'Welcome. Where you go?' The cabbie hustled to open the door.
Jasmine avoided looking at the man. 'Hotel Palma Dourada,' she answered as she slid into the backseat of the bright yellow cab, fanning herself with a map of the city. The cabbie left the door open for Christian to join her.
Still standing on the curb, Christian watched the porter load up the last of their bags into the cab. With the trunk slammed shut, he slipped U.S. dollars into the porter's hand and started to join Jasmine. But an unmarked police car rolled past the tour buses to block the taxi from taking off, a rotating beacon of red fixed to the dash. A car door opened and one man emerged.
'Welcome to Cuiaba, Mr. Delacorte.' Hands against the police car, a lean man in khaki uniform with steely black eyes glared at him. No cordiality on his face. 'Please allow me to accompany you to the hotel. You ride with me.'
Christian raised his chin and eyed the man with wariness.
'How do you know my name? And my ETA?' He asked the questions, but suspected only one answer. No doubt the man had an informant within customs.
'You will find nothing escapes me in my town. I make it my business to know such things. Please ... I must insist.' The man gestured with a hand, indicating the passenger door.
'He's the police captain who followed me,' Jasmine whispered from inside the cab. 'Be very careful. I do not trust him.'
Seeing the woman's reaction to the cop raised a red flag. On the issue of being trustworthy, Jasmine hoisted stones from her house of glass. By his way of thinking, if she didn't trust the police captain— that alone would be a ringing endorsement—making the cop the lesser of two evils. Yet by the looks of the man's stern expression, Christian couldn't tell if he'd be friend or foe. The guy looked scrappy, a street fighter. Not as tall as Christian, he had a muscular build, looking native, with his dark skin and hair. His piercing stare commanded respect. An age- weathered face framed the severity of his eyes and sent a clear message.
This was not a man to mess with.
According to the research on Brazil Christian read on the jet, corruption had become a major thread woven into the fabric of this country—an accepted practice to supplement low wages. Was the man standing before him getting his fair share, or fighting against others who did?
One thing was certain. Cuiaba was his town.
Christian considered Duarte's invitation and shut the taxi door, with Jasmine grimacing at him from inside. With reluctance, he walked toward the man's car.
'How could I refuse such hospitality?'
Once Christian slid into the passenger seat, the man introduced himself, without offering a hand in greeting. This was not a social occasion. 'My name is Captain Luis Duarte. I wanted us to have a moment alone, you and I. Your female companion and I have already had the pleasure.'
As the man spoke, he turned off the red cherry and pulled from the curb, heading for town. With the windows rolled down, Christian rested his elbow on the car door. He glared out the front windshield, only his peripheral vision on the man behind the wheel.
Once beyond the airport terminal, a canopy of stars filled the night sky, fading near the horizon with the lights of the city ahead. Headlights drilled the blackness, luring insects from the gloom. And Duarte's face ebbed in and out of shadows, silhouetted by the eerie light from the dashboard.
As it usually did, darkness closed in on Christian, weighing heavy like a vise around his chest. It squeezed tight, a constant pressure. To distract himself, he kept his eyes focused on the road ahead, glancing in the side mirror at the taxi following close behind.
With effort, he tapped into his senses, almost a heightened meditative state. Hot wind whipped through the car, buffeting his hair and shirt as Duarte drove. The hum of the engine and the drone of road noise absorbed the lull in conversation. His thoughts drifted to Raven, his calming mantra ritual. Eventually, the essence of this strange world washed over him like cleansing rain, invigorating his spirit.
'Yes, Jasmine mentioned your interest in her . . . activities.' Christian heard his own voice like an out of body experience. 'Do you always greet visitors to your country with such a warm reception?'
'No, but I made an exception for you. Then again, you are not just
Christian took a gamble that the police captain didn't know everything and skirted the truth about his relationship to Charboneau.
'Actually, I've come because of Jasmine. I've never met the man.' He didn't
'So you are not connected to his ... organization? The syndicate in Chicago?'
Duarte had definitely done his homework.
'No, not at all. I have my own company, Delacorte Protective Services, but I'm here because I owe her a favor.'
'Such a huge favor. You must owe her quite a debt to repay it in this manner.' The man's dark eyes cut through the murky black. 'She does not strike me as a woman with many friends.'
'I didn't say we were friends.' Christian returned the lawman's stare. 'Besides . . . she wouldn't exactly take no for an answer.'
Duarte found amusement in that. 'No, beautiful women seldom do.'
'Have the kidnappers provided any proof of life evidence? They can't possibly expect payment if they haven't shown he's still alive.'
'It is true most abductions communicate such things, usually a photograph of the victim holding a current newspaper. But I have not seen such proof. Has the bodyguard been contacted?'
'No. She would've told me.'
'Are you sure of that? She seems to be a woman of many secrets.'
Christian shifted his gaze to Duarte. The man's face drifted in and out of the dark as he kept his eyes on the road. He had asked a simple question, one Christian couldn't answer in good faith. By his silence, he gave the police captain all the confirmation he needed.
Grimacing out the window, Christian distracted himself with the changing terrain. Entering Cuiaba, the capital of the state of Mato Grosso, he found the city held traces of its colonial past mingled with newer development.
Known as the southern gateway to the Amazon, the city served as a beacon of civilization on the edge of Brazil's great wilderness. He had seen photos of the city in his latest research, but nothing like seeing the real thing. Intersected by a river named after the city, the urban setting looked peaceful in the photos, with its flat terrain and skyscrapers nestled between an abundance of trees.
But after what happened to Charboneau, Christian knew a seedy underbelly existed in this picturesque place. Mankind tainted perfection with its very nature.
Still, Cuiaba had an undeniable old-world charm. Only a sidewalk's width away from the bustling street, multicolored facades of old villas lined the thoroughfares. The artist Van Gogh wouldn't have enough pigment on his palate to do the city justice. Tall, ornate custom window cornices and colonnades were painted in white and set against walls of vivid blue, yellow, green, and burnt orange, giving the city a festive appearance. Under streetlights, the splashes of brilliance assaulted his eyes, a departure from the more conservative use of color in Chicago. Wrought-iron balconies and gateways accented the quaint colonial manor houses. Without much thought to city planning, apartment buildings stood next to more modern office high-rises and ancient cathedrals. The new sprouted amidst the old, a hodge-podge of culture.
On the tepid night air, strange smells overwhelmed his senses, an unfamiliar fusion of a people's culture and the earth. The enticing aroma of exotic foods mixed with the pungent smells of sweet, rich soil, livestock, and the surrounding marshlands, Brazil's lifeblood. Laughter and music served as the backdrop for a lyric language he did not understand, but welcomed. The flood of new sensations bombarded his senses like a hail of bullets, sweet torture. This time, his heightened awareness felt like a gift—a gift he wanted to share with only one woman.
