"Lily. What the fuck are you doin' here?"
He sounded drunk, but she was so relieved to hear his voice she nearly wept. And when she finally located him and found him sitting up, gingerly palpating his left temple, she promptly dropped to her knees, threw herself against his chest, and clamped her arms around his strong neck in a fierce stranglehold.
"Jeez's Christ," he protested in a harsh voice.
But his arms wrapped around her, and she shuddered in pure, unadulterated relief to feel their strength and the comforting body heat that accompanied his embrace. Clutching at him, she burrowed closer. "Oh, gawd, Zach, I was so scared you were dead."
"Prob'ly should be, letting myself get distracted like a freakin' raw recruit." He suddenly sounded much more alert… and furious. Clasping her chin in one hand, he tipped her face up and thrust his own down until they were nose to nose. "What the hell kind of irresponsible stunt was that, stowing away in my car? What did you think you were doing, Lily?"
"I don't know," she wailed truthfully. "Your friends were supposed to be here to back you up, and then when they couldn't be, it just didn't seem right that you should handle this all by yourself." Considering what a huge help she'd turned out to be, that sounded even dumber said aloud. She shrugged and admitted, "I didn't think, period."
He gave her an odd look. "You were watching my back?"
Her bark of laughter came dangerously close to hysterics. "Well, that was the plan, in theory. But it's so dark out here, and this much nature up close and personal scares me to death, so all I did was nearly get you killed ."
The arm wrapped around her waist tightened. "You wusses—it takes more than a little pop upside the head to kill a marine." Then, releasing her chin, he felt around the ground near his hip. A moment later he gave a grunt of approval, and Lily caught a quick glimpse of a handgun before he tucked it out of sight behind his back.
He shrugged when he caught the direction of her gaze. "At least the kidnapper's not armed with my own pistol," he said and frowned. "I suppose it's too much to hope he didn't waltz away with the ransom money."
"I don't know. He wasn't much more than a shadowy form up here on the hill when I saw him."
Muscles tensing, Zach jerked erect, and reluctantly Lily loosened her grasp on his neck and moved back. Reaching out to grip her shoulders, he stared at her intently. "You saw him up here?"
"Yes, but not very well, I'm afraid. Just enough to think he's too tall to be a woman."
Zach shrugged that aside, obviously not finding it significant at the moment. "Where were you when you saw him? This is important, Lily."
"Down there in the campsite."
He gave her a brief, hard kiss. "That's my girl. Maybe all isn't lost, after all." He pushed to his feet.
When he started to stride away, Lily scrambled to her feet. "Wait! Don't leave me here!"
He reached back and grasped her hand. "Keep up." Despite the brisk command, however, a moment later he tightened his grip and said, "Watch that root."
"What root?" Aside from glimpses of his face when it was an inch away, she might as well have been in a cave. "How can you see anything?"
"Good night vision, remember? When people aren't flashing lights in my face, that is. Move a step to your left."
Zach led Lily down to the campsite, not releasing her hand until they reached the firepit. Squatting down, he felt behind it, and the tension knotting his gut since he'd regained consciousness unraveled slightly when his hand closed over the satchel. Maybe he hadn't fucked everything up, after all. His head felt like spikes were being driven behind his eyes, and his vision was the tiniest bit blurry, but those were things he could live with. Screwing up the drop and further endangering his sister weren't—but it looked as if he might have been given a second chance. And this time they were going to play by his rules.
"I can't believe I scared him off with a rock," Lily said, and he rose to his feet to see her glancing around nervously.
"I doubt you did. My guess is he didn't want you to see his face." Grasping the satchel handle in one hand and her hand in the other, he hustled them out of the campsite and back to his Jeep. But when he opened the passenger door for her a moment later, she dug in her heels, tilted her chin up at him, and thrust out a hand.
"Give me the keys."
"Don't be ridic—"
"Don't you be ridiculous," she interrupted and poked him in the gut with her extended hand. "I've had a rough night, and I'm darned if I'm going to get into a car with a driver who may have a concussion."
"I don't have a concussion." Hands on his hips, he bent his fiercest I-hold-your-life-in-my-hands-and-you'd-be-wise-to-remember-it master-sergeant look on her.
Without her usual skyscraper heels, the top of her head barely reached his chest. She obviously thought she was a giant, though, for not only did she not blink under a look that had sent men twice her size scrambling to do his bidding, she gave him another poke. "Give 'em here!"
He handed them over. As much as he hated to admit it, she was in much better shape to drive than he was, and pretending otherwise was dumb. He climbed into the passenger side, eased his throbbing head back against the headrest, and closed his eyes. He didn't open them again until Lily killed the engine what seemed only minutes later.
Surprised to find that he'd dozed off, he saw they were back at the Beaumonts', and the house was ablaze with light. Biting back a sigh, he reached for the door handle, only to pause when Lily touched his thigh.
"How do you feel?"
Like last week's K-rations. "Fine."
She made a skeptical sound. "You're not a very good liar, Zach."
"Yeah, well, would it make any difference if I said my head's pounding like a kettle drum? I've still gotta do what I've gotta do." He took a bracing breath, then opened the door, slid his thigh out from under her warm hand, and climbed out. But looking at her across the top of the Jeep, he admitted, "I could use your help on one thing, though, before we go in to face the lions."
Miguel had his ear pressed against the heavy wooden panel of a second floor door when the commotion broke out downstairs. Foregoing trying to calculate if it was safe to enter the room, he lifted his head and strained to make sense of the sudden babble of voices. But although the volume rose and fell, exact words escaped him.
He didn't know what was going on down there, but he knew he didn't like it. Even a floor away, he felt exposed, and since he hadn't heard any noise on the other side of the heavy door, he cautiously turned the knob. When no one promptly demanded to know who was there, he slipped inside.
The little bit of light that followed him into the suite showed it was another casually elegant, empty set of rooms. He couldn't believe this place. There were first-class hotels in Bogota not half as beautiful, and he ran appreciative fingertips over the silky, striped chair in front of him. Then footsteps suddenly raced in his direction down the hallway, and he stilled, staring at the door that hadn't quite closed behind him and not daring to breathe again until the footsteps pounded past and on down the staircase.
Hotels didn't seem half as busy, either.
He should probably get out of here. After an hour of cautiously checking rooms, he still hadn't caught so much as a glimpse of Taylor's yellow-haired puta . and now a humming sort of agitation hung over the place, making it feel like a hive getting ready to swarm. That much activity couldn't be good for his chances of moving around undetected. And when a few moments later it occurred to him that he could barely even remember what Emilita looked like, he considered for an instant going back to Bisinlejo and just leaving this whole vendetta behind.