The Payback Assignment (Stark and O'Brien Thriller Series) Page 4

  Felicity stared into his ice blue eyes. They were the eyes of a professional, a man who could kill without remorse. For neatness’ sake perhaps, he would avoid killing if that course proved convenient.

  People who have never been there often wonder if they would hesitate at a time like this. However, when one looks death in the face, one’s values become very clear. Her face formed a tired smile and she shrugged her shoulders.

  “What the hell,” she said. “I can always steal another priceless antique brooch.” Slowly she reached into her bag and produced her glittering prize. She tipped her hand and watched the brooch slide off her palm and land in Paul’s. “By the way,” she said, “What in the world led you to me here? I don’t announce my travel plans and I don’t use my real name. Besides, there must be hundreds of hotels in Acapulco.”

  “Over two hundred and fifty, actually,” Paul said.

  “So how’d you find me?”

  “I’m thorough.”

  When the other two men returned, Paul turned off the emergency button allowing the car to descend. Then he passed the brooch to one of his partners, a pudgy man in a crumpled plaid suit. He examined the brooch with a jeweler’s glass, and verified the object’s authenticity with a nod of his head. The third man, evidently a native, stared at her with undisguised lust.

  Paul maintained the perfect distance from her, out of reach yet in complete control. Leaving the hotel by a side door, the small group entered a black Cadillac limousine. Pudgy drove, Paul shared the front seat and Felicity sat in the back with number three. Paul’s automatic stayed on her the entire time.

  “We have a long drive ahead of us,” Paul said. “We must meet a large yacht on the East Coast, somewhat south of Mexico. If you cooperate we shall leave you alive in a, er, rural area somewhere along the way.”

  At the edge of the city, the limousine pulled up behind a large four by four type vehicle. Paul guided her to the new vehicle with his gun. Her three captors assumed their prior seating arrangement and they drove away, apparently abandoning the Cadillac. Before long, they were cruising smoothly down the asphalt road. The tires whined on the highway but it did not last long. Soon the asphalt faded to gravel, then into dirt.

  They continued rolling, on into the night. In the darkness she knew there was very little chance she could remember the route. With few useful alternatives available, no information on which to build a plan and apparently no immediate danger, she did the only thing that seemed useful and reasonable. She closed her eyes, settled her breathing and went to sleep.

  She awoke when the Trooper pulled to a stop. She knew instinctively that four hours had passed. Pudgy and the Mexican each took a rest stop behind a tree. Pudgy returned to the car, but his partner stood beside the vehicle when he returned.

  “Would you like to go into the woods to relieve yourself?” Paul asked her.

  “I’d go just for a moment of privacy, I would.”

  “Sorry,” Paul said. “I will have to watch you, of course.”

  “In that case, never mind.”

  Four hours later, soon after daybreak, they stopped again. The Mexican took down one of the three ten-gallon gasoline cans on the rear of the Trooper and emptied it into the gas tank. Paul repeated his offer to her and this time, she grudgingly accepted. She took fifteen long paces away from the narrow lane and found a spot between two healthy trees. Flashing defiance, she stared into Paul’s eyes while she hiked up her dress, slid off her panties and lowered herself. It was not the first time Felicity ever squatted in tall grass, but she viewed Paul’s presence as an invasion. He kept the gun trained on her, but handed her a roll of paper when she was in position. And when he heard the sound watering the ground he turned his eyes away. It was a small gesture but somehow it had value to her.

  When they returned to the vehicle, Pudgy stood at the back opening a cooler on the tailgate. He distributed breakfast sandwiches and bottles of water. Back in the SUV, the kidnappers returned to their original seating plan.

  This routine continued throughout the day and into the next evening with little to occupy Felicity’s mind except to count the minutes and try to guess where they were going. She slept a lot, but her body would only accept so much of that. So she sat, twenty-five hours and forty minutes after her abduction by Felicity’s flawless reckoning, trying to catch a glimpse of the world outside the vehicle. It was deep in the night again, a dense field of stars and a sliver of a moon lighting the sky. It was the Mexican’s turn to share the back seat with her. Leering, he reached out to stroke her arm with a sweaty hand.

  “We could have some fun with this one,” he said, grinning through crooked yellow teeth. His accent was a chilling cartoon caricature.

  “You wouldn’t enjoy it,” she said evenly, continuing to stare straight ahead. “I’d just lay there still. Be like having a dead body, it would. And just before you finished, I’d reach underneath, sink my nails in deep and rip your balls out.” She smiled pleasantly.

  “Bitch!” His sweaty palm arced over, slapping hard across her face. Paul signaled with his gun for the Mexican to back off. She turned back toward him in slow motion, looking up from beneath a rumpled mass of red hair. Her emerald eyes glowed out from the shadows. Her voice was polar ice.

  “What’s your name?”

  “Paco,” the Mexican said, grinning. Then he saw her frozen smile.

  “Paco,” she cooed, “You’re a dead man.”

  At that point Paul signaled to the pudgy driver. The four by four vehicle pulled over into the trees. Vegetation blocked the left side door, next to Paco. Felicity’s only looked that way because the tropical grass grew so high.

  “I believe this is your stop, Miss O’Brian,” Paul said, pointing for emphasis with his gun. “Take some advice. If you’re smart, you’ll accept this loss maturely and move on to other projects.”

  She stepped out of the vehicle with her head high, her jaw jutting forward. She slammed the door hard, and the sound echoed through the emptiness. As the Isuzu pulled away, the night noises closed in on her. Darkness held no terror for her, and she recognized the sounds of crickets and frogs from her youth. But without knowing what other wildlife might be around, traveling at night would be stupid. Knowing only a couple of hours separated her from daylight, she found a thick, squat tree and climbed into its branches. There she curled up as best she could to wait for dawn.

  “We will meet, mister mystery man,” she muttered to herself, “And you’re going to regret double-crossing this girl.”

  -9-

  The baked sand of the narrow road burned into the soles of Felicity’s feet. It was a pain she accepted. She could not have walked another step in those damned high heels.

  She had shivered through the night but fear had kept her awake. When dawn finally came she had started walking. Within an hour she was barefoot. That was no big deal. She spent most of her youth that way anyway. An hour or so later she discarded her hosiery. Soon after she tore off her gown to just above her knees. Thai silk gowns, she soon discovered, do not rip easily. Just getting a hole started cost her another fingernail. It hurt, but the gown was too restrictive for walking. She needed the mobility.

  She ached everywhere. Hunger gnawed at her belly. Not the first time in her life for that, either. She was very thirsty too, but she ignored it. Hatred, gleaming in her eyes, was all that sustained her.

  She had no idea if she was even pushing on in the right direction. She saw no landmarks, and the scenery was totally monotonous. She felt as if she was walking on a monstrous treadmill, a lone, lost hamster spinning her wheel, expecting somehow to make progress. Yet she continued.

  She made it ten twenty-six a.m. when she first heard the new sound. An engine, she thought, and it seemed to be getting louder. A vehicle, heading her way! For a brief moment, she reflexively tried to straighten her dress and touch up her hair, before realizing what a hopeless effort that would be. Her chance for rescue would most likely turn out to be a simple local fa
rm boy approaching in an old pickup truck. He would probably beat her, rape her, and dump her in the next jungle.

  Then again, maybe that was not the worst possibility. As the vehicle approached she identified it as an aging, green army jeep. A big black man in camouflage fatigues was driving. He stared stonily ahead, keeping the vehicle centered on the bumpy road.

  At the last possible instant, she nimbly leaped to the side. The silent driver locked up the brakes. The jeep ground to a halt directly in front of the girl. The driver’s head never turned.

  “Get in,” he growled in a hoarse voice. It took Felicity only a second to weigh her options and decide that any company was better than being alone in the jungle. With a shrug she put one hand on the dashboard and the other on the back of the seat to lift herself up. But with one foot in the jeep, she froze. Her eyes were riveted on the small submachine gun lying on the passenger seat. That sight prompted her to look up and reevaluate the driver. He carried the foul stench of river water and was covered with a talc-like layer of road dust.

  “Well, you’re no prize either,” the driver snapped, seeming to read her mind. “Come on! It’s either me or the coral snakes and rattlers.”

  Her eyes bulged. Snakes? She had not thought about snakes. Gingerly she picked up the gun, which turned out to be heavier than she expected it to be. She placed it on the jeep’s back seat with both hands, then climbed into the passenger seat. Her behind had barely touched the seat when the driver slammed the gas pedal to the floor. The jeep bolted forward like a spurred stallion, slamming Felicity back into the hard seat.

  Before she could speak, he tossed a question into the silence.

  “Name?”

  “Felicity,” she responded, starting to blush a bit. “Felicity O’Brian. Listen, glory, I wanted to thank you, and I didn’t even think to ask your name.”

  “Morgan Stark,” he said, smiling slightly. “And you certainly can thank me. I drove a few miles out of my way to pick you up.”

  Felicity wasn’t sure how that could be, but she decided to let his remark lie. The silence lasted for a good two minutes. Finally she had to ask.

  “Okay. I give up. How could you know I was out there?” She found herself smiling broadly when he finally turned to look at her.

  “I don’t know, lady. Really. I just felt this pull, you know? Somebody over this way, in trouble. Alone. Maybe lost. But not scared.”

  “I see.” She was about to elaborate when a sharp curve almost threw her out of the jeep. “Are you in a particular hurry, Mister Stark?”

  “Well, actually, there is a small chance that most of the local army is on my trail. I think I lost them, but I don’t like to push my luck.”

  “The army?” She was grinning uncontrollably now. “I seem to have hooked up with quite a character. Just exactly what did you do?”

  “Well, let’s just say I got caught on the wrong side of a little local political conflict.”

  “Oh.” Felicity’s mind was alight with a dozen romantic notions concerning “mercs.” Was he a hardened killer? A professional soldier? A bored adventurer? Perhaps all of these. In any case, she was instantly fascinated.

  “What about you?” Morgan asked. “How did you come to be alone, in the jungles of Belize, miles from civilization, and so, well, inappropriately dressed?” This guy sounded mighty literate for a grunt type field soldier to her. She figured she had best tread lightly.

  “Well, the truth is, a business associate of mine decided to play a little trick on me.”

  The two travelers glanced at each other. She decided she liked his smile and got the impression he liked hers. After the brief nonverbal exchange he turned his attention back to driving.

  “How long you been out here?” Morgan asked.

  Felicity looked down, shaking her head in self-mockery. “Gawd, I spent the night in a tree.”

  Nodding, Morgan reached up under his seat and presented her with a green plastic canteen.

  “You dear, sweet man is that water?” A shake told her that the canteen was about two thirds full. She gratefully accepted it, starting to guzzle greedily. The water was warm, but it was wet and clean, and she hadn’t known how thirsty she was until she tasted the first precious drop.

  “Slowly,” Morgan said. “If you drink too fast, you’ll give yourself cramps. How long since you’ve had any water?”

  “I don’t know,” Felicity said between swallows. “Late yesterday afternoon I guess. Is this all we got?”

  “Afraid so,” Morgan said. “And we won’t have any more for a while. The next safe town is about thirty-five clicks away. I kind of need to stick to small towns until we hit Mexico.”

  Felicity nodded. “Hey, can I ask you a question?” When Morgan shrugged, she continued. “You sure seem to know this area awfully well. How is it you know which way to go?”

  “Got a map,” Morgan said. “The next town is almost due north.”

  “Oh. You’ve got a compass too, then.”

  “Nope. Don’t need one. Always know where north is. Now, any more questions?” His face flashed defiance, as if he expected an argument.

  “Well, yes. What’s a click?”

  “A kilometer,” Morgan said, flashing a sarcastic smile. “Thirty-five clicks is about...”

  “I know what a kilometer is. Thirty-five kilometers is a little over twenty miles, I’d guess. Not far, really.”

  However, fifteen minutes later, their transportation almost vetoed their plan. The jeep slipped completely out of gear. Morgan almost growled, but despite his playing the pedals furiously, it happened again. Noxious fumes belched out of the undercarriage. Morgan’s right arm knotted as he yanked and shoved the gearshift lever. Alternately cursing and pleading, Morgan managed to cajole the vehicle to the edge of a dirt street village in first gear.

  “Any idea what’s wrong?” Felicity asked. Morgan looked at her as if she just asked him what the steering wheel was.

  “Oh, nothing except a burned out transmission. Probably just hasn’t been serviced right. No big surprise.”

  “Well, how far are we from any place worth being?” she asked as they descended from the jeep.

  “About five clicks from the border.”

  “Three miles,” Felicity said. “Not that bad. How about to a real city?”

  “Two hundred and seventy miles from Merida. Long walk,” he said. “Especially with...” his voice trailed off.

  “With what?” she asked. “Excess baggage?”

  “You said it, I didn’t.”

  “I’ll try to keep up,” she said. “Now, do you suppose we can get something to eat in this place?”

  A sharp look told her she might be pushing too hard. Grabbing up the canteen and shoving his submachine gun into a sack from the back seat, Morgan headed toward town. The track they were on slowly swelled to almost twice its width. It appeared to be the village’s main street. In fact, Felicity began to suspect it was the only street. Despite his long, powerful stride, she followed close behind her rescuer. His grim visage would intimidate anyone they encountered, including her. She simply could not understand why some people can’t try to make the best of a bad situation.

  As they passed a couple of small shacks Felicity got the feeling she had seen this very village in an old spaghetti western. Unwashed children played in the unpaved street, which was lined with wooden buildings. They walked into a small cafe, which also looked like something out of the Old West. A bar counter spanned one wall, in front of shelves crowded with unrecognizable bottles. The rest of the space was cluttered with round wooden tables. Only two of the tables were occupied, in both cases by older couples. The looked fairly clean, despite the fact that it smelled of hot oil and perspiration.

  Morgan moved toward a table in the corner, reaching for the chair with the best view of the door. Felicity liked sitting with her back to the corner as well, but settled for the side with her back to the wall. From habit, she stood next to her seat, waiting. Morgan sat down,
evidently oblivious to her. With a sigh, she seated herself. She had a good view of both the door, and his face.

  Surely they made an unusual sight in this rural locale, or in fact anywhere, but the aging proprietor hastened over to them. He seemed to make a point of not noticing anything odd about them, as if he dealt with armed black soldiers and ragged barefoot white women all the time.

  “Buenos dias,” he said pleasantly.

  “English?” Morgan asked, not looking up.

  The tavern owner nodded and his smile never changed. “Good morning. Our menu is small, but I can offer you fresh lemonade on this hot day.”

  “We’ll take a pitcher,” Morgan said. “Strong and sweet. And a fat beef enchilada. Re-fried beans. Small bowl of chili. Twice.”

  The old man nodded more deeply and moved away. When he was gone, Felicity leaned toward Morgan and said in conspiratorial tones, “He speaks English!”

  “Of course he does,” Morgan said. “Belize is not Mexico, you know. You’ll hear a lot of Spanish here, and a kind of Cajun dialect, but English is the official language. This little country was a British Crown Colony for a hundred years. Only got its independence in ‘81.”

  “Oh.” Felicity fell silent. She was sure she must look like a total idiot to him, and did not want to give him any further evidence. His mind seemed light years away anyway, which suited her just fine. It gave her time to think. As always, she had a plan. It percolated in her mind while she excused herself to visit the ladies room. It too proved clean, although she didn’t enjoy washing her face and hands in cold water.

  When she returned to the table, she saw that Morgan had also washed while she was gone. She found him easier to look at with clean hands and face but she wished he would smile more. Soon after she sat down their food came, on chipped china plates. Morgan fell on his hungrily. Felicity poured and emptied two glasses of lemonade before she even approached the food. She finally lifted a fork full of the beans as if judging their weight, and dropped them back onto her plate.