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Kilmer shook his head, taking the now cool grate and stowing back in its old, dilapidated wooden box. It was a fruit and vegetable box with Spanish writing nearly faded away on one end. “We wear ’em out and order them again, and they never come. The jungle rot is hard on them. I put another request for them in three months ago and they still aren’t here.
Nate, said, “Hey, maybe we’ll get lucky in Lima. You never know, we might find some women who’ll fall hopelessly in love with one of us dudes.”
Mace snorted. “You’re a damned idealist and a certified fool of a romantic. It ain’t gonna happen for any of us sorry sons-of-bitches. Quit reading those romance books.”
Daria smiled a little, hefting her ruck up over her shoulders, untwisting the straps that had bunched up across them. This was normal military trash talk. “Well, when you finally leave the Army, there’s some very nice-looking, single women at Shield security, all ex-military,” she suggested lightly. “Maybe you guys ought to check it out, and the three of you might meet someone nice.”
“Lauren Parker was one of them,” Nate informed them archly with an I-told-you-so look in his expression. “She and Alex fell in love. If they can? Why can’t we?”
“Yeah, and Kilmer wanted her around our team like the black plague,” Cale reminded him darkly. “He wanted nothing to do with her early on into that mission.”
“Mace is a Neanderthal throwback, just like all of us down here,” Merrill groused, hefting on his own ruck. And then he gave Daria an apologetic glance. “Present company excluded.”
“No insult taken,” she murmured, tightening the belt around her waist. She picked up her cloth sack that held two orchids she’d found along the trail on her way to this meeting spot.
“Well,” Nate said, belting up, “Nik got a helluva deal with you being in the mix. He’s got to be in heaven because you’re intelligent and, militarily, you bring a lot to our table. Lucky bastard.”
Daria’s lips twitched as she settled the baseball cap on her head. Earlier, she’d braided her long, dark hair to keep it out of the way while traversing the jungle. “I wouldn’t know. You’d have to ask him.”
Kilmer chuckled darkly, throwing on his own hat and snapping his AK-47 into the chest sling position across the front of his body. “You’d pass in a heartbeat for a pretty Quechua Indian girl, Daria. Good cover. We’ll be in touch.”
“Right,” she murmured.
Nate said, “Come here. You need a hug.”
Surprised, Daria was suddenly enclosed within the medic’s long arms as he gently embraced and then released her. How much like Nik he was, and it brought tears to her eyes that she quickly forced back. Smiling, she reached out, touching Nate’s arm. “Thanks. But if anyone needs a hug, it’s you guys, not me.” She saw Nate give her an intense look, as if he had x-ray vision and could look right through her and know that she was already in a relationship with Nik. That look shook her. She knew 18Delta medics were the best in the world, renowned for their high intuition and remarkable bravery and compassion out on the field of battle. Nate was like that and, uneasily, Daria wondered if he sensed something between her and Nik. From the look in his dancing green eyes, she bet he suspected something, but she wasn’t going to add fuel to that particular fire.
Kilmer came up, towering over her. “Take care of yourself, okay? Don’t ever get cornered by Korsak. He means business.”
“I’ll do that,” Daria promised him somberly, seeing the care burning deep in his eyes. This man was badly wounded, like herself. It took one to know one, and she saw herself reflected in hardcore Mace. The shields he placed around himself were insurmountable. She doubted he would ever let down his guard, nor let go of all of the horror he carried alive and well within himself. He would never be vulnerable. To her, he seemed a tragic figure. “Thanks,” she whispered, reaching out, only grazing his sleeve as she saw him gird himself against her full touch. As if to physically connect with him would shatter him in some way. He was in a worse place than she was and her heart ached for this brave, hardened soldier.
Kilmer looked her dead in the eyes. “Don’t screw with Korsak. If you happen to end up at the same vill with him, get the hell out as soon as you can. Dump your plans. Run. Okay?” he gritted out, heavy warning in his low voice.
“I read you loud and clear, Mace.” She saw concern in his eyes, his mouth going soft for a moment.
“If Korsak goes after you, Nik has to protect you. You know that, don’t you? He’s putting himself at risk at that point. Korsak has already put a gun to the head of two of his other soldiers who defied his authority in the past. And they aren’t alive anymore.” His mouth tightened as he intently studied her. “He won’t hesitate to kill Nik. You’re going to have to protect him, too, if that situation arises.”
“I’ll try very hard to ensure that never happens,” Daria promised him huskily. “I have no reason to put Nik in the crosshairs.”
CHAPTER 17
Daria stared atthe results of the DNA comparison between herself and Rolan Pavlovich. Two weeks had passed since she’d turned in his “tissue sample” and her own blood. Every day, she’d felt the tension creeping higher as she worried over her lineage. She stood in the lobby of the Cusco hospital. The results had been given by a doctor in a private meeting in his office. Now, she knew for sure.
SheWASPavlovich’s distant relative on the Mongol side of the family. It wasn’t completely unknown for Russians and Mongols to intermarry, but it was at least a century ago that such a bonding was an even semi-common practice. The doctor had said that a birthmark would show up now and then, but not on every descendant. The best news was that she was not closely related to the mob boss. Leaning against the white wall in the hall of the busy hospital, nurses and doctors hurrying by her, Daria closed her eyes, the results gripped tightly in her hand. A multitude of dark, different emotions sifted through her. How badly she wanted Nik here beside her, to give her comfort, to say something… anything… that would take this monumental pain away from her chest. She felt ashamed deep down inside herself. If Pavlovich was the dark side of her family tree, then she was the light. What a crazy genetic mess this was. One thing for sure, she had to ensure her birthmark was hidden while he was down here in Peru. She couldn’t risk him or one of his goons, seeing it. No telling what would happen next if it was spotted, and she didn’t want to go there—at all.
She touched the birthmark on the base of her neck beneath the hair that she’d worn down loose to cover it for the train ride here into Cusco. Opening her eyes, Daria stared down through blurred vision at the paper trembling in her hand. The geneticist had told her that her distant relative had been part Mongolian and part Russian. That would explain the color of her skin, as if she were white, but with a heavy suntan. It also explained the slight tilt to her eyes and their gold-brown color; both traits strongly associated with Mongolian heritage. Nik had made more than one comment about her being able to pass as a Quechua Indian woman. He was closer than anyone before had been to the truth of her genes.
She was related to a major global drug dealer. And she was sure he still had ties to the Russian government, including the black ops branch he had been part of for nearly twenty years. Dragging in a deep breath, smelling the antiseptic combined with a faint odor of bleach lingering in the hospital lobby, she pushed away from the wall.
Nik…How she wished he was here for her! She knew he would be if he could. Every day without him, without word from him, worried her. Daria couldn’t help it. As she slowly walked toward the glass exit doors, she felt like her whole life had been torn apart. The only constancy in it was Nik. In her shoulder bag she carried the sat phone. She dreaded making the call to Jack Driscoll to let him know about the DNA results. What would he do? Yank her off the op? Was she a liability to Shield now? To everyone who worked there? Daria knew she was in a compromised position, but she hadn’t asked for this. She was a victim in this whole unexpected situation, too.
Mouth quirking as she pushed through the doors and out into the bright noontime sunlight, she wasn’t in any kind of mood to appreciate the blue sky above Cusco. She took a taxi to the station, wanting to catch the next train down to Aguas Calientes. Once she arrived, she walked away from the crowds to make the sat phone call. She stood by the corner of the white stone building, overlooking the ceaseless car and bicycle traffic teaming along the ancient Incan cobblestoned streets surrounding the large square plaza below.
“Jack here. Daria?”
“Yeah, it’s me, Jack. I got the results on the DNA.” She took a deep breath and told him what the test had revealed. Her fingers tightened around the phone as a strung-out silence met her ear.
“How are you feeling about this?” he finally asked her quietly.
