Home To Texas - Ransom My Heart Part 15

"Buenos'd as, sego rita he said politely.

"Buenos dfas," she answered, beginning to breathe again. A child. But perhaps one who knew the region.

Someone who could give them directions.

"Are you lost?" he asked, still in Spanish.

Bright kid, she thought, a little amused. Astute enough to know she was certainly out of place out here.

"My friend and I," she said, gesturing toward Chase who had already slipped the gun back into its hiding place, "have lost our way."

In response to her gesture, Chase stepped forward into the light and the boy's eyes focused on him.

"You came across the river? From the north?" the child asked. It was a logical question, considering the remoteness of the region.

"We came from the south. We had an accident and our vehicle was damaged," Chase explained. There were no details included in his account, of course. As he had urged all along, the fewer people who knew anything about their movements, the better.

"Do you know San Miguel del Norte? We need someone who can take us there."

"Perhaps my father can help you. He knows many places in the mountains. I will take you to him."

"Thank you," Chase said.

"We would like very much to speak to your father."

Chapter Eight.

It had taken them almost three hours to reach the boy's home, although most of that had been due to their difficulty with the terrain rather than to the distance. The child, who had clambered over the rocks with the agility of a monkey, told them he had been looking for a lost goat when he had approached the cave.

The rancher la the boy guided them to was obviously another victim of the grinding poverty that afflicted so many below the border. The settlement was small and agricultural.

There was some anemic-looking livestock, both cattle and goats, and corn and beans were cultivated on the small hillside plots. The houses seemed to be little more than huts. Brown-skinned women and children gathered in the curtained doorways to watch their progress. The boy led them to one of the larger houses. A woman, who Samantha a.s.sumed was the child's mother, swept up a naked baby that had been playing in the sunshine on the threshold and quickly disappeared inside.

"If you would please wait here," the boy said politely and stepped into the dark interior.

They had waited for perhaps a minute before the child reappeared, followed by a man who seemed much too old to be his father. His seamed features marked him as almost certainly indigen as Indian, as did his black eyes, ageless and unfathomable. He listened to Chase's explanation of the accident without any change of expression. Nor did he question their need to reach San Miguel del Norte, but still, the whole time Chase talked, the dark eyes a.s.sessed them.

However, when Chase had finished his abbreviated version of their mission, he made the offer they were hoping for.

"I can take you to San Miguel, but there is nothing there, seor. There are no longer any inhabitants."

"A ghost town?" Samantha asked. She had had trouble following some of what the man had said because of his dialect.

"Apparently," Chase confirmed.

She guessed that made sense from the kidnappers' point of view. There was less danger for them if there were no witnesses to the exchange. And more dangerous for her and Chase, of course.

"But you can take us there?" she asked.

"Would you take us today?"

The man's eyes shifted to hers and held for a moment before he nodded. He gestured to the boy to come closer and then bent down to speak to him. The words were very low. Chase's eyes flicked to her, questioning if she were able to make out what was being said. She shook her head, keeping the movement tiny and she hoped un.o.btrusive.

When the man turned back to them, the boy slipped into the doorway of the hut and disappeared.

"If you will follow me, seor," the man invited.

Chase's eyes met hers again, but like their guide, he hid whatever he was feeling. She didn't trust the old man any more than Chase did, but she had to believe that they would find Amanda more quickly with some local help. And if this man didn't intend to take them to the kidnappers, if he had other, more sinister intentions, at least she knew that Chase was alert to that possibility.

THEY TRAVELED MOST OF the afternoon, climbing higher into the mountains and through the endless maze of canyons.

At least it was cooler, but the alt.i.tude made their (iayle Wtlson work just as hard as it had been in crossing the lower, hotter, semidesert terrain. Their guide explained that the place where they were heading had once been a mining camp, small even when it was worked, and when the mercury had played out, there was nothing there. He shrugged as he said it, perhaps wondering why they were so insistent on reaching such a destination.

They arrived in the late afternoon. The trail they were following suddenly snaked around the side of the ridge to reveal a narrow arroyo where a small collection of buildings stood. Samantha wasn't sure what she had expected, but the sight of the deserted adobe shacks wasn't encouraging.

"There," their guide said. He had gestured downward, stepping back from the vantage point to allow them a better view. A disappointing view.

"Are you sure this is San Miguel del Norte?" Chase asked.

"San Miguel," he affirmed, nodding, his eyes on the buildings below.

"Will you show us the way down?"

"Of course, seor," the old man said, and set off, picking out an invisible trail in the rocky decline.

"Do you think this could be right?" Samantha asked softly.

Chase shook his head.

"We don't have much choice except to go down and see what happens."

It didn't look any more promising when they'd reached the bottom of the canyon. It was as desolate and deserted as it had appeared from the top. Chase had stopped at one end of the single street that ran between the line of buildings.

Samantha moved up to stand beside him. There was no sign of life. No sign that anyone had been here in a long time. This was where they had been sent, and they'd finally arrived. Thirty-six hours too late.

"Are you sure there's no one living here now?" Chase asked.

There was no answer, and they turned to find the man who had brought them had already begun the climb back up the side of the ridge they'd just descended. He moved as agilely as the boy, and it was only a few minutes before he'd disappeared into the lengthening shadows between the rocks.

"I guess he wasn't expecting a tip," Chase said.

"I don't like this, Chase. It doesn't feel right."

"Don't you start," he said.

"Start what?"

"Getting premonitions. Lawman's instincts," he added softly, andthinking of Mac, he smiled at her. Then his eyes returned to thenarrow street before them.

"You feel it too."

"I didn't like him sending the kid off somewhere. Any more than I likethe idea of him disappearing as soon as we arrive. It doesn't takemuch intuition to figure there's something strange about that."

"But we're still going to ... check it out," she finished awkwardly.There didn't seem much to check. Had they been sent on a wild-goosechase? And if so, why?

"It's what we came here to do. To find San Miguel del Norte. To findthe kidnappers. And if this is San Miguel, Samantha, then I guesswe're a lot closer to doing what we came to do than we were thismorning."

They systematically worked their way to the end of the street, peeringinto windows and doors. It was obvious the old man had been right.There was no longer anyone living here. It was a ghost town and hadbeen left for dead a long time ago.

Samantha didn't ask, not even when they had reached the last of thebuildings, because she had sensed Chase's frustration. It wouldn't doany good to ask him what they would do next. It seemed they had cometo the end. All along, someone had been playing with them. They hadspent the last two days chasing shadows. She fought the memory ofMandy looking over the shoulder of the man who had Carried her away,crying for her mother to help her.

"d.a.m.n it," Chase said. The words were almost under his breath, too quietly despairing to be profane.

"He sent us here," she said.

"Just to set up the ambush.

There never was any message from the kidnappers."

"We don't know that. We were late. It's possible that they just--" "But isn't it also possible that this place has nothing to do with Amanda?" she demanded, interrupting him.

"Isn't it possible that he just gave you the name of some place at the back of nowhere, and all the time we've spent getting here has been wasted?"

"A wild-goose chase," Chase said softly. He had thought that from the beginning. He briefly considered asking her again about her husband, but then decided it wouldn't do any good to bring that up now. She was right.

If anyone had sent them in the wrong direction, it had been the guy with the rifle, the guy who had never expected them to succeed in reaching the place where he'd sent them.

They hadn't been supposed to leave that ambush alive.

"Come on," he said.

"We need to pick out one of the buildings to sleep in before it gets too dark to see what we're doing."

"And in the morning? Can you get us out of here?"

"I can get us back to the old man, to the rancher a. Someone from there can take us to the border."

She nodded. There didn't seem to be that many options left, so she started back up the street.

"Samantha?" Chase said softly, stopping her by cupping his hand around her elbow.

"I can't tell you how sorry I am. Sorry for everything."

She looked up at him. He looked almost as bad as she felt. Almost as defeated, as exhausted. Belatedly she remembered his shoulder. He hadn't mentioned the injury since they'd left the ravine, and concerned about getting to Mandy, she had forgotten about it.

"I know, Chase," she said.

"It's not your fault. I'm not blaming you. I know you've done the best you could."

"Not quite good enough," he said. The muscles around his mouth tightened so that his lips finned into a thin line before he repeated it.

"Still not good enough."

She didn't understand what he meant, but she truly didn't blame him for what had happened.

"This isn't anybody's fault," she said.

"Except maybe mine for making Mandy such an easy target, for never dreaming that something like this could happen. You never think any of the bad stuff can happen to you. Not really.

Not to my child. Not ever to my child. And when it does..."

"Something just went a little wrong with the arrangements," Chase comforted softly, squeezing her elbow. He could probably hear the unraveling of control in her strained voice.

"They'll still want to deal," he rea.s.sured her.

"We just have to find them."

She nodded, not believing a word he was saying. She was to blame for what had happened. She had known that since the day she'd let them take her baby.

"We'll get her back," Chase said.

"I swear to you, sweetheart, I'll find her. You just have to trust me."

A soft sob of reaction to his kindness caught at her throat, and embarra.s.sed to cry in front of him, knowing that crying wouldn't change anything, she tried to turn it into a laugh. It wasn't a very effective laugh, a little strangled, and at the same time she had to wipe at the welling tears. She hadn't even been aware that she was crying until she had looked up to explain and realized Chase's face was only a blur.

"I guess I don't have a good enough track record to make you believe you can trust me," he said. His hand lifted to touch a spot beside her mouth where an escaping tear had begun to streak through the dirt, and then his thumb moved slowly across her cheekbone, brushing away another.