Under the Wire (16 page)

Adam hoped to hell Amithnal was right. It felt like hours since their captors had taken Minrada—in reality, probably no more than an hour had passed. In the dark of the cave, time crawled like ants. Adam didn't know if it was day or night.

But he did know one thing. He'd kill the bastards if they hurt Minrada. Kill them with his bare hands if he had to. She was everything good and fine and special. And they were animals.

He lifted his bound wrists to his face and rubbed at his swollen eye with the heels of his hands. Blood from the hit he'd taken to his temple had caked and clotted and clouded his vision. His head throbbed. His gut and ribs ached where they'd clubbed him. It hurt like hell to bend his elbow.

He supposed he should be good and scared now, but what he was, was pissed. If they hurt her. If they—

The sound of approaching voices brought his head up. His heart started pounding. A small ray of light gradually grew to the yellow-rose glow of a torch beam and filled the cave. Shadowy silhouettes, distorted and wavy, formed on the striated rock walls before two guards came into view.

Minrada wasn't with them.

Adam planted his shoulder blades against the cave wall and levered himself to a standing position. "Where is she? Where's Minrada?"

The guards said something to each other in Tamil, then laughed. On the floor of the cave, Sathi cried out, a grieving sound of a mother for her child.

Adam's adrenaline kicked him full in the gut. "If you bastards touched her I'll kill you!"

The guards grabbed him by the arms and dragged him toward the mouth of the cave. Behind him, he could hear Amithnal calling out to them. Adam didn't understand his words but knew without a doubt what he was saying.

He was pleading. Pleading for his daughter's life. Pleading for Adam's life. Offering to give them anything they wanted if they would spare the children. Sathi's sobs, muffled against her husband's chest, followed Adam out of the cave and into the sun's blinding glare.

He bit back bile as the pain lancing through his head made him nauseous. And then instinct and adrenaline kicked in. He started fighting. With everything in him, he fought. He dragged his feet, swung his bound wrists. Used his head to butt, his shoulders to dislodge. His knee to gouge.

But he was one. Against two. Then two more who came running out of their tent, laughing, like it was sport, as they wrestled him to the ground. Spent, he went lax when they lifted him, then carried him by his feet and his hands and tossed him into the depths of yet another cave.

Sprawled facedown on damp rock, he groaned at the pain. Panted. Cursed. Blood ran into his eyes again. His ears rang.

"Adam?"

Minrada.

He stilled when the sound of her voice whispered out of the darkness. And felt his first pulse beat of hope since they'd taken her away, when the touch of her fingers grazed the back of his hand.

Outskirts of Ratnapura

Green, green, and more green. Verdant. Fertile. Lush. Another time, Lily would have appreciated the beauty. The birdsong. The wild, tropical uniqueness of the countryside. Now she just wanted to get somewhere, anywhere, she had a chance of finding her son.

The sun was gone now. The heat remained, forceful, unrelenting, saturated with the promise of a heavy night dew. With Manny still behind the wheel, silent and stoic, they'd covered the one hundred kilometers from the coastal region of Colombo to Ratnapura in what Lily suspected was record time.

As soon as Dallas had concluded his gun deal and they'd been certain no one was following them, they'd lit out of town like bandits. It still hadn't been fast enough for her even as the Suburban ate up the coastal highway, then veered east to the winding road that passed by the paddy fields cloaking the valley floor. As they climbed steadily higher in altitude, rubber tree forests interspersed with acres of tea bushes flourished on the hillsides and scented the air.

Life—rich and vibrant—surrounded them. Yet all she felt was anxiety and frustration.

She heard movement in the second seat, where Darcy and Ethan had been sleeping for the last hour or so. Dallas was sacked out farther back. Provisions and Dallas's contraband weapons and ammunition were stowed in every available space inside the Suburban. More supplies were lashed to a carrier on the roof.

There had been no sign of a white VW in the Suburban's rearview mirror.

"What are the candles about, do you suppose?" Darcy asked around a yawn as they passed several older houses in the small village of Kahangama.

Lily glanced back to see Darcy stretching as she sat up. "Traditionalists light candles at dusk and leave them on the doorstep. They believe the candles keep evil spirits from entering their homes."

Lily turned back to the side window, searching the dark, always looking for a sign to lead her to her son. She wished that all it took was a lit candle to protect Adam. He could use some help warding off evil. And she could use some protein, Lily realized—something to counteract the fatigue leaning on her like a hundred pounds of lead. But she couldn't make herself eat. Just the thought of food made her nauseous.

She was exhausted, but anxiety over Adam kept the adrenaline at spike level and prevented sleep. From a physiological standpoint, she understood that adrenaline was pretty much all that kept her going. She wasn't sure what gave Manny his stamina.

Wearily she offered to drive.

"I'm fine," he said without so much as a glance her way.

"Always were a stubborn SOB." This from Ethan, who had also roused himself. "Pull over, Rambo. Catch a power nap. I'll take a turn behind the wheel."

To her amazement, Manny pulled over. They all took the opportunity to get out of the Suburban and stretch— all but Dallas, who lifted his head, then laid it back down when Ethan uttered a quiet, "Chill, bro."

It was Ethan who caught Lily's arm when she wobbled and almost went down. But it was Manny who stepped to her side and steered her toward the backseat.

"Climb in the back with Darcy." The gentleness in his tone surprised her and undercut the stern set of his mouth. "You need to sleep."

She would have argued, but Darcy was suddenly beside her, guiding her into the vehicle. "Adam's going to need you rested. You won't be any good to him if you drop over from exhaustion."

Lily actually managed a smile. "Okay, now I understand why you had a career in the diplomatic corps."

"Don't even think about arguing with her." Ethan settled in behind the wheel while Manny climbed into the passenger seat, slumped down low, and closed his eyes. "It's a no-win situation."

"Why, thank you, Lieutenant." Darcy smiled and made room for Lily to lie down on the seat beside her. "Next time we square off, I'll remind you of that little concession. Save us both a lot of time and trouble."

Ethan grunted and shifted the Suburban into gear. "Fixed my own wagon with that one."

Easy. They were so easy with each other, Lily thought as she folded her hands beneath her cheek and closed her eyes. That was the way with love. She'd longed for that once. Longed for that gentle, flirty teasing. Those knowing looks. The ones that said there were no secrets—at least not from each other. The ones that said there were no lies.

The closest she'd ever come to what Darcy and Ethan had was a summer a lifetime ago. With a man who now considered her a traitor.

Manny had been a loving, playful young man when she'd known him then. He'd worn his heart on his sleeve, his emotions in his eyes. He'd been a warrior then, too—but his heart had been gentle.

There was nothing gentle about him now.

Not even his speech. She used to love his lushly romantic Spanish accent. Now even most of that was gone. Seventeen years in the United States had added a crispness to his enunciation and speech patterns. Seventeen years had added a deepness to his voice.

Seventeen years. Lost.

Like her son was lost. Like more hours were lost in her search to find him.

Like she felt lost. . . until she felt the warm comfort of Darcy's hand on her shoulder.

It was a small gesture. A huge expression of understanding. One she'd craved in this hostile country amid all these quietly hostile men. One she welcomed.

Against all odds she drifted off to sleep as a warm, wet tear trickled from the corner of her eye.

CHAPTER 11

On the road to Kandy

"Be lucky if the sonofabitch doesn't jam on the first round," Ethan sputtered. Well-hidden in a copse of trees, he lifted the seen-better-days AK-47 to his shoulder and sighted down the barrel.

It had been a bitch of a day. And this was the first chance they'd had to inspect the weapons and ammunition up close and personal.

"Yeah, well, you can pick your friends, but you can't pick your friendly neighborhood black-market weapons suppliers," Manny heard Dallas say with a grunt. "Or the weapons he supplies. At least not all of them. Trust me these are better than the ancient AK-74s the bastard wanted to pass off as 'superior quality.'"

They were "pseudo" camping in a public campground, well back from the main contingent of campers, acting like tourists, playing down their presence, drawing as little attention as possible. And taking a little time to regroup and figure out where to go from here after a full day in Ratnapura.

Arms crossed, knees locked, feet set wide, Manny stood back in the shadows as his friends examined the weapons Dallas had bargained for in Colombo. Manny had just come from the communal shower in the center of the campground. His hair was still wet. His shirt hung open and free of his cargo pants.

The late-afternoon breeze felt fine against his exposed skin where it funneled in through the open placket of his shirt. It was the only thing that felt fine.

He agreed with Ethan's and Dallas's assessment of the weapons. The rifles—funny how Soviet-made weaponry turned up in every war-torn country he'd ever been in— were functional at best. The handguns were a step up but still a far cry from the state-of-the-art firepower they'd had available when they'd staged Darcy's rescue mission on Jolo three months ago. There they'd had contacts with the U.S. spec ops boys stationed in Manila, who'd gladly let them "borrow" an arsenal that would make a five-star general drop to his knees and weep with fucking joy. Here they had a back-alley deal—with back-alley quality—at Wall Street prices.

Manny glanced toward the darkening sky. The morning had started off cool; it had been a brief respite for what had morphed into a scorcher of a day. They were at a higher altitude now. The night would cool down to tolerable.

Right now, they were all whipped. What sleep they'd gotten last night had been in the Suburban—if power naps could be called sleeping. The guys were okay. Manny was concerned about Darcy and Lily, though. Today in Ratnapura had been long and grueling, but they hadn't wanted to attract any more attention than necessary by checking into a hotel tonight.

The plan was to rest a few hours here tonight, then hit the road before first light. There'd be time for sleeping once they found Adam. In the meantime, each hour was a loss on so many counts. Not that they'd wasted any time. Today they'd spread out and split up into three groups: Ethan with Darcy; Dallas on his own, which he preferred; and Manny had taken Lily by default.

It wasn't that Manny wanted to be with her. Hell no. What choice had he had? She might not be safe on her own, and Dallas and Ethan clearly didn't want to be saddled with her. Manny's friends' reaction to Lily was barely veiled disdain.

He watched a painted stork swoop lazily across the sky, told himself he didn't need to feel any guilt over the way they treated her. That both Ethan and Dallas were solid in the character judgment department and were forming their own conclusions.