“Hi, Ali. Sounds like our boy is feeling good.”
“The stuff they give him hits him hard and fast. Otherwise he wants to get up and go home.”
“He said something about Brubaker.”
“Whatever the boss was so upset about is over,” Ali said. “I don’t know the details, but Brubaker got his hands on a box of old stuff and he’s doing the happy dance around Jase’s bed. I don’t understand any of it, but Brubaker can’t say enough nice things about Jase.”
“Huh.” Hunter saw a riot of color whip by on the left side of the road. Another shrine. Rodrigo’s words echoed in his mind.
And the locals were praying like hell that death didn’t find them.
“…out of danger,” Ali said. “He’s recovering so fast the doctors are amazed. He’s in a regular hospital room now.”
Hunter snapped back into focus. He smiled as a weight he hadn’t realized was there shifted off his chest. “He always did heal fast. Give your big stud a kiss for me.”
Ali snickered. “I’ll be sure to tell him it’s from you.”
The instant Hunter turned off the phone, Lina said, “What’s going on?”
“Someone returned the stolen artifacts, or something close enough that Brubaker doesn’t care.”
“That’s…” Her voice died.
Hunter laughed without humor. “Yeah. But Jase is off the hook and recovering so fast the docs are smiling.”
“So if we assume that the artifacts and the kidnap attempt on me are connected…” she began.
Hunter waited.
“Because the coincidences are pretty overwhelming otherwise,” she added. “So I should be safe now.”
He didn’t answer.
“Well, hell,” she said.
“Pretty much. None of this makes sense. Until it does, I’m all over you like fur on a bunny.”
A spark of color up on the right resolved into another roadside shrine.
“Pull over,” Hunter said. “I want a closer look at that.”
“And you want to make sure we’re not being followed.”
“Two birds, one stone.”
Lina slowed and carefully pulled off the paved highway. They bumped to a stop ten feet from the shrine. Unlike other parts of the highway, no trash was scattered near the shrine. The only bottles there were full, offerings left by believers. The only paper or plastic was in the flowers, though many were fresh. The arms of the cross were longer than was usual for a Christian symbol.
The flowers were brilliant yellow and scarlet and purple against the white limestone crumbles of the roadside. The cascade of petals was interrupted by candles of various sizes and shapes. The cross was covered in snakeskin that the reptile hadn’t shed willingly. Bright feathers were glued to the cross. They moved in the lightest breeze, like they were somehow alive, breathing.
“That’s the fifth one of these that we’ve seen out in the open since Playa del Carmen,” Hunter said.
“Normally you see a roadside shrine and they’re for someone who died in a crash along the highway or something,” Lina said. “They aren’t really legal, but it’s an old custom. They just appear overnight and gradually fade into the jungle.”
“Whoever put this shrine out was pretty brazen. Or else drivers on the highway don’t really care what happens on the side of the road. Must have a lot of accidents here.”
“I don’t remember this many shrines. And there aren’t any pictures or names of loved ones.” Lina rubbed her fingers together, as though trying to clean them. “Flowers don’t smell like this. Like death.”
“I was thinking that.”
“This is creepy, Hunter. Can’t you feel…something out here?”
The wind picked up, making the wall of vegetation rustle and shake as if something large slithered through the undergrowth. Wind whistled over the snakeskin, a sound like thin reptilian wings. The head of the snake appeared to be swallowing the cross from the top down.
For a moment everything felt dry, a forest fire or a desert riding on the restless wind.
“This is wrong,” she said.
Hunter agreed. “Not a quaint little roadside shrine. Someone around here is really into ancient gods.”
The snakeskin twitched in the wind, pulling like an animal wanting to be free.
Lina made a low sound.
“What?” Hunter asked instantly.
“This is an altar to Kukulcan. The cross isn’t here to pay lip service to Catholicism.” She shivered, though the temperature was warm. “This represents an ancient Maya belief system.”
There was no photo or name to honor a relative killed along the highway. The only writing was crudely drawn glyphs painted on snakeskin or inked onto paper and tacked into place.
It was silent except for the random swish of traffic.
No one pulled off farther down the road. No one even paused. The intermittent parade of ancient cars and trucks was splashed with the shine of rich people’s vehicles and the duller gleam of rentals.
Insects crawled among the shrine’s offerings. Wind stirred restlessly, carrying the scent of old blood, old flesh.
“Roadkill?” Lina asked, wrinkling her nose.
“Smells like it, but I don’t see any. Would the locals get upset if I looked more closely at the shrine?”
“As long as you don’t deface anything, it should be okay.”
Hunter went to the shrine and sat on his heels. Very carefully he lifted a mound of flowery offerings. Dull eyes stared back at him. The smell of carrion became overpowering.
“What is it?” Lina asked.
“Monkey head. Maybe a cat. Hard to tell at this point.”
Her breath came in hard, coated with the odor of death. “Blood offering.”
“Looks like it.” Gently Hunter replaced the flowers and tried to ignore the memories of a basement where human blood had flowed red and dried black. The gun he had stuffed into the back of his jeans felt better than it had since Rodrigo had sold it to him. “You recognize any of the glyphs?”
Carefully she leaned down, breathing through her mouth in an effort to minimize the smell. “They’re very rough.”
He grunted.
“Blood. Power.” She stood suddenly. The smell was making her stomach twist. “This shrine calls the powerful old gods, but most of all, the gods of knowledge and death. Kukulcan and Kawa’il.
“I was afraid of that. You think the others along the road are the same?”
“Not all of them. At least one had a picture nailed at the center of the cross, and the arms were shorter. That usually means a Christian commemoration of a dead friend or a family member.”
“But most shrines were like this?” he asked grimly.
“Yes. Kawa’il. Death.”
Hunter straightened swiftly. “Want me to drive?”
“No. I’m okay. Just…” She shrugged.
“Yeah, me, too. Wonder what Mercurio de la Poole thinks of this?”
“I’ll be sure to ask.”
Lina and Hunter got back in the Bronco and drove through a green tunnel of jungle punctuated by flaring shrines.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
ARE YOU SURE YOU WANT TO DO THIS?” LINA ASKED Hunter after a silence lasting many miles.
