Lopez made a disapproving sound but said nothing as they set out along the track.
Ethan could see that there were tire marks in the dusty sand of the track. Dixie was a small settlement nestled deep into the hills, mostly farmsteads and smallholdings. It had taken him a moment to find it on the map, so small was it amid the immense wilderness, but the people who lived there needed access to the highway in their trucks. That meant that if the scientists used their no doubt prodigious intellect, they would drive out to meet Ethan and Lopez and save them the trek.
‘You ever think about the places that your friend Jarvis keeps sending us?’ Lopez asked as they walked, her voice sounding strangely loud in the silence.
Ethan shrugged. ‘Not so much. He’s our employer, we just do what he asks.’
‘I guess,’ she replied. ‘Just it seems that with time we’re getting put up against ever more dangerous odds and in ever more remote locations. It’s like he’s trying to get us killed.’
‘You don’t trust him.’
‘Nope,’ she replied without hesitation. ‘He’s got his own agenda, Ethan, and we’re not high up on his list of priorities.’
Ethan stared at his boots as they walked, Natalie’s recent revelation ringing in his ears. They, and their family, had been kept under observation by at least one government agency in an operation running for years. The implications were too great for him to even begin considering, the questions far too many. That Doug Jarvis was behind it seemed remote, but then how could he be sure?
‘My sister and family have been under surveillance,’ he said finally. ‘Natalie found out during her work at the Capitol.’
Lopez looked at him as her jaw dropped open. ‘When did you find that out?’
‘Yesterday,’ Ethan admitted.
‘And you didn’t figure on telling me about it then?’
‘I’m telling you about it now.’
‘Honored, I’m sure,’ Lopez muttered.
‘It’s not Jarvis doing the surveillance,’ Ethan said.
‘And you know that how?’
Ethan found himself stumped. Between serving as his lieutenant in the Marine Corps to working for him at the DIA was a six-year gap where they’d had no contact. Who knew what the old man might have gotten involved with during the intervening years?
Then he remembered all that Jarvis had done for him, what he had now compared to when the old man had first approached him years before when he had been barely scraping through life, living in a battered apartment in downtown Chicago.
‘He gave me my life back,’ Ethan said finally. ‘Doesn’t mean much to you, I know, but when we need him to he goes the distance for us. He damned near got himself killed in New York last year trying to help us.’
Lopez said nothing for a while, but Ethan could see that she was mulling it all over, and he could hardly blame her for questioning the risks they were taking. Six months ago they’d almost died 2,000 feet beneath the surface of the Florida Straits. The year before that they’d almost been buried alive in New Mexico, and prior to that Ethan had almost lost his life in Israel. Now, they were strolling out into immense wilderness to search for a wild creature that had already killed at least two people.
Bail jumpers, by comparison, seemed tame foes.
‘I just wonder when the money we earn from doing this is outweighed by the likelihood of, y’know, dying,’ Lopez said. ‘I’ve got my family to think about.’
‘We’ve been here before,’ Ethan said. ‘We agreed it was worth it. Besides, it was your idea to work for the DIA.’
‘That was then,’ Lopez pointed out. ‘This is now, a lot further down the line. I thought we’d be apprehending high-profile criminals, not running around in the woods looking for man-eating monsters.’
‘We’re well paid,’ Ethan answered her.
Lopez smiled, her neat white teeth contrasting with her olive-brown skin.
‘And you get access to all kinds of technical wizardry so you can keep searching for Joanna,’ she said demurely.
Ethan stopped on the trail and looked at her. ‘You think that’s all this is about?’
‘Is it?’ Lopez challenged. ‘You’re a risk-taker, Ethan, just like me. But is what we’re doing for the DIA too much of a risk? What good are you to Joanna if you get your head ripped off by the homicidal long-lost relative of the gorilla?’
‘Finding her means a lot to me,’ Ethan replied, and was surprised by how easily it came out. Once upon a time, he would not have found the words.
Lopez sighed and nodded, took a pace closer to him.
‘I know it is,’ she said. ‘And I also know that Doug Jarvis keeps dangling a damned carrot in your face to keep you hoping that you can find her.’
‘He doesn’t do it like that.’
‘No?’ Lopez asked. ‘Like the fact that he let you see the footage that proves she’s still alive, then refuses to let you use the same intelligence information to track her movements?’
‘He said that national security would not allow me to—’
‘Bullshit!’ Lopez almost shouted, loud enough to scare a nearby bird into flight. The flapping wings chased the echo of her voice into the distance. ‘He had us inside what was probably the most secret installation in the entire United States’ secret arsenal of secret places, lets you have a quick glimpse of her, then suddenly you’re not allowed to see any more? Jesus, Ethan, wake up and smell the beans.’
Ethan felt momentarily deflated as he looked into her angry eyes and realized that she was right. He hadn’t even noticed, so focused was he on the chance that Joanna might still be found.
‘If it’s all so bad,’ he said finally, ‘then why do you stick with me?’
Her eyes flickered and she blinked.
‘Because… we’re partners; that’s what we do.’
Lopez had lost her previous partner, a DC homicide detective, years before during an investigation in the city that eventually led her to Ethan. Lucas Tyrell had died a hero, and Ethan knew that Lopez still blamed herself for leaving his side.
Ethan swallowed thickly. Words tumbled out of him as though he were listening to a recording of his own voice.
‘I’m not leaving you,’ he said. ‘If you’re done with this, I’ll follow you.’
Lopez stared at him and he saw a smile blossom across her features that she tried, and failed miserably, to hide.
‘Asshole,’ she muttered. ‘Got a goddamned answer for everything.’
Her smile was infectious and he found himself grinning back at her. He took a deep breath.
‘I mean it,’ he said. ‘I’ve got your back, Nicola, whatever happens.’
Lopez stared at him for a moment longer, then took a pace closer.
‘Okay,’ she said, almost a whisper. ‘We got that settled. What happens if you find Joanna?’
‘What happens?’ Ethan echoed.
‘To us?’
Ethan had never really seen Lopez as closely as he was looking at her now. Her dark eyes were staring up into his as though she had opened a window to her soul.
‘I haven’t figured that out, yet.’
‘You wanna start thinking about it?’ she asked.
He was about to reply when a shout hollered across the canyon toward them.
‘There you are!’
Ethan turned his head to see a small man in khaki shorts, sneakers and a blue T-shirt emblazoned with a Superman logo walking toward them, a map in his hand as he waved. Ethan bit his lip and looked down at Lopez, who was also staring at the newcomer. She shot Ethan a wry glance.
‘Saved by Superman, huh?’ she murmured.
Ethan grinned, relieved. ‘The caped crusader’s got my back too, it would seem.’
‘Dr. William Proctor,’ the man said breathlessly as he hurried up to them, flashing a smile of big white teeth that clashed with a frizzy mass of wiry black hair. ‘Great to meet you both, really great.’