“Navajo code talk.” Zach left the city’s midday traffic behind and merged onto Carretera Federal 10 northbound, glad to be safely away from the hotel. “Some buddies and I memorized it, used to send messages to each other.”
He and his teammates had studied a code-talker dictionary, memorizing it during their early days as SEALs, figuring that it might come in handy behind enemy lines. Mostly, they’d just used it to irritate other SEALs and play pranks on people.
“Do you think Kat will be able to figure it out?”
“If she does, she’ll know exactly where we’re going. If not, I’ll still get you home.” But this time Zach had a few questions of his own. “So . . . ‘
chula
,’ huh? Sounds to me like Joaquin thinks the two of you are more than just friends.”
Maybe Natalie felt the same way. The look on her face when she’d heard Joaquin’s voice had been one of overwhelming relief and happiness.
Are you jealous, McBride?
No, of course he wasn’t jealous. Why should he care if Natalie and this photographer had a thing for each other? Good for them.
Natalie shook her head. “That’s just Joaquin. He calls all the women in the newsroom ‘
chula
.’ He says it means ‘pretty woman.’ ”
And some part of Zach felt relieved. “It’s the Mexican Spanish equivalent of calling a woman ‘baby,’ as in, ‘Hey, baby.’ But if you’re okay with that . . .”
“I’m not going to file a sexual harassment lawsuit or burn my bra over it.”
At the word “bra,” Zach’s gaze jerked reflexively to the amazing sight of her braless breasts. He dragged it back to the highway.
Jesus, McBride! You should’ve beat one out in the shower.
He hadn’t been this horny since he’d first arrived at college and found himself surrounded by equally horny eighteen-year-old women.
It’s your own fault, you big idiot. You light a match, you get burned. If only you’d kept your mouth to yourself . . .
Yeah, but he hadn’t, had he?
She’d been asking him very personal questions, pretending that it was only journalistic curiosity driving her, when he knew damned good and well that she was every bit as attracted to him as he was to her.
So you had to go and prove that, didn’t you? Now what?
Now he needed to keep his mind on the job and his hands—and lips—off the woman. Her life depended on his keeping a cool head. Besides, she was more than a little vulnerable. Whatever attraction she felt toward him was surely colored by the fact that he was in the act of saving her life—and that she was alone and entirely dependent on him. He’d be lower than a snake’s ass if he took advantage of that.
He glanced over to find her smiling, the AK looking out of place on her lap.
“I’m just so glad he’s alive.” Her smile slowly faded. “I thought for sure they’d shot him, but I guess they killed someone else. It feels wrong to be happy about that.”
“The world is a crazy place, Natalie.” He reached over, took her hand, and gave it a squeeze. “Sometimes you have to take happiness where you find it. Your friend is alive, in part because of what you did to save him, and that’s a good thing.”
She looked up at him through big beautiful eyes, her slender fingers lacing through his. “Thanks for understanding.”
And for a while they drove in silence.
“Those couples who were attacked in their hotel rooms—the Zetas were looking for the two of us, weren’t they?”
“Yeah.”
The cops had called the incidents “robberies,” but Zach knew better.
“Was anyone hurt?” There was a hint of worry in her voice, as if she’d been wondering about this for the past couple of hours but had been afraid to ask.
“They roughed them up a bit but didn’t kill anyone.” He didn’t tell her that one of the women had been raped. She’d probably take the weight of that on her own slender shoulders.
Why are you shielding her from the truth all of sudden, McBride?
He started to make up some excuse in his mind about not wanting to deal with her when she got emotional, but then gave up. Truth was, he didn’t want to burden her with information that she didn’t need. She’d been traumatized enough already.
“Oh, thank goodness for that! I hate to think of anyone suffering because the Zetas mistook them for us.” She seemed to relax.
“Why don’t you have a boyfriend?” The question must have come out of some other guy’s mouth, because Zach hadn’t planned on asking her anything about her love life.
Her voice took on a tone of artificial calm. “What makes you so sure I don’t have a boyfriend?”
“You’ve never mentioned him.” It seemed logical to Zach.
“Given your situation, if there were some special man in your life, you probably would have tried to call him rather than your boss at the newspaper.”
“You know why.” She looked at her hands. “I lost my fiancé and—”
“That was six years ago, Natalie.
Six years
.”
What a loss it would be for the male race if she spent her life pining away for a corpse. Then again, he had no idea what it was like to lose a lover. He’d never been in love—not seriously anyway.
“I guess I haven’t met the right man.” Then she turned the question around, her face a carefully composed mask. “Why is there no one in
your
life?”
This was an easy question to answer. “As you’ve seen, my life isn’t exactly the sort of existence a man shares with a woman.”
“Maybe you should do something about that—like quit being a crook.”
He chuckled, but his reply died before it reached his tongue.
When he looked in the rearview mirror again, a military jeep bristling with assault rifles passed a slower-moving pickup and swerved into their lane, gaining ground fast.
The first letter on its license plate was a big, black Z.
Adrenaline punched through him. “Get down!”
Natalie turned to look over her shoulder. “Wha—”
“I said get down, damn it!” Zach forced her head down, hoping the men behind them hadn’t seen that there was a woman in the vehicle. He drew the AK onto his lap, working the bolt with one hand. “There’s a jeep full of Zetas on our tail.”
Steady, McBride. Don’t rabbit. Just because they’re behind you doesn’t mean they know they’re behind you.
He glanced down at the speedometer to make certain he wasn’t speeding, then did his best to drive casually, the jeep now right on their tail. “Reach for the Glock. It’s on the floor near your feet. Hold on to it. If they start shooting—”
With a roar of its engine, the jeep swerved to the left, passing them in a plume of exhaust and heading up the highway.
Zach let out a long, slow breath, adrenaline subsiding. “You can sit up now.”
Slowly, Natalie sat upright, peering over the dashboard with wide eyes, Glock in her hand. “They’re gone?”
“Yeah.”
“Oh, thank God!”
Zach didn’t share her sense of relief. The Zetas were headed straight for the junction at Janos, where Mexico 10 intersected with the Carret and connected Janos to Juárez. Anyone headed west from Juárez would have to pass that intersection, as would any driver heading north on Mexico 10. It was the perfect place to screen traffic leaving the state of Chihuahua for Sonora.
That’s where Zach was taking Natalie, and now the Zetas would reach the intersection before they did.
ZACH GLANCED OVER at his sleeping passenger, feeling a tug in his chest. Her long hair spilled over her cheek, her lips slightly parted, her breathing deep and even. The bruise on her cheek was the only indication of the hell she’d been through these past couple of days—well, that and the Glock resting in her lap.
What was it about her that got to him? Sure, she was pretty. Okay, she was beautiful. But he’d met lots of beautiful women, and none of them had gotten inside him like Natalie had. Maybe it was the combination of grit and vulnerability that was so much a part of her. Or maybe it was just their situation. Hell, he didn’t know.
And now isn’t the time to try to figure it out.
Besides, it didn’t matter. His job was to get her home safely. Then she would go back to her life, and he would get on with his mission. They wouldn’t see each other again.
He glanced in the rearview mirror, then over at Natalie again.
It would be better for both of them if she stayed awake. If another jeep full of Zetas were to come up behind them now, he’d lose precious seconds waking her and waiting for her to get her bearings before she’d be of any use to him. And for a moment, he considered rousing her. But he couldn’t bring himself to do it. The peaceful expression on her face told him she’d found forgetfulness in sleep, and the last damned thing he wanted to do was to rob her of that, not when ugly reality lay just up the highway.
Let her sleep, McBride.
He took one hand off the wheel, opened the plastic bottle of ibuprofen he’d left on the dash, and popped a couple of pills, then washed them down with bottled water. Then he put his gaze back where it should be—on the road.
IT WAS ALMOST midnight by the time they reached Altar. The streets were still busy, but, apart from a couple of street vendors, most of the stores were closed, making it impossible to buy everything they’d need for their journey. They had no choice but to stay the night.
Zach had been forced to leave the highway to avoid roadblocks the Zetas had set up outside Janos, Agua Prieta, and Nogales. But he hadn’t seen a single Z on a license plate since they’d passed the outskirts of Nogales. Oh, the Zetas were here, all right. All the cartels had a presence in Altar, which served as a starting point for many of the trafficking routes into the U.S. But Altar was in the grasp of the Sinaloa Cartel.
The Zetas were lying low.
Beside him, Natalie stared out the window in apparent fascination at a vendor who was doing a brisk business in bottled water, canned food, and sunhats with American flags on them. “Is there a drought coming on? Look at how many gallons of water that man in the cowboy hat just bought.”
“Keep your head down, Natalie. Someone might recognize you.”
She did as he asked, her dark hair falling down like a curtain, concealing her face. “Sorry. I’m just curious by nature, I guess.”
Really? I hadn’t noticed.
“He’s selling water to people who are going to start out for the border tonight.”
“Tonight?”
“It gets up to a hundred and fifteen degrees out there in the desert. Traveling by day puts a person at greater risk not only of being seen by traffickers, but also dying of heatstroke or dehydration. If you’ve got the cash to pay a good coyote who knows the way, you can travel when it’s cool, and then rest during the heat of the day.”
She nodded thoughtfully as if thinking this through, then slowly turned to look up at him, wariness on her face. “Is that what we’re going to do—walk across the desert at
night
?”
So she didn’t like the idea. He couldn’t say he blamed her.
“That’s the plan.” He drew up to a stop sign, then made a left. “Oh, don’t worry. We aren’t leaving tonight. I need to buy supplies. Our objective now is to lie low—get a room in a safe hotel, buy supplies tomorrow, and then get out of town.”
“I suppose you’ll be shopping around for a ‘coyote,’ too.” She spoke the word with distinct—and understandable—contempt.
“No need, angel.” He glanced over at her and smiled.
“You’ve already got a guide.”
He tilted his head back and let loose his best coyote howl. Chuckling, he glanced down again, his laughter ending abruptly when he saw the expression on her face.
Clearly, she was
not
amused.
CHAPTER 11
NATALIE COULDN’T BELIEVE she was doing this, her heart already pounding. She squirmed and tried to make herself smaller, her body bent in a fetal position and crammed into the military duffel bag that had held their guns. Then her hair caught on the zipper. “Ouch!”
“Sorry.” Zach’s fingers freed the strands, then tugged the corner of the bag up over her right shoulder, encasing all but her face in thick canvas.
“You promised. Just a few minutes.”
“I’ll get you out of here as fast as I can.” Zach reached down, cupped her cheek, his features invisible, his head a shadow against the darkness. “I’m sorry, Natalie, but it’s the only way. Are you ready?”
She wanted to shout at him to get her out, but then how would he sneak her into the hotel room? The Zetas were searching for American
couples
. If anyone saw her, if anyone recognized her . . .
She drew a deep breath, steeled herself.
You can do this.
“Yes.”
Then he closed the trunk.
Darkness. Heat. The duffel bag tighter than a coffin.
Her pulse picked up, panic closing in.
Snap out of it! Two days ago, you spent hours in a trunk in the hands of killers. You’re safer in here than out there.
She heard the driver’s door shut, heard the engine start, and drew a steadying breath. It was only a few blocks from the edge of town, where Zach had pulled off the road, to the hotel. He would drive to the front entrance, where everyone could see that he was alone. He would go in, pay in cash, speaking only Spanish, then drive the car around to the door of their room—and sneak her inside.
No one would know that she was there. If the Zetas showed up looking for an American man and woman, the front desk would tell them there weren’t any.
She closed her eyes, kept her breathing slow and steady as the car slowed and came to a stop at the traffic light.
Only two blocks to go.
The seconds dragged by, the heat inside the duffel bag sweltering, her body cramped, her skin slick with sweat.
The car began to move again, then slowed and turned left.
One block.
The darkness seeped in on her, so slowly that at first she didn’t realize it.