Burial Ground (13 page)

Someone was definitely following them, but
who? And why? This wasn't a frequently traveled waterway. Its
seasonal nature and the unpredictability of its rise and fall made
it dangerous. Floods could rush down the mountains from the high
country with a ferocity that could swamp a boat and drown all
aboard. Conversely, the river could also peter to a trickle that
would mire even a shallow dugout and potentially leave it stranded
for months. It could always be more explorers like themselves, but
he hadn't seen anyone in town who fit the bill. Then again, they
hadn't kept their profile as low as he had recommended while in the
city. Between the roving camera crew and the simple influx of white
faces, they had surely drawn enough attention to have half of the
population following them out of suspicion. Colton tended to think
otherwise, though. He couldn't trust that no one had learned about
the relic in Hunter's possession. Antiquities of questionable
provenance fetched huge money on the black market, and there were
men who were willing to do anything to get their hands on them. If
word had leaked that there were artifacts crafted in solid gold at
an unspecified location in these mountains, then the hills could
already be crawling with murderous bandits. Or worse, if someone
had recognized the implications of the rocks Hunter found, they
could be dealing with a different kind of pirate entirely. Relics
were small game, but a gold mine with a yield in the tens of
millions was the big time. Entire expedition parties had been
slaughtered for less.

Or maybe he was just being paranoid.

One glance at the other men only confirmed
that if that were the case, it was contagious.

If anyone had learned of Hunter's
discoveries, then someone must have blabbed. Merritt had found the
body and could easily have shared the information. Based on his
background and his shady history, it was possible that he had the
knowledge to recognize the significance of the placers and the kind
of brass clankers it took to stand before them and lie right to
their faces. Was he in collusion with those that followed them?
Then there was the Consulate. There could be potential leaks
anywhere in that building. It was a cog in the capitalistic machine
that was the United States after all. And, of course, there was the
Peruvian government, which could have sent entire military
contingents into the rainforest to search for more treasure.

He needed to take a step back and evaluate
the situation objectively. The Ejército del Perú could be safely
eliminated, as its soldiers weren't the kind of men with the
requisite patience to follow from a distance. They would have
descended upon them with all guns blazing and dragged them by their
hair through the jungle to secure the prize. So what did that
leave? Again, his thoughts returned to Merritt. The pilot was the
wild card, the element of unpredictability. If he were responsible
for their stealthy pursuit and proved to be a snake in their midst,
then Colton would take great pleasure in slitting his throat.

Rippeth sidled up to him and spoke so that
only he could hear.

"We could head back downriver while it's
still dark and flush them out."

Colton admired the man's directness. In
cases like this, however, patience was more than a virtue. It was a
weapon.

"Not yet. Let them think we don't know
they're there. They'll eventually grow overconfident. When they
make their move, we'll be ready." Colton followed the man's gaze to
the channel leading into the valley. Whoever was following them
would eventually have to pass through there. "Besides, I need some
time to figure out if we have a mole in our ranks."

Rippeth nodded, but kept his hand within
easy reach of the sidearm tucked into the back of his pants.

"You and your men take shifts watching the
camp," Colton said. "If anyone so much as attempts to breach the
perimeter, I'll pay you fifty grand a head."

"Just the head?" Rippeth asked through a
smirk. A strange light twinkled behind his eyes.

Colton clapped him on the shoulder and
strolled back over to the fire. The humming of the giant mosquitoes
had swelled to a whine. He threw more leaves onto the coals to
reinforce the smoke.

Smiling, he turned back toward the lake.

Let their followers come, for they would
soon learn that in the jungle, the roles of predator and prey were
easily enough reversed.

October 27
^th

2:58 a.m.

Tasker crouched at the base of a
moss-covered stone formation shaped like a sinking ocean liner,
concealed by the masses of shrubbery and the enormous prehistoric
trees on the crest of the southeastern rim of the bowl-shaped
valley. He brought the night vision scopes to his eyes and again
surveyed the camp. Where once there had been five men patrolling
the perimeter of the oblong circle of tents, nearly concealed by
the wide arms of the Brazil nut trees, there were now only two.
They feigned nonchalance, but Tasker knew better. These men were
professionals with military training. It was obvious from their
posture, their stride, and the angles they maintained to one
another while surveying the forest. The arrogance that radiated
from them. These were men whose egos were bolstered by skill and
experience. Their impudence would be their undoing.

The shift change at precisely two a.m. had
been rigid, and the discussions more involved than a simple verbal
exchange in passing. They had obviously sensed they were being
tailed, and thus stood at heightened awareness. Tasker had planned
for this contingency, of course. He had never expected to be able
to follow them upriver without betraying their presence, not while
maintaining the necessary proximity to keep from being shaken. It
was all part of the game. As long as their quarry continued to look
over their shoulders, they wouldn't be focused on what was
ahead
.

His right hand in this operation, Corporal
Terrence McMasters, appeared as a faint shadow among shadows to the
southwest of the camp exactly as he had been instructed. The
soldier was flat on his belly in a snarl of vegetation, visible
only for a split-second by the whites of his eyes before he again
closed them. He was within feet of the stacks of supplies unloaded
from the boats. Less than a minute later, he was gone, his
assignment complete.

Tasker lowered the lenses and crawled back
around the stone abutment until he was safely on the other side of
the mountain before standing. The rain drew lines through the mud
he had smeared over his face and hair, and which still clung to his
fatigues. It reeked of sulfur and decay, but in addition to making
him nearly invisible against the ground and the night, it held the
mosquitoes at bay.

He half-slid, half-scrabbled down the wet
slope, silently skirting massive trees and jagged boulders, and
slipping through tangles of shrubbery like a ghost. Even he didn't
see the three men guarding their boats until he was right on top of
them. He both confirmed the success of the mission and dismissed
them with a nod. Making no more sound than the falling rain, the
men, specters as intangible as mist, eased their boat out of the
undergrowth and into the river. They pushed away from the bank and
drifted into the fog that clung to the rapids, and then they were
gone.

Tasker vanished into the recently vacated
blind and waited for McMasters. Two hours from now, before the
first rays of the rising sun highlighted the cloud cover, they
would rendezvous with the rest of the unit several miles to the
east. Then the waiting would begin.

He withdrew the handheld tracking device
from inside his filthy jacket and shielded the display with his
hand before turning it on. A small blue beacon radiated in
concentric rings at the center of the grid. Everything was going
according to plan. He switched off the unit and returned it to his
jacket.

Half an hour later, McMasters emerged from
the forest, and together they lowered their craft into the water.
With a shove, they floated away from the shore and gained momentum
as they were carried downriver.

Soon enough, their tracking would begin in
earnest. For now, they had plenty of time to relax and let their
prey expend all of their energy hacking through the forest and
creating their path for them. Then all they would have to do was
overwhelm them once they found the rest of the relics.

It was now only a matter of time before they
were multimillionaires.

Tasker couldn't help but smile in the
darkness.

No one would ever find the bodies. There
were countless places to dispose of the remains, and just as many
creatures that would be happy to expedite the process of
decomposition.

There was just one more thing he had to do
before the hunt officially commenced.

4:06 a.m.

The ringing phone roused Eldon from a sound
slumber. His eyes were still too blurred by sleep to clearly read
the clock. All he knew was that it was late enough that there had
better be a really good explanation for waking him.

He snatched the phone from the headboard
after the third ring and answered in his most irritated tone.

"Monahan."

"Good morning, Mr. Consul-general."

He immediately recognized the voice, and was
suddenly wide awake.

"How did you get this number?"

"You insult me, Eldon."

"Why are you calling me? Especially here? If
anything happens, you know how quickly it will be traced."

"Which is exactly why I'm calling. To remind
you that we're in this together. I'm not the only one taking a risk
here, am I
Consul-general
?"

Eldon's heart beat so hard and fast that he
could barely breathe, let alone formulate a reply. This had gone
beyond threat to implication. If their plan spiraled out of
control, he would no longer have the luxury of deniability. How had
he allowed this to happen? He could have somehow maintained the
upper hand, or he could have simply walked away. But he would have
still been a third-rate diplomat in a Third World country, and the
prospect of that future was even more frightening than the
consequences of a liaison with the devil.

"Don't tell me the sound of my sweet voice
has lulled you back to sleep," Tasker said.

"No," Eldon whispered.

"Good." He could hear the smile in Tasker's
voice. "Now here's what I need you to do..."

Eldon held his breath while Tasker detailed
what he realized would be the end of his career in politics. The
room began to spin around him and the floor tilted on an unseen
fulcrum. There'd be no opportunity to return to the States to vie
for a seat in the Senate. He'd be lucky if he ever had the chance
to return to America again, luckier still if he managed to stay out
of prison.

Life as he knew it had come to an end.

Something broke inside of him and he started
to cry.

"You're pathetic," Tasker said. "Suck it up
and do exactly as I told you," he added, before disconnecting.

Eldon buried his face in his trembling
hands. His shoulders shook as he sobbed. He would be unable to
return to sleep tonight, if ever.

There was no immediate need to climb out of
bed and do what Tasker asked, but he feared that even from hundreds
of miles away, Tasker would know, and the consequences would be
dire. The man was a snake without a conscience. Though Eldon had
been wrong to trust him to uphold his end of their original deal,
he completely trusted that the man would follow through on this
most recent threat.

Rising, he passed through his bedroom and
stepped out onto the hardwood floor in the hallway of the old
hacienda that had housed countless Consul-generals before him.
Until now, he had never paused to wonder what had become of those
who had never reached the ambassador's mansion. A short staircase
led him down to the recessed living quarters. As he had been
instructed, he weaved through the maze of leather couches and
chairs in the darkness until he reached the wet bar at the back of
the room, and walked around behind it. He shoved aside a row of
champagne bottles on the bottom shelf to reveal a rectangular white
box standing on end. It looked like the kind department stores used
to wrap sweaters, only larger.

Collapsing onto his rear end, he pulled the
box down into his lap. It took several minutes to muster the
courage to open it. The headdress fit snugly inside, polished to a
high shine that reflected the moonlight from the window behind him.
As Tasker had promised, an envelope rested over the jeweled eyes of
the relic. Eldon fumbled it open and held the small stack of
photographs in hands that shook so badly he could hardly see the
pictures clearly.

They were snapshots from the surveillance
camera in his office. In the first, he sat at his desk with the
headdress in his left hand, lovingly tracing the contours of the
precious stones with his right. In the next, he accepted the golden
artifact from the dirty pilot. And there were more. All of them
showed him in various poses with what the Peruvian government would
undoubtedly consider a national treasure. Each bore a time and date
stamp. If he had a change of heart and attempted to renege on his
side of the bargain, copies would be sent to a dozen different
Peruvian and American agencies. Too much time had passed for them
to forgive him outright. The Peruvians would undoubtedly love
nothing more than to make an example of him and give Uncle Sam a
political black eye in the process.

He suddenly realized the true depths of
Tasker's deviousness. What if the man had never intended to cut him
in on the profits? What if Eldon's only purpose was to serve as a
smokescreen for the operation? The black market connections were
Tasker's. When he found the relics, they would be in his
possession. There were no guarantees that he would ever come back
for Eldon. All he had was Tasker's word, the word of a blackmailer
who even now was stalking an unknowing expedition into the
mountains where he intended to kill them.