Don't Look Back (12 page)

“Well,” Neto said, “don’t just
stand
there
.
”

Lulu, wearing a woven hemp backpack that sprawled across her shoulders, led the way toward the
zócalo
. The others followed her lead, dispersing.

Will touched his hand to the small of Eve’s back. “Jay wants to check out the fighting cocks. I know—insert joke here. Catch up to you in a bit?”

“I’d like that.”

She watched the others depart and took a moment to breathe in the scene. If she let it, her concern over the strange man would override everything, and she didn’t want to waste her time here, didn’t want to return home with regrets. In this moment there was no threat. In this moment she had no obligations, no schedule, no agenda. Just a mountainside pueblo and wherever her feet wanted to carry her. She made a deal with herself—explore a bit but keep the others within sight.

She was drawn first to the market, with its barrels of glossy chilies and dried grasshoppers, its produce trays showcasing more varieties of banana than she’d ever encountered. A hefty old woman who seemed part of the crate on which she sat was preparing hibiscus tea leaves, pulling the branches through a Y of split bamboo to separate the brilliant magenta flowers from the stems. Another woman made corn-coconut tortillas on a clay disk, her wizened hands dancing across buckets of ingredients, adding dashes of cinnamon, dabs of molasses. Captivated, Eve returned their gentle smiles.

She bought a tamale and ate it on her feet, peeling back the banana leaf to get to the rich paste of almonds, cacao, chili, and sesame. Ungodly fresh, flavors cascading after each bite like the finish on a good wine.

A stand to her left served thin slices of meat next to a do-it-yourself grill. Schoolgirls lined up with cardboard trays for their lunch servings, glancing at Eve, whispering, and tittering. They wore uniforms—lavender dresses paired with conservative white blouses, knee socks sporting oddly suggestive bands of lace at the tops.

As Eve turned to throw away the banana leaves, she came face-to-face with a young girl with smooth caramel skin. She wore a tattered princess dress—Belle from
Beauty and the Beast
—and a big dress-up ring with an oversize blue stone.

“That’s a beautiful ring,”
Eve said, the Spanish coming easier than she’d expected.

The girl smiled broadly and said, in proficient English, “I will trade for one hundred dollars U.S.”

Eve laughed. “I think it looks better on you.”

“My
mamá,
she has the bad hip. The money is for her medicines.”

But Eve was carrying much less than that. Rather than barter for a ring she didn’t want, she smiled apologetically and wandered back toward the square. She realized that with the exception of last night with Will, this was the first stretch of time the man from the canyon had fully left her thoughts.

Distant thunder rolled across the mountaintops, an animal growl. So odd to hear the sound of a storm while standing beneath a blue sky and a sweltering sun. The others were bellied up to a row of stalls, perusing all order of trinkets—little wooden animals with bobbing heads, figurines carved from coconut shells, tiny ceramic busts of women with pronounced earth-goddess breasts. Even Neto seemed taken in, weighing a tiny carving of the three monkeys in his palm.

“Hey, priddy lady. Look at these beautiful
rebozos.
” The beckoning man had his shirt unbuttoned to his waist, the billowy fabric evoking a cape.

She reached across the counter and fingered the scarves, which were indeed beautiful. Her hand dropped to the price tag, and she saw the tourist markup in full effect. She glanced across at the others, shelling out wads of pesos, and realized she was the only one of the group checking prices. A wave of embarrassment washed through her as she backed up, shaking off the man’s entreaties. Walking away, she felt a renewed appreciation for the all-inclusive nature of the lodge, which was, aside from Harry and Sue’s HutMansion, an egalitarian setup.

She crossed the square, passing coffee beans roasting on a concrete patch of sidewalk. She asked a pregnant woman where the coffee fields were, and the woman smiled, showing chipped front teeth, and pointed to the surrounding jungle. Sure enough, there were the dark-leaved coffee bushes, sprouting in the shade of larger trees, wreathed with a flutter of metallic blue spots that resolved as morpho butterflies. No crop fields, just bushes spread at random through the jungle. The woman gestured at a crumbling brick compound that resembled a prison.
“The coffee workers used to stay there during the season, but since the economic troubles they do not come anymore.”

Eve shaded her eyes, checking out the houses wedged into the hillside beyond. Many were literally coming apart, corrugated metal walls rusted through, wood eroding. In others rebar had been stubbed up through concrete-slab roofs in expectation that another story would be tacked on one day, but the metal had long gone to rust, a fine metaphor for abandoned optimism.

A half block off the main square and all color seemed to have drained from the pueblo. Eve turned back, but the pregnant woman had shuffled on, drawing Eve’s eye to a dilapidated church. Soft pastels tinted the crumbling walls, yellow-hued volcanic stone composing the broken-up floor. Half of the roof was missing, likely torn away by a storm, revealing an Easter-egg curve of gilded flowery ceiling that ended in jagged nothingness. The dented church bells had been preserved and resurrected outside the building, where they hung side by side from makeshift scaffolding built of thick branches.

Eve gave a slow turn, eyeing her surroundings, ensuring she wouldn’t be caught off guard again by the scarred man. But there was no one suspicious in sight, and the others remained at the tchotchke stalls, a shout away.

Drifting across, she entered the shell of the venerable church, marveling at the intricate ceiling design. The pews had been smashed by a fallen tree, its gnarled roots rearing up like an enraged squid.

The creak of a footstep near a side entrance tensed her, and she turned to run, her retreat path clear. But it was just the little girl in the Disney dress, peering around a shattered pillar.

“Your sunglasses, then.”

“What?”

The girl picked her way across the wreckage. “I will trade you my ring for your sunglasses. My
mamá,
she has the bad eyes. Look, it is very shiny.”

Eve couldn’t help but smile. “Let me see.”

The girl held up her fist proudly, the faux sapphire winking in the light filtering through the ruptured roof. Eve’s smile froze on her face.

The ring was from Columbia University’s School of Journalism.

Chapter 17

The ATV lurched and spit game-trail mud, skidding sideways between two trunks. Eve squeezed the throttle, Theresa Hamilton’s ring and her old wedding band pinching into the knuckles of her right hand. The convoy stopped at a clearing beneath an open patch of canopy, and Eve hopped off, wiped dried tears from her temples, already missing her Ray-Bans. At least the sun was less intense, a puffy blanket of clouds unfurling overhead.

As Harry arched his back and Sue massaged out cramps from her forearm, Neto lurched into sight on Ruffian, who chewed his bit with apparent boredom, rippling the star of white fur on his muzzle. Neto looped the reins around one of the ATVs and clapped his hands together, a solicitous waiter eager to announce tonight’s specials. “All right, my friends. Wait till you see
this
!”

“Hope you remembered your swimsuits,” Lulu said, then grabbed a machete from Neto’s pack and hacked at a rise of near-solid underbrush. The wooden handle came apart in her hand, and she frowned down at the bare curve of steel, then tossed it aside. “
This
is why we have a backup.” She lifted another machete from the pack and pushed through the wall of green, vanishing completely.

Harry shrugged, took Sue’s hand, and made the plunge after her. As the others started to follow, Eve grabbed Neto’s arm, holding him back in the clearing.

She drew close, picking up the conversation where they’d left off back in the village. “We should go back now and let someone know about this.”

“
Who?
And over what? A
ring
?”

“Theresa Hamilton went missing
here.
Not in Mexico City.”

Neto’s irritation was evident. “How do you know she didn’t give her ring away?”

“Her
class
ring? From Columbia?”

“It’s just a
thing.
”

No. You and I know she didn’t
give
that ring away.

An image floated to her: Rick, stating his case, cross-examining, making the argument. She cleared her throat, stood her ground nervously. “Someone should look into this. Someone should know.”

“This isn’t America. They don’t send in SWAT teams and CSI groups to look at clues.” Neto blew out his cheeks, let his hands slap to his sides. “Look at the sky. See those clouds? Soon it will storm. This may be the last chance to see the cascade. I have five other people who signed up for this trip, who paid good money to see this. I should cancel
all this
because you found a ring?”

“I don’t care about the cascade right now. I’d like to go back to camp.”

He hoisted a bulging pack onto his shoulders. “Well, I have the supplies. I
must
go to the cascade. You are welcome to go back to camp alone.”

How the hell would I do that? I’d get lost in minutes, and you know it.

She set her teeth. “Where is it?”

“Five kilometers northeast.”

“I thought it was south.” The jungle was like that for Eve, a hall of mirrors, every scene a slight variation on every other.

“This is why you should just wait,” Neto said. “And for your sense of safety, as we discussed at the ruins yesterday.”

I don’t want to wait.

“Well?” he said. “Do you want to see the cascade?”

No.

She glanced nervously at the dense trees all around. “Fine,” she said, and followed him through the wall of foliage.

*   *   *

The path was so overgrown it hardly deserved to be called a trail. Will and Jay brought up the rear with Claire. Neto sauntered past, whistling, but Eve slowed to match their pace.

“Any headway?” Will asked.

Leaves and shoots brushed Eve’s cheeks. “Nothing.”

Lulu was out of view ahead, but the swish and chop of the machete drifted back to them.

Claire paused, grabbed a trunk, and bent over, adjusting her braces. “I don’t know what you expected
him
to do about it.”

“Contact the authorities. There would’ve had to be an investigation.” Eve looked across at Jay. “Do you have your satphone on you?”

“Yeah,” Jay said. “But what should we do? I mean, we can’t just call 911. With so much lawless shit going on in Mexico, the local cops won’t care about a class ring. So do we go all the way back to Huatulco, file a report in person? Or do we have to fly back to Mexico City to find anyone who’ll take it seriously? You know how this Third World crap works—”

“Technically, Mexico is a
developing
country,” Will said.

“Thanks, PC douche. But seriously. There’s no move but a
big
move.”

“Look,” Claire said. “Let’s even say Theresa Hamilton
was
killed here four months ago because she chose to night-commando over and tangle with this guy. Like they say on
Law & Order,
that’s pretty victim-specific.” She gritted her teeth and started up again, pulling her legs forward with visible effort. “What are we gonna do? Cancel our trip? Go home? Because—
news flash
—there’s someone dangerous in Mexico?”

Eve glared at her, feeling her face redden.
Maybe.

“We should watch our asses, is what we should do,” Will said, speeding up to take the lead. “There’s someone dangerous within hiking distance of our camp. Who is focused on Jay.”

“A
two-hour
hike away,” Jay said. “And unlike Theresa Hamilton, I’m not a defenseless woman. No offense. The guy’s half my size.”

“More like
three-quarters
your size,” Eve said.

“But can he squat five hundred?”

“What are you gonna do if he comes after you?” Will called over his shoulder. “
Squat
him to death?” He bent a branch forward and let it snap back into Jay’s chest. It staggered Jay a quarter step, and Claire laughed and high-fived Will.

“We can figure out some way to get in touch with someone without canceling the entire trip,” Eve said.

“You’re right.” Jay paused to brush off his shirt. “As soon as we get back to the lodge, we’ll get online, do some research, figure out who to contact about the case—either here or in the U.S. Someone who (a) cares and (b) can do something about it.”

“It’ll have to be the
federales
or the FBI or something,” Claire said. “Not Los Keystone Kops Locales.” Through the trees they heard Sue gasp with delight, and Claire gazed wearily at the trail ahead. “Maybe she found a kale farm.”

But Eve understood Sue’s reaction when they stepped around the turn. Set against a natural stone amphitheater beneath an awning of trees, a waterfall tumbled two hundred yards to an emerald pool. Even Eve’s fears seemed small in the presence of such breathtaking beauty. On a broad flat stone overlooking the water, Neto and Lulu were unpacking, laying out a picnic.

Jay stripped off his shirt and leapt off the stone, cannonballing fifteen feet into the natural pool. He came up with a whoop. “This is incredible.” Treading, he pointed up the rock face. “If we hiked around the mountain, we could come out up there and cliff-dive right down the front of the waterfall.”

“Not without a guide,” Lulu said. “It’s a long way around.”

“Not if I climb up the face.”

“You want a challenge?” Neto said. “Then swim
beneath
the waterfall. There’s a passage that goes
underwater,
leads to a beautiful grotto.”