The Death Relic (38 page)

Less than an hour into his morning search, he came across a photograph from a small village in the Yucatán. It wasn’t a fuzzy mobile-phone picture, like so many he had seen in the previous hours, but a series of clear shots of a redhead, taken with a telephoto lens. He recognized her face instantly, like a mother identifying her young. There was no doubt or indecision. He knew it was the woman who had killed his friend. Somehow she had been spotted a time zone away and tracked to a tiny camp ground near the ruins of Chichén Itzá.

Within seconds, he was on the phone.

Within minutes, he was rounding up troops.

Within hours, he was flying across Mexico to get revenge.

He didn’t care who or what got in his way. The bitch needed to die.

Led by Payne, who kept a close eye on Tiffany, the group left the jungle path and marched through two zones (the Central Group and the Ossario Group) in the site as if they were on a field trip with guns. Payne and Jones did their best to conceal their weapons, but there was only so much they could do with so many witnesses around. Fortunately, most people were paying attention to the Mayan ruins, not the six foreigners who were about to be attacked.

They had just re-entered the Great North Platform when Tiffany spotted a man near the entrance who resembled Angel Ramirez. At first, she assumed her mind was playing tricks on her. She was in Chichén Itzá, nearly a thousand miles away from Mexico City. There was no way in hell he could have found her that quickly. Besides, didn’t Angel die at Zócalo? She was pretty damn sure that Church had killed him at the beginning of the shootout. Or did he? Before she had a chance to ask Church, he had been shot himself. In the aftermath, she had assumed that Angel had been killed, either from a bullet to the head or the bomb in the
SUV
. Now she wasn’t so sure. From a distance, the guy looked like Angel. Same face. Same build. Same mannerisms. And his arm was in an elaborate sling. Not the kind someone would wear for a simple sprain, but the kind someone would wear if he had been shot and lived.

‘Oh shit,’ she mumbled to herself. ‘It can’t be.’

Payne heard her comment. ‘What’s wrong?’

‘Can we stop and talk?’

‘Of course we can. Would you like some tea?’

‘I’m serious,’ she pleaded.

‘I’m not. Keep moving.’

She stopped anyway. ‘Listen, I know you’re not going to believe a word I say—’

He pushed her forward. ‘Exactly. So why even try?’

‘Because we’re walking into a trap.’

‘Speaking of traps,’ he said, ‘shut
your
trap and keep walking.’

‘
Listen
,’ she said urgently as she hid behind him. ‘If I wanted to make a scene, I could do it with ease. All I have to do is start running. Trust me, I’ll scream so loud they’ll hear me in Florida. I know it and you know it. The only reason I’m playing along is because you’re doing everything that we anticipated. Do you really think I would have used Hamilton’s credit card at the petrol station if we didn’t want you here? I stared into the camera on purpose, you know.’

Payne had figured as much. ‘Go on.’

‘See that man in the sling?’

He looked towards the entrance. ‘Yep.’

‘We tried to kill him yesterday. Apparently, it didn’t work. My guess is he won’t be happy about the attempt.’

‘Who is he?’

‘His name is Angel Ramirez. He’s a dangerous man with a lot of dangerous friends.’

‘How dangerous?’

‘Let’s just say there’s a reason we left you a boxful of weapons in the Hummer. We didn’t want you to be unprepared in case he slipped past us.’

‘Which he did.’

She shrugged. ‘We’re not perfect.’

‘What do you expect me to do about it?’

‘That depends. Did you bring the AKs?’

‘Nope.’

‘The C-4?’

‘No.’

‘Shit.’

Jones moved in from the rear. ‘What’s wrong?’

Payne answered. ‘According to Tiffany, we’re about to be attacked.’

‘By whom?’

‘The guy in the sling.’

Jones looked ahead. ‘No problem. I’ll just shoot him in the other arm.’

‘He might have friends.’

‘How many?’

Tiffany answered. ‘More than us.’

Jones grimaced. ‘I don’t know. I’m on Facebook. I have a lot of friends.’

She shook her head. ‘Unless they have guns, I don’t think they can help.’

‘They might. Do I have time to tweet?’

Payne ignored him. ‘Does Angel know who we are?’

‘Yes,’ she lied.

‘All of us?’

‘Yes.’

‘So hiding won’t help?’

Worried about her safety, she continued to lie. ‘For the short term, maybe. But
not
for the long term. These are the type of guys who will follow you home. America, Italy, Switzerland – it really doesn’t matter. They won’t stop until we’re dead.’

Payne stared at her, trying to gauge the truth. Unfortunately, she was a trained
CIA
agent – someone who lied for a living. There was no way he could detect a lie with any certainty. ‘What do you recommend?’

‘That depends. Are you as good as they say?’

‘Yes.’

‘Then we can take them.’

Jones interrupted. ‘What’s this “we” shit? We’re not giving you a gun.’

‘Of course you will, if you want to live. You’re severely outnumbered.’

Jones shook his head. ‘Right now I count one guy in a sling. He may or may not be a bad guy, who may or may not be looking for us. How are we outnumbered?’

‘I’m telling you,’ she assured them, ‘guys like this don’t come alone.’

Payne continued to stare at her, searching her eyes for any signs of truth. He simply couldn’t tell if she was lying or not. ‘Petr, come here.’

Ulster hustled over. ‘You rang?’

‘How well do you know this place?’

‘Quite well. Why do you ask?’

He continued to stare at Tiffany. ‘Where’s a good place to hide?’

‘From what?’

‘Possible gunmen.’

Ulster gasped. ‘The jungle, I would think.’

He shook his head. ‘I don’t want you leaving this site.’

‘Well, in that case, I would say—’

Payne cut him off. ‘Whisper your answer to DJ. I don’t want the others to hear.’

‘But—’

‘Just do it.’

Ulster did as he was told. He whispered the answer to Jones.

‘DJ, you got it?’

Jones nodded. ‘I got it.’

‘Good.’ Payne pulled out Tiffany’s gun. He handed it to Ulster, who was tempted to object, but the look in Payne’s eye kept him in line. ‘I want you to take Maria to that hiding place. Stay there until one of us comes and gets you. Do you understand?’

‘Yes.’

‘If anyone else comes, shoot them in the face.’

‘Yes, but—’

‘But, what?’

‘What about Terrence?’

Payne shook his head. ‘Sorry. Don’t trust him. He’s involved in this, but I don’t know how. Until I do, he’s on his own.’

Maria objected. ‘That’s not fair! Why do you get to decide everything?’

‘Because you called me. The moment you did, you put me in charge of your safety. So that’s what I’m doing. Trying to keep you safe.’

She started to argue. ‘But he’s—’

Hamilton cut her off. ‘He’s right, Maria. He’s right. I haven’t earned anyone’s trust. Go with Petr. He’ll keep you safe. I’ll be fine with Tiffany.’

Maria glanced at Jones for support, but he was on Payne’s side.

‘Go,’ Jones said. ‘I’ll come get you when this is over.’

She took a deep breath and nodded. ‘You’d better.’

Payne found himself in a predicament. He didn’t trust Tiffany, but he believed her story about the man in the sling. Angel Ramirez was there to kill her. She had just enough fear in her eyes to be convincing. Unfortunately, Payne didn’t know what to do about it.

Had he trusted her story fully – that Angel was a dangerous man with dangerous friends who would systematically hunt them down until they were dead – he would have lured Angel to a private section of the site and put a bullet in his brain. No questions. No guilt. No problem. The crisis would have been over before it had gotten out of hand. But the reality was he
didn’t
trust her. Not in the way he trusted Jones or Raskin. If one of them had warned him about Angel’s intentions, Payne would have sprung into action immediately, because he trusted them implicitly.

But he couldn’t kill a man on Tiffany’s word.

He simply couldn’t. He was more cautious than that.

What if Angel was there for her, but he had
legitimate
reasons to be after her? Perhaps he worked for the Mexican government and had been assigned to track her down for crimes she’d committed in Mexico. Or maybe Angel worked for the
CIA
and had been tasked with stopping an illegal operation she had been running? In that case, Payne’s involvement would not only be reckless, it would potentially make him a traitor in the eyes of America. There was no way he could risk his reputation over a woman he didn’t trust.

With that in mind, he did the next-best thing.

He sent Jones to collect some intelligence.

Before departing, Jones whispered the name of Ulster’s hiding place to Payne, so both of them would know it, then he dashed into the jungle, between the Ossario Group and the main entrance to the site. From there, he hoped to learn as much about Angel as possible. Was he Mexican police – a Federale – a criminal, or something else? Was he acting alone, or did he have a team of gunmen at his disposal? And if he had a team, what type of weapons did they possess? Answers to those questions and several more would help Payne decide what they should do next.

Meanwhile, Payne realized he couldn’t afford to stay in the open. Not only because he was a large target, but because he didn’t want to be seen with Tiffany. If she was a wanted woman, he didn’t want to be linked to her in any way. He quickly surveyed their options, then ordered her and Hamilton into the closest grove of trees, where the three of them could analyze the site while waiting for word from Jones.

Jones ran, jumped, ducked and scurried through the jungle until he was hiding in the underbrush less than 20 feet from Angel, who’d positioned himself near the main entrance to the site. He was standing there with a scowl on his face, staring at people in the passing crowd. His left arm was in an elaborate sling. It had multiple straps around his back and waist, which took the weight off his shoulder while keeping his arm anchored against his stomach – as if any movement at all would cause his wounds to reopen. There was also thick wad of surgical gauze protruding from the collar of his shirt, some of which appeared to be stained with blood.

Standing by Angel’s side were two thugs who looked like they had just escaped from a Mexican prison. They were covered head to toe in tattoos, including teardrop tattoos under their eyes. In some Hispanic cultures, it means the bearer has killed someone while they were incarcerated. From appearances alone, Jones didn’t doubt it for a second. Everything about them screamed danger. If they were Federales, they were the best damn undercover officers he had ever seen, because their ink probably took two years to complete, if not longer. They also had a look in their eye that said, If you touch me, I’ll turn your dick inside out.

All in all, they were not happy men.

Jones stayed in the weeds for several seconds, trying to learn as much as possible about them. He didn’t flinch, despite feeling ants and spiders crawling across his legs and into his clothes. He simply blocked it out of his mind, as he’d been trained to do in sniper school. Back then, he had been required to remain motionless for hours at a time under the harshest conditions imaginable. A few minutes in the undergrowth wouldn’t kill him.

The three men didn’t talk, but Jones still managed to learn a lot about them in a short amount of time. Under the back of their shirts, they had solid bulges that went halfway up their backs. Probably large-calibre handguns – the kind with serious stopping power – or smaller pistols with silencers already screwed on. Earpieces were visible in their right ears, which suggested a network of gunmen that extended wider than the three who were visible. He assumed the two thugs who wouldn’t leave Angel’s side were bodyguards.

Unfortunately, Jones had no way of knowing who else worked for Angel. The odds were pretty good that they
wouldn’t
look like Mexican gangbangers. Otherwise, they would be too easy to spot amongst the crowd of tourists. If he had to guess, he would say that Angel’s scouts probably looked and acted like normal folk – with one major exception.

They would be wearing earpieces.

Jones backed away from his hiding place and called Payne, who listened intently as Jones described the three men near the entrance. He also detailed his theory about the earpieces. He felt they could be used to identify sleepers around the site.

Payne thanked him for the info. ‘Anything else?’

‘Simple question: yes or no on Angel?’

Payne groaned. He knew the query would be coming. Unfortunately, he still didn’t feel they had enough to go on to kill a man in cold blood. Just because Angel looked like a bad guy didn’t mean he deserved to die. And even if he did, Payne wasn’t going to ask his best friend to pull the trigger on a whim. They were soldiers, not executioners. Sometimes there was a fine line between the two, but Payne knew at that moment they were on the wrong side of the line.

‘That’s a negative. Repeat. That’s a negative. Do not shoot Angel.’

‘Are you sure? There are no friendlies in the way.’

‘Still a negative. Repeat. Still a negative. Fall back and regroup.’

‘Understood. See you soon.’

Payne ended the call, only to find Tiffany staring at him.

She said, ‘You are such a pussy.’

‘Excuse me?’

‘You heard what I said. You’re a pussy. Jones had the shot and you ordered him down. Why would you do that?’

‘Why? Because I don’t trust you. Not one bit. I’m not going to take a man’s life on your word alone. For all I know, you lured me here to do just that.’

She shook her head. ‘You are
such
a disappointment! I had heard so many stories about your exploits I had built you up in my head. But now I know you’re just a coward.’