“Hard in those days to be a captain and a quitter,” Russo pointed out. “The crew would have lynched him.”
“Good point,” Crouch said. “And what to do with all that treasure?” He stopped in the middle of the sidewalk and looked around. “What indeed?”
Alicia took in their surroundings. Casca Viejo seemed to be a small town with a neatly laid-out collection of buildings, several narrow through roads and sea views to most sides. Crouch input the coordinates to the cathedral on his Android phone and started to follow the resulting blue line and soft-spoken directions. The town appeared quiet, but several people wandered the streets or drove their cars along the roads. Another sleepy place then, just like most they had visited in the last few days.
“All right, I admit,” Alicia said as they walked. “I couldn’t handle all this chilled-out stuff. I’d go nuts.”
Russo joined her at the back of the team. “In some ways it would…” He struggled to speak the word, even a simple one. “Help.”
Alicia sensed the big soldier might finally have something to say. “Is the rage so bad?”
“Imagine a matchstick sparking to life. Imagine a pile of tinder set aflame. Then see it spread into a forest fire that engulfs a state. That’s the rage. And you feel it every day.”
“No diminishing?”
“Sometimes.” Russo shrugged slightly. “Depends on the day.”
“When did you first feel it?” She knew it was an important question and one Russo might not want to answer.
“I can’t remember when it wasn’t there.”
Alicia was surprised. “Really? Earliest memory? School?”
“Yeah. A bigger boy decided to bully me. They had to pick his arms and legs up off the floor.” Russo frowned. “Figuratively.”
“And the source?”
Russo was silent for a time. “Ah, I’m not ready for that yet.”
Alicia nodded. “So why now? Why tell me now, I mean?”
“I sense the change in you. Out of all the people I know, you’ll handle the truth best.”
Alicia nodded toward Crouch. “Better than the boss?”
“He wouldn’t understand. You will. And we have the battle trust now.”
Soldiers that faced death together bonded fast. Alicia already felt she could ask Russo anything. The answer, however, might come pricklier than a briar patch but as Russo said — she could handle anything.
“I’ll be ready. But look — is it better to hold it all in, or to just let it go?”
“I understand why you ask that. You’d think venting the rage would make it all easier. But in fact it’s the opposite. Opening the cage only makes it want more.”
“And talking about it?”
“I guess we’ll see.”
Russo moved off, walking up front and saying no more. Alicia took a few moments to study the Gold crew, thinking about how they came together and how well they worked as a team. This quest, with all its disappointments and dead-ends and nasty pieces of work pitted against them was more than testing, more than mystifying, it was a way of building up the team.
Healey strode along beside Caitlyn, the two not touching but clearly wanting to, happy together and less vigilant because of it.
But Alicia watched out for both of them. She studied Crouch too, and wondered if there were more secrets to come. Could there be worse?
It didn’t matter. Because they were a team. When it came down to it, Alicia would risk everything for every one of them. Crouch then stopped up ahead, staring at a row of trees.
Time to go to work.
CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE
Alicia found herself entering a pleasant, peaceful area bordered by trees. Well-tended lawns were broken only by a few narrow gravel paths. Low, ruined walls ran everywhere and could have been the remnants of almost anything, but one tall brick tower still stood at the far end of the site.
Alicia stopped. “That’s a cathedral?”
Crouch nodded. “Apparently. Destroyed by an earthquake in 1644. Rebuilt only to be set upon by Morgan — and others — since. Maybe they knew it wasn’t destined for a happy life.”
Alicia studied the single tower with its empty windows and crumbling frames. The top tier was blackened, as if still bearing the stains of the seventeenth-century ravishing, but Alicia knew it couldn’t be so.
Could it?
“Is this site still in use?”
“Only for tourists. I did think there would be more of them around right now, considering the time.”
Alicia guessed mid-afternoon was a good visiting time, but the area was empty. Tranquil, but eerily so as if a four-hundred-year-old ghost had chased everyone away. Crouch stared hard at the cathedral itself.
“I guess we should start there.”
Russo fell in line. “Is this a good time to ask what the script actually said?”
Crouch fished out the map. “Well, as we know this was a bad venture for Morgan and his band of pirates. Missed out on the gold. Arrived starved and desperate after days of being ambushed through the woods. Allegations of torture and still no gold. Then the great fire, which some say was set by Morgan and others that the town’s captain general ordered the gunpowder magazines exploded. Either way, thousands died. And so we come to the ruins of Nuestra Senora de la Asuncion. And so to Morgan: ‘Our woes and our fate and our comeuppance came all at once in the City. Our reward gone, our hearts and heads all ablaze with rage, we blamed the town. And its people. Shame on us. And what recompense we could make, we made at Nuestra. ’ ”
“Ahh,” Healey said. “Now it makes sense. I couldn’t understand the connection between the cutthroat Morgan and a house of God.” He paused. “Except maybe the charring.”
Alicia kept her eyes on their perimeter. “Let’s hope there’s an X this time. Burned into the ground.”
“Amazing it’s stood so long,” Caitlyn said. “And became part of a World Heritage Site.”
Alicia saw a shape flit between the trees. Not the slow meanderings of a tourist, but the quick gait of a man coming closer. The sighting was too quick to make out if he carried a gun, but she reached down for hers.
“Nine o’clock,” she said. “Potential enemy.”
Russo nodded. “And at eight. We’re being watched.”
Crouch folded the map. “We’re twenty feet from the cathedral. Can we make it?”
“If that’s around eight meters,” Healey again showed his youth, this time on purpose, “then I think we can.”
Alicia dropped to one knee and drew her weapon. “Then go,” she muttered. And then, loudly, she called, “Show yourselves, boys. Best to stay on my good side.”
As the team headed rapidly for the dark, open doorway, Alicia saw three men leap out into the open. Instantly, she registered they carried weapons, and opened fire. Distance affected her aim and the bullets shot wide, but still caused enough consternation to give her a little more time.
She backed up, following her team.
Russo spun at the cathedral entrance and squeezed off a few more shots. More men appeared among the trees. Alicia quickly counted five before joining Russo.
“Why an ambush?”
The big soldier shrugged. “Maybe they were waiting for us to find something. Maybe we saw ’em sooner than we should. We need to—”
Crouch’s yell of warning cut him off. “More here!”
“Crap.” Alicia bypassed Russo, leaving him on guard at the door, and headed inside. The cathedral smelled of age and mold, heat and dark places. The alcoves were covered in cobwebs. Steady rays of sunlight beamed through the open windows above, a golden latticework, shot through with dust motes. She could already see the building’s far exit and Crouch leaning against an ancient wall as three men picked themselves up from the floor ahead. They carried shovels and backpacks, flashlights and pistols.