dark green uniforms pounded my way, so I took a page from the Brain’s book and skedaddled up an ivy-covered wall. On the other side, I sprinted over Market Street to the River Bend parking garage and my first floor Rent-A-Wreck. Thirty seconds later I motored sedately out into evening traffic.
Only after I knew I wasn’t being followed did I pull over so I could study the paper the Brain had so graciously given up, unbeknownst to him, in our scuffle amid the gorgeous dancers.
Harrison’s proprietary code covered the page. I scanned through the gibberish, finding nothing but lots of notes to self about insects, repellants and allergies. The poor Brain had got himself bamboozled. Then a set of letters and numbers caught my attention. I translated, tried not to get too excited.
Oh, yes, Harrison had been in the field. That little encoded phrase at the bottom of the sheet told me exactly where he’d been.
Roraima, Brazil, here I come.
Chapter 3
The Hotel Imperial in Boa Vista crouched at the city’s edge, its clapboard sides weathered and unpainted for most of a decade. Chico, the Brazilian contact I’d inherited from Daley when he got dumped from von Brutten’s payroll, had set up both my flight from Boa Vista into the jungle and my guide. He’d also booked the Imperial for me. Doing me a favor, he probably thought. I could tell it was usually a brothel but, for the sake of the International Conference on Environmental Protection and Sustainable Living being held that week, it had temporarily become a true hotel. Just grungy, sleazy and cheap.
Thanks for nothin’, Chico.
The conference was being held in one of the legitimate hotels in the city’s heart. Strange city to have a conference, I thought as I collected the old-fashioned church key to my no doubt dingy and bug-ridden room. Why not Manaus, which at least had a cosmopolitan air? The greasy hotel landlord smiled a greasy smile and wished me a good stay. At least I’m pretty sure that’s what he said; my Portuguese isn’t what it should be.
As I trudged up the narrow stairs, I heaved my canvas duffel bag over one shoulder. The pain about doing what I do isn’t the scraping around in the jungle. It’s having to buy all your supplies at the local open-air market—rice, beans, a cooking pot, matches, mosquito netting, a hammock, tins of cooked meat, bottled water (which is incredibly heavy after you’ve carried it around for a while), and rum or whiskey for trading with the Indians. Bickering prices with wily natives whose language I imperfectly speak and hear is no fun. I walk away suspecting I’ve been robbed.
I usually bring with me the real basics: my day pack, two sixty-meter climbing ropes and assorted climbing hardware, a collection of Hefty OneZip bags in various sizes, a first-aid kit complete with snakebite antivenin and antimalarial prophylactic, several cans of mosquito repellant, three changes of cotton underwear, tincture of iodine, tampons and garlic. I know. Garlic. But I swear, the jungle grows fungus better than any place on earth with the possible exception of a woman’s vagina. One clove used as a suppository can kill the beginnings of a yeast infection. Cross my heart. Garlic is a natural antibiotic.
Life in the jungle doesn’t get really hairy until about the second or third day. You count on being able to wash out your undies in a stream at least once a day; when you can’t, you turn them inside out or go grungy until you can find a stream. When the bottled water runs out, you boil enough local water to fill a canteen, doctor it with the iodine and hope for the best. You try not to get bitten by snakes, and Brazil has plenty. You also learn real fast how to tie mosquito netting around your hammock so the little bastards don’t eat you alive in the night. The mosquito netting also keeps the vampire bats off you. And no, the garlic won’t help in that situation.
Normally all this stuff would get carried around by lackeys I’d hired. But Daley decided this time last year his best bet to finding good plants was to track me rather than the plants. Besides, an orchid stolen from me wouldn’t make it into von Brutten’s hands. During his first attempt, I’d had two “interns,” a gun-toting guide and a burly carrier for the heavy stuff. As a result of having too many people to worry about when Daley and his little band of Merry Men struck, I nearly let him make off with a delicious Phragmipedium. Never again, I vowed, and have traveled with only a guide since.
I humped all my stuff down the long, dark corridor to my room. The church key went into the heavy stained-door’s lock and turned. The lock clicked and thunked. I shoved. The door creaked but didn’t budge. Brilliant. The damn door was stuck in its frame.
I dropped my stuff on the dirty floor and backed across the corridor—a whole step. Not much room to build up a head of steam. And in my colorful cotton turista dress disguise, I couldn’t just pound the door down without getting the neighbors’ attention. I certainly didn’t want that in case Daley managed to track me this far, which he was probably working on. So I set my back against the corridor and put the heel of my flat sandal near the rickety handle. I gave a quick, sharp, satisfying kick.
The door exploded open. It swung hard and bounced off a wooden chest placed too close to the doorway. Inside, the room echoed the same gloom as the corridor. I stepped in to review the scene. Rickety iron bed, cracked mirror, dirty walls, light eeking from a bare bulb in the middle of the ceiling. Hotel California it ain’t.
“I beg your pardon.”
I spun. Behind the partially open door and battered bureau sat an iron claw-footed tub filled with soapy water and a handsome man. Dark hair, dark eyes, lightly flared nose, a flurry of black hair on his well-muscled chest.
“I told the manager I wasn’t interested in any entertainment,” he said in what I suspected was perfect Portuguese. He looked me up and down, pausing in interesting places. “But you may have changed my mind.”
He stood, revealing the most splendid specimen I’d ever seen either in the hothouse or in the field. Water glistened over his dark skin, accentuating every angular muscle and darkening the dense thatch beneath his navel. An admirable addition to any garden, I thought. He reached for a towel and casually dried his back, still standing knee-deep in water and letting me enjoy the view.
Part of my brain scrambled for the proper phraseology for I’m not a whore, you chauvinistic ass, while another part searched for, Take me now and be quick about it. The sane part—the very small part with the synapses still firing—screamed to get out of there.
I struggled with my Portuguese. “You must have the wrong room.”
“Inglês?”
“Yes.”
He continued to study me while he lifted one powerful leg from the tub, then the other. Even the undersides of his thighs were dark. The towel made another circuit of his broad shoulders and traveled down his chest, but not far enough to obstruct my line of sight. The scientist in me took over, pondering dimensions, speed, staying power.
“I rather think you have the wrong room.” His English was as perfect as his Portuguese. And his deep voice stung right where a girl needs it most. “Too bad.”
I managed not to stutter. “I was told this room.”
“Then maybe that’s correct.” He looked pointedly at the laughable excuse for a double bed provided by the establishment. “Do you hog the covers?”
“On that thing I wouldn’t have to.”
“It is narrow.” His gaze lingered on the open neckline of my dress.
I resisted the urge to tuck my arms in and artificially produce more cleavage than I legitimately have.
“I’ll straighten this out with the manager,” he said.
He dressed as leisurely as he toweled. First he pulled on a pair of cotton trousers. I guessed underwear wasn’t his thing. He shrugged into a loose shirt, then buttoned it from the bottom up, leaving me a nice swath of bulging chest to admire for as long as possible.
Evil man.
I followed his broad shoulders downstairs where he engaged in a lively debate