Into the Wild (18 page)

G
ATOR'S STOMACH LURCHED
as The Conquistador piloted his helicopter through a turbulent patch of sky. So many clouds. Some of them black. He worried that his employer was insane enough to fly into the storm dead ahead, but at the last second, the man made a sharp turn and dip and suddenly they were skimming the top of the jungle.

Holy shit.

Con laughed and Gator realized the man was fucking with him. “Few have the balls to fly into the Llanganatis,” he yelled over the engine's roar.

In other words, few were crazy enough.

“Commercial airliners steer clear,” Con added as they gained altitude and sped toward a cloud-covered mountain. “This area is known as South America's Bermuda Triangle.”

Great.

Gator was beginning to doubt his own sanity. Instead of calling The Conquistador from Triunfo, he should've driven to the nearest airport and skipped the country. But self-preservation had taken a backseat to greed. He could taste that Inca treasure. Eight billion dollars. The closer he got to the legendary mountains, the greater his
hunger. He'd already killed two men, risked his own skin and freedom, and suffered bodily injury. Looking through high-powered binoculars, he'd watched McGraw and blondie suit up and disappear into the jungle with a treasure hunter that he recognized from Baños. That's when he'd had one of Con's obsessive thoughts. “They're after
my
treasure.”

Now he was flying into an Andean Bermuda Triangle with a fucking lunatic.

They buzzed into a cloud bank and Gator tightened his seat belt. “Hope to hell you know where you're going,” he muttered.

“I know where McGraw is headed. We'll be waiting. You'll get the second half of the map, and then I'll know
exactly
where I'm going.”

Gator frowned. “You mean
we.
”

Instead of answering, Con bobbed and weaved, maneuvering the helicopter through a sudden hailstorm while Gator fought not to puke.

R
IVER IGNORED
the disgusting muck, the threatening plants and the potential bugs and germs. She ignored the excruciating burn in her muscles and the eye-crossing lack of oxygen.

She climbed.

And climbed.

She grabbed hold, dug in and focused on reaching the
páramo.
Anger fueled her every labored move. Anger directed at Henry, Spenser and herself.

The climb was so steep and she was so weak that she did indeed keep to her hands and knees. Spenser and Cy seemed tireless, damn them. Although Cy was focused, whereas Spenser seemed distracted. What was he thinking about? She would've asked had she the spare breath.

Miraculously, about an hour into the climb, she started feeling better. Then, soon after, she was feeling no pain. It had to be the seeds. She'd had a double dose thus far, and if she needed more she had no qualms about asking. Anything to get her to the top. Closer to Henry. Closer to closure…and returning home.

Spenser had pegged it back in Baños. She was out of her element. She thrived on order and there was no order
in the wild. Everything was up to chance. Everything was chaos. She couldn't think straight. She'd fallen into bed with a man she barely knew. She'd entrusted Henry's fate to not one, but two treasure hunters. She was flirting with hypobaropathy and jungle rot. She was high on seed juice.

She was a mess.

But a determined mess.

River clawed soggy dirt and toed spiked branches in order to move inches closer to regaining control of her life. She couldn't shake the worry that she'd used Spenser to fill a need. She couldn't shake the suspicion that he'd used her to locate a treasure. She didn't trust what they'd shared. She didn't trust anything or anyone…including herself.

The ground shimmied, jolting River out of her mental monologue. “What's that?”

“Earth tremor,” Spenser said, moving in next to her.

“Some call the Llanganatis ‘the mountains of electricity and earthquakes,'” Cy shouted down.

“Electricity?”

“Electrical storms,” Spenser clarified.

The sky rumbled.

River frowned. “Great.”

“Rain's coming,” Cy shouted. He was several feet ahead of her. “Going to get messy.”

“We need to climb faster,” River said, even though she was moving as fast as she could without poking out
her eye. She had
not
come this far to fry. She could just as easily get struck by lightning at home.

“If I hurry,” Cy bellowed over a distant crack of thunder, “I can reach Brunner's camp and have at least one shelter ready by the time you get there.”

“Do it,” Spenser said, giving River a boost when her foot slipped off a branch. He'd been shadowing her all day. Catching her when she bobbled. She appreciated the gesture, even though it dented her pride.

Cy held his position until River caught up. “Give me your pack,” he said.

“Why?”

“The lighter your load, the faster you'll climb.”

“But it'll burden your load.”

“No burden,” he said, tugging at her straps.

She glanced at Spenser. It was the first time she'd really looked at him since they'd started the climb. His complexion was off and he was sweating profusely. “You don't look so good.”

“I'm fine.”

“You don't look fine.”

“So you said. Give Cy your pack.”

“But—”

“Just do it, dammit.”

Another shimmy and rumble. A gust of cool, then humid wind.

Adrenaline and dread surged through River's fatigued but oddly charged body. Her brain felt weirdly disengaged.
Can't think straight.
She didn't want to give up her backpack, although she couldn't reason why.

“Torrential downpour equals poor visibility and the possibility of a mudslide,” Cy said.

Suddenly she wished her feet had wings. She relinquished her backpack and watched in awe as Cy scrambled up the tricky cliff face and disappeared from view. “Wow. What is he? Man or mountain goat?”

“Keep going, angel.”

“
You're
a grouch.”

“Keep going!”

She crawled upward, smiling when she realized she did indeed feel lighter. She moved faster, but she wanted to fly. “How many seeds do you think Cy sucked to get
that
kind of energy boost?”

“Don't know. Don't care. God
damn.
”

River flinched at the sound of Spenser's pained curse. She looked back and saw him shrugging off his cumbersome pack while clutching one knee to his chest. Pulse racing, she backed carefully to his side. “What is it? What's wrong?”

“Nothing. Just give me a minute.”

She glanced at the darkening sky. Lightning flashed behind ominous clouds. Those clouds could burst any second. “Sure you need a whole minute?” she nervously teased.

He shot her an annoyed look, tried to stretch his leg, wiggle his foot and muttered a curse.

River tried to focus on the moment, on Spenser. She felt as though someone had injected her brain with Mexican jumping beans. “Did you twist your ankle?”

“No.”

“Wrench your knee?”

“Cramp.”

“What?”

“Muscle cramp. A goddamn charley horse. Get it?”

She got it. She just didn't understand. Her muscles hadn't cramped and he was far more fit and experienced. Then she realized… “You're not breathing right.”

“We're at thirteen and a half thousand feet, River.”

“But I'm not having nearly as much trouble as you. Didn't you suck the seed juice?”

“No.”

“But you had a whole pouch.”

“For you.”

“I'm sure there was enough—”

“I needed a clear head.”

River frowned. “I have a clear…okay, not totally clear, but—”

“Exactly.”

Perplexed and anxious, River looked at the angry sky, then back at Spenser. His expression warned of another kind of storm. Male pride no doubt figured in, but it went deeper, touched on his past.

The bad stuff.

“Where's the cramp?” she asked. “Foot, calf or thigh?”

“Thigh. What…
Fuck!
”

“I'm sorry,” River said as she kneaded the knotted muscle, “but sometimes you have to hurt to help. Try to stretch your leg again, but slowly. And don't pump your foot. Stretch. Slow. Easy.”

“What are you, a doctor?”

“A runner. I've dealt with my share of cramps and charley horses. I researched—”

“I'm sure you did.”

“Don't be an ass.”

“Sorry. It just…
Fuck!
”

“Talk to me.”

“What?”

She continued the gentle massage with a keen eye on the ominous sky. “You're too aware of the pain. Too stressed about the delay. It's making you tense. You need to relax.”

“I know what to do.”

“Stop being all macho and let me help. Focus on something other than the pain.”

“Like what?”

She wanted to ask about the bad stuff, except those experiences were connected to these mountains. In light of their current precarious situation she steered away. “Who's Atahualpa?”

“Don't patronize me.”

“I'm not. I seriously don't know—”

“Sun King.”

“What?”

“The Lord of the Inca, descended from the sun, the creator god. Everything—the land, the people, the gold and silver—belonged to the Sun King. In 1527 there was a rivalry between brothers, but Atahualpa…”

“Yes?”

“Believed he was the true Inca king. Five bloody
years of battle with his brother Huascar. He believed himself the victor, then Pizarro and a few hundred Spanish conquistadors landed on the coast of Peru. Then everything went to hell.”

“Go on.”

“River—”

“What happened?” She continued to massage, one eye on the approaching storm as Spenser drank deeply from a water bottle.

After urging her to hydrate as well, he rushed on. “Long story short, Pizarro and his men captured Atahualpa and held him captive in Cajamarca, a small town in Peru. Knowing the Spaniards' lust for precious metals, the Sun King offered to have his people fill a large room with gold and twice over with silver in exchange for his freedom. An offer he honored. But even that didn't appease the greedy bastards. Nor did it quell Pizarro's fear that Atahualpa's most trusted general, Rumiñahui, would attack in retaliation.”

“This ends badly, doesn't it?” River shivered in anticipation of something horrible. After all, the ancient kidnapping had spurred a curse. A curse connected with these mountains.

“The conquistadors executed Atahualpa not knowing, at that very instant, a caravan of sixty thousand men protected by twelve thousand armed guards and led by General Rumiñahui were headed for Cajamarca, carrying all the gold from every temple and palace in the empire.”

“Atahualpa's ransom,” River whispered, entranced by the tale.

“Upon hearing the news of their king's death,” Spenser said, “Rumiñahui redirected his troops into the Llanganatis.”

River was used to hearing old wives' tales about marriage. Conditioned to handle problems associated with impending weddings, not ancient executions. She processed Spenser's information. “So all that gold and silver, sweat of the sun, tears of the moon, is buried…here.”

“Somewhere. Later Rumiñahui was captured and tortured, but he never gave up the location of the buried treasure. The secret died with him.”

Spenser had told her about the buried treasure days before. She'd even considered the possibility that there was truth to the legend. But this was the first time she'd actually ached to see that treasure for herself. She could feel the chakana burning against her breastbone.
What if?

“According to sources,” Spenser said, “Henry claimed contact with Rumiñahui.”

“The Inca general? But he's been dead for centuries. It's not possible.” And just like that, her moment of wonder evaporated. So, what? Her father was hallucinating? Lying?
Crazy?

“Sources also blame Henry for a guide's death. Said the professor killed the man in order to protect his secret find.”

River blanched. Yes, she'd blamed her father for her
mom's death. But it's not like he'd
murdered
her. “I don't believe it.”

“Neither do I. But someone drove a spear through that guide's heart.”

“A spear?”

The sky crackled. Louder this time. River barely noticed. She was too busy massaging Spenser's thigh and envisioning Indians with primitive weapons.

Spenser nabbed her wrists and nudged her away. “Get going.”

“What?”

“Push on, River. I'll catch up.”

She suppressed a flutter of panic. “I'm not going anywhere without you.” It wasn't solely the fear of being alone in these godforsaken mountains. She couldn't imagine abandoning someone in need.
Ever.
Part of the reason she was here to begin with. No matter her issues with Henry, she couldn't abandon Spenser to some unknown fate.

“If I start to lose sight of you, I'll tell you to stop. Meanwhile, it'll motivate me to move. Mind over matter.”

She tugged off her gloves in order to get a better grip on his thigh, a deeper massage.

“Your hands,” he said, wincing as she dug in. “Getting dirty.”

“Have you taken a good look at me? I'm covered head-to-toe in jungle muck.”

“Germs.”

She got his drift. Normally she would've been dousing
herself with liquid sanitizer. “I'm more worried about getting zapped.” She glanced at the sparking clouds, then back to Spenser. He was struggling to breathe. “I'm more worried about you.”

His expression softened. His green eyes smoldered. Back anchored against a wall of vegetation, Spenser pulled River into his arms. He kissed her, passionately, and suddenly they were lost in lust, the ground grumbling beneath them and the sky rumbling above.

This is crazy,
River's mind whispered. But she was powerless to break away. Coca tea and Cy's seeds had nothing on Spenser's kisses. She burned for this man. It didn't matter that she suspected his motivations. It didn't matter that they were making out on a precarious mountainside while a thunderstorm loomed or that they were both flirting with acute altitude sickness. The only thing she was in danger of was falling in love.

That
thought hit her like a bucket of ice water.

River reared back—heart pounding, lungs seizing, blinded by…rain. They were drenched in a matter of seconds.

“Shit.” Spenser shifted into a half crouch. “We have to hurry.”

River sleeved raindrops from her lashes, watching as he muscled on the heavy pack. He showed no signs of discomfort but she knew he was hurting. “Your leg.”

“It's fine. Thanks to you.” He cupped the back of her neck, branded her lips with a searing kiss, then urged her up the slick incline. “Grab hold of whatever you can, anchor yourself. Slow and easy, angel.”

“You said we have to hurry!”

“Hurry with caution.”

She tried to channel his calm…and failed. “I don't know the way,” River said, panic building. Cy was out of sight and she saw no visible path. The rain blurred everything. She pulled her new GPS unit from her jacket pocket, but her thick leather gloves proved a hindrance and she fumbled. The compact gadget fell out of her hands and disappeared somewhere below. “No!”

“Leave it,” Spenser said, but she'd already turned and…

The ground gave way beneath her feet. A scream lodged in River's throat as she slid on her back several feet in a river of mud, down the cliff face, limbs flailing. She had a brief vision of a scene in
Romancing the Stone,
when Joan Wilder whooshed down a muddy hill, landing unharmed in a pool of murky water with her hero's face between her legs. River anticipated no such luck. She anticipated impaling herself on one of the nasty, spiky arrow plants.
I'm going to die,
she thought, just before she slammed into a jutting tree.