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But at what price to her? To him?
***
Sierra didn’t wantto go back into the jungle. The seven days in Cusco had fled by like a wild mustang galloping across the plains. She’d goaded Nate and Cale into afternoon games of Scrabble. They’d come less eager than whipped dogs to the table. Mace was also there, and she’d found out very quickly he had a damned sharp mind and a helluva vocabulary too. But so did Nate and Cale. Their afternoon games had consisted of cold beers for the two men, water for her, and Mace bringing over trays laden with appetizers from the restaurant every now and then.
A warm feeling threaded through her breast as she sat strapped into the jump seat at the rear of the Black Hawk, the bird vibrating soothingly around her as they headed for the Highlands at 1500, 3p.m., on the seventh day.
Her gaze wandered over to Mace, who sat flat on the deck. The crew chief had taken the other jump seat beside her. Mace had slumped against the back of the pilot’s seat and pulled his baseball cap down over his face, grabbing a nap. So had Nate and Cale. They were laying on the deck, arms beneath their heads, eyes closed. Those three could sleep anywhere, Sierra knew. Her heart softly turned every time her gaze swept across Mace’s long, hard body now in his jungle cammies once again.
He’d never made a move to try and kiss her after the night of the Scrabble game. Why couldn’t she just have a one-night fling? It would have been wonderful. Sierra knew it would. Her lips tingled, imagining what it would be like to have his mouth glide against hers, open her, taste her. Groaning to herself, she wrapped her arms around her torso, closed her eyes and tipped her head back against the seat.
Too soon, they were going back in that green hell. And Belov was out there… somewhere…
CHAPTER 11
After being droppedoff, Mace led his team into the jungle for cover. The winds along the highland area were brisk. He made sure Sierra was second in line as he chose the well-worn path that would take them even higher, up to the Q’ero village of Caverna. The village was in the Highlands, in a godforsaken rocky, cliff area. He often wondered how the people survived up there. They had terraces of farmland, built hundreds of years earlier, down below the lofty village, where they grew corn, potatoes, quinoa and beans, staples of their diet.
He always worried when getting dropped off during daylight hours by the Night Stalkers, but to try and fly up into this area in the dark was too dangerous. The winds shifted and flowed down off the mighty Andes toward the ocean where the city of Lima, the Night Stalkers’ base of operations, sat at sea level below. No commercial flights within Peru ever flew in this region in the darkness because of the possibility of a crash, due to the powerful winds. So, they were now stuck, unless it was one of those life-and-death emergency situations. Being picked up and dropped off during daylight hours, when the winds came back in off the Pacific and flowed upward into the mountains would be their only option. They were a lot tamer in comparison and didn’t tear wings or rotors off aircraft. But daylight pick-ups and drop-offs were risky as the Night Stalkers well knew, hence their moniker.
Mace’s senses were on full alert as he trotted through the jungle. Within a mile, they’d broach the Highlands, and the jungle would thin out, its lush tropical plants fading to rough, bare ground due to the high altitude. Nine thousand plus feet of altitude, along with the winds from the snowclad Andes, slashed the timberline short like a cold saber. The trail was muddy as usual. His heart, dammit, was squarely on Sierra. Mace felt the impasse with her. Understood it, now. She’d already fallen in love once with a Marine sniper she’d been teamed with. Sierra didn’t want to repeat that mistake. The man had died out on an op with her. Was she worried that would happen again if she capitulated? If she took the risk to have a personal relationship with him? Mace thought so, feeling as if he’d lost something of such great value before he’d even had it.
As he moved fluidly up the inclining trail, the heavy ruck on his back, rifle in his right hand, Mace felt his heart tearing open. It was damned painful. He’d seen the fear in Sierra’s eyes, heard it in the slight tremble of her voice, as she’d told him about Jeb being killed by the Taliban in the surprise trap they’d sprung. His mouth thinned. Why would she ever want to have a relationship with him? Yet, that night he’d gathered her into his arms, slipping his cammo jacket over her to give her some protection from the pouring rain, Mace had felt himself come alive.
He thought he’d died when Ana Beth had died. But as he’d sat there on that log, sheltering Sierra, felt her shaking with cold, he’d felt his heart crack open. It had been torturous for him as he’d felt himself awakening as if from some deep, long sleep. Back in the present, his emotions were bubbling and clamoring inside his chest, wanting that unexpected intimacy between them once again. He was so powerfully drawn to Sierra that he felt nearly possessed by the feeling. No woman had ever filled his life, his body, his heart and head, like she did. And all she’d had to do all of that was just show up for this op.
Mace felt the sweat running down between his shoulder blades as he pushed up the trail. He kept an ear keyed to his team behind him, hearing their soft footfalls, the cadence of them, knowing they were remaining in line, about twenty feet between each of them in case bullets started flying. To be bunched up in a tight group would guarantee they’d all be gunned down quickly in an ambush. This way, strung out, they’d have a chance at least to dive into the jungle, hide, and return fire.
Where was Belov? Mace didn’t sense him and his team around. He was hoping that their contact in Caverna had received some word from Sacha Pavlov. One of those sparse bits of intel he relayed whenever he could take the risk. In every village, he had a contact, someone he trusted, memorize his message to pass on to Mace and his team once they visited. Sometimes, if it was overly technical, Pavlov would write it down. The trusted Indian, always a woman, and usually a mother, would then slip Mace the paper. They could not read what was on it since it was in English. Most Q’ero Indians knew a smattering of Spanish, but no English. He was hoping and praying Pavlov would give him intel on where Belov and his team were heading. Then they could set up a hide and Sierra could nail the bastard once and for all.
As they breasted the hill, leaving the mud of the jungle behind, bare rock riddled with fissures and holes met their footfalls. They had been trotting for five miles when Mace held up his arm, his hand in a fist, a silent signal to stop. His team halted immediately. Mace chose a huge area of massive rocks, a hodgepodge of them, thirty feet high and at least a football field in length. It was a good place to hide, catch their breath, hydrate, and rest for a moment. Mace first took a walk along the fading tree line of the jungle, alert and watchful. There was nothing beyond it but the gray, black and white granite escarpment that reminded him of a loaf of bread, smooth and curving upward. Above that granite cliff, sitting up there at nine thousand feet, was the village of Caverna.
As his team followed him into the rocky fortress of towering boulders, Mace found a niche and squatted down. He got rid of his ruck, setting it aside. His gaze swept over his sweaty team. Their cammos were soaked with sweat. Their green t-shirts clung to them. His gaze moved to Sierra. She had her hair in two long braids, her t-shirt clinging damply to her, the bullet proof vest over it. Her face was glistening with sweat. She came over near him, shrugged out of her own ruck and squatted down, drinking deeply from her Camelbak. Mace found himself wanting to smooth back some of those frizzy tendrils of hair clinging to her damp cheeks from behind her ear but resisted. His gaze moved to Nate and Cale. They came over shortly. Everyone looked fit and not stressed.
“Wish I was back in Cusco,” Nate said with a grin as he sat down opposite Kilmer.
“Makes two of us,” Cale growled, joining them.
“I’m already soaking wet,” Sierra whined, picking at her t-shirt, pulling it off her skin, wrinkling her nose.
Bitching was healthy. Mace pulled a waterproof map from his thigh pocket and spread it out so Sierra could look at it. She needed to know the layout of these villages as they visited them. “Focus on this,” he told her gruffly, smoothing it out on the smooth, granite surface.
Sierra knelt. “What am I looking at?”
“Caverna,” he told her, sliding his finger along the map’s surface. “Q’ero village, a hundred and fifty people.”
“And we’re going there why?” she asked, twisting a look up at him.
“Need to connect with Pavlov’s contact there,” Mace said, resting his arm against his knee. “What I’m hoping is he’s going to tell us where Belov is headed to. And if we can get there ahead of him in time to set up an ambush.”
“Interesting name for a village,” she said. “It means cave in English. Are there caves in that area?”
Nodding, Mace said, “A hell of a lot of them. Frequently, Belov stashes the cocaine he’s manufactured in them.”
“How does he transport it all out of here?” Sierra wondered. She wiped her forehead, the humidity high even though it wasn’t at all what she’d call warm up here at this altitude.
“There’s two old Russian transport helos run by undercover Spetsnaz and KGB Russian pilots out of Aguas Caliente,” he said. “They pay them to transport the drug shipments out.”
“To where?”
