Rogue Diamond (20 page)

Nick folded his arms and stared into her face. "Are you finished with your tirade? I don't think I can stand listening to you and those damn birds at the same time!"

"Dammit, Nick
,
I'm tired of this crazy stuff
.
And scared
.
And I want to get out of here
.
"

"So do I. But this won't cut it
.
I have work to do. Now, if you aren't going to help, go
si
t in the chopper. I'll do this by myself
.
I'm not leaving without the cargo."

She wheeled about, her first instinct hurling her back to the safety of the helicopter.

"But if you want to speed this process up a bit, you could help."

She turned back around with a deep
si
gh. "Okay. What do you want me to do?"

"First, shut up. Then, help me carry these crates."

Alex gritted her teeth together and lifted one end of the crate. They hauled the three quiet boxes to the helicopter and she tried not to look in
si
de. She could tell that all of them contained some kind of reptile. She shuddered as Nick threw old rags loosely over them, hiding them from view.

"Now, the challenge." He motioned to her. "Where's the whiskey?" Nick poured a few drops of the intoxicating liquid into a half-rusted tuna can, then added some water from the canteen. "Okay, you little
squawker
s
.
This'll make you mellow and quiet
.
Bottoms up
.
" He opened one end of the crate and slid the can in
si
de for the birds to drink.

One particularl
y aggres
si
ve parrot with a bril
liant red head and lime-green body slithered past his hand. "This one's getting away
.
Catch him, Alex!"

Without even thinking, Alex lunged for the bird. She clamped her hands around the wiggling feathered bo
dy. Just as she smiled in satis
faction at Nick, the bird brandished his only available weapon, his beak.

"Ow! Damn!"

With a desperate fluttering of wings, the bird escaped into the blackness.

"Hell, Alex, you let him get away!"

"He bit me, Nick!"

Nick looked at her in exasperation. "There goes money on the wing."

"Looks like a little Mexican parrot to me," she jibed. "A free Mexican parrot
.
" Alex grasped his arm. "Please, Nick. Let them all go
.
I don't know what you're doing or why you're doing it, but it doesn't look good. It just isn't right to keep them penned up like this, and give them whiskey, for God's sake—" She drew a frantic breath. "Oh, Nick, let them all go free
.
"

He gazed at her stricken face. Maybe it was a mistake, after all, to bring her along. She was so honest and sympathetic. Her sense of justice was so straight down the middle, she was idealistic. She knew nothing about the harshness of the real world. Could he trust her to keep her mouth shut about this?

"I can't let them go, Alex. I have to do it. More rests on this than these few crates of birds. Now, if you can't help me, get back in the chopper. I'll do it alone. But I'll do it." His dark eyes looked hard with determination and the rest of him blended in with the darkness around them.

He was suddenl
y a frightening
si
ght. Alex won
dered if she knew him at all. Was this man with
the evil eyes the same one who made love so
wonderful
ly? She shuddered and looked away. She had no alternative. Begrudgingly, she helped him.

Those birds that seemed listless were taken out of the crate and laid out individually. All were then hidde
n with canvas and the rags
Jose
had included. Finally they were ready to lift off, loaded with an impres
si
ve variety of exotic birds. Large groggy scarlet macaws, elegant sn
ow-white cockatoos, small gray
cockatiels
with bright orange cheeks, and common red-headed and green-
bodied Mexican parrots kept com
pany with the boas. The cargo was now quiet.

As they flew back under cover of darkness, Alex's head whirled with confu
si
on. Just when she thought she knew Nick Diamond and could trust him, he popped up with another crazy scheme that seemed damn close to being illegal. Smuggling! That was the rumor in Hermo
si
llo about him. At this moment, she was damned if she didn't believe it
.
What else could she think? Why else would he
be transporting all those ex
otic birds? And boas, of all things! She knew there were quotas on bringing animals into the States and she supposed it held equally for birds. There were quarantine periods because of diseases and inoculations and tariffs.

But why wou
ld Nick do such a thing as smug
gle birds? For the money? After all, he had said of the escaping parrot,
‘t
here goes money on the wing
’
. Why,
he was as bad as that awful
Raul
who found a baby for them to buy
, from his own family.

She gazed
si
deways at Nick. His angular face
was half-shadowed, his dark eyes steady and looking straight ahead, his chin set. Could he be involved in illegal activities? He'd told her no, but was he telling her the truth? Even though some of her questions had been answered during this intimate weekend with Nick, a hundred more had surfaced.

Jose
met them at the airport and had a cab waiting for Alex. He conferred briefly with Nick while she scrambled out of the helicopter.

"Alex." Nick reached her
si
de before she could climb in the cab. "Alex, I know this is hard, but you'll just have to trust me. Can I . . . depend on you to—"

Her indigo eyes flashed in the muted airport lights. "To keep my mouth shut about all this? Of course! Because if I blow the whistle on your schemes, Nick, I ruin my chances of finding Jenni, don't I? It's a strange sort of blackmail."

"Is that what you think?
” He moved closer to her. “What a
bout last night?
Don’t you trust me yet?
"

She looked down, feeling crushed. "I
... I don't know what to think
. I just know I can't deal with your cynicism. I don't understand it."

"No more th
an I can reason with your ideal
ism."

"Not idea
lism," she countered with an up
raised chin. "Sense of fairness. It isn't fair, what we saw yesterday with that baby. Even tonight . . ." she gestured futilely.

"That's idealistic nonsense
.
"

"How can you say that? You're an American too
.
Fairness and justice are what our country is based on
.
"

"Justice? Fairness?" he scoffed. "You forget
about my military
serv
ice
in
countries that stone women and hire suicide bombers to kill innocent people. Tell me what’
s fair about that? What were you doing while I was watching my buddies die?" He turned away from her sharply. He hadn't intended to explode about all that pain.

"Nick . . . Nick?" She took his hand and brought it to her cheek. "I . . . I'm sorry."

He took a deep breath. "I shouldn't have said
all
that. You had nothing to do with my life."

"But I do now. Or you have something to do with mine. I hav
en't decided yet if our involve
ment was one of my more foolish acts." She reached for the cab door but Nick's hand closed over hers.

"Alex . . ." He paused as she looked up at him. "I hope you decide it wasn't
for nothing
."

"For a while I thought it was wonderful."

"It was." He bent and kissed her quickly. "Come to the office tomorrow after work. There's been a new development."

She was suddenly alert. "About Jenni? What?"

He shook his head. "Tomorrow. You get some rest tonight."
He opened the door and gave in
structions to the driver.

When Alex a
rrived home, her phone was ring
ing. "Hola?"

"Alex, where on earth have you been? I've been trying to reach you for two days!"
Rosemary’s voice was high-pitched and excited.

"Nothing serious, I hope," Alex muttered vaguely, slipping out of her shoes. Her thoughts were filled with Nick Diamond.

"Depends on how you look at it, Alex."

"Rosemary—not the budget
.
"

"It's public. And final. All exchange teachers have been cut. Oh, Alex, I'm
so
sorry
.
"

CHAPTER TEN

"My God, Nick, you look awful
.
"

"You don't look so great yourself." He drew her into the office. "Didn't you get any sleep last night?"

Alex smiled and shook her head. "Not much. Did you get your cargo delivered properly?"

"Yep. Only lost one little
cockatiel
.
Might have been
si
ck before
we picked him up
.
They’re a precarious cargo.
Any
way, we just got back a few hours ago."

"Just got back?" Alex raised her eyebrows in query. "From where—" She halted mid-sentence and gave him a cunning glance. "I know, I know. Don't ask."

"You catch on fast." Nick motioned toward his desk, where
Jose
hovered intently. "I wanted you
to come down this afternoon be
cause we have a
nother
lead, Alex. Photos of the man we think took Jenni. And
maybe
of Jenni too. We want you to make a po
si
tive identification of her."

Alex's heart pumped wildly and she rushed to
Jose
's
si
de. The desk was strewn with photos, various shots of the accident.

"These
are from the newspaper photogra
pher,"
Jose
explained. "He took all these at the scene."

"But where is Jenni?" Alex frantically scanned through the photos, her shaky fingers sorting them apart quickly. She tried not to look at the images of Teres
a lying on the
si
dewalk and her
self bending over the inert form.

Jose
's large brown hand lifted a particular photo and handed it to her. "Your eyes must be, uh, how do you say, looking into the pictures."

"Discerning," Nick offered from behind Alex.

"
S
í
. Look carefu
lly. See the child in the backg
round? Near the right
si
de."

Alex squinted
her eyes to improve her discern
ing ability. "Yes, I see that child. It ... it could be Jenni."

"What about this one?" It was a blow-up of the same child.

"Oh, yes," Alex breathed excitedly. "Yes, this is her all right!"

"You sure, now?"

"Yes! She had on a pink dress with ruffles on the front. And see her curly hair? Yes, yes!" Alex swallowed hard. She was torn by tender emotion at seeing Jenni
and a growing euphoria for find
ing her. "But you said a man took her. Where is
he?”

"He's in t
his one."
Jose
handed her an
other photo. "You can see a man's arm around the child. We believe he's in the process o
f ab
ducting her."

Alex seized the photo and stuck it close to her
nose then held it at arm's length. "But,
Jose
, you can only see part of him
.
And a small part, at that
.
"

"What did you expect? A mug shot?" Nick clipped, irritated by her lack of enthu
si
asm for their discovery.

"How can anyone identify him from this?" She threw it back down on the desk. Her balloon of hope was rapidly deflating.

Jose
gave her a patient smile beneath his elaborate mustache. "Ah, but these photos tell us much. Here you see a leg, an arm, and half a face."