Power (Special Tactical Units Division 1)

Everything matched the description, but there wasn’t a truck in sight.

Was it in one of the outbuildings? Or wasn’t it here?

She stepped from the SUV, reached back inside for the light denim jacket she’d carried on the plane. It was cool here; a breeze blew lightly through the trees.

Alessandra slipped on the jacket.

How still things were.

Even the rainforest, where they’d been miles from civilization, had not been quiet. Monkeys had screamed from the trees. So had bright-plumaged birds. Small creatures had scuttled through the bushes.

Here, the silence was complete.

She drew herself up. She was procrastinating, an excellent English word, and she had not come all this distance to procrastinate.

“No more dawdling, Alessandra,” she said aloud. “Just march up to the porch, knock on that door, and tell Tanner what happened. What really happened.”

Except…except, what if she told him all about the general’s lies, his interference, and Tanner said he was glad she’d told him the truth, but it didn’t change anything, that what they’d had together had only been temporary, that he’d just been doing his job…

Alessandra took a deep breath.

She had come here for the truth and if any of that turned out to be the truth, it would be better to know it than to spend the rest of her life mourning a memory.

She walked to the porch. Went up the steps. Reached for the brass door knocker and banged it against the door.

Nothing happened.

She banged it again.

Still nothing.

Now what?

She wrapped her hand around the doorknob. Gave it a slow turn…

The door swung open.

She was staring into a living room. Polished oak floor. Log walls. A big stone fireplace with logs neatly stacked on the hearth. There was a rug in front of the fireplace, something bright and, based on her knowledge of fabric and design, probably hand-loomed. The furniture was simple and handsome. A rocker. A big club chair.

A coffee table held a stack of magazines. She walked closer. The magazines had names like Appaloosa and Profitable Horse Ranching.

There was a couch, too, drawn up before the fireplace. It was long and deep. It looked like a place a big man would sit to relax after a hard day’s work.

An afghan was neatly folded over the back.

Okay.

What should she do? Go back outside, get into the SUV and wait for Tanner to show up? Get into the SUV and drive back thirty or forty miles to where she’d seen a small café and an equally small motel?

Or sit down on the couch right here, pick up one of those magazines and wait.

“Wait,” she said, because if she didn’t, she might just lose the courage that had brought her here.

So she picked up a magazine at random. Curled into the corner of the couch. Yawned. And, after a while, yawned again.

Her eyes felt heavy. It was difficult keeping them open. Another yawn. She reached for the afghan, drew it over herself. Put her head back, just for a minute. Closed her eyes, just for a minute…

Sleep swallowed her up.