Midnight Shadows

by Nancy Gideon

  "So we can get on with your plans?"

  He shouldn't have missed the ice creeping into that claim, but he did.

  "Yes. The plans I've made for the two of us."

  "How good of you to decide my future for me as if I were incapable of doing it for myself. Poor little Sheba, so confused and in need of direction."

  "That's not what I meant."

  "Isn't it? Hasn't it always been? Haven't you just been humoring me all along?"

  "Sheba, it's not like that."

  "Of course it is, Paulo. It's just like that. You wanted to bring me here so I'd fall apart and you could get me to admit that I'm helpless. Then you'd be the strong one, the hero, and take care of everything for me. Isn't that why you resent Frank Cobb?"

  "Don't bring him into this,” Paulo growled, his bristly attitude confirming her summation.

  "I didn't have to. You did."

  "Sheba."

  And there it was in his tone.

  "Don't patronize me, Paulo. I am not a little girl anymore. I'm not helpless and I'm not crazy. And I am not in love with you."

  That wasn't how she'd meant to say it, blurting it out with an amputating slash, but she was glad it was said. It had to be said.

  Paulo stared at her for a long moment. Varying emotions swept across his dark gaze like clouds scudding ominously across the moon. His jaw worked upon his pride and disappointment. And finally the pride, that overpowering Latin pride, won out.

  "You are wrong, Sheba. We are meant for one another. Once we put your past to rest, you will see. You will love me."

  In a flat, somber tone that left no room for question or hope, she told him, “No, Paulo, I won't."

  She gasped as he grabbed her forearms and yanked her hard against him. She angled her head away from his attempt to kiss her, and his bruised pride evolved into anger. He pushed her from him, not caring that she nearly fell or that he'd left darkening circles upon her arms from the possessive bite of his fingers. He glared at her, seething with fury and injury.

  "You will regret this, you and your Americano lover."

  "Frank's not my—"

  He waved a hand to cut off her protest. In his mind, that could be the only excuse for her rejection. As if afraid he'd come to violence if he remained, Paulo stalked away from the fire and into the night. At first Sheba felt relief, then concern. He hadn't taken a light.

  "Paulo. Paulo, come back."

  "Don't you dare consider running after him."

  She whirled to face Frank Cobb who had very probably witnessed the whole sordid affair and was probably snickering over his supposed part in it. She struck out at him in her frustration and embarrassment.

  "Don't presume to tell me what to do."

  "Then don't try to make your problems my fault."

  She was angry at him, irrationally, illogically furious and all without cause. Or perhaps because she had no cause. She wished Paulo's accusations were true. She wished she could claim Frank Cobb was her lover. She wished, foolishly, that he'd made those same declarations about a future and plans and hopes. But he hadn't and he wouldn't and that's why she was so mad.

  That wasn't his fault.

  But it didn't stop her from being angry.

  "No, of course not, Mr. Cobb. None of this is your doing. Your job is to sneak around in the shadows, to manipulate and lie to get things to go your way. Or rather your employer's way."

  "I haven't lied to you."

  Said so calmly, with such bland sincerity, was rubbing salt into her wounded ego.

  "You're lying right now. Maybe you're just so used to it, you don't even realize you're doing it."

  Still, he remained unruffled in the face of her tirade. “What have I told you that's not true?"

  "That you were here to help me."

  "That's not what I said, Doc. I told you why I was here. I'm here because Harper sent me to do a job."

  That's exactly what he'd told her. Over and over. Just a job. Work and travel.

  "And I'm just a job to you? That's not what you let me think."

  "I didn't lead you on, Sheba. I never let you think there was anything personal going on."

  No, he hadn't. Damn him.

  There were tears on her cheeks. Her voice shivered like a petulant child's.

  "But you said you believed me. You told me to trust you. And all along, all along, it was just a lie to keep me happy, to keep me out of the way, to keep me from poking around where Peyton Samuels doesn't want me."

  "Why would you think that, Doc?"

  "Because I heard them talking. Sam and Rosa. I heard him saying that he'd hired the best to make sure I didn't get out of line."

  "To make sure you didn't get hurt,” he corrected quietly. “That's why he hired me."

  She took a great hitching breath, blinking against the burn in her eyes. “What?” She swallowed hard, struggling to rein in her runaway emotions. “You mean you weren't trying to placate me with what you said?"

  "What I said was the truth. I told you I believed you because I do. It's not personal, Doc. The job is never personal. I can't afford to let it be more than a job."

  "I see.” She sniffed up her tears and frantic feelings, trying to look as though that truth wasn't almost as bad as the lie.

  He smiled, a thin cocky smile that lifted one corner of his mouth and crinkled the scar upon his cheek. An indulgent gesture. “No. You don't see. It's more than just the job, Doc. That's the hell of it."

  She wasn't sure which of them made the first move, but suddenly their arms were entwined, their lips wildly slanting, their tongues tangling in a forest fire kiss that singed all the way to her toes. She grabbed at his head, clenching her fingers in the short nap of his hair while his combed through her unruly curls. And there was nothing the least bit impersonal in the way he sought to acquaint himself with her tonsils.

  All hot and cold and shivery inside, she gave her all to that kiss, all the loneliness, the longing, the hunger, the need, not just for anyone. For him. And if he didn't realize that by the time they broke apart to grab for breath, then he wasn't such a smart guy after all.

  His eyes blazed, rich, green-gold fire. Burning for her and her alone. And his smile, that crooked, smug smile made her feel like laughing out loud over how foolish she'd been to think he wasn't interested. A mistake she wouldn't make again.

  But what to do about it?

  She stroked through his hair and let her fingertips trail down to the sides of his mulish jaw.

  "Is this a good thing, Frank? It feels like a very good thing."

  "It could be, Doc. Right now I'd lay odds on it."

  Her eyes closed languidly and she leaned back into his kiss, this time sampling him fully with a thoroughness that wrung a groan of restless complaint from him. For that moment, the world and all its problems ceased to exist. There was only the delicious taste of Frank Cobb made doubly sweet by the drizzling of her own pent up desires.

  "Let's get a room,” he whispered huskily against her provoking lips.

  "I'm afraid the accommodations are rather primitive out here."

  "I'm feeling rather primitive at the moment."

  He was feeling huge and urgent where his hips ground into hers. A giddy sense of excitement rippled through her, of a wondrous discovery about to be made.

  Until Frank stepped back from her with a suddenness that left her gasping. Fumbling to gather her wayward senses the way she'd put together disheveled clothing if they'd had time to go that far, she followed the intensity of his stare to the edge of camp.

  To where Paulo Lemos stumbled into the light, his eyes glazed.

  His throat black with blood.

  Chapter Seventeen

  "What are we going to do?"

  Frank looked at the pale figure tossing restlessly on the cot. His response was grim. “We go back. We have no choice now. He's lost too much blood. He needs a hospital, a transfusion, care we can't give him out here."

  Sheba tried to look up
on Paulo's deathly white features without tearing up. Panic beat in her breast. She would have thought she'd jump at Cobb's suggestion of retreat. Why she didn't was a mystery to her.

  "What ... what attacked him?"

  Cobb peeled back the crude bandage from his neck to reveal the twin puncture wounds. “My guess would be a myth. What would yours be?"

  A vampire.

  He was saying it was a vampire.

  But at least he wasn't saying I told you so. Raking her fingers through the chaos of her rumpled hair, blocking her mind to the remembrance of Frank Cobb doing the same thing only an hour before, Sheba tried to think logically. An explanation. There had to be one. Something other than a preternatural creature from the late show. Something that wouldn't defy the rationale she followed when casting doubt upon fiction and poking holes through fantasy. But those avenues failed her when confronted by this truth. Something had attacked Paulo Lemos and drained him nearly dry in a matter of minutes, without a sound, without raising any suspicion or alarm.

  While she and Frank Cobb were lip-locked only yards away and oblivious to his peril.

  And if Paulo died, he would be on her conscience, too.

  She closed her eyes, breathing deep, struggling to separate fright from reason. Failing.

  Outside, the rest of their group muttered in increasingly vocal anxiety. Sheba's cry upon seeing Paulo had pulled them out of their tents but Cobb, quick-thinking Cobb, had covered the source of the attack.

  "What are we going to tell them?” Sheba asked, referring to the others who waited for some word.

  Cobb's smile took a cynical turn. “That he was bitten by something potentially fatal. No sense causing a panic and no sense trying anything before daybreak. Going out into the forest at night would be ... suicide."

  "So we wait."

  "And we watch."

  And Sheba watched as Frank took another from his collection of silver crosses and fastened it about Paulo's neck, just below the patch that covered his contamination. By what? A vampire? Vampire bat, perhaps. That would explain the mark. But she had the feeling that Frank Cobb wouldn't go for that explanation. And beside, how big would a bat have to be to consume such a quantity of human blood? Man-sized. Sheba shuddered as the trap of logic closed tighter about her. A logic that said Cobb was right, had been right all along.

  There were monsters.

  Her gaze followed Cobb as he rose to his feet and approached her. The awareness of how he'd tasted, how he'd felt, so hard and strong against her, momentarily swamped her senses. Then the fact that they'd been enjoying one another while Paulo's life was being drained away sucked all the passion from her memories. She went cold inside.

  "Here."

  Cobb hooked one of the small crucifixes about her neck as well. The metal quickly warmed to the heat of her skin.

  "Don't take that off."

  "Shouldn't I wear a necklace of garlic, too?"

  Cobb didn't smile at her slightly frayed attempt at humor. “If I had one, you'd be wearing it. You need to take extra precautions. When he wakes up, he might be ... different."

  She fingered the cross and looked back to where Paulo tossed and turned in a fever of possession. “Different? Different, how?"

  "He belongs to Alexander now. He'll be his master's eyes and ears during the day and his puppet during the night."

  "Isn't that a bit dramatic?” she asked, wishing it was, knowing it wasn't.

  "Believe what you want, Doc, if the evidence isn't enough to convince you."

  She took a shaky breath. “If this creature is after you, why attack Paulo?"

  "To make us go back. He'll know it's too dangerous to travel with him, for Lemos’ sake and ours. That was the whole idea, wasn't it? To sabotage this trip. To keep us out of the jungle."

  "Why? What's out here that's more important than the lives already lost?"

  "The lives of an indigenous tribe. A way of life and the means to support it. I don't know. I'm not a philosopher or an ethnologist. This is more your area than mine. With Alexander, there doesn't have to be a reason."

  "Other than to get back at you. It would seem that you're our problem, Cobb."

  "Now who's being overly simplistic. The problem was here before I was, but I can be the solution. I know the enemy—"

  "And he's gotten the upper hand on you again."

  Cobb's features closed down tight.

  With a sigh, Sheba rubbed her aching brow. “I'm sorry. I'm being an idiot. We've got enough to worry about without tearing at each other."

  Cobb accepted her apology without a blink. “I'll go tell the others that we're leaving in the morning."

  After he'd slipped out of the tent, Sheba went to kneel next to Paulo. His terrible white skin and shallow breathing brought tears of anxiousness and frustration at last. This was her fault. If she hadn't been so brutal in her rejection of him, he wouldn't have placed himself in jeopardy, alone in the jungle. If she had been a true friend, she would have been watching out for him instead of pursuing her own selfish desires. She'd come all this way, back into the shadow of her nightmares because he'd called and when he needed her the most, she'd failed him.

  "I'm sorry, Paulo. I should have been stronger for you."

  Lifting his alarmingly cold hand in hers, she pressed her cheek against the back of it and let sorrow shake through her shoulders. When she felt the faint stir of his fingers, she leaned back to anxiously search his ghostly features for signs of awareness.

  His eyes opened, burning like dark coals. Though he stared at her, there was no recognition.

  "You have the key, Sheba.” His words rasped out, dry and cracked, the voice not his own. “How many must die before you find the courage to use it."

  Chill fingers closed about her hand with a strength both crushing and dominating. Sheba lunged back, pulling free.

  "What's going on?"

  She turned to Cobb, teetering on the edge of a scream. “Nothing."

  His narrowed gaze said, Yeah, right. Looks like nothing, but he didn't challenge her directly. He had an uncanny ability to recognize when the time was right to keep his mouth shut.

  And maybe it was time for her to show a little courage.

  * * * *

  Neither she nor Cobb slept that night. Paulo grew weaker and, finally, as daybreak approached, his thrashings stilled. He lay close to death.

  It was then that courage came to Sheba.

  She said nothing to Cobb. He had his own job to do. This was hers.

  And when Paulo was strapped down on a makeshift litter and everyone was anxious and ready to start back, she let them know her plans.

  "I'm not going with you."

  Cobb's stare came up with an intensity that nearly knocked her backward. “Yes, you are."

  She took a breath. She'd come up against difficult obstacles before. She wasn't about to let Frank Cobb intimidate her.

  But she could see why he was so good at what he did even as she put her best argument forward.

  "I've come too far to give up now. If I go back, I'll never find the answers I need. That's why Paulo brought me here, to put the past to rest."

  "And I was brought here to make sure the both of you survived this little expedition. There's no way I'm going to let you wander off by yourself."

  "I won't be wandering. I know this jungle inside out. I was raised here, remember.” Her smile was thin, almost condescending. “There's no way you can stop me, Frank. This isn't about you or Paulo or Sam. It's about me and the things I have to know. If Paulo's grandfather has the answers, I have to ask the questions. I have to know. I can't go back without knowing."

  He studied her for a long, stoic moment then pronounced, “Bull. You're going with us if I have to carry you the whole way."

  She shook her head, still smiling the enigmatic smile. “No you won't, Frank. You'll let me go. Your job is to stay with Paulo, and I'm trusting you to do that job, to keep him alive and safe. Earn that paycheck."

&nb
sp; For a minute, she thought he might actually say to hell with it and go against his duty for her sake. But being Cobb, she should have known better. He gestured to the others to pick up their gear and to her, he had a terse suggestion.

  "Watch your back, Doc."

  Swallowing down the sense of disappointment, she nodded. “Do the same."

  With one last look at Paulo, who was critical at best, she turned and continued on. She didn't look back as she heard Cobb give brusque orders for them to move out in a judicious hurry. Without her.

  Cobb would see that Paulo was safe. He'd earn that big paycheck.

  And she would continue on to confront her demons. And earn her self-respect.

  * * * *

  By late day, she started climbing. Shaded by the jungle canopy, it wasn't bad at first. Then the foliage thinned, and the sun's intensity increased, beating down on her shoulders like the heavy yoke of her thoughts. Spongy ground gave way to hard-packed earth and the path, as well as the going, got rocky. That was good. Having to concentrate on the step-by-step of her travel kept her from ruminating over the whole of it. It was too late to second guess her choice. She'd never catch the others before darkness fell, and there was no way she was going back into that forest alone after nightfall.

  Besides, what could they do to protect her from the fears that lived in her mind?

  What could Cobb do to protect her from his monster?

  What to believe? Was his creature the same entity that stalked her in her dreams? How could that be? And how did the one or the both tie into the death of her parents? And why? The why had always been the worst. The not knowing. The wondering why she alone survived.

  And what had she done with the precious life that had been spared? She'd continued to live it in the shadows, alone and afraid. Was that the kind of testimony her parents would have wanted from her? Had their fate meant so little that she'd hidden from the truth of it for twenty years? She'd convinced herself that she was doing the good and right thing, destroying the illusions that preyed upon people's lives through fear and ignorance. And yet while conquering their demons, she'd let her own go unchecked. Wasn't it time she stopped challenging the symbolic dragon and confronted the real one which scorched her dreams in flames of dread and mocked her from the empty corners of her mind? She'd always known the answer was here, and yet she's chosen to avoid seeking out that truth.