Darkness(56)

“So tell me what happened back there at the camp,” he said, his voice a deep rumble that cut through the increasingly high-pitched whining of the wind.

Gina knew what he meant: he wanted to know what had happened when she’d reached the LORAN station.

In careful, concise sentences that were designed to keep emotion at bay, she told him what he wanted to know. But for all her calm on the surface, as she talked she discovered that she was still shaky inside and that grief and horror had solidified into what felt like a permanent knot in her chest.

As she ended her story with his unexpected appearance in the kitchen, her heart was pounding and tears pricked her eyes.

“The guy with the Texas accent—can you describe him?” he asked.

Firmly blinking the tears away, Gina shook her head. “The only one I saw was Ivanov.” Frowning, she added, “When you got to the camp, how did you even know where I was?”

He shrugged. “I headed for the building with the lights. Luckily, I was still a fair distance away when three men walked out the door. I gave them enough time to get clear and went in. I made it as far as the kitchen when I heard somebody coming and ducked behind the table thing. You ran through. I stayed where I was for a minute to make sure you weren’t being chased, and then I started to come after you. Only by then you’d encountered our friend Ivanov and were running back through the kitchen the other way.”

“How many of them were there? At the camp?”

“I saw the three who came out of the building, plus one other. But from the footprints I came across, I think there were at least six. The dinghy holds eight.”

Gina was assailed by a terrible thought. “Oh, my God, the dinghy probably just docked and nobody had a clue that there was anything wrong.” Her throat constricted, making it difficult for her to get the words out. “They probably walked up to the camp and started shooting people. No, whoever saw them pull up probably went down to the dock to meet them and invite them up to the camp. Mary—Jorge—none of them would even have dreamed that they could be in danger. Ivanov talked to Mary. I know he did, because he knew about her accent—she had this heavy Brooklyn accent. She would have had no clue what was going to happen. None of them would have had a clue. They were just slaughtered.”

Gina’s voice quavered on the last word. The thought of Mary and Jorge as they had looked lying there on the floor refused to leave her head. Fighting to banish the image, she took a deep, shuddering breath.

“Hey.” The path wasn’t really wide enough for two to walk abreast, but he caught up to her anyway. She could feel the weight of his gaze on her face but she didn’t look up at him because that damnable prickle of tears was back. But he clearly realized that she was upset. He caught her hand, squeezed it gently. Until she looked down at his black-gloved hand holding hers, she hadn’t realized that her fingers were clenched into tight fists. Having his big hand wrapped around her fist was almost ridiculously comforting. “I’m sorry this came down on you and your friends. I can’t do anything about the others, but I’m going to do my best to get you out of this in one piece.”

She took a deep breath.

“It’s not your fault,” she said. “You didn’t deliberately crash your plane.”

“No,” he agreed. “I didn’t.” He was still holding her hand, and she realized that her fingers were relaxing in his, instinctively responding to the solace he offered. She freed her hand before her fingers could do something stupid, like, say, clutch at his. Or entwine with them.

“None of that explains where you got the coat.” Her voice was deliberately crisp. Succumbing to sorrow was the last thing she meant to do. Right now what she needed most of all was to keep a clear head.

“Coat?” His genuine confusion earned him an exasperated up-flick of a look. Exasperation, she decided, was a far preferable emotion to everything else she’d been experiencing.

“This one. The one you’re wearing.” She gave his sleeve a tug.

“Oh,” he said. “A second dinghy dropped two men off near the rocks where I was hiding. One of the men headed down the coastline, like he was going to walk around the point. The other went right on past me and took the same trail you did. I followed him, and when I got the chance I took him out. His gun went over a cliff in the struggle, but I got his coat before I pitched him after the gun. I would have taken his boots, too, but they were too small. Then I got to thinking that you might run into somebody like him, so I followed you.”

Gina looked at him. He must have found a knit cap somewhere, probably in a coat pocket, because he’d pulled on a black one that hugged his head and almost touched his eyebrows in front. Below it, his eyes were as dark as the mountain behind them. His square, unshaven jaw was set and hard. His mouth was unsmiling. He looked tough. Capable. Dangerous, just as she’d suspected from the first.

And so handsome her heart beat a little faster just from looking at him.

He’d spoken of “taking out” the man he’d been following so nonchalantly, as if killing was something he was accustomed to doing. She thought of Ivanov and the butcher knife: killing obviously was something he was accustomed to doing.

A shiver ran down her spine.

Nice bear.

Both of those men had been killed on her behalf, she reminded herself, but that still didn’t make her feel less wary where he was concerned. It was, Gina reflected, sort of like finding herself under the protection of what was so far the biggest, baddest predator in the jungle.