“That’s where Perry and Liam would have gone, isn’t it, Homer?” she said. “Liam didn’t die in Tikal. You think I should take a shot, however unlikely, at finding him.”
A shiver worked up her spine. An image of Liam O’Shea rose in her mind; she didn’t even have to pull out the photo. It had long since been memorized.
“Maybe I was premature about dismissing ghosts,” she muttered. “I’m beginning to think Lucky Liam is haunting me. Is he up there somewhere egging me on, waiting for me to trip his curse? Is he doomed to wander these ruins for eternity until someone lays his bones to rest?”
“Bones, señorita? No bones here. But I show you many things.”
The voice was young and masculine and accompanied the teenage boy who stood directly in front of her. Mac was grateful she’d never had much of a blush. The kid probably thought she was nuts, talking to herself.
But he only regarded her with an open, earnest face that bore a remarkable resemblance to the murals and carvings of the Maya of ages past—strong, hooked nose, full lips, and high cheekbones. He was skinny enough to remind her of herself. On his belt, secured by a leather loop, hung a large and imposing machete.
He grinned at her. “You want a guide, señorita? Into the jungle? I take you. Only five dollars.”
Five dollars. An absolute bargain. I’m beginning to believe this isn’t just a coincidence, Homer.
More craziness. Maybe the heat was doing funny things to her brain. She made a mental inventory of her supplies. Just enough for a day’s wandering: map, small flashlight, repellant, canteen, matches, first-aid supplies, and a few other useful items. “What did you have in mind?” she asked the boy. “I’m not prepared to hike too far out into the jungle today.”
The boy’s grin widened. “Not far. You want bones? Maybe I know where.”
Well, that was too much of an incentive to pass up. Not Liam’s bones, she reminded herself. Not human either. I hope. But she fished in her wallet for a sweat-dampened five-dollar bill and set it on the boy’s grimy, outstretched palm. Even if this proved to be a waste of time, five dollars was not exactly a huge investment.
“You won’t be sorry, señorita,” the boy said, tucking the bill in the pocket of his own threadbare trousers. “I know the best place. Venga conmigo, por favor.”
Before she could ask a single question he was off, striding away from the carefully maintained area around the central plaza and toward the border of trees. He set a remarkably rapid pace for someone who must be used to dealing with sedentary turistas. The boy hardly waited for her to catch up before he plunged into a seemingly impenetrable mass of green.
At first there was a trail that even Mac could see. On either side the jungle formed a living wall of small trees, palms, ferns, lianas, and a hundred unfamiliar species of flora. Overhead hung the upper canopy of larger trees, with the occasional great ceiba towering fifty feet above the rest.
Only isolated cries of birds or monkeys broke the almost eerie quiet. Mac knew the jungle wasn’t as noisy as fiction often painted it, but there was something in the quality of the stillness that made the hair at the nape of her neck stand on end.
It was as if the very jungle were holding its breath.
Mac rolled her eyes as she tripped over a root across the path. Great. Are you putting these crazy ideas in my head, Homer? I sure as hell don’t remember thinking this way before…
“Cuidada, señorita. I cut a path now.”
She barely avoided walking into her guide as he deftly pulled the machete from his belt and began to slash at the growth into which their path disappeared. Mac glanced back the way they’d come. One part of her—the familiar, practical part—told her that it wasn’t such a good idea to cut through the jungle away from the marked paths.
There was another part of her that snorted in derision at her caution. It was the part that Homer had remembered from her childhood, that had once confronted a neighborhood bully. The part that followed the Sinclair blood. The part that could see a mere photo of Liam O’Shea and respond on a level that made no logical sense.