanna bet? Men like Lazear don’t leave anything to chance, Maddy. He knows we know about his setup at the newsstand—we saw him with the goods in his hands. For no other reason than that, he’s got to eliminate us. You can bet that new hairdo of yours that the minute his plane was in the air, he was on the phone to one of his thugs ordering a couple of hits. If I let you go off by yourself, you’ll never make it home alive.”
“Then go with me,” she pleaded. “You don’t have to go after Mr. Lazear yourself. Just call the authorities in Venezuela and have them pick him up at the airport.”
“Dammit, it’s not that simple. We’re not talking about a law-abiding citizen who crosses all his t‘s and dots his i’s and always plays by the rules. He’s a slippery son of a bitch who greases palms and pulls strings everywhere he goes. He won’t wait for the police—hell, he won’t even wait for customs. He’ll slip out the back way and just disappear before anyone even knows he’s there.”
“And you’re going after him.”
It was a statement, an accusation, one that he didn’t bother to deny. “You’re damn right I’m going after him. He’s headed for Carlos Barrera’s place in the jungles—”
“Carlos Barrera!” the man who walked up behind them echoed in disbelief. “Madre de Dios, amigo, are you sure you know what you’re doing? Nobody messes with Barrera.”
His roughhewn face breaking into a slow smile, Ace pivoted, his hand already extended for an affectionate slap of his friend’s shoulder. “I was beginning to wonder if you were going to show your ugly mug. What took you so long?”
Josh gave him a pained look. “Not everything can be done at the snap of your fingers, my friend. Some tasks take more than a phone call. So are you going to introduce me to the pretty lady or do I have to do it myself?”
The smile he shot Maddy was boyish and wicked and guaranteed to steal a woman’s heart on the spot. Ace had seen his friend turn it on unsuspecting females a hundred times before, always with phenomenal success. But he’d always gone after sophisticated blondes, gorgeous women who knew the score and were as experienced as Josh was himself. In no way, shape or form did that describe Maddy. Surely the idiot could see that. She was blushing, for God’s sake!
Bristling, fighting an inexplicable urge to deck his friend, he gave Josh a frown that warned him to back off…or else. “Maddy, this joker is Josh.” The amenities taken care of, he growled, “Did you get it?”
Rolling his eyes, Josh turned to Maddy with a grin. “Don’t mind him. The man was born a grouch. Nice to meet you, Maddy. I believe these must be for you.”
“Me?” Surprised, Maddy gingerly took the small brown paper bag and looked at it as if she expected a snake to jump out of it any second. “What is it?”
“Disposable contacts,” he said. “Ace said you lost your glasses.”
“Yes, I did. But how in the world did you manage to get these at this hour of the morning?”
Grinning, he winked. “I have my sources. It’s safer for you if you don’t know what they are. You ever had contacts before?” At the shake of her head, his eyes started to dance. “I made sure instructions in English were included, but maybe I should help you put them in—”
“I’m sure she can figure it out by herself,” Ace said curtly, glaring at him. Nodding toward the rest rooms, which were almost directly across the concourse from them, he told Maddy, “You can put them in in there. Holler if you have a problem.”
Unable to believe that he’d called out a friend at that hour of the morning just to get her contacts, she stared at him in wonder, a smile she couldn’t contain stretching across her face as she clutched the bag to her as if it were more precious than diamonds. “I’ll be right back,” she promised breathlessly, and hurried away.
“She’s not your usual style,” Josh said into the silence left by her leave-taking. “You’re not serious about going after Barrera, are you? And taking her with you? Are you crazy, man?”
“I haven’t got much choice,” he said disgustedly. In a few short, concise words, he gave him the facts of the case. “The most expensive thing Lazear made off with was a diamond bellybutton ring that was once worn by Cleopatra herself, and I can only think of one man in this part of the world who would have both the interest and money to buy it.”
“Barrera,” Josh spit out in distaste.
“Exactly. And Lazear can’t get to him fast enough. I’ve got to stop him before he does.”
“Or before Barrera kills him for invading his space without an invitation.” Shaking his head over the task his friend had set himself, he said, “Damn, amigo, are you sure you want to do this? Tracking someone in the jungle is a tough job even for you. But to take a woman with you! Are you out of your mind? She’s a city girl, isn’t she? She’s going to freak the first time she sees a snake.”
“Then she’ll just have to freak,” Ace retorted. “Because I don’t have time to take her home. I’ve got to catch up with Sneakers before he gets behind the walls of Barrera’s jungle fortress or that ring will never be seen again.”
Chapter 4
By the time they reached Caracas, it was nearly lunchtime and the airport was bustling with activity. Bleary-eyed, unused to the contacts, Maddy followed Ace as he wove his way through the traffic crowding the concourse, her hands clutching at the belt loop of his new khakis under the tail of the outrageous Hawaiian-style shirt that stretched across his broad back. She, too, wore new clothes—jeans shorts that left her legs bare and a scooped-neck aqua T-shirt that was too low, too tight, too…sexy.
Resisting the urge to tug at the neckline, she was hit from all sides by a mixture of languages. Spanish, something that she felt sure must be an Indian dialect and a smattering of broken English that her tired ears simply refused to comprehend. It was wonderful and different, a kaleidoscope of color, foreign sounds and exotic smells. Normally, Maddy would
have been looking everywhere at once, committing it all to memory, hoarding the images for a lonely rainy day. But she was just too tired. She’d gotten just enough of a catnap on the plane to make her sick with exhaustion, and all she wanted to do was find someplace out of the flow of traffic and lay down. Just for a minute.
Ace, however, showed no signs of slowing down. His eyes sharp and clear, his strides quick, he forged through the crowd like a man on a mission, apparently not the least affected by the time zones they’d traversed or the minuscule bits of sleep he’d managed to grab over the course of the long night and morning. If anything, he seemed to be stronger and more alert than ever, never once dropping his guard as he led her outside to a taxi stand. If she hadn’t been so tired, Maddy’ would have found his whole demeanor extremely irritating. Did the man never run out of gas?
He hailed a cab with a sharp whistle, then gave the driver directions in a short spat of Spanish that might as well have been Greek for all it told Maddy. Tiredly, she slumped in her seat. “Where are we going?”
“Somewhere a cockroach like Lazear would feel right at home. The slums.”
Her brain fuzzy, Maddy frowned, trying to find the logic in that, but at the moment she couldn’t have added two plus two. “Why would he go there? I thought this Barrera character he’s trying to find lives in the jungle.”
“He does, but Barrera’s not going to be sitting in plain sight waiting for him. He’s the head of one of the world’s largest drug cartels, and rumor has it he’s got a regular fortress hidden in the rain forest somewhere, complete with his own army of mercenaries. Sneakers’ll never find it by himself, and no legitimate guide who values his skin will go anywhere near the place.”
Stretching out his long legs, he appeared relaxed beside her, but he automatically noted every turn the cabby made as they left the airport on the outskirts of town and traveled down the wide boulevards of the suburbs, then narrower streets where the houses were smaller. The area was still respectable, but all too quickly, the manicured yard of Caracas’s middle class gave way to a maze of twisting, rutted streets that were crowded with run-down shacks that should have been bulldozed down years ago.