Countdown - Iris Johansen [100]
“I’ve been in contact with Bartlett. He said that everything is status quo. No great urgency.”
“Every minute is urgent right now and every possibility is important.” She glanced back at the sky where Eve’s plane had disappeared into the clouds. “Eve realized that or she wouldn’t have flown here to see me. It wasn’t easy for her.”
“I’m surprised you’re not more upset with her. She lied to you.”
“She did it because she cared about me. How could I be angry with her when she was whipping herself?” She paused. “And I love her. That’s the bottom line. Whatever she did, I’d forgive her.”
“That’s an impressive blanket statement.” He opened the door. “It makes me wonder what it would take to be enfolded in that blanket.”
“Years of trust, of give and take, of knowing that no matter what happened she’d be there for me.” She glanced at him. “Have you ever had someone in your life like that?”
He was silent a moment. “My father. We were . . . friends. When I was a kid, I didn’t want anything more than to live on our farm and tend the fields and be just like him.”
“A farmer? I can’t picture that.”
“I liked growing things. I guess all children do.”
“And not now?”
He shook his head. “You put your heart and soul into the earth and it can be destroyed in a moment.”
She looked at him. The sentence had been spoken almost casually, but his expression was shuttered. “Is that what happened?” She added quickly, “Don’t answer. It’s none of my business.”
“I don’t mind talking about it. It was a long time ago.” His pace quickened as they crossed the tarmac. “There was a local racist gang who hated my father because he treated his workers well. One night they raided the farm and burned our home and fields. They killed sixteen workers who tried to fight them off. Then they raped and killed my mother and pinned my father to a tree with a pitchfork. He died very slowly.”
“My God. But you survived.”
“Oh, yes. I annoyed the gang’s leader by trying to stab him, and he had me tied up to watch the slaughter. I’m sure he was planning on killing me later but he was interrupted by the soldiers. Our neighbors had seen the fire and smoke and called them out.” He stepped aside for her to climb the stairs of the plane. “They said I was lucky. I’ll always remember that as a poor choice of words. I didn’t feel lucky.”
“Jesus.” Jane could almost feel the agony, see the horror of that scene and that boy tied up and forced to watch his parents’ murder. “Did they catch them?”
He shook his head. “They disappeared into the bush and the government let them go. They didn’t want the bad press a trial would have caused. Understandable.”
“I don’t think it’s understandable.”
“Neither did I at the time. It was one of the reasons that I was considered incorrigible during the first year I was in the orphanage. But then I adjusted and learned patience. My father always said that patience won the day.”
“Not if that murderer went unpunished.”
“I didn’t say he went unpunished. Right before I went to Colombia the gang leader came to a nasty end. Someone tied him down, castrated him, and let him bleed to death.” He smiled. “Isn’t it wonderful how fate has a way of taking a hand?”
“Wonderful,” she echoed as she gazed at him. She had never been more aware of how lethal Trevor could be. On the surface he was urbane and sophisticated, and it made her tend to forget the violent experiences in his background. “And they never found out who did it?”
“Some old enemy, they presumed. They didn’t look too hard. Considering the delicate balance of the politics at the time, they didn’t want to stir up trouble.” He shut the cabin door. “Better