Where There's Smoke

What if Father Geraldo wasn’t there? What if he’d been tortured until he divulged information? What if it was known by the rebel commanders that the widow of the late U.S. ambassador was returning? Not only her life but Key’s would be in peril. There would be no one to help them. They would be at the mercy of their captors and, as Lara knew, the Montesangrens were not a merciful people. Their best hope would be to crash and die instantly.

“Shit!”

“What?”

“I’ve got to pull her up. Hold on.” He pushed forward on the throttle quadrant and the craft went into

a hard climb. Lara looked below. They barely cleared the crest of the mountain. Key banked to the left and skimmed the steep, vegetated walls before swinging back out over the surf.

“Where’s the padre, Lara?”

“I don’t know.” Anxiously she pulled her lower lip through her teeth. She’d been confident that their escort would be there.

“See anything?”

“No.”

“Wait! I think I see—”

“Where?”

“Four o’clock.”

He executed another drastic maneuver that sent her stomach plunging. She closed her eyes to regain her equilibrium. When she opened them, the horizon was back in place and three small dots of light were glimmering below and ahead of them. Then a fourth flickered on.

“That’s him!” she cried. “He’s here. I told you he would be.”

“Hang on. We’re going in.”

He leveled the aircraft and decreased their altitude and air speed. Sooner than Lara anticipated, the spots of light were rushing toward them. They landed with a hard bump. The plane bounced along the uneven dirt strip. Key put all his strength into pushing the throttle forward. He practically stood on the foot pedals. The landing strip was built on an incline to assist slowing them down and facilitating a short landing. Still, it seemed to take forever to stop. They came breathtakingly close to the trees at the end of the crude runway.

He turned off the motor. They sighed with relief. Key placed his hand on her knee. “Okay?”

“Okay.” Since she had to alight before he could, she reached for the door.

“Wait.” He sat tense and still, his eyes sweeping the black curtain of darkness outside the airplane. “I want to see who our welcoming committee is.”

They sat in silence. Behind them, the six torches, three on each side of the landing strip, were extinguished one by one.

Key kept his right hand on her knee. With his left, he reached for the handgun beneath his seat. He’d told her it was a Beretta 9mm. He slid back the top, automatically loading the first bullet into the chamber. It was now cocked and ready to fire.

“Key!”

“We’re sitting ducks. I’m not going to be snuffed out without putting up at least token resistance.”

“But—”

He held up his hand for silence. She heard it, too—an approaching vehicle. Looking back, she saw a jeep emerging from the darkness and slowly taking shape. It pulled up behind the aircraft and stopped. The driver stepped out and moved toward the plane.

Key aimed the Beretta at the shadow figure.

Lara released a gasp of relief. “It’s Father Geraldo. He’s alone.”

“I hope to hell he is.”

Lara opened her door and gingerly stepped out of the plane, climbing down using the footholds in the wing. “Father Geraldo,” she said as she jumped to the ground. “Thank God you’re here.”

He extended his hands. “Indeed. It’s good to see you again, Mrs. Porter.”