Ransomed Dreams (5 page)

“Sheridan—” Luke leaned across the table—“he will probably die within days if he hasn’t already. Calissa said he’s left a raft of unfinished details, that she’s in over her head.”

“She’s one of his assistants and has a dozen of her own assistants to take care of details.”

“She said that what she most desperately needs right now is her sister.”

“Calissa has never needed me in her entire life. . . .” Her voice trailed off. Calissa was seven years older and had seemed to Sheridan to be a strong, independent woman for almost as long as Sheridan could remember. Growing up together with a mother who adored them and a father who apparently didn’t had forged a special bond between the sisters, but it had been severed years ago. When their mother died, Sheridan was thirteen; Calissa stepped effortlessly into the matriarchal shoes. Sheridan lost her sister as surely as she’d lost her mother.

It was too much to take in. Luke, her father, her sister had all violated her safety zone. She jerked as if a long bandage had been ripped from her flesh.

Luke slid a small white envelope across the table. Nothing was written on it. “It’s for you, from her.”

She hesitated. Calissa was shrewd. A personal note hand-delivered by Luke? This wasn’t simply about Harrison suffering a stroke. Her sister wanted her attention.

“Traynor,” Eliot said, “why you?”

“Excuse me?”

“Why you? Why did Calissa send you?”

Luke blinked slowly.

Sheridan felt a stab of annoyance at Luke’s diplomatic two-step. Since his injury, Eliot had lost his own diplomatic knack for weighing words and couching them in ambiguity. It was almost an even trade. Instead of the two-step dance, they took jaunts down rabbit trails.

At last Luke spoke. “I met Calissa at the hospital, in Houston.” He referred to her sister’s visit during Eliot’s stay there.

“I wasn’t aware your paths had crossed.”

Sheridan opened her mouth to speak but closed it. Reminding Eliot that she had told him of Calissa’s meeting Luke would only annoy him. Besides, he spoke the truth. He was unaware of it as he was unaware of many things. Pain and meds occupied too much memory space.

Luke said, “I gave her my card. She contacted me a week ago. She figured that with my State Department connections, I had the means to find you.”

“Which of course you did.” Eliot’s eyes narrowed behind his thick lenses. “And why, pray tell, did you agree to do it?”

Luke smiled briefly. “Your welfare concerns me. We almost died together. That tends to quicken one’s relationship. Why wouldn’t I say yes to Calissa’s request? I couldn’t let someone else deliver this difficult family news.”

“How convenient you were available. In between assignments, are you?”

“In a manner of speaking.”

Sheridan tuned out Eliot’s inquisition and Luke’s bunk. She fingered the linen envelope. It was sealed. Not that sealed meant unopened. Luke had single-handedly extracted her from the scene of an assassination attempt. Surely a little glue would not be an issue for him.

She broke the seal, pulled out a folded blank card, and opened it. At the sight of her sister’s handwriting, she ached for the relationship they didn’t have.

Sheri ~

Even Isaac and Ishmael came together to bury their father. The older brother probably told the younger surprising tales about their father, things the younger would not know or remember. Please come.

With love,

Lissy

“Well?” Eliot’s tone was harsh. “What’s in it?”

She looked at him, shutting the card and tracing her thumb along its fold. He was getting tired. Tact went the way of the diplomatic two-step when he was tired. “Calissa says that Isaac and Ishmael came together to bury their father.”

“Hm. Harrison Cole is not exactly an Abraham.”

“I don’t think that’s her point.”

“No. That would be a stretch even for your sister.” Eliot pushed back his chair and slowly rose. “Traynor, my wife owes her family nothing. Please convey our condolences to Calissa, but I’m afraid we are not able to travel at this time. It was good of you to stop by.” He reached across the table and shook Luke’s hand.

“A pleasure to see you up and about, sir.”

Eliot glanced at Sheridan. “I think it’s time we got to work. I’ll be in the study.”

She stared at his receding back, her own shoulders slouching like his, the weight of the world pressing in. The rhythmic ping of aluminum against concrete blotted out all thought.

“Sher.”

She turned to Luke.

The seam between his brows was scrunched again. This time it stayed there. “What do
you
think?”

“That I can’t think about it right now.” The words popped out of her mouth and she recognized what she was saying. If she’d learned one thing through the past year, it was to know when to quit, when to step back from life. “I have to shut down.”

“And how do you do that?”

“Church. I go to the church.” She anticipated the peace and safety that surrounded her as she sat in the pew. It would be like pressing back into place the bandage that Luke’s news had forcefully removed.

“Is the church open?”

“Yes, it’s always—oh!” She glanced at her watch and stood. “There’s a service at noon. I can make it.”

“A service?”

“It’s Annunciation Day.” She recalled her earlier comparison. “You know, kind of like what we’ve just had,
Gabe
?”

“Gabe.” His smile was unfeigned, the first real one since his arrival. “As in Gabriel the angel?”

“You came and you announced.”

“And it’s thrown your world off-kilter, as Mary’s must have been.” He tilted his head slightly, accepting responsibility but not apologizing for it. “Mind if I join you?”

“Yes.”

“Understood. Not a problem.”

The familiarity of him took hold of her once more. How many times had he joined her in a hospital chapel simply to keep her company?

The truth was, no matter how much she wanted to deny it, she had needed him then and she needed him now.

She said, “But it’s okay.”

He gave a slight nod.

Chapter 8

Sheridan entered the living room that served as their study. They’d furnished it with a large desk and several bookcases. Eliot was in his recliner, his feet on the raised footrest. A book lay open on his lap, his glasses on top of it.

“Eliot.”

He looked up. “Is Traynor gone?”

“No. He’s going down to the church with me.” She sat on the ottoman beside his chair. “Mercedes is already there. Did you remember it’s a holy day?”

He sighed, a loud exhale of frustration. “And you can’t miss a service.”

She tamped down her own frustration. She missed services all the time. There was no space in her schedule to attend the daily Mass or even every Sunday. But the ancient liturgy grounded her like nothing else, and sometimes, like now, she absolutely craved it.

She said as she always did, “Do you want to go?”

And like always, he replied, “I don’t care to, no. When will you be back?”

“An hour. An hour and a half at the most. Why don’t you rest? When I get home, we’ll eat lunch and then work.”

“We are not obligated to entertain him, you know.” Obviously Luke was at the forefront of his thoughts. “I don’t think I was rude to him, but we can’t welcome this sort of intrusion into our lives. I am no longer in service to the United States.”

“It wasn’t exactly national business that brought him here.”

“You don’t think so? Sheridan, the man is a CIA operative. He doesn’t have a personal bone in his body. No matter what Calissa told him or what he told us, he came because he has something to gain. You’re not actually considering going to Chicago?”

“I haven’t thought about going anywhere beyond church.” A shudder went through her. She could not imagine leaving Topala, traveling back into the chaos of the real world, into a huge city. How she had survived five months in Houston during Eliot’s recuperation remained a mystery. Getting them on the plane to Mexico thirteen months ago used up every last ounce of stamina she had. The counselor told her it would be restored. Of course, she didn’t believe that woman’s word about anything.

Eliot said, “Is there any hint at all in Calissa’s note about why Traynor’s interested?”

She thought of the note she’d slid into a drawer between the folds of a camisole. It was a banal hiding place, but at least the thing was out of sight. “There was the reference to Isaac and Ishmael.”

“Two brothers who probably lived in the equivalent of different countries, at odds over family business. A significant age difference between them. A dead, or nearly dead, father. There are similarities to you and Calissa, but beyond those things?”

She heard the question in his voice.

And she chose not to answer it.

There was more “beyond those things,” but what exactly she didn’t understand. Something, though, kept her from wondering aloud with him. Something inside of her curled up protectively around this peculiar message from her sister.

Calissa had written a cryptic note that might just as well have been stamped “For Your Eyes Only.” She had contacted a spy who had a connection like none other with Sheridan. Calissa had probably paid a lot of money for his spur-of-the-moment travel expenses.

Surprising tales,
the note said,
about their father, things the younger would not know.

Sheridan looked at her husband of ten years, her best friend and confidant. His eyes were shut. Out of weariness? pain? anger that their location was known? or just plain indifference? More and more it had taken on shades of indifference, of detachment from her, and really, of life in general.

Things were changing between them. Since moving to Topala, they had lived in what felt like physical safety, that centerpiece around which they’d made every decision since the shooting. Luke had it right. She was Eliot’s nurse, cook, housekeeper, secretary, chauffeur, companion. She wasn’t sure where
best friend
and
confidant
fit anymore.

Calissa’s note was personal. It didn’t involve Luke or the government. It declared a sister’s love. No. She was not going to answer his question about “beyond those things.”

Instead she said, “It was signed, ‘With love, Lissy.’”

“And you believe that? that she cares?”

She stood, covered his legs with a light blanket, and kissed his forehead. “Yes, oddly enough, I think I do.”

Chapter 9

As Luke walked beside Sheridan down the steep hill, he said, “How does Eliot get around town?”

“Mostly he doesn’t. We have a car. It’s parked at the cantina.”

“You don’t use it much, then?”

“Only when we go into Mesa Aguamiel. Here in the village we all walk or ride a burro everywhere. Neither of which he can do, of course. Too many hills.”

“Topala, the place where time stopped. This can’t be a walk in the park, no matter how idyllic it appears. How do you get food and stuff?”

“It’s delivered by truck, weekly or daily, usually to the square. I hire the boys to lug propane and drinking water up the hill.” She gave him a sidelong glance. “Don’t you know these particulars?”

“No.”

“Little blip in the research, eh?”

He ignored her smart remark.

She noted how he strode with athletic ease over the uneven cobblestones, his eyes hidden behind sunglasses under the bill of his cap. She had always been impressed with the way he moved and spoke. He epitomized the quality of being at ease no matter what. There was absolutely nothing awkward about him, either physically or socially. It always disconcerted her.

She said, “Do you know what’s in Calissa’s note?”

“I have no idea. She didn’t tell me, and I didn’t open it.”

“How did she convince you to come? And please don’t give me that line about being concerned about our welfare.”

“That is true, though.”

At some deep level his words resonated. What he had done for them in the aftermath of the shooting spoke volumes of care and concern. Ludicrous as it sounded, the guy probably did sense a connection with her and Eliot because of that day. But . . .

“But it’s not enough, Luke. Not enough to disrupt your life and bring you all this way.”

“Yeah.” He hesitated, no doubt taking time to choose just the right words. “I half expected a ‘tommyrot’ out of Eliot. You’re right. There is more to it.”

So. That was that, then. Eliot had been right. Luke came because he himself had something to gain. Her tiny flicker of hope that he might have come purely because of altruism was snuffed out. Poof.

She took a deep breath. “Okay. Thank you for being honest anyway.”

“Sure.”

They fell silent and continued their walk downhill. Below them lay the town center, now awash in sunlight and tourists.

Until Luke’s arrival that morning, this daily influx of visitors did not disturb her. Most of them came up from cruise ships docked in Mazatlán. They came, they went, all in short order. They purchased trinkets and handicrafts. They ate the luncheon special, complete with a slice of banana cream pie at Davy’s restaurant. They climbed back on the bus, perhaps wondering how five hundred residents survived in a town founded by silver miners in 1565, where pigs freely roamed the streets and electricity was a fairly recent addition.

Yes, tourists were as much a part of the landscape as the whitewashed adobe buildings, as common as the red-tiled roofs. Not a threat.

Until now.

She scanned the strangers dressed in trendy cruise wear, crisscrossing the square, going in and out of the shops. She wondered which ones were studying her.

As usual, village boys dogged the tourists, holding out palm-size wooden replicas of Topala buildings that they’d carved. The kids were born salesmen, aggressive, smiling affably as they eased into the bargaining process without batting an eyelash.

On the far side of the square, where the church steeple rose far above everything, she noticed a handful of tourists heading through the massive doors, cameras in hand. Her heart sank even further. Of course they were always drawn to Iglesia de San José, a baroque beauty finished in 1775, a jewel in the middle of nowhere. But she had so hoped for a respite during the service. How could that happen with a bunch of goggle-eyed, photo-snapping intruders?