River of Secrets (11 page)

Swinging the hammer brought satisfaction, but too much pain. He couldn’t do it. He’d have to supervise or something. Eventually, the other workers arrived one by one, coming from various parts of the jungle or the city of Tefe. Everyone exchanged greetings and got to work, not wanting to miss out on an ounce of daylight and the cooperative weather. The forecast called for another thunderstorm later in the day, and Juan wanted to have the walls finished by then. Piece by piece, the plywood went up. As he made the rounds, checking nails, the progress of the other workers and pausing to let his rib rest, he thought about Amy and her crazy trip into Tefe last night.

What was she thinking going off on her own like that? Who had she gone to meet and why? When he’d asked Anna, she’d been vague, saying that it was up to Amy to tell him. He wondered who her attacker had been and why she didn’t want to report him to the authorities. What was she hiding? And what “things” had she been going to tell him last night?

Maybe he should have stopped by the dock this morning instead of coming straight to work on the wing. No, she’d find him as she’d promised when she was done with her quiet time. He pictured her sitting out there on the dock, studying her Bible and talking to God. Or would she find a different place to have her quiet time instead of the spot where he’d almost been run over?

He stopped to take a swig of water from the canteen he’d filled earlier and again wondered if he should go find her. One of the workers stepped past him carrying an armload of insulation. Another carried a piece of drywall. Soon the exterior construction would be finished and then they would start on the inside, painting and decorating. The new wing consisted of eight rooms. One parent room with a private bath and sitting area, six children’s dormitories with a bathroom between each and one big playroom. It would be fabulous when it was finished.

Once complete, this orphanage would be the nicest in the country. The kids deserved it. They sure didn’t deserve the tragedy in their young lives—watching their families die before their eyes, or being left on the doorstep by parents who couldn’t afford to feed them or just didn’t want them.

Capping his water, he turned to ask one of the workers a question about the lumber. When he looked up, he stopped. Amy. Standing in the doorway, watching all the action. Their eyes met and she smiled, a worried half smile.

Uh-oh. Something must be wrong.

Hammering, drilling and men chattering in Portuguese echoed all around him, but faded into the background as Amy started toward him. Then her eyes flew wide, horror filling them. He heard the creaking, felt the rush of wind; something knocked him in the back and he went stumbling sideways. Renewed pain arched through him, his rib screeching at the rough treatment. Time slowed. Wood crashed around him, smashing into the floor. Pieces scattered, one slamming into his leg. He went down. Another piece of wood bounced off his shoulder, falling to swipe his knee.

“Micah!” she screamed. Vaguely he wondered who Micah was. Then another piece of lumber clipped the side of his head, tumbling his world from its axis. Landing on his side, he felt a hand grab his arm and yank him out of the way as the rest of the stacked wooden wall smashed all around him. Lights flashed behind his eyes, a sharp pain streaked through his brain. He felt the warm gush of blood trickle down his right cheek. He raised a hand to the wound and looked up to see Amy kneeling beside him.

“Micah, are you all right?” Her hands cradled his wounded head.

The name echoed around him, through him, all over him.
Micah.
He knew that name. His name. Dazed, he whispered, “What?”

“Are you all right?” she repeated. “Your head. Let me look at it.” Suddenly, she was all business, the professional nurse she’d been trained to be. “Salvador, get me the first-aid kit in the tool room. Hurry!
Pressa!
”

Salvador stood as though frozen, staring at the dripping blood. Amy raised her voice a notch. “Salvador, now!
Agora!
”

The teen snapped his attention to Amy, then hurried to grab the first-aid kit. He was back in less than ten seconds, and Amy had a square of sterile padding out and on Micah’s head in even less time than that.

Micah’s ears buzzed. A thousand bees were swarming in and around his head. Then he realized he was looking into a face he’d seen all his life. He was looking into the eyes of Amy Graham, his sister’s best friend and the daughter of Senator and Cecelia Graham. The woman who had known his identity and had kept it from him. He stared at her, disbelief and disappointment, hurt and fury, all battling within him. He searched for the words to ask her why and came up empty. He could only stare into those bewitching blue eyes and wonder what really went on behind them.

He knew. She’d seen it in his eyes as soon as she’d said his name. Amy swallowed hard and concentrated on the gash on his forehead. She didn’t think it needed stitches, but it could use a couple of butterfly bandages. One hand holding the gauze, she used the other to rummage through the first-aid kit and came up with some disinfectant and two Band-Aids. She affixed them to his head and sat back, never taking her eyes from his.

Heart pounding, she waited for the explosion.

“Amy?” The hurt and confusion in his voice made her wince.

“Welcome back, Micah,” she said softly.

“Why?”

She understood every question he had condensed into that one word. Sucking in a deep breath, she stood and placed a hand on his arm. “I’ll explain it to you later. We need to get Lucas to check your head.”

Micah waved her off. “I’m fine.” He struggled to his feet jerking away from her touch. He glared at her. “I don’t think I can afford any more of your help.”

Pain like an arrow through her heart nearly sent her back to her knees. Aware of the many eyes still on them, she started, “Micah…”

“Never mind. I need to look at something.” He limped over to the fallen wood, looked at the pieces for a moment then leaned over to pick up the end of a length of rope. He pulled the rest of it from under the lumber. By this time, Lucas had arrived, called from the medical mission just a boat ride away.

Amy watched him stride over to Micah. “What kind of trouble are you in now? You know, I…Good grief, man, what happened to your head?”

Micah held up the rope. The smooth edge taunted him. “This.”

Lucas took the rope and examined it. He raised an eyebrow. “You thinking what I’m thinking?”

“Probably.”

Amy walked up, looked at the smooth edge of the rope and gasped. “That was cut!”

Lucas quirked a smile at Micah. “Guess she thinks like us, Juan.”

“My name’s Micah.”

Lucas jerked around. “What?”

Amy whispered, “He remembers everything.”

Shock rippled across the doctor’s features. He took in the bandaged place on Micah’s forehead. “Getting knocked on the head brought it all back?”

“Nope.” He glared. “Amy calling my name did the trick.”

His bitterness hurt, cut her to the quick.

Lucas’s eyes darted back and forth between the two. “Okay, obviously there’s something going on that you’re not saying. Right now, I’m going to pretend I don’t sense the undercurrents. Has anyone contacted the police?”

Amy forced her attention away from Micah. Her heart hurt, and she felt the terrible tug of guilt for not saying something earlier. “No, we’re just getting ourselves together. I’ll make the call.”

Anna laid a hand on her arm and said, “I’ll take care of it.”

“Thanks.”

The two men were deep in conversation. Amy slipped away to her room and shut the door. She fell across the bed to pour her heart out.

Oh, Lord, help me here. Someone just tried to kill Micah again. Who, God? Why? How do I go about helping him? He remembers, and I’m so glad for him, but God, he’s going to remember the e-mail he sent my mother, then he’s going to have questions. How do I tell him she’s the one that betrayed him and caused him to lose two years of his life? He’s so angry with me. And I don’t really blame him. Soften his heart, his anger. Keep reaching out to him. Show Yourself to him.

A knock on the door brought her to her feet. She opened it to find Carlita standing there, bunny tucked snuggly under her arm. Amy’s heart lifted as she leaned over to say in Portuguese, “Hello, little one. What can I do for you?”

Carlita shifted, looked down the hallway. Amy followed her gaze, but saw nothing. “What is it, Carlita?”

Slowly the little girl pulled her hand from behind her back and held it up to Amy. A piece of paper fluttered in her tight grasp.

“For me?” Amy asked.

Carlita shook it at her and Amy took it. “
Obrigada,
sweetheart.”

A little smile crossed the girl’s bow-shaped lips, and then she walked toward the room she shared with her brother. She looked down at the note—and gasped. Slipping back into the room, she shut the door. Curling up on the bed, she read, “You’ve been looking for me. I will be at the little chapel in the jungle tomorrow at six o’clock in the evening. Come alone. If you bring authorities, you will die.”

Another note. Could she believe it? Trust that it really was from the woman she’d been trying to contact? Or was it a trick to get her alone again? What should she do? Amy mulled the problem for over an hour. She finally decided she would ask Anna to be there with her, hiding in the chapel. Anna knew how to use a gun, so if something went wrong, between the two of them, they could handle the situation. She couldn’t burden Micah with her problems now that he had so much to process.

Tomorrow, at six, she would meet her maternal grandmother for the first time in her life. She just prayed she’d live through the experience to tell about it.

EIGHT

M
icah paced his room and closed his eyes against the mad rush of memories. They swirled and twirled like a hummingbird on speed. After Amy had left, Lucas declared that Micah needed to lie down and sent him to his room like a schoolboy. Micah, still in shock, hadn’t fought the order, so now he was alone with his thoughts and he couldn’t settle his mind on just one.

Every time he focused on one thought, another one intruded. Finally, he just decided to let the memories come in a stream-of-consciousness flow. His family, sister and best friend and fellow SEAL. He, Micah McKnight, was a Navy SEAL. He’d been on a mission with his SEAL buddies and Gabriel Sinclair when the mission went terribly wrong. He frowned and concentrated hard. What
had
gone wrong?

Gabe had practically twisted his arm to get Micah on that mission. Micah had been working on something else, and Gabe’s mission had the potential to blow Micah’s current cover. Instead, Manuel Cruz, gunrunner, human trafficker, and all-around really bad guy had found out that he was about to be raided and had blown everything to smithereens—including his own son. Micah’s heart ached at that memory, ached to his very soul. He could still feel the child’s small hand in his, smell the smoke, feel the searing heat of the fire as it licked around them. Then the last explosion had rocked the mansion and the child’s hand had slid from his as Micah’s world had spiraled into darkness.

Somehow, he’d crawled out of the inferno and reached the jungle. Pain like nothing he’d known before had ripped through him, threatening him with unconsciousness. He remembered Gabe and Manuel locked in combat; Manuel stabbing Gabe. Then Micah pulled the trigger to end the evil one’s life. He’d killed a man. Granted, it had been to save Gabe’s life, but the thought that he was responsible for the death of Manuel Cruz hit him hard.

Could the man’s family have found him at the orphanage? Were they behind the attempts on his life?

He thought about his family. He’d tried to call them and had gotten nothing except voice mail. Pulling those numbers from his memory had been sweet. They had kept the same numbers, and he figured it probably didn’t have a lot to do with a calling plan. They’d kept them for him. In case he could call. Love swelled inside him. He missed them. No, they weren’t the perfect family, but they loved each other. And he couldn’t wait to catch up with them, see them, hug them.

And Amy had kept that from him. Why? Why would she do such a horrendous thing? What could she have been thinking?

Was everything about her a sham? He pictured her sitting on the dock reading her Bible. Her unwavering care for him when he’d been sick. Her bravery in going after him in the water. Little Carlita snuggled up on her lap with Amy’s chin resting on the dark head. No, it wasn’t a sham. But there was something else going on, and he intended to find out exactly what.

Then he remembered the e-mail he’d sent to Senator Graham, Amy’s father. He sat down hard on the bed. Juanita Morales aka Cecelia Graham, Amy’s mother. While on a separate mission, the one before he’d been hurt, he’d come across a picture of a young girl, Juanita Morales, on the wall of the police station. He’d been shocked at the resemblance between the girl and Cecelia Graham and had impulsively sent an e-mail to the senator, asking him if there was a connection. And heard nothing.

After that, he’d been so busy on his next mission that he hadn’t really given it much thought. And then Gabe had called, practically forcing him to join the team for the raid on Manuel Cruz. Then Micah’s world had literally exploded.

And then Amy called his name.

Was Juanita Morales really Cecelia Graham? What if the Graham family didn’t want that to get out? Would the senator do something so rash as to betray his country to keep his wife’s background quiet?

If she was Juanita Morales, the political scandal would be enormous. He could easily picture what would appear in the newspapers and magazines. A young girl who disappeared as a teen, thought to have been sold into prostitution, turning up in the United States married to a senator, using a different name and lying about her background?

Men had killed for less.

And he, Micah, had sent an e-mail to the man with a picture of a suspected prostitute who looked like his wife. Had the senator set Micah up to be killed? Had Amy arrived to finish the job? To protect her mother? Although, if that was the case, why was he still alive? She’d known his identity when she’d fished him out of the water.