Chapter Twelve
Easing up on the gas pedal, Shay brought the rental car to a stop in front of a small store. Bucamaranga. She never thought she would see this place again. Moving slowly, she exited the vehicle was overcome with a sudden wave of nausea. The past couple weeks of neglecting her health on top of not having eaten for the past forty-eight hours was taking its toll on her. Her vision blurred and grew dark; she felt herself falling forward and her last conscious thought was that maybe, just maybe, when she woke the nightmare would be over.
"Senorita Dumas?" a woman's voice called to her through the thick fog in her brain. She felt a light tap on her cheek and blinked her heavy eyelids. "Carlita?" she asked, focusing on the young Hispanic woman kneeling beside her.
"Si. Are you alright?"
"I'm sure I will be, Carlita." She smiled warmly at the young nurse who had taken such great care of Frank after they had finally gotten him to safety. Shay sat up slowly, with Carlita's help. "Carlita, you must promise me...if anyone comes looking for me, you have not seen me. Do you understand?"
"No, Senorita, I do not. I remember when you left; how devastated that handsome Señor Donovan seemed," she replied. "Now it is as if you are running away again."
"Oh, Carlita. I wish I could explain, but there is no time. The people who come looking for me will probably be Mr. Donovan and Mr. Shaw. They can't find me; my son's life is at stake, Carlita."
The desperation in Shay's voice seemed to register to Carlita. She nodded her understanding and promised she would keep silent.
Shay hugged her, thanked her and left her abruptly to run into the small store she had stopped in front of. She quickly purchased a few personal belongings, a couple changes of clothes and some odds and ends for D.J. Carlita was nowhere in sight when she returned to the vehicle.
She drove the rental through the winding dirt roads that led to the cottage Jorge had mentioned. He had taken her there often during the four months she had spent with him. Shay knew Jorge would not let her off easy; he would demand her body as part of the deal. Her stomach rolled in disgust thinking about his touch and the heavy weight of his body on hers. The wave of nausea was too much for her to handle. She slammed down on the brakes and pushed open the door; hanging her head out of the opening, she retched violently.
************
"Where is she, Cody?" Donovan demanded as he held the telephone in a death grip.
"The one place you'd never think to look," Cody replied.
"And just where is that?" he asked, clearly frustrated. He paced the hotel room as far as the telephone cord would allow.
"Where we've already looked," Cody informed his boss.
"Bucamaranga," both Donovan and Cody said at the same time.
"Si, Señor," Cody replied in his fake Spanish accent.
************
"Welcome, Querida," Jorge greeted, helping Shay as she stepped out of the vehicle.
Shay sighed heavily. "Let's not pretend we're anything more than what we are, Jorge." Defiant sky-blue eyes glared at her former lover. "I am here for one reason only...D.J."
He took Shay by the arm and squeezed firmly. "You will call him Richardo, after my father," Jorge insisted.
"Never!" she hissed. "His name is Donovan Jacob and you will not take his name away from him."
Jorge removed his hand from her arm and grasped her by the hair and slammed her face down onto the hood of the car. "Get one thing perfectly clear, Larissa, your life is worth nothing to me and I will lose no sleep over sending your dead body back to your father and that man you've been keeping company with."
Shay whimpered quietly at the mere mention of Frank and her eyes filled with tears. How she loved him, his walk, the sound of his voice, his quirky mannerisms, especially how thick his accent became when his passion rose. And how he must hate her for sending him on a wild goose chase when she knew perfectly well where Jorge would be.
He pulled her up by the roots of her hair to face him and looked into a face defeated. No, the spunky agent was gone; replaced with a whipped shell of a being. He knew he would have no trouble controlling her now. "Your hair...I do not like this color. You will change it, yes?"
Shay nodded. "May I see my son now?"
Jorge smiled silkily. "Yes, Querida. He will be most happy to see you."
************
He saw her instantly, through the bars of his crib. He gurgled a happy greeting to her. How sad she looked, he thought. Her eyes were leaking even though she smiled at him as she bent over the crib to pick him up.
"My darling baby boy," she whispered, sobbing as she hugged him to her breast.
He put his arms around her neck as best he could to assure her he was fine and much better now that she was where he could see her. He had missed her terribly; it was not right that these people had taken him away from her. He looked over her shoulder searching for the man called Tiger. No, he was not with Mommy. Something was very, very wrong.
************
"Señor! Señor Donovan! Señor Jake! It is so good to see you, my friends!" Carlita called to them as she ran down from the hospital towards them.
Jake waved to the pretty nurse and caught her in his arms as she approached without slowing down. "Hello, Carlita," he said, laughing slightly.
She looked from one man to the other. "She said you would come."
Donovan frowned. "Shay? You've seen her?"
Carlita paused before she remembered that Fallon Dumas was Shay Renquist. The world of undercover spies was far too confusing for her. "Si. She begged me to lie to you; to tell you she was not here."
Frank ran a hand through his hair. "Do you know where she went?"
Carlita smiled. "I do. Fallon...Shay, she went to meet the man who has her baby."
"How do you know this?" Jake asked.
"Ah. A woman and a man brought a baby boy to the hospital yesterday. Apparently the baby was very fussy and would not stop crying. They thought something was terribly wrong with him." Carlita gave a small laugh. "The child is teething, so of course he is fussy. Dr. Hernandez...he recognized the man."
"How so?" Donovan asked.
"He was the same man who inquired about Fa—Shay after all of you had left Bucamaraga. The poor Doctor...it took him weeks to recover from the beating he took. He was very embarrassed that he revealed the fact that she was carrying a child, but you must understand, he did not want to betray anyone."
"Of course he didn't," Jake replied, smiling warmly at the beautiful nurse. He had almost forgotten how beautiful she was.
"Do you know where Espinosa is hiding out?" Donovan asked. He was getting antsy and ready to be on his way. Shay had put herself into a dangerous position. Espinosa would not be very accommodating. It would not take much for her to set him off, and the woman who had become everything in Donovan's life would be the madman's first target. He didn't want to think about the possibility that Espinosa might kill his own child.
Carlita nodded. "I will show you."
"It's too dangerous," Jake said, shaking his head. "Just give us the directions."
"Si, it is dangerous, but we must hurry. Shay is not well," she said.
Frank looked at her sharply. "What do you mean?"
"When I met her, just down the street, it was after she had passed out; right on the sidewalk next to her vehicle. It was most disconcerting," she assured.
"Get in," he ordered, holding the door to the Jeep open.
"Frank, this is a bad idea," Jake insisted, climbing in the passenger side.
"Probably, but I don't give a damn right now."
