Marked in Mexico (11 page)

The boy seemed especially nervous around Jack. Certainly, he didn’t come off as overly warm and friendly to Jessica when she first met him either, but she suspected Manny’s suspicion lay in the fact that Jack was a man more than anything. Jack held back, which she respected. There was no need to frighten the child, who had offered them food, blankets and a place to get out of the rain.

“Manny. Thank you for your help. You can’t know how much we appreciate it. We have some very bad people looking for us and we don’t know who to trust, so you can tell no one we’re here. Do you understand?” Jessica smiled warmly as she knelt in front of him and gently took his hand.

The boy nodded his head, indicating he understood.

“Can you tell us where the closest village is? We need to find a telephone and the police.”

Manny spoke the name of a village they had never heard of and told them it was a day’s walk. He pointed in a general direction.

Jack approached behind Jessica. Manny pulled away, so he stepped back, afraid the boy would bolt.

“Jack won’t hurt you. I promise.”

Jessica took Jack’s hand and pulled him forward, motioning for him to kneel down so he would be eye level with Manny. The boy seemed to relax, but didn’t come any closer.

“It’s a small village with a clinic, a school, a church and we have a market on Saturday. The village has a radio for emergencies, but no telephone or
policía
. There is a road that leads to a larger village that might have a telephone.”

“Do any of these paths leaving from your home lead to this village you talk about?” Jack asked in a soft voice.

Manny nodded and pointed in the direction of the path. He promised to show it to them in the morning, offered a few more helpful bits of information and then darted off, saying his mother would worry if he didn’t return soon.

They fumbled in the darkness for the blanket and water jug Manny had stashed, trying to avoid getting too close to the nervous cow the boy had warned them didn’t like storms. Manny had told Jessica to speak softly to comfort the cow if any thunder came, but she had no idea what to say to the big stupid creature. She had seen cows her whole life in Texas, but had never gotten close enough to one to merit a conversation much less console a beast. Those tasks had been left to the wranglers who worked the family ranch.

She’d been content to keep to her favorite horse and leave the cattle to those more knowledgeable. For the first time in years she missed her sorrel gelding. He was getting old, but still looked good the last time she visited the ranch. Now, she wondered if she would ever see her horse again and the thought brought her emotions tumbling to the surface and she had to fight for control. She wasn’t a coward, but she didn’t want to die in the jungle.

The shed smelled of manure, but looked sturdy and was a huge step up from the night before. Having a roof overhead and four walls made her feel much more secure. They huddled in the corner of the shed just as the rain began to fall.

The information Manny had relayed regarding the village wasn’t promising, but it was a start. Jack didn’t feel comfortable trying to summon help over a two-way radio, certain that
Las Culebras
would have radios with them and would likely intercept any message. But, if they could find a village, they could find a road, and if there was a road they were bound to come across vehicles.

“Wasn’t he just adorable?” Megan whispered as she scooped rice out of the leaf bundle with her fingers and stuffed the sticky grains into her mouth.

She passed the rice and water to Jessica and licked the rice from her fingertips. “Not bad when you’re starving.”

They sat in the darkness, listening to the rain tap on the roof of the shed and ate the rice until it was gone. For a few moments no one said anything, each deep in their own thoughts. They sat close enough to each other that their bare arms touched and no one seemed uncomfortable with the nearness.

Megan leaned her head on Jessica’s shoulder. When Megan looked to her as the stronger, wiser, maternal one, she gladly accepted the role, but it made her feel much older than her thirty-two years. She had always been daddy’s little girl and had always been taken care of. It felt good to be needed. Jessica wasn’t sure if she would have had the strength to hold it together for herself, but staying strong for someone else seemed easier.

“I feel guilty being alive after what happened to Ashley,” Megan whispered.

Jessica didn’t know how to answer. It could have been her or Megan, but Ashley had been sitting in the wrong spot at the wrong time. The girl had done nothing to provoke her captors and had no control over her fate, yet she was gone. Jessica felt a stab of pain at the remembrance, but there was no way to bring Ashley back.

Jack stiffened next to her and Jessica knew he felt guilt too, though of a different kind. He had tried to intervene, but had been rendered helpless by a gunman. Jessica sensed Ashley wasn’t the first person he had been unable to save. When he had expressed the night before he couldn’t let anything happen to her and he couldn’t go through it again, she was certain he hadn’t been talking about Ashley. There was something buried deeper in his past which clearly still haunted him. Jessica had the urge to comfort him, but she didn’t know how to offer support when she didn’t even know if it was needed.

“I do too,” she finally responded. “But, we can’t dwell on it now. There will be plenty of time to grieve later if we survive, and if we hope to bring Ashley’s killers to justice, we have to live to tell our story.”

Megan nodded and took a blanket and curled up next to Jessica to sleep. When Jessica was sure Megan was asleep she wrapped the extra blanket Manny had brought around her and Jack and rested her head on his shoulder.

“There was nothing you could have done. There was nothing any of us could have done. If you would have gotten yourself shot, it wouldn’t have changed Ashley’s fate and where would Megan and I be now?”

He didn’t respond and Jessica could think of nothing else to say. The best she could do was to allow him take care of her. She felt better when she was taking care of Megan, so she hoped he could find the same comfort in being there for her.

The sound of the shed door creaking open and then falling shut brought Jessica abruptly out of a deep sleep. Jack was already on his feet and Manny stood in front of them out of breath, dripping wet, urgency in his eyes.

“Go. You must go now.
Las Culebras
have come looking for three Americans
¾
two pretty girls and a man.”

“Where are they now?” Jack demanded.

“They are talking to mamma on the porch. I crawled out my window to warn you.”

“Is your mother in danger?”

“No. One of the men is from the village and he knows my father, so he will not harm us, but they will look here. You must go.”

By the time Manny had finished talking Jessica and Megan had gathered their few belongings and had hidden Manny’s blanket, hoping the gunmen wouldn’t find it if they searched the shed. Each woman hugged the small boy and thanked him. Jack shook Manny’s small hand and this time the boy didn’t flinch as Jack removed his Saint Christopher medal from his neck and draped it over the boy’s head.

Manny rubbed the pendent between his fingers and smiled at Jack. The boy tucked the chain inside his shirt and darted into the rainy night.

Jessica, Megan and Jack slipped out of the shed and scrambled toward the trees not far from the building. As soon as they reached the shadows, they paused and watched as two flashlights bounced down the path toward the shed.

A beam from the second man’s light illuminated the first so that Jack could see the PJE patch on the leader’s uniform and the automatic rifle slung over his shoulder. He was sure they were the same two men he had seen when he’d returned the pack full of drugs. Their captors were still looking for them, as expected, and this time, they were too close.

The second man swept his light toward the trees. Jack, Jessica and Megan dove to the ground just as the beam swung over their backs. Jack’s hand rested on the small of Jessica’s back, holding her to the ground. She tilted her head to the side in order to breathe and tried to blow a puff of air out her nose to dislodge the mud that had been forced up her nostril in her dive for cover. Jack’s face tilted toward hers and she could see the look of concern in his eyes.

The light swept over them a second time, making Jessica fear something had caught the man’s eye on the first pass. Jack’s hand left her back and eased toward the gun in his waistband.

Both men scanned the trees and the mud around the shed with their flashlights. Jessica held her breath. Had they left tracks in the mud during their hasty exit, giving away their presence? The illumination danced over the trees as the men slid their weapons off their shoulders, held them ready for use, and moved cautiously in their direction. If they tried to stand and run they would be spotted, but if the men’s path didn’t divert soon, they would be right on top of them.

Jack drew his weapon and steadied it in front of him as they continued to lie on their bellies in the mud. Thunder rumbled in the distance, followed by a series of loud thuds coming from the shed. The sound made the men stop and look back.

Manny raced from the house toward the shed, yelling at the two men. Jessica knew the boy was coming to comfort the cow, but feared for his safety if gunfire erupted. She said a quick prayer urging the men to move on. The thought of having a shootout here made her sick to her stomach. Manny was so young
¾
he didn’t deserve to die from an errant gunshot wound or even to witness such violence merely for trying to help a group of strangers.

After what seemed like an eternity, her prayers were answered. The men turned toward the shed and went inside with Manny. Jessica imagined the men wanted to ascertain it was the thunder that had enticed the cow to kick at the sides of the building and not three wayward Americans.

As soon as the door slapped shut, Jessica, Jack and Megan leapt to their feet and fled the homestead. The sound of the storm drowned out the noise of splashing through puddles as they made their rapid retreat. With any luck, the rain would quickly wash away all evidence of their presence left in the mud, though the further they penetrated the forest, the less their tracks showed amidst the growing amount of dead leaves cushioning the ground.

As dawn approached, the rain slowly gave way to scattered clouds. They had put an hour between them and Manny’s home, enough for them to slow the pace and take occasional breaks. The rain had made for tough going, but Jessica was thankful the steady downpour had washed the mud off her face, legs and arms. Her clothes were pretty much destroyed, but at least her skin was now clean.

“What now?” Jessica asked. “If one of those guys is from the village, it’s probably a place we shouldn’t go.”

“I think we should still look for it. We’ll try not to be seen, but if we can find the village, we can find the road, and it will give us a direction to travel.”

“What about the original three men? We don’t know what these two are capable of, but we know the other three have no qualms about murder,” Megan asked.

“These two are better armed and probably even more dangerous. I’m sure they split up to cover more ground, so who knows where the rest are searching. We just have to stay together and stay alert. I think this is the direction Manny pointed to as the way to the village.” Jack altered his course through the dripping trees.

They walked for several hours before they crossed a well-worn path. There was no way they could be sure it was the trail leading to the village, but it was something. They decided to try to follow parallel to the path, but not on it in case it was being used by someone they didn’t want to run into.

The day had turned hot and steamy. The air was so laden with moisture that Jessica’s clothes never completely dried. She was uncomfortable and getting a rash on her thighs were her damp shorts rubbed against her skin, but since neither of her companions complained, she kept her discomfort to herself and walked on.

Jessica’s legs ached, but she knew they had to keep moving. She went to the gym three to four times a week back home, but nothing could have prepared her for the swarms of bugs, extreme heat, oppressive humidity, uneven terrain, grappling vines, briars and the brutal pace. She glanced over at Megan and envied the woman’s long legs and youth. At nearly a decade younger and with a longer stride, Megan was holding up much better than she, and Jack showed no signs of fatigue.

Everything looked the same to Jessica, but as long as they kept the path in sight, she knew they weren’t traveling in circles. They had to be getting somewhere and she hoped it was anywhere the killers weren’t.

As the sun began to sink, Jessica could hear dogs barking not too far in the distance, so she assumed they had reached the village. They continued on and the sounds grew louder and occasional flickers of light penetrated through the small gaps between the densely spaced trees.

At the edge of the village they came across an abandoned stick hut. There was no door and most of the roof had been blown away, but it provided some cover. Vines had begun to crawl over the structure, giving it an eerie look, but at least it didn’t appear as if anyone had visited it for a very long time.