His eyes went skyward as one hand rested lightly on her shoulder.
She didn’t push his hand away; instead, her attention remained on the sky and the bats coming out of the cave in one awe-inspiring, massive cloud. He looked in that direction but what he thought of was how her skin was warm, how the jut of her shoulder teased his palm, how her skin might feel like silk. He let his attention stray only slightly before he reeled it in, keeping an eye on the movements around him while appearing to marvel at the sight that everyone else was enthralled with.
She was watching—appearing to watch, anyway, but he knew that her mind wasn’t really there. He could feel it in the tense way she held herself. He would have liked to know what she was thinking. He assumed she was still fearful, still considering her options, still thinking about when she needed to bolt. What he knew for sure was that she was tense. He wanted to knead the soft skin and ease the tension from her.
He put his free hand over his eyes as if to get a better view. It was an amazing sight, but one he’d seen on a previous mission during which he’d killed two rogue former KGB agents. His familiarity with Malaysia was one of the reasons he’d been called on.
The wrinkle-lipped bats were a black mass. Their squeaking seemed to fill the evening sky. In a way it was oddly surreal. The cloud of bats made him feel as if he were a tourist like the others. He reached for her hand, tentatively brushing his palm against her fingers. She didn’t flinch or pull her hand away. His index finger brushed against her thumb. She tensed, and he held his breath, hoping she’d allow that one bit of contact.
They stood watching wave after wave of bats exit the cave. Their wings seemed to chafe the evening sky, their squeals echoing hollowly around them.
“Unbelievable,” she said when the last of the animals trailed from the cave. The Japanese couple smiled at them and chatted happily as they followed behind on the long hike back.
Thirty minutes later they were at the resort. In a way it had all been oddly anticlimactic.
Josh looked at his watch.
Time was slipping away.
Chapter Fourteen
Wednesday, October 14, Mulu
“I need a fly-in at exactly 19:00 hours, eight hours from now.”
“You’ve made contact. Got her panting after you.”
“Made contact,” Josh said shortly. He didn’t have time for Wade’s chauvinistic and rather outdated humor, but Wade was from another generation and despite a youthful appearance, a few decades older than Josh’s twenty-eight. That aside, Wade was his and Erin’s ticket out of this place.
“You’re okay?” Wade asked. “Haven’t heard from you in months.”
“Back-to-back assignments.”
“Look, we’ll talk after this. Get together. I’ve missed you, buddy.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Josh replied. He thought back to his conversation with Vern and what he’d learned and how it was not something to be shared with Wade. “I could use a few drinks, some laughs.”
“Say no more.”
Josh disconnected, thinking how much he missed just the friendship side of their relationship. Wade Gair had flown him in and out of hot spots since he’d first become a CIA operative. The two of them had trained together, military training first and then the more specialized training for the infiltration that their jobs demanded. Wade had been a latecomer to the CIA, arriving after a career in policing. In that time, and despite their age difference, they had become not just colleagues but friends.
His hand grazed the rail. It was muggy from the rain the previous night. The jungle was oddly quiet, which he found disturbing, almost ominous. A gecko skirted along the opposite railing and a multi-colored parrot-size bird stared at him from a nearby tree. He had no idea what kind of bird it was. He only knew that it was no threat and gorgeous. He scanned the area ahead. The pool was to his right, bracketed by lounge chairs and bordered by concrete. The rectangle of crystalline blue seemed to stretch endlessly. Empty, it was mesmerizingly still. A door shut on the main common area and a slight woman wearing the colorless dress of an employee came out carrying a tray. Again, no threat.
The click of a latch, and he turned but knew without a visual it was Erin.
She frowned when she saw him. There was something else in her look that had him pushing away from the railing, going to her.
“What’s wrong?”
“I’ve looked everywhere. The common area, out here, everywhere...”
“Everywhere?” Had he lost his touch? How had she ended up out here without his knowledge? Without... There was no time for second-guessing. “What did you lose?”
“A picture.” She hesitated as if she were going to say something else and then thought better of it.
“Picture?” His brows drew together. Considering everything that had happened to her, he couldn’t comprehend the importance of one picture.
“My father. He died when I was young. I know it may sound silly, but I carry his picture with me.” She hesitated. “I always have. And now it’s gone.” There was a haunted look in her eyes and a pallor to her face that made him realize that this was real, a fear unlike the case of claustrophobia-that-wasn’t yesterday. Whatever it was that was attached to that picture was as real as her flight to Mulu. And, he realized, despite the gravity of her situation, in this moment possibly more important.
He thought of the beaded earring in his pocket. He’d carried it for five years now, almost since he’d first joined the CIA. A talisman that he’d admitted to no one and a reminder of his mother who’d died five years ago, the victim of a home invasion and brutal rape.
“Did you have it after the Deer Cave yesterday?”
“I’m not sure.”
He glanced at his watch, although in a pinch he could approximate time by the position of the sun. There was no tour going to Deer Cave this morning and no tourists going on their own. He’d spoken to Tenuk and gotten a full account of the day’s activities. A group of tourists was going with a guide to one of the farther caves. They’d left more than an hour ago. Since the resort wasn’t at peak capacity, there were only a few left behind.
“I’m going to Deer Cave,” she said with determination and as if she had read his mind. “I can’t lose that picture.”
“Erin, I don’t think you—”
“That I should go there? Alone,” she finished as if they were an old married couple. “It’s okay, Josh. Broad daylight.”
He pushed away from the railing. He didn’t like the idea of her heading anywhere alone, especially to one of the caves. It wouldn’t happen.
“I have to go, Josh.” And there was steel in her voice. “That picture is everything to me. There are no others.”
“What do you mean? It’s not digital? Scanned?”
She shook her head.
No others. Josh was flabbergasted. In this day of computers, that there wasn’t a scanned picture on a disk drive somewhere was unfathomable.
“I have a copy on my computer, but this one...” She bit her lip again. “He gave it to me. He...”
He got it. Her father had touched it with his hands. And while that might seem overly sentimental to others, he could see the importance. He knew from his research that her father had died of a brain aneurysm when Erin was twelve.
He could see it was important enough for her to forget the danger that was so close, important enough for her to focus on the search rather than her plan to leave. The exit strategy was clear. He’d seen the map in her bag. Smart, using a physical map rather than relying on traceable technology. But her plan wouldn’t happen. She’d be out of here before she took action into her own hands. By the end of today she’d know who he was and welcome his protection. It was a comforting thought, but one way or another she was leaving tonight. In the meantime, they were still in the clea
r. Tenuk had reported less than thirty minutes ago that his sources along the river had seen nothing. So he’d humor her on a mission that he could see was of high sentimental importance.
Within the past thirty minutes, the first plane of the day had landed as scheduled and before it landed a quick background check on all of them had brought up nothing but innocuous tourists—two Americans, both women and neither travelling together, a French single woman and a Malaysian couple with two kids. And the pilot had been doing this run for a long time, his skin swarthy from years of sun, his eyes hidden within the folds of skin that had wrinkled in late middle age. None of them was a threat, yet going back on this path was ill-advised despite the signs pointing otherwise. It wasn’t facts he’d garnered but rather a gut reaction. He’d learned to trust gut reactions every bit as much, but how did he explain that to Erin. Truth at this point could damage the trust he’d already built between them.
“I often think if Dad hadn’t died, my sister, Sarah...” She hesitated. “I’m sorry. You don’t know her and now I’m burdening you with stupid family history.”
“It’s not stupid if it means something to you,” he assured her. He knew she had booked a boat ticket tomorrow. There was no way she was leaving here by boat or any other means by herself. He had hours to reveal the truth and get her to buy in. He pushed the thoughts aside and smiled encouragingly. “Tell me.”
“Sarah had a tough time growing up. She didn’t fit. She was shy, introspective, different—and kids bullied her.” She shook her head. “Look, I’m sorry. You don’t know what I’m talking about and it’s not relevant.”
He merely nodded. He knew exactly who Sarah was. Four years younger than Erin and the reason she was on the run. There was nothing he didn’t know about her, including that her sister was now in protective custody.
“If you want to talk about it,” he ventured.
“No.” She waved her hand. “I’m sorry. It’s just... I have to find that picture.”
Thirty minutes later they were back on the path heading to Deer Cave.
They didn’t go far or fast. She moved slowly, her attention shifting from right to left and into the dense foliage that bracketed the path. He had never seen her so jumpy, not even on that first day after all the horror of the explosion. Even then, despite the haunted look in her eyes, she had projected a composure that he had admired. Now he could see the tension in the way her shoulders were set and in her silence. And it was not over men with guns and a death wish, but rather one simple photograph. In a way it was as oddly endearing as it was disconcerting.
“I can’t lose it,” she muttered, twisting her hands together.
His gaze swept the jungle, the walkway and her.
“Tell me about your father,” he said as a way to disperse some of the tension. She was working herself into a state that threatened to be exhausting.
“I wasn’t close to him,” she said through tight lips.
That surprised him considering her reaction to the missing picture.
“I know.” She laughed, a dry, humorless sound that sent a sliver of warning straight to his gut. “You’re wondering, why am I in such a knot about this picture?” She stopped, stuffed her hands into the pockets of her shorts and looked somewhere past him, as if the answer were in the ever-changing yet never-changing jungle.
“He was your father. Understandable.”
“I think it was because I missed so much. I never really knew him. He was on the road a good portion of my childhood.” She pulled her hands from her pockets. “This is all irrelevant. We’re wasting time. The tours begin in an hour. It won’t be so easy to look at our leisure then.”
“But if you don’t find the picture you still have the memory.”
She stopped and swung around. “Thanks, Josh.” She hesitated. “For everything.”
“I haven’t done much—”
“You’ve done more than you know,” she interrupted with a hand on his arm. Her touch was hot and connected in a way that he wanted to reciprocate, to touch her back, to press her against the railing, to...
He put his hands on her upper arms, pulling her closer.
She didn’t stop him. Instead, there was an oddly puzzled look, a softer cast to her gaze.
His right hand cupped her cheek and his lips met hers. His tongue caressed the velvet skin, parting it as his hand moved downward, slipping along her ribs, flirting with the edge of her breast, imagining what it would be like to taste her there.
She moaned, and he pulled her closer, his crotch hard and tight against her belly, his arm around her waist, his tongue plundering her mouth.
Security.
Damn it, he thought.
“I’m sorry.” He pushed her gently away, steadying her but putting distance between them with his arms.
She pulled away from him, stumbled back, her eyes confused and clouded.
“Sorry?” she asked, and her hand swept the curve of her waist and then dropped. “I... You’re right. That shouldn’t have happened.”
“I hope this doesn’t stand in the way of our friendship.”
“No.” She stumbled. “No. Of course not. I shouldn’t have, either. I...I need to find that picture.”
He took her hand. “C’mon, let’s keep going.”
It was minutes of silence, of him trailing her, watching her and watching the jungle around them before he spoke.
“Where are you going after here?” It was an inane question, but it was safe.
“I’m not sure,” she said. Her eyes scanned the walk as if the picture would miraculously appear in the middle of a path that had seen too many footprints since yesterday.
And from the tone of her voice he knew that she was sure.
It was almost time to reveal the truth. That her destination was not what she thought, and he was not who she believed.
Almost.
A ray of sun shone down and seemed not only blindingly bright but reminded him of their narrow time frame, how the morning was already aging out, and the situation that could heat up at any minute. He looked left, then right, his hand ready to grab his weapon at any time.
They were at the mouth of Deer Cave. The jungle was oddly quiet and the bats safe in their rooftop hollows, sleeping until the rush for feeding tonight. It seemed despite millions of breathing, sleeping bats, they were alone.
“I hate to say it, but that picture is more than likely lost.”
“It can’t be, Josh.” She shook her head.
“You didn’t go into this cave, so there’s no point going in now.” And despite his words and the hint that she had a choice, there was none. She wouldn’t be entering that cave with or without him.
“You’re right.” She hugged her arms to her chest and looked so forlorn he almost took her into his arms without thought.
A crack broke the tension of his thoughts. The sound was foreign and unlike the sounds that he had heard in the time they had been at the resort. He tensed, prepared to act, to protect her.
One hand was on his gun, the other on her elbow.
There was a split second of silence and then a branch snapped hollowly as something shrieked in the heart of the forest. The crack was followed by a flash of light and an echo that volleyed in the brush, reverberating through the dense foliage that closed around them. A warning, a missed shot. He suspected the latter and dove into action.
“Get down!”
He had her around the waist, hitting the ground first and rolling with her. He lifted his head from where they lay flat to the wooden walkway. There was silence. Worse, he couldn’t see through the thick canopy of long-leafed plants and tall grass that bordered the walkway and seemed to close in around them. They blocked any view he might have. He didn’t know what view the shooter had.
Josh had his Gloc
k in one hand. He silently indicated that she should remain where she was. Her eyes confirmed that she understood. She lay motionless, but he could feel her tension and knew she was poised to run.
He scanned the area, searching. The whisper of the jungle began to heat up and something shrilled again, as if warning of change, of danger deep in its depths.
He drew in a tense breath as he considered what that single shot had meant. Was it a warning or a way of drawing them out and off the path? It was all the data he had, and he had to make a decision. To remain on the wooden boardwalk was to remain in the open—a target. They had to get back to the resort, to safety.
His analysis was broken by another shot to the left, but seemingly distant enough that Josh suspected the shooter was firing at random. The odds were high that he didn’t have a clear view of them, any more than they did of him. But the second shot was too close and within seconds of that shot, Josh had his arm around her and was again rolling along the wooden pathway to the right and toward a dip that took them closer to the jungle floor. With the shots coming from behind them, there was no way they could go back the way they came. They had to move ahead, and the nearby cave was no option.
He thought of the river in Clearwater Cave, a back entrance that could lead them to the resort and potentially to safety. Safety, that was, if he could keep the target unharmed and stop their pursuer.
He ran through the layout of the cave, the path and the suspected location of the shooter. They were far enough ahead, and the pathway angled for a few hundred feet in a way that would be to their advantage. And with the pursuer behind them, they were being pushed forward and that made forward the logical way to go. He couldn’t judge the distance, but whoever it was, was well concealed by jungle.
He rose with a tight grip on her hand.
“Let’s move.”
He met resistance but he’d expected that and was ready to power through. He turned and with gritted teeth said, “Look, Erin, I know who you are.”
“Who are you?” she whispered, her voice tight, almost strangled.
Suspect Witness Page 10