Ryan shook his head. “No. That’s what I was expecting but when we got to Lisbon he made contact with people in South Africa who told him about the Syrians. He and Saqqal wanted to meet to discuss the Lost City so a meeting was arranged in Tunis.”
“Tunis?” Hawke said.
Ryan nodded. “We were there less than a day. It was decided that Kruger would secure the Mask of Inti while Saqqal arranged the extra muscle with Chastain. I don’t know what Saqqal is looking for but it’s not any lost treasure. He kept going on about Utopia.”
Hawke frowned. “Utopia?”
“Uh-huh, but no idea what that means. I think he’s a few clowns short of circus, if you ask me.”
“So what happened next?” Lexi asked.
“Then the plan was to meet up in Colombia, and that’s where you entered the picture.” He sighed heavily. “Which is good, because Kruger said he was only keeping me alive until he had no further use for my skills… and then the plan was to shoot me… I’m so glad it’s over. Now, would someone please tell me where Maria is?”
“Come with me, Ryan,” Reaper said. “We need to talk.”
“About what?”
“Please…”
Reaper flicked his roll-up away and put his tattooed arm on Ryan’s shoulder as he wheeled him away from the group. They walked back along the track a few yards and the Frenchman began talking quietly.
Lea watched the conversation from a distance, her heart breaking as she watched Ryan get smashed yet again with the terrible news about Maria Kurikova and how she was killed by Ekel Kvashnin back on the Seastead. The young man walked around in circles for a moment, with his head in his hands and then collapsed to the floor as he broke down. Reaper tried to comfort him with a heavy hand but Ryan pushed him away and then staggered to his feet before scrambling into the jungle.
Reaper returned slowly to the group and began to roll another cigarette. “I told him what happened. I told him she was a hero.”
“He needs time,” Lea said, anxiously scanning the tree line for any sign of her ex-husband.
“That can’t have been easy to take,” Hawke said flatly, working hard to keep any emotion out of his voice. “Not after Sophie.”
Scarlet sighed. “No…”
The journey into Bogotá was winding, stuffy and silent. Ryan sat in the back and stared wordlessly out the window as the jungle slowly turned into the suburbs of the city. When they got back to the hotel they bought beers and moved away from the bar to talk. Ryan pulled a piece of grubby paper from his pocket, handed it to Luis, and after downing his drink he turned and walked right back to the bar on his own.
“I need another drink.”
“What’s this?” Lea said.
Without turning or stopping, Ryan called out over his shoulder. “The marks on the mask Kruger nicked from Cartagena.”
Luis Montoya’s eyes widened like two full moons when he saw the sketches Ryan had made from his memory of the Mask of Inti. “This is incredible… are you sure it is what you saw?” He looked up but saw Ryan was now at the bar and making his order.
“Can you help us, Luis?” Lexi said.
“Maybe.”
Scarlet sighed. “Helpful. Kruger’s got the mask and is presumably well on his way and we’re buggering around with a maybe.”
“Easy, Cairo,” Hawke said, raising his hand to calm her. “He’s doing his best and he’s all we’ve got. I don’t think Ryan’s with us at the moment.” Looking into the bar he saw Ryan downing his third consecutive whisky.
“Yeah, I noticed that,” she said.
Lea stepped into the fray. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Stand down, kitten,” Scarlet said. “It’s supposed to mean precisely nothing.”
“I can help, I think,” Luis said, ignoring the obvious tension in the room. “But these are very unusual symbols. I can see why Héctor hid it away.”
“Tell us what you can,” Reaper said, lighting a cigarette and moving over to the window.
Hawke passed a tense hand over his face and sighed before crashing down on a soft chair. “Yes — please, Luis. Anything you have could help us.”
“If these sketches are accurate then they are Incan in origin, which is not surprising, but they’re not entirely consistent with the traditional Incan style.”
“What are you saying?” Lexi asked.
“I’m not sure I can read them — at least not this one here. It’s very confusing. It appears to be Indian in origin.”
“As in curries?” Scarlet said.
“As in the Hindu Mandala,” Luis said. “Are you sure Ryan can’t help?”
Lea looked over at Ryan. He was slumped over the bar and leaning into a good-looking woman with a low-cut top and lots of lipstick. “I think Ryan’s still MIA.”
Luis looked confused. “MIA?”
“Missing in Action.”
“Ah… I see. What about this Alex?”
“She’s been called away to be with her family,” Hawke said, and didn’t elaborate. “We can communicate with her but it’s on her schedule not ours.”
Reaper stubbed out his roll-up and stepped over to them, stopping to clap his heavy hand on Luis’s shoulder. “What they’re saying, mon ami, is that it’s all down to you.” And with that he raised his lager and took a long drink before sighing with satisfaction.
“So speak up or forever hold your peace,” Scarlet said.
“I don’t think I can help you. I am concerned by the presence of the Hindu Mandala on this mask. It should not be here. I can only presume it has been added later as a joke.”
“I wouldn’t bank on it,” Lexi said.
“What do you mean?”
“She means we’ve found many archaeological pieces which don’t exactly add up to make sense,” Hawke said. “What we need to focus on right now is what these markings mean. Kruger has killed people for the mask and he obviously knows what it means. That means we have to know as well or we can’t stop him.”
“Yes!” Luis said, leaping up from his seat and pacing up and down. “I agree, but what?” In his hand he was still holding the folded paper Ryan had drawn on, and as he raised it to his eyes for a closer look he knocked Reaper’s beer off the table where it tumbled to the floor and spilled out all over the carpet.
“Oh, sorry!”
“De rien,” Reaper said, and grabbed another beer from the bar while Luis hurriedly mopped up the mess on the floor with a napkin.
“What were you going to say, Luis?” Lea said, concealing the frustration in her voice.
“I think we’re going to need to show this to Mauricio Balta.”
“Who’s he?” Scarlet said.
“He’s the curator of the Larco Museum in Lima.”
“Lima, Peru?” Lea said.
Luis looked at her. “Is there another one?”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Their flight to the Peruvian capital was uneventful and boring and as soon they had cleared customs they were piling into a hired SUV and racing into the city. Lea watched the suburbs rush past in a blur as Hawke weaved the Pajero deftly in and out of the lanes on the highway, and her mind drifted to Dirk Kruger and his new friends, Saqqal and Jawad. As for Rajavi, the Iranian strongman, she shuddered to think what was behind the mask.
She hated that she didn’t know what Kruger was up to. Was he now using his massive wealth and grubby black market connections to expand his network in a bid to beat them to the truth they had sought for so long? Even worse was the fact that now they had two enemies to fight — the Oracle and his mysterious Athanatoi and now Kruger and his nutcase Syrian terrorist friends and their weird obsession with Utopia — whatever the hell that was.
She glanced in the mirror and looked at Ryan. He was sullenly staring out of the window but his eyes were covered by a pair of sunglasses. He’d pulled his messy hair forward to hide his face. He hadn’t spoken since Reaper told him about Maria’s death and she knew he was turning inside himself again. This time it would be worse than ever. The anger and misery of grief was whispering its poison in his mind and only time could heal that.