Path of the Jaguar (12 page)

Delores wore a tight cotton shift, dyed a deep pink, one she had no doubt purchased from a street hawker. Her black hair was as carefully-styled as ever, her lipstick fresh. Only Delores' eyes appeared different to Lennea. They were much too bright, even a little glazed.

Lennea reacted to Delores' desperation with alarm. "What on earth has been going on?"

Delores glanced nervously around, though no one was in sight. "Let's walk somewhere." She chose a path which led back into the dense trees.

Delores retreated to her place of concealment, a badly crumbling ruin partially secluded by the trees. Lennea followed her inside the hollow arch of the doorway. The thin cotton shirt had grown wet against her body. The heat beneath the shade of the trees had stifled her: it was only slightly cooler under the shelter of stone. "Why didn't you contact me at the airport?"

"Because he was there at the baggage claim."

"Who was there?" Hadn't Wesley and all the rest warned her that it would be some wild romance? Lennea responded with anger. "The least you could have done is told me!"

"Nothing." Delores' sharp features hardened. With a nervous, jerky motion, she shook back her dark curls. "I just wanted to quit—you know—break it off. But he wouldn't accept the fact that I've found someone else!"

Delores certainly wasn't talking about the man who had been following Lennea, the Mayan. He was much too solemn, too non-prosperous, to be Delores' jilted lover. "Who are you talking about?"

"It doesn't matter. All that matters is that my life is in danger!"

"You're probably overreacting. I can't really understand..."

"It's simple," she snapped, "I jilted him and he won't be jilted. He tried to kill me! He was waiting for me down at the luggage ramp. He grabbed me as if there were no one around, tried to force me to kiss him! When I wouldn't, he tried to strangle me!"

"In front of hundreds of people?" Lennea said with disbelief. Delores flushed and moved stiffly away. "By God, don't believe me then! I expected you of all people to help!"

"You didn't seem to want my help when I found you in the church."

The silver charm bracelet jingled against Delores' arm. "I've been so scared. Honestly, I don't know what I'm doing!"

In the thick silence, Lennea pictured the scene at the airport that Delores claimed to be true—the incensed lover, one Delores was discarding like an old rag. Delores, cold and haughty; the man exploding in jealous rage. Delores had starred in this scene before. How many times Lennea had warned her that she would someday meet the wrong man! Lennea felt a sudden resentment over the stupid mess Delores had gotten herself into.

"When they find me dead, then you'll believe me," Delores said sullenly.

"Let's tell the police you're being threatened."

"What good would that do? They're not going to be able to keep him from killing me! I can't even show up for work. That's what I'm faced with now."

"Maybe he's cooled off."

"You would say something like that. Crazy people remain crazy!" She paced away from Lennea, as if succumbing to morbid fear. "I should have seen the signs. He's always pretended to be interested in Wesley's projects so he can hang around me."

"He came up in answer to your page at the airport. He said he was supposed to meet you there." As Lennea spoke she recalled Joseph's brusque manner when he had first approached her at the airport, the way his lips had been tightened with anger.

"I had already told him I wasn't going to see him again. Wesley probably told him I'd be on that plane."

"You two have been going back and forth from Mexico to the U.S.?"

"Joseph lives in Mexico City, but he travels to the States all the time. He was at the University of New Mexico two weeks ago. We had talked about our flying into Merida together then. But last time he called me, I told him I was through with him. For good."

Either Joseph was using Delores to make some kind of illegal deliveries back and forth across the border, Lennea thought, or they were in on the scheme together. How much of what Delores was telling her was the truth? Lennea studied Delores a moment, undecided, watched her closely as she told her about the money she had found in the maroon suitcase.

"Oh, that snake!" Delores cried. A dark, angry flush spread across her high cheekbones. "He's been using me! He gave me that suitcase as a present. I've been set up good!"

"What do you mean?"

"If there was money in that suitcase, then you can be damned sure that Joseph Darrigo put it there! What a jerk I've been! I wonder how many times he's used me to smuggle his dope and black money through customs! Did he get his hands on the money?"

"No. I've got the money." Another scene at the airport flashed through Lennea's mind, how Joseph had aided her in getting the suitcase through customs, had intervened, preventing the inspector from finding that secret compartment. Even if the money had been found, the suitcase was definitely not his, so he had himself a fall guy! It had occurred to her before that the Mayan man and Joseph were working together. She now wondered which one of them had stolen the suitcase from her room.

"What did you do with the money, Lennea?"

"No one knows I have it. It's—safe."

"Bring it to me," said Delores. "I'll go back to the States with it and turn it in over there. We'll nail him good!"

Lennea could not even trust Delores' account of what had happened; she certainly wasn't going trust her with the money. "The money should be turned in here," she said.

"The Mexican police would never believe someone planted money in my suitcase. They'd probably lock me up here forever!"

Lennea thought about Carlos Alfonso, her instinctive distrust of him. "You're right about that. The only thing you can do is go back to the States immediately. Once you're safely back, I'll turn the money over to the Mexican police and tell them the whole story."

"What if they don't believe you?" Lennea noted, was a question Delores did not bother to ask. Instead, she moaned, "But I just can't leave here! Wesley needs my help! With the book about ready for publication and all!"

"I'll explain your absence so he'll understand. You must go to Kansas and stay with Val until I contact you. Maybe I can figure out something where you won't even have to be implicated."

"I have fifty dollars in cash. That's not going to take me very far!"

"I have money." Lennea dug into her purse and all the cash she found she pressed into Delores' hand. "Can you get a plane out right away? Today?"

"Rico will take me to the airport."

"I won't do anything at all until I hear from you. When you get back to the States, call. Right away. Promise me." "Sure. I knew you'd help me out," Delores said, stuffing the money into her pocket. "I just knew I could depend on you."

Lennea watched Delores' escape through the thick trees. As she did, a feeling of fear possessed her. Delores was leaving her to face the Mexican authorities alone, to face Joseph! What a fool she was to risk her own safety for Delores'!

* * * * *

Chapter Ten

"Take the jeep," said Frank, forcing the keys into Lennea's hand.

"But we're going to begin excavation on the big temple south of Tikom this morning. Surely you don't want to miss that!"

Frank considered a moment. "I've got to finish some carvings," he said a little sadly. "But you'd better hurry. Dr. Hern won't like it if you're late."

Lennea, always anxious to please Wesley, checked her watch and noted that she could save time by taking the back road that cut from the LaTillas to Chichen Itza. The jeep jogged as wheels settled into accustomed ruts in the narrow dirt road. Dawn in the jungle. Solitude. Quietness. Yet peace seemed far away, a memory Lennea had left many years ago, somewhere back at the farm in Kansas.

Her thoughts, with a renewed agony, kept returning to Joseph. She had trusted the sparkling dark eyes, the affection she had seen in them as he had sprung to the defense of her pies. She had often caught Delores in lies—wasn't her accusations about Joseph just another one?

She forced her thoughts to today's work and the prospect of what the day might uncover lifted her spirits. Some design upon rock, some fragment of jade or clay, studied with sensitivity and knowledge, interpreted by Wesley Hern—always her world came back into focus around Wesley!

The rutted gaps in the trail grew deeper, forcing her to slow down. Driving directly to the site from this back road was impossible. She pulled off the trail and began to hike the rest of the way up the rise.

As Lennea reached the crest of the hill, she could see Wesley far in the distance. She could always tell his mood by the way he stood, today rigidly straight. A sudden change in his position caused her to realize that he was talking to someone. She stopped suddenly, her heart pounding heavily in her chest as the woman close beside him came into full view. Delores!

Lennea might have known Delores would never leave thinking Wesley angry and the job she valued so much, ended. Delores was dressed for traveling, high heels, bright, linen dress. With dark curls brushed carefully into place, she appeared once again the Delores of the University, sharp, confident. Delores' slender arm rose in a gesture of exasperation, sending glitters of light from the charm bracelet Lennea had given her for Christmas.

"You're not ever going to work with me again." Wesley's words rang into the stillness. "Not here. Not anywhere!"

Lennea detected a deeper hurt in Delores' voice that made her realize it wasn't just the book they were arguing over, but much more. A lover's quarrel! Lennea's heart became as frozen as her body. How could she believe it? She simply couldn't. She must be mistaken.

"You could have been my wife," Wesley said coldly. "I would have married you, Delores. It's not my fault you're not to be trusted."

"Did I ever say I wanted to marry you?" Delores asked with a prideful lift of voice and head. "You're so egotistical. God! I don't care about you! I just want my job back!"

Lennea, relieved that she could not see Wesley's face, tensely waited for his answer. She wondered how Wesley could appear to straighten up when he was already standing so very tall. "I'll give you a good reference," he said cuttingly.

"For the book or the bedroom?" Delores hurled back at him. Her voice had become shrill, a tone Lennea had never before heard her use. "To hell with you and every despicable thing you stand for!"

Lennea watched Delores disappear into thick trees. She expected Wesley to follow after her. He cared so much. She could see that in the heavy way he turned and seated himself on a rock beside his books. She felt as sick as he looked, betrayed by them both.

How long had their affair been going on? How could she have been so blind, so stupid? Lennea's heart unthawed to pain. She had shared her dreams of Wesley only with Delores. She had told no one else, not Mom, not even Val.

It's not fair! A voice inside her groped its way through her pain to defend Wesley. She could not blame him. Wesley had no idea how much or how long she had loved him. Only Delores knew. Delores, not Wesley, had deceived her.

She heard the roar of a vehicle from the top of the slope. Delores leaving. Anger and pity mingled and at last surfaced as hope. The pathway to Wesley was now open and clear. She told herself that she owed Delores no loyalty. Now when Wesley, her idol, was so deeply hurt.

As Lennea approached she noticed how self-consciously Wesley reached for his notebook and pretended absorption.

"The one person I can count on," he said. His deep blue eyes raised from the book, watching her approvingly. Then, abstractedly, he inquired, "Where's Paco?"

"Wood-carving."

"God help the art world."

Lennea saw how his mouth set in a tight line, how his words held an edge of bitterness. She waited for him to make some mention of Delores.

Lennea's heart pounded. Her mouth felt dry. To know, and yet have to pretend that she knew nothing about his meeting with Delores, was awkward, difficult. "I saw Delores yesterday," she said finally. "She's flying back to the States."

Wesley turned a page of the book. Nothing about their broken love affair, not a word about the angry scene she had just witnessed.

"I thought Delores might have stopped by to talk to you."

"Delores is irresponsible." Wesley attempted to shrug away all association with her. "Anyway,' he added coldly, "Delores is no longer important to this project—to us."

"I see." Troubled, Lennea avoided his eyes. Wesley hadn't exactly lied about seeing Delores. But it was obvious that he preferred to keep his meeting with her a secret. His evasion left Lennea feeling even more hurt.