Not Without The Truth

Turning her head slowly—it seemed to take a year—she glanced behind her. Joaquin was gone, the platform where the guide had been waiting now empty.

She puzzled over his disappearance. Maybe he’d slipped behind the foliage for a moment’s privacy…. Maybe he’d sat down on the forest floor to wait for his turn to cross…. Maybe he’d gone back to his village and left her to her own devices…. She couldn’t reverse her steps so she looked the way she’d been heading and tried to calm her concerns.

Then the rope bucked.

It steadied almost instantly and she sucked in a gasp of relief but before she could exhale, the cables went completely slack.

She screamed in terror as air replaced the support at her feet. The rope swung wildly and, burdened with her weight, headed for the rocks in front of her. If she held on, she’d slam into the side of the cliff.

The rough hemp burned through her palms, peeling the flesh from her fingers and setting them on fire with pain. The overhang zoomed closer. A tree branch, reaching out from the precipice as if to help, scraped her cheek instead.

A thousand different scenarios careered through her head but she knew she only had one choice. She held on until the last possible moment, but she finally opened her hands and let go.

She shrieked all the way down and hit the water with a splash. There was silence after that. When the last echo died, the birds resumed their calls.

“HOW YOU DOING? Seen any ruins lately?”

Meredith Santera spoke in a casual way but Armando Torres wasn’t fooled by her tone. Meredith wasn’t a woman who telephoned just to chitchat. Her intensity never abated and she remained focused at all times. On occasion, she pretended otherwise, but in reality, she never let up.

“Why do you wake me in the middle of the night to ask how I feel?” A native of Argentina, Armando’s accent became more obvious. “I think you have something other than my welfare on your mind.”

A pause came over the line before she answered. “How come you say so little but understand so much?”

He made a sound of dismissal. “If you listened more and spoke less, you would hear what I hear. I have no special skills.”

“I disagree, which is exactly why I’ve called you.”

He waited in silence.

“I had an interesting conversation yesterday,” she began.

Armando heard the sound of shuffling papers and he imagined Meredith sitting at her desk in Miami. She’d moved there after she’d left the CIA and started the Operatives. At the beginning, there had been four of them—Meredith, Armando and two others, Stratton O’Neil and Jonathan Cruz—but in the past few years, some changes had come about.

Stratton had been the first to leave. Following a job that had gone tragically wrong, he’d moved to L.A. to escape his past and disengage from life. His plan had been foiled when he’d taken one last job then had fallen in love. Cruz had been next. He was teaching at Langley now and he, too, had a new wife. She happened to be Meredith’s best friend. Cruz had married her after he’d rescued her and her son from the drug kingpin who was the child’s father.

Armando had also wondered from time to time about leaving the team. He had more work at the clinic than he could handle and it was good work, productive work. But what he did with the Operatives was important, and he wasn’t sure he could ever give it up.

Meredith’s voice brought him back. “I got a call from a doctor in Dallas by the name of J. Freeman Stanley. He’s a very well-known child psychiatrist. His expertise is in repressed memories. Does his name sound familiar?”

Armando held his breath, his past rising up from the grave where he kept it buried. “Not really,” he lied.

“You’ll remember when you hear the rest. You must be getting old.”

I am, he thought, and growing even more so as you speak. He’d never told Meredith much about his early years. Her father had helped her form the company and he’d been the one she’d trusted to choose the men. He’d known everyone’s secrets but he was gone now. All Meredith knew was that Armando had been involved with the Peruvian job. She had no idea he’d seen the girl. No one knew that, except for him and her.

“Dr. Stanley has a daughter named Lauren,” she said. “Her mother was Margaret Stanley.” Meredith paused. “Don’t tell me you don’t remember her. She was—”

“One of the consuls in Lima.” He dropped his pretense. “Christmas eve, 1989. I was sent there that night, but she was already dead before I could get to her. They said she interrupted a burglar and he killed her. I remember.”

“Finally! I was getting worried about you for a minute.”

He interrupted her, an act of discourtesy he’d normally never indulge in. “What’s wrong?”

If she noticed his shortness, she ignored it. “Lauren Stanley is twenty-six now. She’s a writer for a travel magazine called Luxury and she’s been on assignment in Peru doing an article about the ruins.”

“Luxury, eh?” Armando forced the tightness in his chest to loosen. “That sounds like a nice job. To visit rich people’s resorts and write about them.”

“It sounds good, yes, but something must have happened. About two weeks ago, she stopped checking in and her father is getting frantic.”

“How did he connect with you?”

“He didn’t. My father was still in Washington when Stanley’s wife died and Dad debriefed the doctor after he and his daughter left Peru. According to Stanley, Dad told him if there was ever anything he could do for him to call. So he did. The office forwarded the message to me. Stanley had no idea that my father was dead.”

Her voice seemed to thicken but Armando knew he was imagining the sound. Meredith’s emotions were so tightly controlled he didn’t think she even knew how to feel them anymore.

“And what does this have to do with me?”

“She’s missing. You’re there. I thought you could at least ask around—”

“She is a grown woman,” Armando said sharply. “She probably found a lover and ran off with him.”

“I hope so, but the situation’s a little more complicated than it appears. Freeman Stanley said the mother’s death left Lauren Stanley unstable and prone to depression. Considering her past, I think he has a right to be concerned. I would be if she were my daughter. So would you.”

Outside his open bedroom window, somewhere in the undergrowth beyond, Armando heard the foliage rustle and the low grunt of an animal. He didn’t try to guess what it was. The rugged mountainous terrain provided a home for many living things, as well as for some things that weren’t. The Quechuan were a superstitious lot, but not without good reason.

Meredith’s voice held her first hint of impatience. “Have you seen anything—”

“I’m not that close to Machu.”

“No, but you’re not that far and a lot of people visit those smaller ruins close to where you live, too. She could have done that.”

“It’s possible,” he said reluctantly, “but I’ve heard nothing.”

“When was the last time you went into the village?”

The clinic was located near a dot on the map called Rojo. It was located between Cuzco and the ruins of Machu Picchu. “I haven’t been to Rojo in a month,” he said. “Maybe two. I forget.”

Meredith made a tsk-tsking sound. “You’re turning into el ermitaño, Armandito….”

“A hermit is better than what they call me now.”

“The locals still think you can make yourself invisible?”

“They must,” he said with a shrug. “Nothing but el médico del fantasma could do so, I presume.”

“You need to get out more,” she remarked. “Go to Rojo for me. Be my ears and eyes. I want to call this man and help him out.”

“And if we cannot do that?”