Page 31 of Fear No Evil

CHAPTER 7

When Maggie woke up at the crack of dawn, her head was on Jake’s chest, her arm around his waist. Shocked by what she’d done in her sleep, she froze. Heat flooded her face. When had this happened? Surely he’d noticed, unless he slept very soundly.

She ordered herself to ease away from him, hoping he wouldn’t waken and catch her in his arms. But she lacked the will to move just yet. Instead, she lay there, enjoying the dense but supple texture of his upper chest and shoulders. She could hear his heart beating, slow, steady strokes. His manly scent still reminded her of rain showers. The chest hair under her arm made her want to comb her fingers through it to find out if it was as soft as it looked.

Don’t you dare, Maggie.

Her heart had begun to thud. Breaking out in a light sweat, she managed to peel herself off him. With great exertion, she squirmed out from under his heavy arm, moving it out of the way so she could lie back down.

Then she closed her eyes and willed herself to fall back to sleep. Instead, she listened to Jake breathe. He didn’t snore. She turned her head to look at him. His profile in the muted light was so familiar that her heart clenched. In college, she’d thought him handsome in a nerdy way. But there was nothing nerdy about the profile of the warrior sleeping next to her.

With difficulty, she tore her gaze to the blinds by her feet. The sun was brightening by degrees behind the bamboo slats, slowly filling their cubicle with morning light. How surreal that she was lying on a mat near the top of a mountain with the only man she’d ever loved‍—and romance was out of the question, regardless of how attractive he’d become.

The blare of a recording shattered the camp’s peaceful quiet.“¡Despiértense todos. Arriba y Ándale!”Maggie bolted upright, startled by the unexpected reveille, bellowing for the trainees to wake up, get up, and get going.

Jake’s hand coming to rest on Maggie’s bare lower back made her want to throw herself at him. Appalled by her response to him, she tossed back the blanket. “Time to get up.” She jumped into her remaining clothes and her boots and left the bungalow before he did.

Minutes later, Jake joined her in watching the young rebels exercise under Mondo Gallo’s eagle eye. In the middle of the camp, themondohad them doing burpees, push-ups, and lunges. Maggie had to laugh at their form. Jake couldn’t watch.

Shortly after drills, the FARC and the peacekeepers shared an uninspired breakfast of leftover rice and moreagua panela. The sickly-sweet drink was getting old already. Desperate for carbs, Maggie forced herself to drink it.

Once breakfast was over, Comandante Marquez jerked his head at the Argentine and said,“Vámonos.”Let’s go.“Mondo Gallo is in charge. We will be back in three days.”

Watching Marquez and Arias cross camp toward the .50-caliber machine gun, Maggie met Jake’s speculative gaze. Rojas was smart to avoid using the handheld radio for his communication, preferring to do it in person. Spy drones couldn’t pick up face-to-face communication. But was his camp so far away that it tookthree full daysto get there and back?

The good news was Marquez was wearing the watch he’d stolen from Jake, which meant the JIC would soon have the coordinates for Rojas, if only briefly, unless Marquez gave the watch to his leader as a gift‍—or had it taken from him, as Jake had.

A vision of Gallo swaggering toward them tempered Maggie’s hopeful thoughts. Uneasiness swept over her as he hitched his trousers in a gesture of self-importance while running a hostile gaze over the peacekeepers.

“Oigan.”Listen up. “I am the commander now. If any of you cause mischief, I will lock you in there.” He pointed to a wooden shack standing at the far edge of the camp, nearly swallowed up by the forest. It appeared so rotten and dilapidated that it might collapse at any moment. “It is filled with hornets and bats. Don’t cause me any trouble.” With a dark look, he stalked toward the officers’ quarters to enjoy being king of the castle.

The UN team all regarded one another. What were they supposed to do in the meantime?

Boris suggested some team-building exercises. Maggie, used to working alone, wanted no part of that. Seeing several of the teenage boys heading toward the bull’s-eye field, kicking a soccer ball between them, she suggested, “Why don’t we play soccer with the kids?” What she really wanted to do was find out whether any of them knew where the hostages were kept.

Esme, who’d come out of the bungalow looking better that morning, immediately declined, as Maggie knew she would. Boris shook his head. “I’m too old for that.”

Bellini laughed. “And I’m too lazy.”

But Charles jumped to his feet enthusiastically. “I’m game. How are yourfútbolskills, Jacques?”

Jake shook his head. “No, no. I can’t even see the ball. Lena’s the soccer player.”

The Frenchman tipped his head at Maggie. “Shall we suggest a game? Two against four. You think they’ll go for those odds?”

She raised an eyebrow at him. “You’d better be good.”

The Frenchman gave a modest shrug. “I’m not too bad.”

Curious to see what happened, Jake followed Charles and Lena so he could see the game better, allegedly. Positioning himself by the sandbags that surrounded the machine gun, which was currently unmanned, he watched the boys receive Charles’s offer with surprise. In unison, they glanced at Gallo’s brick quarters, then shared a look and shrugged. Sure, why not?

For the first time, Jake noted nets already strung up on either side of the field. They’d played soccer here before. The terrain was almost flat but only a little larger than a tennis court. Lena took up a fullback position, and Charles played center forward, letting the ball slip right by him as the game began.

Sitting on the sandbags, Jake glanced casually back at the machine gun. It had only a short belt of bullets, suggesting the FARC were as low on ammo as they were on food. Returning his attention to the game, he watched Lena defend the goal against two fleet-footed youths. Admiration put a smile on his face as she put her long legs to work and stole the ball from under one boy’s feet, then passed it up to Charles, who let it slide right by him again.

The look of pure annoyance on Lena’s face made Jake chuckle. Her passionate nature, as evident as it had been twelve years ago, was a cultural trait she’d picked up growing up in Venezuela. Being hotheaded wasn’t the best characteristic for a case officer, but she made up for it with her awareness of the environment, something Jake struggled to emulate.

Stealing the ball away a second time, Lena bellowed at Charles to hold on to it. At that moment, the door at the little quarters creaked open. Turning his head, Jake was dismayed to see the disagreeablemondoglaring at them from across the camp.