Trading Secrets (22 page)

“What happened last week? Something to do with the lady in Dallas?”

“Let’s just say that my life is undergoing a severe change. I need the money Coyne’s offering.”

Valdez nodded, inhaling on his cheroot. “I understand completely.”

“You do?”

“Sure. The profits off that bookstore in Acapulco aren’t enough to support a family in Dallas, right?”

“It costs a lot of money to live the average American capitalist lifestyle. You know that, Ramon.”

“It costs a lot of money to run a revolution, too.” Valdez frowned thoughtfully. “Your Mr. Coyne’s offer of several shipments of guns is most tempting. But I don’t like the man.”

“No one does. He doesn’t seem to mind, though. Just goes on very dutifully about his bureaucratic business.”

“He’s told you what he wants me to do in exchange for the guns?”

“Yeah. You’re to guarantee an assault on the capital. Have you really got the men and the organization to pull that off, Ramon?”

Valdez lifted one shoulder in a careless shrug. “It could be done. With enough weapons and ammunition. For the past few years we have been a thorn in the side of the Estes government. This could be the opportunity we need to make a truly decisive move against Estes and his private army. It is tempting, Matt. Very, very tempting.”

“If the offer from Coyne is on the level,” Matt concluded.

“That, my friend, is what your presence is supposed to guarantee,” Valdez pointed out coolly.

There was a long silence while Matt thought that one over. At last he said quietly, “Do you know what I like least about the plan, Ramon?”

“I’m listening.”

“The timing. I don’t like the way Coyne is planning to wait until the last minute before he brings the guns ashore and hands them over to you. He says it’s because of the huge risks involved. It makes sense not to have a warehouse full of guns and ammunition sitting around for even a day or two and risk discovery, I suppose.”

“Discovery would be very embarrassing because all those weapons will be of U.S. manufacture. Your government is not exactly fond of Estes, but it has tolerated him because there has been no real alternative.”

“Except you.”

Valdez chuckled. “And I wasn’t willing to sell my soul to the U.S. government in return for its support, regardless of how much fun I had while I attended the University of California. Now here comes Mr. Rafferty Coyne saying the U.S. is no longer demanding my soul. Only a decisive blow against Estes. The ways of international politics are very strange, Matt.”

“I still don’t like the timing.”

“It would be nice to have those guns a few days early so that my men could check them out and familiarize themselves with them more thoroughly. It would be easier to distribute them, too. Under Coyne’s plan we will have to assemble in force the night of the assault, distribute the weapons, and go immediately against Estes.”

“The logistics are going to take very precise planning,” Matt said. “The last time I was involved in one of Mr. Coyne’s carefully planned operations I walked into an ambush.”

“So I heard.” Valdez glanced at Matt. “There is a saying about that sort of problem, isn’t there? Something about the best-laid plans of mice and men?”

“Sabrina thinks Coyne’s a little twerp.”

“Sabrina being the lady in Dallas? I’m inclined to agree with her. Sounds like an excellent judge of human nature.”

“I don’t like the timing, Ramon.”

“Neither do I. But I want what Coyne’s offer will buy me.” Valdez laughed around the cheroot. “And I have you here tonight verifying that Mr. Coyne will deliver on his promises, don’t I?”

Matt was silent for a long moment. “Can you get a message off this island? Estes has the phone system under total control, apparently. I haven’t even been able to risk calling Sabrina to say hello.”

“Most of the fishing fleet are sympathizers. Any one of a number of men would take a message. You want a
candygram
sent somewhere?”

“There’s a man I know. A guy who was with me that night two years ago. He left the Army shortly after that fiasco and went independent.”

“A mercenary?”

“So I understand.”

“Bastards. Men who bloody their hands only for money.” Valdez grimaced scornfully.

“I thought I’d made it clear money’s the reason I’m here on Buena Ventura.”

Valdez shook his head. “No, Matt. For you it would never be just the money. If I didn’t know that, I wouldn’t have agreed to meet with you tonight. You will take the money but you would not betray me in order to get your hands on it. You would not betray yourself, either.”

“Your basic problem as a revolutionary may be that you’re a bit too noble-minded at times,” Matt said dryly. “At any rate, this guy thinks he owes me something for getting him back out of the jungle two years ago. He told me if I ever wanted to collect on the debt I could reach him through a firm that’s based on Flores de
Noche
Island.”

Valdez inclined his head. “I could get a message to Flores de
Noche
. What do you want the message to say?”

Matt mulled over the various questions he could ask Thomas Mayhill after two years, and then he carefully picked one and repeated it to Valdez.

Valdez got to his feet. The moon was just starting to rise. “I will see that the message is delivered. No problem.” He searched Matt’s face in the dim light. “You see? I was right about you.”

“How’s that?” Matt stood up, automatically gazing down the dirt track to make sure it still looked empty.

“You would not be sending such a message if you were only on Buena Ventura to collect a large sum of money from Rafferty Coyne and take it back to Dallas.”

Valdez turned and disappeared into the jungle behind the shrine. Matt waited for a moment, staring after his old friend, and then he turned and started back toward the jeep.

There was a lot he didn’t like about this whole setup, he realized. Maybe Coyne was right. Perhaps he was questioning things that he wouldn’t have questioned in the Army. Perhaps the last two years had made him more cynical than he had realized.

But he didn’t like the timing. He also didn’t like the way Coyne had tried to have him followed the other night. And he didn’t like the overall feel of the whole situation. It reminded him too much of the night he’d walked into that ambush in the jungle. Matt hoped Mayhill would still be around and that he could be reached. And that he might have an answer to the question Valdez was sending.

A lot of if’s.

The jeep was waiting where he had left it. Matt climbed inside and started back toward town. He wondered what Sabrina was doing at that moment. Memories of their last night together made him ache. He badly wished he were back in Dallas about to slide comfortably into bed beside Sabrina.

He hoped Brad wasn’t making life too difficult for her. The boy had been stunned when Matt had explained he was leaving for Buena Ventura. It had taken hours to clear some of the fear and bitter hurt from Brad’s eyes. But in the end Brad had seemed to believe that his father really did intend to return. Brad had been uneasy about being left behind with Sabrina, however. Just as uneasy as Sabrina had been about having to play a maternal role.

So many risks, Matt thought. There was the risk that Sabrina would decide she simply didn’t want to become Brad’s stepmother. The risk that she would decide Matt wasn’t worth waiting for. The risk that she would give up on the prospect of building a future with one Matt August, washed-up major and bookstore proprietor.

She had resisted the idea of his going to Buena Ventura right up until the last minute. But she hadn’t withheld herself that last night. Instead she had given him all the warmth and softness and sweet excitement that was in her. And he had taken it with an urgent aggression that was a translation of his own fierce determination to make the venture succeed.

What if she changed her mind while he was gone? Matt asked himself grimly as he drove toward town. He wasn’t sure she fully understood how he felt about her. Hell, he wasn’t even sure he understood it himself. The sense of possessiveness was new to him. But he didn’t question it. It existed, and being the pragmatic man he was, Matt accepted it. The only thing he wasn’t certain of was Sabrina’s reaction to finding herself belonging to a man. And him belonging to her. She appeared to have spent a good portion of her life edging away from men who tried to control her. A natural independent. She’d probably get along famously with Valdez.

Matt’s fingers flexed around the steering wheel. Absently he stretched them out again and then gripped the wheel more tightly. It wasn’t that he wanted to control Sabrina. He just wanted her. Totally. Completely. He had never wanted anything or anyone so totally or completely in his life. He wanted a future, Matt thought. Sabrina and Brad were now his future.

He just wished he didn’t feel so damn queasy about the situation here on Buena Ventura. It would be nice to be back in Sabrina’s apartment tomorrow morning, stuffing clothes into a washing machine and dragging out the vacuum cleaner and knowing there was forty grand in his bank account.

The phone rang in Sabrina’s apartment just as she was curling up on the persimmon sofa with a glass of wine and a good book. She glanced at the clock as she reached over to pick up the receiver.

“It’s Wednesday night, so this must be Jeffrey,” she said brightly.

“Right first time.” Her brother chuckled. “How are things going, Sabrina?”

“Just peachy. And you? Foreclosed on any widows and orphans lately?”

“Not since last Sunday. You know we prefer to save foreclosures until Sundays. We like to move in directly after church.”

“Your banker’s sense of humor could get you in trouble one day. How’s the kid?”

“Our new nephew is doing great. When are you going to come out and see him?”

“Get right to the point, why don’t you, Jeff? I really don’t know when I’ll get out there. One of these days, I imagine,” Sabrina said vaguely. “I’ve got my hands full here at the moment. I told Dad that last Sunday when he called.”

“You weren’t very clear about just what was keeping you busy, apparently. Dad said something about the IRS?”

“They’ve been bugging me. Actually sent a couple of guys out to talk to me.”

“They did?” Jeffrey’s voice abruptly changed to serious concern. “About what?”

“Something about a penalty payment I’ve been fighting. It’s all over now, though. I got a written apology from them today.”

“Sabrina, I can’t see the IRS sending two people out to talk to you about a penalty payment.”

“Harassment. I told them so, too. They backed off. In any event, it’s all over.”

“So what else is keeping you so busy you can’t come out to see the new addition to the family?”

“Well, I’ve got an addition to my own family.” There, stew over that one for a while, she thought.

Astounded silence greeted that remark. “What exactly are you talking about, Sabrina?”

“I’m taking care of someone’s kid for a month.”

“Who on earth would leave a child with you for a month?” Jeffrey demanded.

“A friend.”

“Sabrina, are we talking about a man friend or a woman friend?”

“A man.”

“A good friend?”

“Yes.”

“Would you mind being a little more forthcoming? Who is this friend?”

“His name is Matt August. He’s out of the country for a while.”

“Sabrina Chase, if you do something dumb like getting married without telling Dad first, you’ll break his heat and you know it.”

“To date,” Sabrina said quite firmly, “no one has discussed marriage.”

“But this Matt August is important to you?”

Sabrina considered that. “Unfortunately, yes.”

“For God’s sake! Why unfortunately? What’s wrong with him?”

“What’s wrong with him is that he sometimes exhibits a distressing number of male characteristics.”

Jeffrey was confused. “Well, if he’s a man, then it seems natural he would, doesn’t it?”

“Interestingly enough, he tends to use the same excuse.”

“Sabrina, are you really serious about this guy?”

“Serious enough to take care of his kid for a month. You know I’m not the maternal type, Jeff.”

“Most women are maternal once they hold their own babies,” Jeffrey told her with outrageous masculine certainty.

“That, pal, is a myth put about by men who like the idea of women being tied to home and hearth.”

“Well, if you’re getting serious about August, you’d better trot him out to Oregon.”

“So you and Dad and Nolan can look him over? An amusing thought.” Sabrina laughed. “He’s not exactly a banker, you know.”

“You said he’s out of the country. On business?”

“Yes,” she agreed diplomatically.

“Is he with some multi-international? Dad wouldn’t object to a corporate type for you.”

“He’s not exactly a corporate sort of man,” Sabrina remarked, thinking about it. “But I guess you could say he’s on the cutting edge of his field.”

“What, precisely, is his field?” Jeffrey asked deliberately.

“I think he sells used knives or something. Look, Jeff, give my best to everyone and tell them I’ll be out to check over the nephew one of these days. I’ve got to run now. My houseguest will be home soon.”

“Where is he now?”

“At the ballet.”

“Oh.”

“That’s what he said when I told him he was going. Good for him, though. Good night, Jeff.” She hung up the phone as politely as possible and picked up her wineglass.

Another call from family over and done, Sabrina congratulated herself. It looked like she might have to make that trip to Oregon one of these days, though. If she didn’t she was liable to open the door some morning and find the Brothers Grim and her father standing on the threshold, demanding to look at Matt August.

That might be an interesting confrontation, she thought, sipping the wine slowly.

She wondered if Brad was enjoying the ballet with Alex. The boy had definitely not been thrilled at the idea. He had grumbled and complained and finally agreed only because Alex cajoled him into it.

“If it’s really dull, we’ll split in the middle and go to an arcade,” Alex had promised easily. “Or go find a film.”