e-mail wasn’t very specific.”
His mouth tightened. “Well, that’s just great, Benny. People spill their guts to you all day long, but you never walk back across the bridge.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I know exactly why you left Acuña to come all the way down to the Yucatán. You were afraid I was getting too close to you. Which is also why you’ve ignored me this whole week.”
“I didn’t ignore you! I was busy!” Benny clenched her hands. “We’ve had doctors and nurses and dentists needing translators and—”
“And I wanted to help, but you wouldn’t let me. ‘Go play with the children, Owen. Take this load of supplies over to the camp, Owen. I don’t have time to talk right now….’” He repeated her words with dead-on mimicry. “My Spanish may not be as good as yours, but trust me, I got the subtext.”
Benny looked away. Owen was a distraction, and it wasn’t just those eyes or the deep set of dimples that accompanied his ready grin. He could walk into a room and she’d find herself tuned like a metal fork against a table. Maybe she couldn’t block out that attraction, but she was determined to keep herself committed to her mission.
“I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings.” It had never occurred to her that he would notice the absence of one person’s adulation. Everybody loved Owen—her supervisors, the children who ran around the village, the visiting medical personnel. Kyle Garrett idolized him. “Anyway, I know you can speak Spanish. That’s why you’re so useful entertaining the kids while they’re waiting to be treated.” She risked another look at him and found him frowning at the instrument panel. “What’s the matter?”
“Uh, we may have a slight problem.”
“What do you mean?”
Jaw shifting, he flipped a switch or two. There wasn’t a dimple in sight. “Either the fuel gauge is out of commission or both tanks are leaking. Neither’s a particularly good scenario.”
“You think bullets hit the fuel tanks?”
“Don’t know. Hold on, let me see who I can get on the radio. Mayday! Mayday! Broncobuster to control tower…”
Benny sat still as his attention focused on the instrument panel and his headset. He was a skilled pilot with thousands of flight hours under his belt, and she could trust him with her life. The Cessna didn’t seem to be losing altitude, but what did she know?
Looked like she’d dodged out of one dangerous situation right into another—worse than the guy in the dark suit and tie who’d shown up at the clinic yesterday afternoon. Flashing a badge, he’d asked if he could have a few minutes of her time.
Surrounded by screaming babies, worried mothers and fishermen with rotten teeth, she’d nearly booted him out without apology. But when he’d asked if she knew Celine Andrews, she’d handed the baby in her arms to Stacy Garrett and stepped outside.
How could anybody have connected her to a woman she hadn’t seen since she was fifteen years old—and traced her all the way to the Yucatán?
Lord, it’s me again. Please help me know what to tell Owen—and give him wisdom and skill to handle this problem with the plane.
She made the mistake of looking out the side window. They had begun to yaw downward and to the right. Nothing but blue ocean below. Her stomach surged. “Owen!”
“Hold on. The radio’s messed up. Must’ve got hit.”
“We’re dropping!”
“We should have enough fuel to clear the Gulf.” Owen winked at her. “Unless you’ve got your heart set on going for a little swim.” He laughed at her expression. “There’s a wide-open field a couple of miles inland, north of Veracruz. That’s where I’m headed.”
“Can’t we land at an airport?”
“Too far away. Hang on.”
The plane began to buck like a mustang. Owen’s full attention returned to the controls. His jaw tightened as he operated the rudder pedals and control column.
Benny’s teeth slammed together as the plane took a roller-coaster dip into a pocket of air. She wasn’t going to scream again. She wasn’t. Gripping the armrests, she closed her eyes. The ride became smooth for several seconds, then hit a corrugated patch that made the plane shake like a tambourine.
Oh, God, have mercy on us. You know I don’t swim well.
“You praying?”
“Of course I am.”
“Just checking. Another few minutes and we’re on the ground. Grab those life jackets under your seat just in case.”
Could one pass out from hyperventilation? She couldn’t remember ever being this frightened—even when the guy in the suit opened fire on her as she was leaving her room early this morning. She fished the life jackets out from under the seats and helped Owen into his. Fastening her own, she reminded herself how far the Lord had brought her. Her life was in His hands, and He could take it or give it back to her.
Your will be done, Lord.
She peeked out the window again at the jade-and-terra-cotta patchwork of coastal landscape below. Owen banked left and the plane stalled as they lost altitude.
“Hey, who knew Mexico had this many trees?” He tensed. “You might not want to look right now.”
“Owen! Look out!” Treetops zoomed at the plane.
“Relax.” Limbs and leaves scraped the belly of the plane. “You’re in the hands of a—”
She screamed as the landing gear came down with a fwump, snicking off the tops of a row of cypress trees. The right wingtip whacked into the trunk of a palm tree. Her stomach was somewhere around her eyebrows. The plane wobbled and skated clear of the trees, the wheels jouncing across somebody’s cow pasture. Another couple of wild bounces and they were taxiing.
Owen applied the brakes, his muscles bulging with the strain of holding the plane steady on the rocky field. Benny watched his face, mesmerized by the fierce concentration in his narrowed eyes, flared nostrils and tight lips. Then she glanced out the windshield.
They were headed straight for a barn.
TWO
Raymond Briggs tossed his navy suit coat across a chair and pushed the rifle case under the outdoor cantina table. Scowling at the pretty young waitress waiting to take his order, he yanked out another chair and dropped into it. Drowning his frustration in a shot of tequila would have redeemed some of this miserable day. Unfortunately, one did not order alcohol at ten o’clock in the morning in a conservative city like Villahermosa.
“Agua embotellada, por favor,” he growled.
The little waitress scurried inside.
Slouching, Briggs unclipped the cell phone from his belt and stared at it. He’d rather face a mountain lion than have to tell his boss he’d let Bernadette Malone slip through his fingers.
How could he have missed that shot? At least once a week, he’d spend a few hours at a practice range so he wouldn’t choke under pressure.
He was a professional. Hidden in the thick vegetation on the outskirts of the camp, he’d waited patiently for a chance to catch the missionary alone. With his binoculars trained on her cabin, he’d seen her and another young woman walk toward a long Quonset-like building, which he assumed to be the cafeteria. Thirty minutes later, she’d returned alone and he’d had his chance. He should have been out of there, his mark dead and no one the wiser; he’d had a silencer on the rifle and he was a genius at disappearing.
But the sting of a mosquito had made him twitch, sending the bullet into the cabin wall. Startled, the woman stood there for