The Sooner the Better (7 page)

She didn't answer.

“Understand?” he repeated.

“Yes,” she muttered.

“Good,” he said, still sounding calm.

Five minutes later he cut the engine. She heard footsteps on the dock and then felt the boat bounce against the tire bumper. A rush of Spanish followed between Jack and someone on the pier. It appeared to be a pleasant exchange. The boat rocked slightly when Jack jumped onto the dock.

With the insufferable heat Lorraine barely had the strength to remain upright. The table and benches were filled with papers and an assortment of clothes, which she folded and placed in the drawers. Not that her goal was to be helpful. She simply needed space to stretch out. Books littered the compact area. Bored, Lorraine glanced at a few titles and shook her head. A few sailing manuals. Techniques of war. Weapons updates. Military histories. Almost every piece of reading material had something to do with soldiering and death. For all she knew, he could be a trained killer. Talk about jumping from the frying pan into the fire! And down here, in this intolerable heat, it felt as though that was exactly what she'd done.

Lorraine couldn't help wondering if her father knew about Jack's preoccupation with war and death. If he did, would he have asked Jack to get her out of the country? Lorraine doubted it.

Forty minutes passed. Forty of the longest minutes of her life. She wet a cloth and dabbed her face and wrists. Ten minutes later, she unbuttoned her blouse and fanned herself with a copy of
Soldier of Fortune
magazine. Jack
had been gone for fifty minutes now. Every once in a while she'd hear voices; her hopes would soar but then the sound would fade away. Water slapped against the side of the boat, which rocked gently in the protected waters of the marina.

At one o'clock she heard the faint strains of music drifting down from what must have been a waterfront cantina. The emptiness in her stomach refused to be ignored. All she could think about was how hot and miserable she was and how hungry. Visions of salty tortilla chips and fresh salsa tormented her. Served with a tart salt-rimmed margarita… Or was that more Tex-Mex than Mexican? She wasn't sure. But they'd certainly have
something
at this cantina. Maybe a shrimp-and-garlic dish like the one her father's…wife had made. No, she wouldn't think about them. She conjured up the memory of chicken fajitas, instead, with lots of onions and peppers….

The music grew louder. It didn't require much imagination to picture Jack sitting inside the cantina, taking his own sweet time over a big lunch, drinking a cold beer. He probably had a friendly
señorita
on his lap, as well. The image was so real, so believable, she convinced herself of its truth.

Forty minutes he'd said, and he'd been gone longer than an hour. Lorraine couldn't stand it anymore. Not only did she intensely dislike Jack Keller, there was no reason she should trust him. Given what she'd learned about her father and Azucena, how could she trust
any
of these people? Once again, she pushed all thoughts of her father from her mind. She didn't want to think about him, didn't want to acknowledge that Gary had been right and she'd made the biggest mistake of her life in seeking out this stranger.

She'd lost control of the situation by letting others make the decisions. Time to rectify that. She hadn't had anything to do with that stupid artifact, and once she explained what had happened, the authorities would believe her. They
had
to. Anyway, she'd rather take her chances with the police than die a slow death at the hands of Jack Keller. And she couldn't tolerate this heat another minute.

Being a conscientious person, she found a pen and paper and left Jack a note.

She propped the paper on the table with the saltshaker and reached for her purse. Then she hesitated. Most of her traveler's checks were back in her suitcase in El Mirador and she had only a small amount of cash. She couldn't very well ask a vendor in this dinky town to accept a credit card.

It didn't take her long to discover where Jack kept his cash—although she did feel guilty about rummaging through his things. This was just a small loan, she told herself. Either she'd repay him herself or her father would. She peeled off a few bills and shoved them inside her purse.

Once more she hesitated, then removed her watch and set it in his drawer. Its value far exceeded the cash she'd borrowed, she reasoned. She left quickly before she could change her mind.

When she opened the double doors leading to the deck,
Lorraine gulped in deep breaths of the fresh cool air. Cautiously she stuck her head out and looked around.

The village was small, smaller even than El Mirador. A row of ramshackle shops lined the waterfront, but La Ruta Maya didn't seem to consist of much else. The first thing she needed to do was find someone to drive her into Campeche. Surely in a city of that size she'd be able to connect with the American Embassy. Then she'd tell them her story, explain how Jason Applebee had hidden the artifact in her suitcase, and the American government would clear her name and get her safely home.

Lorraine didn't blame her father for interceding on her behalf, but his solution had been shortsighted. Once her name was cleared, she'd be free to return to El Mirador in the near future and demand some answers from her father. Then again, perhaps it would be better just to go home and forget all this.

She knew, as she climbed off Jack's boat, that she was taking a risk, but that couldn't be helped. The truth was, he'd be just as glad to get rid of her. This seemed the best solution all around.

Within a few minutes of leaving the dock area, Lorraine noticed that several children had started to follow her. Not wanting to attract attention, she opened her purse, thinking to give them each a new peso and send them on their way. Her ploy didn't work. As soon as she reached for her coin purse, she was surrounded by children of every age. They pressed in around her, crowding her, all eager for a handout.

An older man barked at the children in an authoritative voice and they scattered. Lorraine thanked him with a smile and continued down the street, stopping only long enough to buy some fruit in the village marketplace. She gobbled down the fresh papaya, then
purchased a tortilla filled with vegetables and meat. The meat didn't have a familiar taste, but she decided she didn't want to know exactly what she was eating. She understood turtle was popular fare in this area—not a thought that appealed to her. However, at this point she was too hungry to care.

With her helpful Spanish phrase book, she asked a grandmotherly woman about finding a driver who would take her to Campeche. The woman avoided eye contact and shook her head. Lorraine asked a vendor next, but he was far more interested in selling his wares than answering her questions. He held up a number of things—baskets and pottery—he hoped to persuade her to buy and explained two or three times in fractured English that he would give her a special rate because she was his first customer of the day. She finally extricated herself from him, then asked a third person, a young barefoot woman, who pointed Lorraine in the direction of the cantina.

On second thought, perhaps it would make more sense to contact the American Embassy by phone and not worry about hiring someone to drive her.

Lorraine flipped through the pages of her Spanish dictionary until she found the word for telephone. She felt embarrassed by how little she remembered of her high-school language class.
“Teléfono?”
she asked.

The barefoot woman grinned and nodded enthusiastically, then pointed toward the cantina again.

Lorraine grumbled under her breath, glancing at the very place she'd planned not to enter. She supposed she didn't have anything to lose. If Jack did happen to be inside, which she strongly suspected he was, she'd simply explain what she'd said in her note.

When she peered inside the cantina, she found—to her
relief and surprise—that Jack Keller was nowhere to be seen. The place was stark, devoid of any decoration. It had a rough plank floor, a long wooden bar and a number of crude tables and chairs.

Four or five underdressed women glared at her when she walked in. Lorraine smiled at them, certain they could see that they had nothing to fear from her. She had no intention of cutting in on their business.

A greasy-looking man looked up from a table, where he sat with a bottle of tequila and a shot glass. He was dark and ugly, and a scar ran down one side of his face. He eyed her with the avid interest of a tomcat spying a mouse. It wasn't a comfortable sensation, but she ignored him and approached the bartender, whose frown seemed to suggest she should get out while she could.

Lorraine forced a smile. With her dictionary in hand, she asked about the phone. He shook his head. There was one attached to the wall, but apparently it was out of order.
No funciona,
a handwritten sign informed her. Again going through the dictionary, she painstakingly asked about hiring a driver to take her to Campeche.

“I take you to Campeche,” the greasy-looking man at the table offered in heavily accented English, his voice slurred with suggestion. His chair made a scraping sound as he stood and carried the bottle and shot glass over to the bar.

Every eye in the place was on the two of them.

“No, thank you,” Lorraine said politely. She continued to look at the bartender.

“You want a driver?” the man persisted. “I get you there.”

“I prefer to hire a car, thank you.” She returned her attention to the bartender.

Her unpleasant companion slammed the bottle down on the bar. “We have fun on the road, no?”

“No,” Lorraine said, refusing to look at him. He smelled evil. She'd never thought such a thing was possible, but this man was the epitome of the word. The stench about him was nothing compared to the blankness in his eyes, as if he had no feelings, no sympathy, no conscience. The way he stared at her made her skin crawl.

The bartender, who'd said little to this point, spoke to the man in a placating manner. Although she couldn't understand much of what was said, it seemed fairly obvious this man was feared. The bartender then appeared to suggest something involving one or more of the other women, judging by the way he motioned toward them. One thing Lorraine did pick up from the exchange was the man's name. Carlos.

Carlos's reaction to the bartender's suggestion was a blast of foul-sounding words that had the bartender fleeing to the other end of the bar.

“You come with me,” Carlos said, and reached for her. “We have fun on the road to Campeche, you and me.” He grinned at her as if to say she might as well enjoy it because she had no choice.

Lorraine managed to avoid his grasp. “I most certainly will not.”

He lunged for her a second time, but once more she was able to avoid his groping hands. Clearly Carlos was drunker than he'd seemed, which was in her favor. Although he looked to be a mean drunk.

“Kindly keep your hands to yourself!” she snapped.

Carlos's response was to grab a fistful of her hair and yank hard.

Lorraine let out a cry of shock and pain, whirled around and slapped him as hard as she could across the face. “Keep your filthy hands off me!” The action had been purely instinctive. She didn't know what kind of monster this man was, but she wasn't going to let him or anyone else manhandle her.

A collective gasp went through the cantina. Even Carlos was too stunned to react. Then he slapped her, hard enough to send her staggering backward. Her jaw felt as if it'd been dislocated, and the pain brought stinging tears to her eyes.

He laughed, and it was the cruelest sound she'd ever heard. She saw pure undiluted hate in his eyes. Holding her hand over her cheek, she took three small steps back, recognizing beyond doubt that she'd crossed a dangerous line and was about to suffer the consequences.

She wanted to say something, a joke, an apology, anything to defuse the situation, but her mouth had gone dry. She could hardly force out a word.

She'd made one mistake after another, but this was the most desperate yet. Two minutes ago she'd walked into the cantina with a simple request and now she was staring into the eyes of a man who wanted to kill her—and worse. She felt a sudden urge to yell “Time out!” so she could sit down and analyze what had gone wrong…and figure out how to rescue herself.

Hearing footsteps behind her, she whirled around. Her relief at seeing Jack was enough to make her knees weak.

“Oh, thank God,” she whispered, closing her eyes. The one man she'd been trying to elude was now going to be her salvation.

The tension between Jack and Carlos could be felt by everyone in the room. Lorraine practically ran toward Jack.

“You know this woman?” Carlos asked, glaring at them through narrowed, menacing eyes.

Jack took one look at Lorraine and shrugged. “Never saw her before in my life.”

G
enerally speaking, Jack was an easygoing guy. It took a lot to rile him. But Lorraine managed to do it without so much as opening her mouth. He'd returned to the boat with a case of beer balanced on his shoulder and a plate of hot food for her. The way he figured, she'd been fourteen or fifteen hours without anything to eat, and a generous helping of Angelina's special chicken
frijoles
and rice was sure to sweeten her disposition. It had certainly improved his own.

Nothing could have shocked him more than finding her gone. By the time he read her note, he was so angry his ears burned. Jack didn't often let anyone or anything reduce him to this state. In his previous work, anger wasn't an emotion he could afford. When it happened, which was rare, he didn't plow his fist through a wall. If anything he remained stoic. His acquaintances knew well that the calmer he was, the angrier.

He could have pulled out of port then and there with a clear conscience—but he hadn't. Thomas was his friend—but there was a limit to what he could take. After spending a few minutes cooling down, he left his supplies piled on the dock, where the shopkeeper had delivered them, and
went in search of the most irritating, infuriating, ungrateful woman he'd ever met. When he found her in the cantina, he couldn't deny a certain satisfaction at discovering that she'd gotten herself into real trouble.

Now he intended to see how she planned to get herself out of it. Rescuing damsels in distress was an outdated business at best, and Jack had long since decided a contemporary woman was capable of taking care of herself. If Thomas Dancy's daughter needed help, she'd have to ask for it. On second thought, she'd have to ask
real
pretty for him to get involved. One thing was certain: he was going to make her sweat it out before he stepped in.

“You're going to pretend you don't know me?” Lorraine shouted. She thrust out her arms in supplication or in anger, he wasn't sure which. A look of astonished disbelief crossed her face.

Jack sauntered up to the bar, where he ordered a glass of tequila and a lime. After the day he'd had, he needed a high-potency drink.

“He knows me.” Lorraine stretched out her arm and waggled her index finger at Jack. “He might claim otherwise, but he knows me. We're traveling together.”

Jack tossed back his tequila and sucked greedily on the lime.

“Exactly what kind of man are you?” she raged, disgust written on every feature.

“A thirsty one,” Jack answered with a slow, lazy grin. Then, as if to prove his point, he downed a second shot and smiled at her through gritted teeth as the alcohol burned the back of his throat. “As far as I'm concerned, your friend over there is welcome to you.”

“His name's Carlos. If you were any kind of a man, you'd see I'm in trouble here.”

“Yeah.” Did his heart good to see it, too.

“Aren't you going to
do
something?”

“No.” He raised his glass and saluted Carlos. Lorraine knew how to pick 'em. Old Carlos looked like he'd just as soon slit a guy's throat as sit down and have a drink with him.

Apparently Carlos didn't know what to make of the exchange between him and Lorraine. He glanced from one to the other, his head jerking back and forth in an effort to follow the conversation.

One of the prostitutes minced across the cantina toward Jack. The best-looking one of the lot, Jack was pleased to note. He collected a second glass and met her at a table.

Her smile radiated easy sex. Her eagerness for his company was a pleasant change after what he'd been forced to endure with Miss High-and-Mighty. Jack pulled out a chair and sat down. Grinning, the woman sat on his lap and poured them each a drink, making sure her lush breasts grazed his arm.

“You're a rat, Jack Keller,” Lorraine yelled. Carlos half rose from his chair, obviously startled by her vehemence.

Jack yawned as though bored. “Sticks and stones, Raine, sticks and stones.”

“I can't believe you're going t-to take up with that woman when you can see I've got a problem here.”

Well, yeah, she did, Jack thought. Carlos was keeping a close eye on her. He seemed more than ready to leap up and grab her if she tried to make a run for it.

“Hey, you got yourself into this mess,” he said. “It's going to be real interesting to watch you get yourself out of it.”

“You're lower than low.”

Jack laughed and nuzzled the throat of the woman on his lap. While she might be nice-enough looking,
she unfortunately smelled like cheap perfume and stale smoke. Not that he'd let Lorraine know. As far as Her Highness was concerned, the other woman was a breath of fresh air. And oh, so tempting…

“Okay, okay,” Lorraine said, sounding far less certain now. “If you want me to apologize, then I will. I shouldn't have left the boat.”

This was what he'd been waiting for from the first. Jack abruptly set the woman aside and vaulted to his feet. “You're damn right you shouldn't have. I asked a small thing of you. One small thing.”

“It was so hot down there—and you took much longer than you said.”

“It's too much to expect you to follow directions?”

“I thought…I hoped…”

They scowled at each other. Jack's expression was as angry as he could make it. His voice was raised, and while he didn't want to attract a lot of unnecessary attention, he hoped to extract her from this predicament and save his own hide in the process. From the cutthroat looks Carlos gave him, it wasn't going to be easy.

“Don't shout at me,” Lorraine said, giving a fine impression of royalty.

“I'll shout at you if I please, and right now it pleases me a great deal.”

“This wouldn't have happened if you'd had the decency—”

“Enough!” Carlos boomed, and banged his fist on the bar. The sound echoed through the room like a gunshot.

Lorraine gasped and pressed her hand over her heart. For several frightening seconds the entire cantina went silent. Then, before he could react, she whirled around and faced Carlos. “Can't you see we're having an
important discussion here? When I'm finished with Jack Keller, I'll take you on. Until then, wait your turn.”

Carlos's mouth fell open, and he wore a look of complete and utter confusion.

“Decency?” Jack shouted, doing his best to distract Carlos from Lorraine. “If you want to talk about decency, I've got plenty to say. Let's have this out right here and now.”

Lorraine stared at him as if he'd gone mad. She wasn't far off, since his little performance was a good imitation of a lunatic's ravings. Waving his arms, still shouting, he edged her toward the door. With the two of them trading insults he'd be able to confuse Carlos long enough—he hoped—to place himself between them. And give her a way out.

Once she was close to the door, he yelled a few more insulting remarks, using the same tone of voice, hoping she was smart enough to understand what he was doing. “Run,” he ordered when she stood in the doorway.

“Run?”

“Get the hell out of here!”

She hesitated, then turned on her heel. Okay, so it wasn't a brilliant plan, but it was the best he could do on short notice.

“What about you?” Jack thought he heard her ask. Answering wasn't a concern just then. Carlos was.

The other man dashed after Lorraine, and seeing there wasn't anything he could do but stop him, Jack stepped into his path. It was a long while since he'd been involved in hand-to-hand combat. This time, however, the odds left much to be desired.

Carlos had a knife and he didn't.

 

Lorraine was panting and her thigh muscles were quivering from the run to the waterfront. She raced to the boat,
the dock rocking precariously with the sudden movement. Not sure what to do next, she hurried belowdecks and collapsed on the U-shaped bench that constituted the eating area. She could hear her pulse pounding in her ears.

This episode had been a disaster entirely of her own making. She was to blame for everything—the danger to herself and to Jack, as well. When he got back, she'd bet her last dollar he wouldn't be gracious about it, either. Not that she didn't deserve every comment he could possibly make. She'd done something incredibly stupid, and she didn't have a single excuse. What could she say—it was too hot and she'd grown tired of waiting? At the moment, that sounded pretty lame.

Her pulse still hadn't returned to normal when she decided she couldn't remain down here. Not without knowing what had happened to Jack. She had to find a way to help him; after all, he'd put himself at risk trying to help her. It'd taken her far longer than it should have to figure out what he intended, back at the cantina, what he wanted her to do. All she hoped was that he knew how to protect himself.

He did, she thought, reassured, as she went up to the deck. The evidence was all over the boat. Everything he read was about warfare, self-defense and fighting.

But her confidence in Jack's abilities waned as time passed. She'd assumed he'd be close behind her. Two, three minutes. Not so. A good ten minutes had already gone by.

Her relief at seeing him approach was enormous. He wasn't running, but he didn't seem to be taking a leisurely stroll, either. Even from the deck she could see that blood soaked his sleeve and ran in rivulets down his arm and onto his hand. One side of his face was swollen, too.

“Jack…Jack.” Lorraine felt sick with regret, knowing he'd received these injuries because of her.

As soon as he'd arrived at the dock, Jack broke into a trot, making it pitch precariously. When he reached
Scotch on Water,
he untied the rope and jumped onto the deck. Moments later the engines revved to life, churning up the water.

A flurry of Spanish came at them as Carlos and three other men appeared on the waterfront.

Jack didn't bother to translate. Even with her limited knowledge of Spanish, Lorraine caught their drift, and it wasn't anything she cared to repeat.

Jack put the boat in gear, and they roared off with enough force to sink smaller boats in their wake.

They hadn't cleared the marina when Lorraine heard an odd cracking sound, as if one of the engines had backfired. She glanced over her shoulder, but before anything could register, Jack shoved her to the deck and fell heavily on top of her. The shock of his actions left her stunned.

“What's going on?” she asked when she'd recovered her breath.

“That, Your Highness, was your buddy taking potshots at us.”

“Shots? You mean with a gun?”

“That's the weapon of choice for your average thug these days.” Jack climbed off her, then helped her to her feet.

Once they were safely in open water, Jack cut the engines to a more comfortable speed. He stood with his hands on the wheel, staring straight ahead.

Lorraine knew the time had come to apologize, abjectly and in full. Unfortunately her tongue refused to cooperate. It shouldn't be this difficult. But Jack had the
infuriating self-satisfied look of a man who knew he was right and was waiting for her to admit it.

“You're hurt,” she said, instead.

He pressed the back of his hand to the corner of his mouth, then glanced at the slash on his upper arm. He arched his eyebrows as if surprised at how deep the injury was. Gingerly he tested the area and winced as his fingers probed it.

“Let me take care of that,” Lorraine volunteered. She was about to head belowdecks for the first-aid kit she'd noticed earlier.

“Leave it,” Jack snarled.

“No! It needs attention. I'm a nurse and I should know.”

“Look, I don't want—”

Tempting though it was, she had no intention of wasting time arguing with him. Without waiting for his approval, she went belowdecks and grabbed the kit.

He stayed at the helm and grudgingly let her tend to the wound. Lorraine thought it probably should've had stitches, but fortunately the first-aid kit contained a number of butterfly bandages, which served almost as well. Other than a grunt now and again, Jack didn't speak while she bandaged the cut.

“What about your face?” she asked when she'd finished with his arm.

“It's fine,” he growled.

An ugly bruise had started to form on his chin. Examining it, Lorraine swallowed her pride. “I'm sorry, Jack.”

He didn't respond right away, then looked at her briefly. “I see you have your watch back.”

So he knew.

She'd retrieved her wristwatch when she'd gone below to get the first-aid kit.

“Did you put the money back, too?” he asked.

“Yes.” She wasn't proud of what she'd done. Her face burned with embarrassment.

It had been a stupid idea—
another
stupid idea—and she sincerely regretted it.

“Don't try anything like that again. Understand?”

She nodded. She didn't know if he was referring to her taking the money or leaving the boat. Probably both.

“You know, you're getting to be a little too expensive.”

“I put the money back,” she insisted with ill grace.

“I'm not talking about the money you
borrowed,
” Jack muttered. “The supplies. This is the second time this has happened.”

“What?” She'd seen the case of beer on the table belowdecks and assumed everything else had already been loaded onto the boat.

“They got left behind on the dock.”

She closed her eyes and groaned, vaguely remembering the boxes stacked alongside the boat. “But the beer…there's a case down below. You mean to say the only thing that got on board was the beer?”

 

Late that afternoon, Jack docked in a freshwater inlet for the night. Rio Usumacinta emptied into this cove, which was a small, sheltered one. Although he was fairly confident Carlos hadn't tried to follow them, he wasn't taking any chances.