OBSERVATIONS ON A POTENTIAL PEST

by Noah Hellstrom,

owner of Wanderlust Tours

…another day in the bush. Our plans are coming together well, and I stand to make quite a fortune from the poaching operation. This alliance with the Texan will prove very profitable indeed. I worry—needlessly, I’m sure—about the American park ranger, Wynne Sperling. She is as intriguing as she is infuriating, arresting my men as if she were some kind of savior. I cannot afford to let her disrupt my most exciting venture yet. But I can’t say that her fighting spirit doesn’t compel me, even though her prim rebuttals of my advances annoy me. And the albino leopard that follows her every move like a kitten is equally disturbing. But that’s part of Wynne’s charm—she is as rare as that damn beast, and twice as beautiful. What a wonderful trophy my pretty little ranger would make….

Dear Reader,

What’s in your beach bag this season? August is heating up, and here at Bombshell we’ve got four must-read stories to make your summer special.

Rising-star Rachel Caine brings you the first book in her RED LETTER DAYS miniseries, Devil’s Bargain. An ex-cop makes a deal with an anonymous benefactor to start her own detective agency, but there’s a catch—any case that arrives via red envelope must take priority. If it doesn’t, bad things happen….

Summer heats up in Africa when a park ranger intent on stopping poachers runs into a suspicious Texan with an attitude to match her own, in Rare Breed by Connie Hall. Wynne Sperling wants to protect the animals under her watch—will teaming up with this secretive stranger help her, or play into the hands of her enemies?

A hunt for missing oil assets puts crime-fighting CPA Whitney “Pink” Pearl in the line of fire when the money trail leads to a top secret CIA case, in She’s on the Money by Stephanie Feagan. With an assassin on her tail and two men vying for her attention, Pink had better get her accounts in order….

It takes true grit to make it in the elite world of FBI criminal profilers, and Angie David has what it takes. But with her mentor looking over her shoulder and a serial killer intent on luring her to the dark side, she’ll need a little something extra to make her case. Don’t miss The Profiler by Lori A. May!

Please send your comments to me c/o Silhouette Books, 233 Broadway, Suite 1001, New York, NY 10279.

Best wishes,

Natashya Wilson

Associate Senior Editor, Silhouette Bombshell

Rare Breed
Connie Hall

www.millsandboon.co.uk

CONNIE HALL

is an award-winning author whose writing credits include seven historical novels, written under the pen name Constance Hall, and four screenplays. Her novels are sold worldwide. An avid hiker, conservationist, bird-watcher, and painter of watercolors and oil portraits, she dreams of one day trying her hand at skydiving. She lives in Richmond, Virginia, with her husband, two sons, and Keeper, a lovable Lab-mix who rules the house with her big brown eyes. For more information, visit Connie’s Web site at www.erols.com/koslow.

To Julie Barrett at Silhouette for her vision and for giving one hundred and ten percent of herself to her writers. To Anne McLaughlin, Camelot McAren and John Remmers, my worst critics and best friends. I love you guys.

Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Epilogue

Chapter 1

Lower Zambezi National Park, Africa

Wynne Sperling held the steering wheel of the Land Rover with one hand and pointed at the vultures with the other. “Look, you can see them for miles. There must be hundreds of them.”

“A sure sign we’re close,” Eieb said, speaking very proper English, but slowly, lacing it with a Tonga accent. In his ranger rags, he resembled a black Dudley Do Right, save for the shoulder-length dreadlocks and the Garfield baseball cap, a thirtieth birthday gift from Wynne. He looked like a guy who would go out of his way to avoid stepping on a beetle, but Wynne had seen him wrestle a grown lion to the ground. Perhaps his deceiving appearance made him such a good ranger. Wynne usually worked alone, but when she needed backup, she chose Eieb.

He checked the compass on his watch, then glanced back at the vultures. “It’s close to where Aja said the meeting would go up.”

“That’s down. Go down.”

“Right, down.” Eieb frowned at his attempt at American slang and seemed to file the word away for later use.

“It looks like we’re about ten miles from the site.” Wynne swallowed hard and asked, “How many elephants do you think they’ve killed?”

Eieb glanced through the windshield and narrowed his eyes. “I don’t know, but I’d say a lot by the amount of vultures.”

“I hate this part of the job. We work so hard to keep them alive, and in a few seconds they’re destroyed.”

“You feel responsible for all the animals we protect. Not good.”

“I can’t help it. It only takes one person—”

“To make a difference,” Eieb finished for her. “I know. I know. But even an army can know defeat.”

He had a point. Not that the underfunded Zambian Wildlife Authority could pay an army of rangers. Comprised of one hundred and twelve rangers—including Wynne, and Commander Kaweki, the unit warden—ZAWA was expected to police twelve thousand square miles. Still, she couldn’t help feeling responsible. She gripped the steering wheel until her knuckles shone white and said, “This happened on my watch. I should have been more vigilant, patrolled longer—”

“You’re the only person I know who makes Nelson Mandela look lazy.”

“I feel like I’ve done nothing. Poachers are hitting us more often, right under our noses. Why didn’t we know these guys were operating right in the park? We should have known. They’ve been here at least three days.” Wynne remained pensively quiet and stared at the road ahead.

“It is as if they know our every move.” Eieb studied Wynne a moment. “You think we have a spy in camp,” he said with certainty.

“How else could they be killing animals right in the park?” Wynne asked, aware Eieb knew what she was thinking. He probably knew her better than she knew herself sometimes. “Someone must be directing them, and that someone has to know where the rangers are at all times. And if we don’t catch them, they’ll expand. I’ll bet that if we hadn’t kept this sting to ourselves, we wouldn’t have been able to set it up.”

“We were lucky Aja received that tip from the villagers about the poaching.”

“If Aja hadn’t come to us with the information and arranged the buy, we wouldn’t have known a thing.” Wynne thought of Aja. He had been her first friend in Zambia, and her teacher. Without his help, she would never have learned to survive the harsh extremes of Africa. He was the most revered tracker in Zambia and a poacher’s worst nightmare.

“We have to find out who it is.” Eieb rubbed his jaw and seemed to be ticking off names in his head.

“I know.”

“It will be a good mystery. Something to look forward to when we get back.” A hard, unrelenting glint twinkled in Eieb’s eye, an unusual contrast to his typical restrained facade.

Snow, one hundred and ten pounds of white fur, perked up in the cargo area of the Rover. The leopard’s unusual pink eyes gleamed in the mirror as she lifted her nose and scented the buzzards. Or the kill. Wynne didn’t know which.

“Some powerful and dangerous predator you are,” Wynne said to Snow, the irritation still in her voice, though it was directed at herself for allowing this poaching ring to thwart them at every turn. Wynne finished with a guttural moan, cat language Snow understood.

The leopard responded by rubbing her whiskers against Wynne’s arm, nudging her into the side of the door.

The Rover veered toward the ditch. Wynne jerked the wheel back. Her collection of Simpsons bobble-head dolls on the dash nodded in unison.

Eieb frowned at Snow and said, “You know, you’re going to have to take her to another reserve one day and set her free.”

“I can’t until she’s hunting on her own.”

“Uh-huh. I saw her drop a kill at your door yesterday.”

Wynne didn’t answer him. Snow had been hunting on her own for three weeks now. Wynne thought she’d done a pretty crafty job of hiding it, until now.

“You’ve tamed her so much she may never assimilate back into the wild.” Eieb reached back and scratched Snow behind the ears.

“We’ve bonded, that’s all.”

“Uh-huh. What about the Big Five Habitat? You bonded with those creatures, too. You keep bonding as you say, the habitat will be overflowing.” Eieb gave her his most critical glance.

“Hey, we just turned a bush baby and an eland loose last week.”

Wynne thought of the Big Five Habitat, one of the few accomplishments in her life of which she felt completely proud. She had convinced the park’s veterinarian to train older school children in helping to care for wounded or motherless animals. It aided in recruiting volunteers for the reserve and educated the children on the delicate ecological balance maintained by all living creatures. They not only learned the importance of conserving the big five wild animals of Africa—the elephant, rhino, buffalo, lion, leopard—but all wild animals and their habitats. Some of the happiest moments in Wynne’s life were watching the smiles on the children’s faces as they released the animals back into the wild.

“But you do nothing to set Snow free.” Eieb motioned toward the cat.

“I raised her from a cub,” Wynne said, hearing the desperation in her own voice. “I won’t throw her to the poachers and hunters. You know her white fur is prized.”

“Survival is not guaranteed in the wild, as you know. But if you do not let her go, she’ll never have a normal life or live free. Want to know why I think you keep her?”

“No, but you’ll tell me anyway.”

“I think you’re using Snow as an excuse to remain alone.”

“That’s not true. I don’t keep her on a leash.”

“No, just in your hut at night.”

Wynne thought she’d hidden that as well, but obviously nothing escaped Warden Freud here. “She’ll leave when she’s ready,” she said, her voice adamant. “I won’t drop her somewhere and abandon her, and that’s that.”

She knew firsthand what it felt like to be disowned, severed from those dearest to her, and she wouldn’t discard Snow in a strange place to fend for herself. One day she would let Snow go, when they were both ready.

Eieb lapsed into silence, and Wynne was glad when they neared the site. For now, the third degree was over, but Eieb would bring it up again. He was just as stubborn as she was.

She couldn’t stop thinking of the Judas in their operations base as she left the main road, keeping her eyes on the vultures. The Rover bumped through the tall grass, past a herd of blue wildebeest. The lead bull raised his head and shot them a casual glance, then went back to grazing.

She breathed in the scent of dung, fresh pasture and last night’s dew, the raw scent of vastness, primitive earth and pulsing life. The self-reliant, adventurous part of her craved that solitary open scent. She felt needed and wanted here.

“Let me out up ahead.” Eieb picked up the rifle resting near his right leg and hung it over his shoulder by the strap. He checked his walkie-talkie to make sure it was turned on. “Frequency four?”

“I’m already there.” Wynne patted the unit inside her vest pocket, and the handcuffs in an adjacent pocket rattled slightly.

“I’ll circle around through the forest and come in on the east side.”

“I’ll go in from the west side.”

She parked the Rover near the forest’s edge and cut the engine. She checked to make sure the leather slingshot wrapped around her waist was secure. It wasn’t a modern slingshot with an elastic band attached to a forked base. No, she was schooled in the art of the sling; a ballistic weapon David had made famous in the Bible when he slew Goliath. It had been one of the most important weapons in an ancient army’s arsenal. It was still used in some African cultures today. Two long cords were attached to the ends of a leather strap. The strap held the projectiles—she preferred smooth stones—and the cords allowed her to whirl the stone overhead or at her side. The cords were long enough to go around her waist, and she had disguised the slingshot to look like a belt from a Ralph Lauren Congo collection. But in her trained hands it was a lethal weapon.

Eieb’s expression turned grave. “If I was hard on you earlier—”

“I needed to hear it.” Wynne grinned at him.

He tried for a smile, but only managed to pull his lips into a thin sober line. He tugged on her long braid twice, the closest thing to a hug she had ever gotten from him, then he said, “Godspeed.”

“You, too.” Wynne did the same with his dreadlocks, then he slipped off into the woods. For a six foot guy, he moved through the forest like a ghost, disappearing into the foliage.

She lifted the left cuff of her pants and checked the small dagger and sheath there. For the undercover operation, she had worn her most loose-fitting civilian clothes, a white oversized safari shirt, a hunting vest, and tan cargo pants. The pants were wide enough at the bottom to allow her easy access to the dagger.

She dropped the cuff and reached across the stick shift. Strands of blond hair escaped her braid and fell in her face. She blew them back and found the packets of money she had wrapped in waxed canvas and tied with twine. Carefully, she shoved the neat little package into a vest pocket.

A .22 rifle, a Winchester, and a dart gun were in the trunk, mandatory equipment for a ranger. She used the dart pistol when she needed to sedate an animal, but the other guns she rarely utilized. She had seen firsthand the damage guns could inflict. They were made for taking life, not preserving it, and there had never been a time in the two years she’d been a ranger that cunning and wits hadn’t won out over bullets.

She slipped into the forest, Snow shadowing her. Wynne found a well-worn elephant path and the going was easy. She kept her eyes trained for movement. Poachers were infamous for setting traps and had murdered a ranger six months ago.

A blue striped skink skittered across the path in front of her. Out of habit, Wynne paused and found what the lizard was running from. A slender mamba slithered after its prey.

Snow paused behind Wynne, curious, but inherently cautious.

The snake wasn’t quite four feet long and still olive-green, a juvenile. Mambas turned black when full grown and Wynne had seen them fourteen feet in length.

The snake sensed her, but mambas were as poisonous as cobras and they had an attitude to back it up, so it didn’t challenge her and pursued its skink-a-la-mode dinner.

Lack of fear was the snake’s first mistake. Wynne whipped off the slingshot, loaded a rock in the leather strap and followed the mamba.

It reared its head at her.

One snap of her wrist and the slingshot’s cords wrapped around the snake’s slender neck and mouth. Wynne grabbed the back of its head and loosened the cords. She forced open its mouth and drained the venom on a log.

“Don’t worry, little guy, you’ll be free soon,” she said, thrusting the snake in a cloth pouch she kept for capturing poisonous snakes.

The skink looked at her as it scurried off into the underbrush, as if to say, “Thanks.”

The snake thrashed and writhed in the sack as she secured it to her belt and continued her approach.

Another twenty yards, and she paused at the sound of male voices. She imitated the call of a sparrow weaver.

Eieb’s whistle answered.

Everything was in place. She gave Snow a hand signal to stay, then peeked past the underbrush. Five elephant carcasses littered the ground. They had been butchered, only meaty bones and tendon left, the choicest morsels for the vultures and blowflies. By the smell and look of the carrion, the animals had been killed a good three days ago. It surprised her that the meat had been butchered so quickly. Five bull elephants amounted to tons of meat. It took a tribe of hunters a day to butcher one good-size elephant. These guys had killing down to a science.

It made her sick to see the senseless carnage, and she glanced down at her hands, feeling a tightening in the region over her heart. It was part of her job to monitor the elephant herds in the park. There were only one hundred and fifty elephants in the reserve—now only one hundred and forty-five. She had named some of them by their personalities. Which ones had she lost? God! She didn’t want to know.

Thirty feet from the kill, standing near the tusks, Wynne spotted Aja and three poachers. Aja was about fifty, elderly for an African, with graying temples and the expression of a sage. Strands of beads covered his legs, arms and neck. He wore a loincloth. A leather slingshot, identical to Wynne’s, hung down the side of his hip. Despite the development and exploitation of Zambia, some Africans hadn’t lost their sense of heritage. Aja valued the old ways of his ancestors. He truly was one of the people of the earth, and he wore his pride in his bearing. They made eye contact, but he had been expecting her and didn’t give her away. He continued to converse with the poachers.

She assessed the other three Africans. Young, not locals, probably from another province. They donned camouflage fatigues, urbanite garb from a military store. They held Remington M70s, enough firepower to take down the side of a house. More than likely they had herded the animals here and mowed them down like a firing squad. Wynne tried to take a long calming breath, but she kept picturing the slaughter, and the air sat in her lungs like she had just breathed fire.

The tallest of the three men wore a tan beret. An ivory earring dangled from his nose and ear. A belt crafted from giraffe hair and elephant tail hair was threaded through the belt loops of his pants—nothing like flaunting the contraband. He glanced around as if expecting trouble; the leader, she presumed.

She stepped into the clearing, a Teflon smile pasted across her face, while inside she seethed.

The men grew wide-eyed with confusion and concern.

Did they know she was a ranger? Had her cover been blown? Fear pulled at her. She reached for her slingshot, but the men’s uncertainty quickly segued into obvious disdain and she slowly relaxed her hand at her side.

The leader took her measure and spat. He looked at Aja. “We wish to do business, but not with a woman,” he growled in Nyanja, one of over seventy dialects spoken in Zambia.

“Her money is good.”

“We don’t deal with women.”

Wynne had come up against men like these many times before, killers who didn’t respect women or any living creature. To them, she was nothing but a lowly woman, beneath them and not to be trusted. She pulled out the money from her vest and spoke in their language. “Here’s the seventy pounds as agreed upon.”

This softened the leader’s expression.

Wynne tossed the packet to him.

He snatched it out of midair and grinned, white teeth flashing. “Maybe we can do business.”

The other men drew close as the leader tore into the packet.

Wynne stepped back and smiled, focusing on the miniscule cloud of brown dust flittering down as he dropped the covering.

For a moment Aja met her eyes and they shared a knowing glance.

“It’s all there.” Wynne watched the leader fan the bills, more dust scattering in the air.

The others stared, rapt by the sight of so many greenbacks.

“I’ll have my men pick up the ivory.” Wynne walked toward the tusks, each weighing about seventy to eighty pounds, flesh still attached to the ends. She had to look down at her hands.

“Wait.” The leader shoved the money in his pocket and nudged his companions.

They walked toward Wynne. Her gaze shifted between their eyes and their guns.

“Ivory is prized,” the leader said. “One hundred fifty pounds, or no deal.”

“We agreed on seventy,” Wynne said. “That’s all I’ve got on me.”

“You can pay us the rest tomorrow.”

“What about the meat? Is it for sale?”

“No meat.” The leader shook his head emphatically. “All bought.”

Wynne had a horrible suspicion brewing in her. She hedged, then said, “Where shall I meet you?” How many other poachers were in the area and involved in this ring? She looked forward to interrogating them.

“Here.”

“No, not here. I passed rangers on the road about twenty miles north. What about your camp?”

A moment of indecision, then he said, “We’ll meet you at this location.”

“Very well, but I may not be able to come up with all the money right away.”

The leader eyed her up and down. “You’re not a bad-looking woman, you can think of something.”

Wynne gave him her most winning smile, while she visualized what she’d like to do to him later. It involved the mamba and a knife.

The leader nodded at the tusks. “Get them.”

“Wait! They’re mine!” Wynne stepped between the tusks and the two men. She held up her hands and tried to look as if she were at their mercy.

Aja stepped next to her and crossed his arms. “They are the woman’s.”

The men glanced at them: a woman and an old man. They found it amusing as they aimed their cannons at Wynne and Aja. The leader’s teeth glistened in a Cheshire grin. “I keep the tusks until full payment.”

“I don’t think so.” Wynne looked at Aja. “Do you?”

Aja nodded. “No, I do not think so.”

Snow chose that moment to step out of the woods and pad toward them.

The leader saw Snow. Fear registered in his expression. He whipped his gun around to shoot….

Wynne already had the sack in her hands. She tore it open and hurled the snake at the leader. It landed on his head.

“Get it off! Get it off!” He screamed, dropped his gun, and flung the mamba into the forest.

It was the diversion Wynne needed. She kicked him, then knocked him down on the ground in a tantui move, a martial arts form of kickboxing. In seconds she’d wrestled his hands behind his back and cuffed him.

Abruptly the other two men groaned and grabbed their stomachs. They staggered several feet and dropped their weapons.

Wynne was on them in a flash, throwing them to the ground, cuffing them, while Aja grabbed their rifles.

“It took a long time,” Aja said. “Did you use enough lobelia on the money?”

Lobelia—a tobacco derivative—contained poisonous caustic latex, more potent than digitalis. It was one of the tricks Aja had taught her. “I did, but I didn’t want to kill them. Next time, I’ll make the powder more potent. But I did bring the mamba as a diversion.”

“Huh, a mamba.” Aja shook his head, then the wrinkles stretched around his eyes in disapproval. “I would have found a cobra.”

Wynne was used to Aja’s criticisms. He was the master in the African bush; she was only his student. She knew how fortunate she had been to have his friendship and tutelage, and she always showed him the deference he deserved, though it never stopped her from hoping to hear him compliment her one day.

Her gaze shifted to the three downed men as Snow sniffed them. The thought of losing five elephants to these creeps ate at her. However, it gave her pleasure to watch them trembling not only from sickness but from having a full-grown leopard breathing down their necks. An idea came to her.

One hand signal from her and Snow paused, bent down and sniffed the leader’s neck.

He stiffened, his body trembling all over.

“You probably don’t know this, but albino leopards stay hungry all the time. Has something to do with their genetic anomaly.” Not true, but sounded good. “And Snow here hasn’t made a kill in days.”

“P-please…” His voice was a raspy whisper.

“I know you were trying to make a little extra cash with this deal. Was it your idea, or your boss’s?”

“Ours alone.”

“Whose?” Wynne motioned to Snow and the big cat plopped one paw on his back.

“Mine.” He struggled not to move.

“Where is the meat?”

“Packaged for b-bush meat….”

Wynne grimaced. Bush meat. The most devastating kind of poaching. It was the illegal use of wildlife for meat and had caused the near-extinction of animals in Africa. Also it exposed consumers to diseases such as Ebola, and twenty-six kinds of SIV—Simian immunodeficiency virus—two of which had been identified as the origin of AIDS. Bush meat poaching meant a highly organized, commercial illegal operation. They could wipe out the park’s wildlife in a few weeks.

“How are you transporting the meat?”

“Supposed to drop it at a contact point.”

“When?”

“Tonight…midnight.” His eyes squeezed shut as Snow sniffed his ear, and his trembling turned to full-blown shudders.

“Where?”

“Near Sausage Tree Camp….”

“How is it moved?”

“Z-Zambezi River.”

“Through Zimbabwe?”

“Yes.”

“Where does it go from there?”

“I don’t know. I-I swear.”

“Who is behind this ring?”

“I don’t know.”

“Okay.” Wynne shrugged. “Snow, it’s poacher dinner for you, girl.” She signaled the leopard with one finger.

Snow let out a roar that Wynne felt deep in her chest and she was certain rocked the poacher’s eardrum a little. Then the big cat flopped down across his back.

“Haah! Please… Please! I-I don’t know! Money and instructions come through e-mail.” Perspiration streamed down his brow, and he blinked it back.

Wynne believed him, not because he was scared out of his wits and wouldn’t dare lie to her, but because the ring leader had been clever enough to set up a bush meat ring right under their noses, even had a spy, or two, in their camp. He’d definitely be clever enough to keep his identity hidden. She motioned for Snow to back off.

Shots rent the air. Wynne’s head snapped up. Buzzards scattered into a black haze.

Aja glanced into the forest and asked, “Where is Eieb?”

“Oh, my God! Eieb!” Wynne should have known this arrest had gone down too easily. There must have been a lookout. She snapped a hand signal at Snow. “Guard.” She pointed to the poachers and heard another staccato blast of shots.

“Please, watch them,” Wynne yelled over her shoulder at Aja as she ran into the forest, whipping off her slingshot. Wynne prayed Eieb was still alive and that the poachers hadn’t won this round, too.

Wynne slowed as she neared the gun battle. It was seventy yards ahead of her. She crept forward, using the dense undergrowth as cover. She couldn’t see Eieb or the poachers. Only heard them. A semiautomatic rapid fire, rat-tat-tat-tat, layered by Eieb’s shotgun, ka-plow. At least she knew Eieb was still alive. It sounded like the middle of a war zone.

Abruptly the shots stopped, the quiet deafening.

Her pulse drummed in her ears. She smelled the bitter scent of gunpowder, thickened by the humidity. The air pressed in around her as she searched for movement, a quick rapid scan. Left. Right. Only lush green jungle. She tuned into the faint sound of moaning, jagged breathing. Was that Eieb?

She didn’t dare call out. Poachers could still be in the vicinity, ready to play the Kill the Warden game. She prowled toward the sound, then heard…

Whisper of leaves. Footfalls behind her. She loaded her slingshot and whirled it, arm poised, ready to fire.

“It’s me,” Eieb whispered, his voice wired from the gun battle.

She relaxed, relieved to see him, and let the slingshot drop. “Any more around?”

“Only one. The shots came from this way. Pretty certain, he’s down.”

Eieb headed toward the sound, Wynne on his heels. They spotted the fallen African at the same time. He was barefoot and wore ragged civilian clothes. His body was curled into a fetal position and he held his stomach. Blood oozed between his fingers and ran down his arm. An AK-47 lay next to him.

Wynne kicked the rifle away. Then she and Eieb must have seen the young man’s face at the same time, for they gaped at him.

“Mehan?” Wynne said, aware she shouldn’t feel empathy for a poacher who had tried to kill Eieb and probably other rangers. But she had seen Mehan’s smile every morning in camp for the past two years, knew his wife and four children, and the promise within him; he was an artist and had carved a leopard out of wood for her. It resembled Snow. How could she distance herself from someone she had called friend?

“Why, Mehan?” Eieb looked as tortured and in pain as Mehan.

Mehan squeezed his eyes shut, as if he couldn’t bear to look at them or face what he’d done. “Need…” he spoke in Nyanja. “Feed…family.”

It was always about need. Mehan needed to poach to feed his family. Wynne needed to stop bush meat poachers. She grabbed a nearby Balsam plant, stripped the leaves with one glide of her hand, then crushed them between her palms. She pulled her dagger from its ankle sheath, tugged her shirt from her waist, and cut the bottom off; Mehan probably had two shirts to his name—if he was lucky.

Wynne squatted on the other side of Mehan and looked at Eieb. “Help me roll him on his back.”

Mehan grimaced but didn’t cry out, the African male warrior in him refusing to give way to pain.

“Hold his hands.” She waited for Eieb to grasp Mehan’s hands, then thrust the leaves against the bullet hole.

Mehan tensed, agony scorching his dark eyes. Perspiration trailed down his forehead. He clenched Eieb’s hands as if he were dangling from a cliff.

“Just one more thing.” She wrapped the shirttail around his middle, packing the leaves against the wound. He was so thin, she knotted the strip of material twice. Mehan bit his lower lip, and his eyes glazed as if he might pass out. “That should help the bleeding. We’ll get you some real help.”

“Who is behind this?” Eieb bent over Mehan, his voice soft, but his expression hard with resolve.

“LZCG….” Mehan’s lips quivered, the name dissolving in his throat. Then he shuddered and passed out.

“LZCG?” Eieb and Wynne both spoke at the same time, openmouthed in disbelief.

“I don’t believe it.” Eieb shook his head. “The LZCG behind a poaching ring?”

“Not just a poaching ring,” Wynne said. “A bush meat ring.”

“Are you certain it’s a bush meat operation?”

“The carcasses have been butchered and one of the men we caught confirmed it.”

“I still do not believe it. Mehan could be lying to cover for someone else.”

“I don’t think so. It’s like he was clearing his conscience.”

“But without the LZCG we wouldn’t have the air and ground support. They just paid for the new animal tracking system,” Eieb said as if trying to convince himself it wasn’t true. “They gave us the funding. No, I cannot believe it.”

“Now that’s the kicker, and what the orchestrator of this ring would like us to believe,” said Wynne. “If you think about it, it’s the perfect setup. No one would suspect someone in the LZCG of poaching.” The Zambian Wildlife Authority had been fortunate to have the LZCG base their operations in Zambia. Wynne knew the Lower Zambian Conservation Group, or LZCG as most people referred to it, had done more for saving wildlife than the Zambian government. It was a nonprofit organization started by safari tour owners and tradesmen who catered to wealthy tourists, photographers, and licensed hunters. In the 1970s and ’80s, safari owners had witnessed the near extinction of wildlife in Zambia, and they realized their livelihood was dying. Thus they created and funded the LZCG. Without its financial support and added manpower, Zambia wouldn’t have begun to make an impact on poaching. The lack of funding from the government made it impossible for the understaffed rangers to cover all of Zambia’s vast lands. LZCG’s employees took up the slack, covering borders and patrolling areas, working alongside the rangers. Some of them had been deputized and could make arrests. They were constantly assisting every ranger on the force, including Wynne when she asked for help. No one would suspect the LZCG insider of poaching. It was the perfect smoke screen.

The furrow on Eieb’s brow loosened and he seemed a little more amenable to the idea. “Okay, just suppose you’re correct. Who could it be?”

“I don’t know. Hey, it could be anyone.” The LZCG board members flashed in Wynne’s mind and for some reason the enigmatic handsome features of Noah Hellstrom stuck. She had seen the way he walked into a room and owned it, his charisma and presence electrifying the air. With just one smile, he had the ability to charm anyone out of anything. Four months ago, LZCG’s board members had unanimously voted him in as their new chairman of the board and head of operations.

She didn’t know how Hellstrom had the time to volunteer at the LZCG and operate Wanderlust Tours, one of the largest safari companies in Zambia. Unlike some safari owners, Hellstrom always followed the laws. On her patrols in the bush, she had never arrested any of his scouts or hunters for not having the proper licenses in the game-managed areas where hunting was allowed. Still, she couldn’t ignore the fact they hadn’t had a poaching problem until Hellstrom took over.

“What about Hellstrom?” Wynne threw out.

“I don’t know. He’s so well liked.”

“I know, but he did shoot down my idea of getting a DNA wildlife crime lab. He said it was too expensive and wouldn’t even take the idea to the board to vote on it.”

“I remember. Strange was it not, since it’s more effective in ferreting out poachers than the tracking system.”

It had been a dream of Wynne’s to see a lab established in the park, but she needed the LZCG behind her and the influence they had with the Zambian government. It certainly wasn’t going to happen while Hellstrom was chairman of the board.

“His safari business would be a great way to transport the meat,” Eieb said, his voice uncertain.

“True, and he knows our every move, but so does all of the LZCG staff.” She glanced down at Mehan. “We need to keep him safe. If the leader of this poaching ring knows he’s alive and talked, they’ll try to eliminate him.”

“I’ll protect him.” A heavy frown stretched across Eieb’s brow.

“After Doc Mukuka treats him, we should move him somewhere safe. Aja can help us.” Dr. Mukuka ran an AIDS clinic about two miles from base camp. It was the closest thing they had to a hospital.

“I know of a place.” Eieb nodded.

“Take the Rover. I’ll deal with the prisoners.”

Eieb hefted Mehan in his arms like he was a child, the tendons in Eieb’s long forearms straining. But the weight didn’t seem to slow him as he hurried through the forest.

“Don’t tell anyone about our arrest just yet,” Wynne called to Eieb’s back.

He didn’t answer her, and she wondered if he was too far away to hear her. If word of the capture got out, the meeting at Sausage Tree Camp would be cancelled. The poacher had said he was to turn over the contraband tonight. The camp was twenty kilometers away, near the southern edge of the park, next to the Zambezi River. She could easily slip down there and see who turned up. Maybe follow them and find out the smuggling route the poachers were taking.

Wynne picked up Eieb’s and Mehan’s rifles, then hurried back to Aja and the poachers. She thought of the LZCG again.

She didn’t want to believe one of the board members could be corrupt, but it was obvious someone was, maybe even more than one person. She didn’t know who to trust any longer. And she couldn’t risk offending all the board members by accusing one of them of poaching without definitive proof. It was the golden handcuff principle at work. And whoever was head of this ring had probably anticipated that advantage.

She knew finding the identity of this person would be like playing chess with the devil. One wrong move and she’d not only lose the job she loved with all her heart, she could lose her life. Tonight, just maybe, she could get one move ahead of the devil—if that was possible.

Chapter 2

The sun had just set and the soft evening moonlight cast a long sparkling shadow down the center of the Zambezi River as Wynne crept along its bank. The water current and bellows of hippos drowned out her footsteps. An occasional splash warned of a croc looking for a snack. A rich brew of animal musk, vegetation and the dank scent of fresh water clung to the air.

There was enough moonlight to see across the river to Zimbabwe’s shore. The Zambezi River acted as a natural boundary between the two countries. It also gave poachers a quick escape route into Zimbabwe. It was September; the end of the dry season, and the river had shrunk to a fourth its size, making it easier for poachers to cross. Poaching was rampant in Zimbabwe. Endangered species were all but wiped out. The country was too impoverished to control it and animals had fled into Zambia for protection.

It made sense the bush meat poachers would transport the meat along the river into Zimbabwe. And she wasn’t surprised she hadn’t come across these men in her nightly patrols of the river. The rangers never made a move unless they cleared it with base camp and LZCG headquarters. Since they worked so closely together, they both needed to be updated. Whoever was on duty would know she regularly watched the Zambezi at night. It was common knowledge among the rangers. She never failed to catch small-time local poachers, but never these new bush meat poachers.

Wynne paused as she spotted five female elephants with a three-year-old calf and an infant. She scanned the underbrush for a bull following the herd. Usually bull elephants traveled separately from the females and either foraged for food alone or in small herds with other male juveniles. But if a cow was in season, bulls trailed the females. They were also larger than the cows and easily spotted. She didn’t see one with this herd.

In groups like this one, a matriarch usually led the herd. She could be fifty or older and her experience in finding food and water, and in sensing danger maintained the social order of the herd. But this lone group of cows seemed frightened and unsure of approaching the river, raising their tusks and scenting the air, keeping their young at their sides. Obviously this herd had recently lost their matriarch—most likely one of the five elephants poached today.

The mother of the calf turned and Wynne saw that she had one broken tusk. Wynne had named her simply Broken Tusk. She was part of Bright Betsy’s herd, but Bright Betsy must have been one of the elephants slaughtered by the poachers. Wynne called her B.B. for short. B.B. had grown accustomed to Wynne and had let her get within thirty yards of the herd while they fed.

Years of poaching and the slaughter of thousands of elephants had made them fear man and they would rarely take the chances of drinking in the open along rivers and streambeds during the day, nor would Wynne have ever been able to get as close as she had to B.B.’s herd. But since the park had cracked down on poaching, the elephants had been overcoming their fear. At seeing this herd disoriented, afraid and mourning the death of their matriarch, Wynne felt a stab of guilt and anger in the pit of her gut. She’d failed them today, broken their trust.

She waited as they eased forward and drank, then plodded back into the forest, following Broken Tusk and her infant. Wynne vowed to see them unafraid and drinking out in the open again.

She spotted the place where the poacher had said he was supposed to hand over the goods. Sausage Tree Camp was nothing but a bush lodge, named for the huge sausage tree that marked its location. The tree grew along the river’s edge, centuries old, its boughs as thick as the tires on her Rover. She could see the phallic-shaped fruits hanging from its branches. Some of the gray-green fruit was well over two feet long and had to weigh at least twenty pounds. Several blue monkeys lounged on the branches, munching on the fruit, a much-prized treat of monkeys and elephants. Some native healers pulverized the fruit and applied the paste to treat skin problems, venereal disease, rheumatism, and cancer. She had used the paste a time or two herself on heat rashes and bee stings. Sausage tree fruit was also employed in a secret ritual that supposedly predicted the size of an infant’s penis when he reached adulthood.

Wynne cracked a smile at the thought, then shifted her gaze to the lodge. It could sleep nine, but it was hardly more than a massive tent with a cement floor, though its lavish description on a safari tourist pamphlet made it sound much more inviting.

Tonight it looked empty. No trucks, or tethered horses—they were often used on bird-watching safaris. Bolts of mosquito netting stretched across the open tent windows. Zambia was a malaria zone; a fact reserved for the pamphlet’s fine print. She had slathered her own skin with mud, a natural and readily accessible mosquito repellent.

Wynne was attuned to the sounds in the bush: the shrill chatter of monkeys; the trumpeting of an elephant; the cough of a hunting leopard. The sounds were always present, a gauging of normalcy, comforting in a way. She heard none of them now, only her own breathing and a dead eerie silence. Had the poachers gotten here before her?

She scanned the area behind the lodge. The trees. Along the road. She was about to take off her slingshot and follow the herd when someone touched her shoulder.

Wynne screamed in surprise and wheeled around. She kicked her attacker in the side, but the large man grabbed her leg and tossed her to the ground. As he came at her again she countered with a knee cut that knocked him off balance.

He staggered back and hit a tree trunk.

Wynne leaped to her feet, ready for the next strike.

He used an aikido side arm thrust this time. She deflected the blow and got in a lucky kick to his ribs.

He flinched a little, but stood his ground, solid as a mountain.

They circled each other, hands up, on the defensive. His face was in shadow and she couldn’t see his eyes. It was important to see an opponent’s eyes; they gave away every intended movement. She felt blind fighting him.

For a broad-shouldered man his movements were decisive and quick and hard to anticipate. He was a head taller than her five foot eleven inch frame. She looked most men in the eye, not this guy.

“We could do this two-step all night,” his voice was deep, honey-coated by a Texas drawl.

“You’re American?” It took her aback for a moment, but she didn’t drop her guard or stop circling him.

“Last I checked.” Amusement laced his voice. He paused and looked too at ease, hardly out of breath.

He’d been sparring with her, not using his full strength. What would have happened had he really felt threatened? “Who the hell are you?” Wynne paused because he’d paused. They stood three feet from each other. She kept her gaze on his hands.

“I was going to introduce myself when I tapped you on the shoulder—that is, before you attacked me like a cat with its tail caught under a rocker.”

“I didn’t hear you behind me. It was a knee-jerk reaction.”

“Guess I should have cleared my throat.” He sounded genuinely contrite. “My mistake. Bygones?” He shoved a hand at her.

Wynne leaped back as if avoiding a mamba attack.

“Whoa, there. Touchy thing, ain’t you?”

“Keep your hands where I can see them.” She narrowed her eyes at his dark form. It seemed massive against the back drop of the moon. She wished she could see his eyes.

“Anything you say.” He slowly raised his hands.

“You didn’t answer my question,” she said, certain he was enjoying toying with her and had this pleasant harmless act honed to perfection. She felt her patience slipping. “Tell me your name.”

“I could ask you the same, darlin’.”

“I’m a ranger, and so not your darlin’. Your turn.”

“Jack MacKay—nice moves you got. You study under a sifu?”

“Fifteen years.” She wasn’t about to tell him his form was as good as hers—a different discipline than the karate kick boxing she had studied, but impressive. His eyes were hidden in the dark, but she could feel him eyeing her up and down. “And you?” she asked.

“Ex-SEAL.”

A good old boy and a SEAL, a lethal combination. That explained why she didn’t hear him sneak up on her. “Okay, Lone Star, what are you doing in this area? The park closes at night.”

“Most people call me Jack. And I was just walking. Any law against that?”

“The park’s dangerous at night. Big cats and crocs hunt at night along this river, and so do hyenas and wild dogs. Stick to walking in daylight when the park is open. And don’t ever sneak up on someone again. Now, I’m going to have to frisk you.”

“Help yourself, darlin’.” He turned and assumed the position with his hands outstretched and feet apart all too willingly. “I’ll warn you, I’m packing,” he said.

She stood behind him to be on the safe side and patted his ribs none too gently and enjoyed it when he winced. “Guns are not allowed in the park.”

“It’s a man’s God-given right to protect himself.”

“This isn’t Texas, or the Alamo.” She felt the shoulder holster, then found the gun. A massive thing, a .44 Magnum. Dirty Harry had nothing on this guy.

“Careful now. It’s loaded. Wouldn’t want a lady hurting herself.”

He had just pushed the wrong buttons. She hurled the gun as far as she could. It plunked into the river with a loud splash.

“Hey, that was the first gun I ever bought. I’m attached to that gun.” The sugar coating left his voice, a steely edge in its place.

Was that the true MacKay surfacing, a hint of dark center behind the Texas buttercream icing? “No guns in the park.” She finished patting him down.

“Y’ all really know how to show a guy a good time around here.”

“Jeez, I’m sorry our social director is off. You got stuck with me.” Wynne finished patting down his legs and decided not to search his crotch. He might like it too much. “You’re clean.”

“Do I get to search you now?”

“You can, if you want to be staked over a termite mound.” Wynne listened to him laugh loudly, an exaggerated roar from deep within his chest. She rested her fists on her hips and said, “Now, I suggest you go back to where you came from.”

“Can’t. My jeep broke down.” He gestured to the dirt road that led into camp.

“You said you were out walking?”

“I was. I knew the camp was here, so I walked here to find out if there was a phone.”

“A phone?” Out in a bush camp. Malarkey. And he’d snuck up on her in a perpendicular direction to the road. What was he up to? Was he the contact the poacher had spoken about?

“What were you doing driving here to begin with?”

“You’re mighty nosey.”

“Technically you’re trespassing on a Zambian national park and a game-managed area. I could bust you for having a gun. So answer my question.”

“All right, no need to get your hackles up. But I kinda think you like gettin’ ’em up.”

She heard the smile in his voice and said, “Just answer the question.”

“I heard of the bush camp and wanted to check it out and see if I might want to spend a week or two along the river.”

“Why?”

“Let’s just say I’m the outdoorsy type. Isn’t that what lures most people to Africa?”

She suspected there was a lot more to his motives than he was admitting. “Where are you staying?”

“Why, you wanna join me for a drink?”

She wanted to toss him in the river, too, and said, “Just answer the question.”

“At Hellstrom’s Tours. Signed up for a safari.”

Wynne’s gut clenched. Hellstrom. There was his name again. Was Cowboy Jack just a tourist? Or sent here to throw her off, or perhaps alert the poachers? The way to the truth stood before her, one hundred and ninety pounds of Texas machismo packed nice and tight in a pair of jeans and a denim shirt. For some reason the sausage tree fruit ritual popped into her head.

She quickly squelched that line of insane thinking. He was the enemy. She said curtly, “I’ll take you back to Hellstrom’s.”

“I’m fishing Jefferson Davis out the river first.”

“Jefferson Davis?”

“My gun.”

“Help yourself. I’ll keep watch for the baboons.”

“Baboons?”

“They like to tease the crocs, so it’s like a natural alarm. But there’s no warning for hippos.”

“I don’t care how many crocs or hippos I got to fight to get my gun. I’m gettin’it.” His voice held an Alamo, Davy Crockett, do-or-die tone.

Something told her this was just the beginning of her night.

MacKay had refused to leave until he’d found the gun. The man was determined, she’d give him that. It also had helped that the gun had landed close to the shore and sunk in the mud. They had walked back the two miles to where she had hidden the Rover, and now they bumped along the road. The faint clicking of The Simpsons dolls and the road noise filled the interior of the truck. Hellstrom’s compound bordered the Great East Road, a forty minute drive from Sausage Tree Camp. With MacKay in the truck, the miles seemed to drag, the trip taking forever. He seemed unusually quiet, distracted.

She chanced a few quick glances at him while driving. She hadn’t really looked at him before. Damp jeans stuck to long muscular thighs. His soaked forest-green shirt was glued to washboard abs. His gun holster crossed over his broad chest and hung beneath his right shoulder. Dash lights glowed along his chiseled features and short cropped blond hair. He had a Brad Pitt face on a Schwarzenegger body. Not a bad combination, she had to admit. But it was obvious he was an expert at using his facile charm and good looks to his advantage.

As if he felt her gaze on him, he said, “Thanks for letting me find ol’ J.D. here.” He used that affable tone of his and patted the gun in the holster.

She didn’t deserve his gratitude. The whole time he was searching for the gun she had visions of a croc running him out of the water. No such luck. She could have confiscated the gun, but if he were going to use it he would have long ago. And he seemed genuinely attached to it, like it was some kind of Texas security blanket, and she had to be at least civil to him. He was the key to getting inside Hell-strom’s compound. Since he was feeling indebted to her at the moment, Wynne figured now might be a good time to find out if he was connected to the bush meat operation, so she said, “No problem. So how did you hear about Hellstrom’s safari tours?”

“Internet—you never did tell me your name.” He pulled off a soggy river reed stuck to his shirtsleeve, then flicked it out the window.

She didn’t want to be on a first-name basis with him, and said, “Sperling.”

“Your first name?”

She hesitated and said, “Wynne.”

“Wynne Sperling?” He tried the name out. It sounded like Spuhlin’ when he said it. “Sperling. I knew some Sperlings. You got family in Amarillo?”

“No.”

“Where’s your family from?”

“Washington, D.C.”

“Visited the District once. Climbed the Washington Monument in the summer. It was one scorcher of a day—”

She interrupted his tourist anecdote and said, “Washington can be murder in the summer, but probably not any hotter than Texas. What part of Texas are you from?”

“All over, but mostly Austin. My life is pretty boring. Now yours is different. How’d you get all the way from D.C. to Africa?”

She didn’t like the adroit way he kept turning the conversation back to her. “I majored in wildlife ecology with a minor in criminal justice. I thought I could do the most good here on the front lines. So what do you do for a living?” she asked, getting back to his life.

“I’m a businessman.”

“What kind of business are you in?”

“Just about everything. Whatever strikes my fancy and turns a profit.”

Was bush meat poaching one of his fancies? “How do you go from ex-SEAL to businessman?”

“I kinda teach aikido to kids, too. Keeps me in shape.”

“I see.”

He reached over and touched Bart’s head, watching it bob. “What’s with The Simpsons fetish?”

“Birthday gifts. From my little sister, Cody. It was one of our rituals to watch The Simpsons every week. She likes to tease me because I don’t own a television here.”

She recalled snuggling on the couch with Cody, a bowl of Doritos between them, watching The Simpsons. Wynne missed hearing Cody’s nasally laugh, the peachy-bubblegum teenage scent of her hair, the way she always used to get in Wynne’s makeup and wear her clothes and swear she hadn’t. The dolls connected Wynne to home, to her sister, to a life that was no longer her own. Wynne cherished the six dolls. She couldn’t bear to see him abusing Bart’s head and said, “Please, they’re fragile.”

“Sorry.” He drew back his long arm and let it rest on his thigh. “You miss your family?”

His insightful question surprised Wynne and she said, “Very much.”

“What about your folks? They alive?”

“Yeah, but divorced.” Wynne thought of her father and smiled. “My father is a veterinarian for the National Zoo in Washington, and my mother…” Her smile melted. What was her mother? A bulldozer in stockings, heels and a Chanel suit. “She’s in corporate law,” Wynne finally said, realizing she’d said too much. “What about your parents?”

“My parents?” He gave a little taut laugh. “They consisted of the nuns at St.Anthony’s Orphanage, and Clarence, the grounds man.” A wistful tone entered his voice.

“Clarence?”

“Yep, old Clarence kinda took me under his wing, taught me how to box, work on cars and how to hunt—the sisters didn’t like that though. He took all us boys hunting on weekends, told the sisters it was a camping trip to commune with God. Ha! I think they were wise to him, but they didn’t say a word. Beside the priest, he was the only male influence in our lives—not knocking Father Reilly, he could go a round in the ring with the best of them, but he liked gardening. We boys just weren’t into perennials….” His words trailed off, and he seemed lost in memories.

The kind of silence that accompanies too much personal disclosure dragged between them. She wished she hadn’t asked about his parents. Was he lying to gain her sympathy? No, there had been an unmistakable honesty in his voice. All she really wanted to know about him was if he was involved in the poaching.

“This is a mighty fine ride you got,” MacKay said, glancing around the interior of her truck. “It’s not standard issue.”

“It’s mine.”

“How does a warden in Zambia afford something like this? Isn’t the government strapped? Your salary couldn’t be but so much. You probably can’t afford to put gas in it.”

“I didn’t exactly take this job for the Wall Street salary.” He didn’t need to know she lived off a trust fund her grandmother had left her. Any momentary sympathy she might have felt for him flew out the window. He was becoming annoying again.

He lifted his beefy hand and began methodically cracking each knuckle. “So are you one of those bleeding-heart, bunny-hugging activists? That it?”

Make that extremely annoying. She jabbed back, “Are you one of those guys who prays to Charlton Heston every time you pay your NRA dues?”

“Touché.” He wrote an imaginary one in the air, then went back to work on his knuckles. “Score one for the liberal. But don’t you use a gun in your job?”

“Hardly ever.” The popping sound of his joints grated on her eardrums like sandpaper.

“Now that is different.” He spoke as if he didn’t believe her. He stopped torturing his knuckles, then said with a smirk, “But you gotta admit being a warden is not a fit job for a woman, even if she were packing.”

She fought the urge to stop the truck and leave him for roadkill, but she wasn’t going to give him the pleasure of letting him know he was getting to her. She smiled at him as if she’d just been impaled by a rhino. “And what kind of jobs are fit for a woman in your opinion?”

“I don’t know….” He shrugged and rubbed his chin. “Air traffic controller, astronaut, lobbyist, lawyer, veterinarian, detective. See, I’m not as chauvinistic as you thought, darlin’.”

“It’s a good thing you can’t read my mind.”

“Maybe I can.”

“You don’t seem psychic to me.”

“No, but I know you’re probably the only female warden in all of Africa. Hell, there’s probably not that many in the States.”

“I don’t defend how I live my life to anyone.”

She’d had to do enough of that with her mother, who would never understand why Wynne stayed in such a dangerous job. It wasn’t just about preserving the last great wilderness on earth, but also about the challenge. She thrived on overcoming the danger and the obstacles, and experiencing the amazing rewards which kept her here, like watching a lioness teaching her cubs to hunt, or the beauty of a herd of impala or zebra grazing. Africa had a wild but beautiful rhythm to it, and that rhythm was in her heart. It was well worth the fight to save it. Something this arrogant Texan would never understand. Or her mother.

“Are you a thrill-seeker, or you just got a death wish?” he asked.

“Do you?” Wynne added enough bite to the words that they came out as a threat.

It actually worked and for once he was speechless. He crossed his arms over his chest and stared at her in a probing, contemplative way.

She didn’t realize she’d driven past Hellstrom’s compound and she skidded to a stop. The Simpsons dolls whip-lashed on the dash and MacKay braced himself, uttering something about female drivers. She shifted into reverse and pulled into the drive then slammed on the brakes.

A man stood in the headlights, a rifle pointed at her.

Chapter 3

Wynne stared into the face of the guard. The headlights glowed along his dark skin and sunken cheeks and eyes. He wore a tan uniform with Hellstrom’s Tours embroidered on the shirt pocket. One hand held the rifle, while he grabbed a walkie-talkie on his belt with the other. He looked at her license plate, then spoke into the radio.

“Hellstrom’s got good security here.” MacKay grinned over at her.

Maybe too good. It hadn’t seemed extreme to her before now because all wildlife ranches and safari owners had secure compounds. But as she gazed at the ten-foot-high barbed wire fence that encompassed the compound and the guard’s AK-47, a rifle more suited to stopping armies than people, she had to wonder what he was hiding. “I guess he has his reasons for it.”

“You ever been here before?” MacKay asked while he rolled down his window, his attention on the guard.

“I ride by on my rounds sometimes.” Hellstrom’s compound was about twenty-five miles south of base camp, in a valley surrounded on one side by rolling hills, a prime area for grazing wildlife. When elephant herds went in search of fresh pasture, she sometimes drove past his compound to monitor them. She remembered the area before Hellstrom built the compound, when nothing was here but open spaces and herds of buffalo, eland, zebras, wildebeest and giraffe. She felt a tinge of loss.

“Can’t blame a man for putting up a fence.” MacKay didn’t wait for her comeback and stuck his head out the window. “It’s okay, Cephu. She’s giving me a ride.”

Cephu dropped the gun, smiled and said in English, “Oh, Mr. MacKay, it’s you.” The guard’s joy at seeing the Texan beamed in his face and a broad smile showed his white teeth. He dropped the walkie-talkie and stepped aside, waving Wynne through. “Have a nice night, Bwana MacKay.”

Bwana was a Bemba term for “Mr.” or “Master.” Wynne didn’t know if MacKay deserved such deference.

She narrowed her eyes at him. “Do you know all the staff?”

“What can I say? I kinda grow on people.” He shrugged, then gave her a sympathetic glance, as if the only way she could grow on someone was if she were toenail fungus.

“I can grow on people, too.” The moment the words were out, she regretted them.

“I bet you do darlin’, I just bet you do.” Good-humored irony laced his voice.

Wynne couldn’t believe what she’d just blurted out. Why did she care what he thought? She didn’t need his approval. She let it drop and looked out at Hellstrom’s compound. It consisted of two hundred acres. Most of the ground had been plowed. Rows of tobacco, yams and maize grew along the drive.

MacKay saw she was looking at the fields and said, “I hear Hellstrom donates food to the Zambian government for the indigent.”

“I know. He also started an LZCG trust for local orphanages and AIDS clinics.”

“I believe someone told me he worked at a mission feeding the poor, too. Gotta respect a man who’s generous with his wealth.”

“Everyone respects him, no doubt about that.” Wynne frowned. “He knows how to win friends and influence people.”

“I wonder when he finds time to kick back and raise a little hell,” MacKay said, forcing a smile. “Everybody’s gotta have a little fun sometime. I sure have to.”

“Around here living is about survival, not about fun.”

“It’s gotta be godawful taking life so seriously. You gotta kick back.” MacKay chuckled. “You’re about as up-tight as a beer can without a pop-top. You’re gonna explode one day and it ain’t gonna be pretty…although come to think on it, it might.” His lips turned up into a sensual grin.

Wynne realized for the first time he had deep dimples, and she said, “Thank you for your candid six-pack psychological evaluation.” Wynne glowered back at him. Was he one of those American guys who hadn’t outlived his adolescence? Or was this part of his happy-go-lucky facade that was meant to fool her. “And you may think life’s an amusement park, but it’s not.”

“Nobody knows that better than me, but it doesn’t hurt to jump on a ride sometime.” He winked at her, his long-lashed eyes gleaming purplish blue in the green dash lights.

She could have fun. Couldn’t she? She loved her job, but she couldn’t remember the last time she’d really had fun. There had been the picnic she’d arranged for the kids at the Big Five Habitat, yet she hadn’t been able to go. A lion had been caught in a poacher’s snare and had gotten his head loose, but the snare had remained embedded in his neck. Wynne had been forced to dart him, while Dr. Leonard, the on-staff veterinarian, worked on him. Had she been in the bush so long she’d forgotten what fun was? She didn’t need the answer to that and certainly not from some stranger involved in poaching.

At her silence MacKay spoke. “In case you haven’t noticed, darlin’,” he motioned toward the fields they drove past, “Hellstrom doesn’t look like he’s having any trouble surviving.”

The Texan was more right than he realized. Hellstrom was too good to be true. Wealthy. A philanthropist. Conservationist. A living breathing paragon. He had to have a dark side. Didn’t he?

MacKay pointed ahead of them. “Just drive right on up to the front door—looks like Hellstrom’s got himself some company. Maybe another fund-raiser dinner. I hear he has lots of them. He’ll probably hit me up for a donation before I leave.”

“When will that be?”

“You sound like you’re in a hurry to get rid of me,” MacKay said, pretending to sound hurt. Or maybe he really was.

“Do I?” Wynne said it in such an innocent Scarlet O’Hara way that MacKay chuckled.

She glanced toward Hellstrom’s house, an expansive two-story Spanish Colonial Revival with iron-railed balconies, arched windows, cornices and parapets. A row of bungalows flanked the right side of the house, the servant and guest quarters. In the back were two large garages, a barn and a landing strip. It was bigger than some villages in Zambia.

She remembered taking a tour of Hellstrom’s house when he had finished building it several months ago. He had given a housewarming party and invited all the wardens and the LZCG members and supporters. Wynne hadn’t wanted to go, but the commander had made it mandatory.

Hellstrom had been his normal charismatic self, delighting everyone with anecdotes and playing the perfect host. At one point he had singled Wynne out, and she had sensed his attraction to her. Thankfully Kaweki, the commander, had interrupted them and introduced Hellstrom to his wife. Wynne had slipped away, relieved, feeling as if she had just escaped before Hellstrom had asked her out. After the incident at the party, she felt self-conscious around him and tried not to be alone with him ever again. No matter how handsome and appealing Hellstrom might be, she didn’t approve of how he made his living.

Safari owners, like Hellstrom, reaped most of their income from wealthy hunters—mostly English and American. Hunters paid safari operators large fees for supplying guides to take them into game-managed areas to hunt. The problem arose when corrupt hunters paid safari owners under the table and killed more animals than their government-issued licenses allowed. Coupled with native poaching, bush meat poaching and loss of habitat, animal populations just couldn’t recover. But Hellstrom did have an altruistic side that made him more likeable. And other than his dismissal of her DNA lab idea and the interest he appeared to have in her, he really wasn’t a bad leader for the LZCG. They had a good working relationship so far, and she meant to keep it all business—unless he proved to be the duplicitous head of this bush meat ring.

She pulled in behind a line of Toyota Land Cruisers, Rovers and Hummers. Some of the trucks had zebra-striped tops with logos from local tour businesses. She parked at the end of the line. Then she spotted the Zambian Wildlife Authority jeep. Rangers weren’t allowed to take the only ZWA jeep out for personal use, which meant the commander must be in attendance. It didn’t surprise her. Commander Kaweki worked closely with Hellstrom, and he was invited to all of Hellstrom’s social functions to represent the ZWA.

“Thanks muchly for the ride, darlin’. It’s been real interesting.” MacKay saluted her and opened the door.

“Wait, aren’t you going to ask me in?”

MacKay’s sandy blond brows rose a fraction and a lazy victorious grin spread across his mouth. “You change your mind about that drink?”

To make her plan work, she had to play along and seem interested. He probably knew she wasn’t. But the pretense would give her a reason to get inside Hellstrom’s office and do a little reconnaissance, and it would keep MacKay guessing. “Let’s just start with the drink, shall we.” Wynne jumped out of the Rover and breezed past him.

“The night is young yet, darlin’.” He sugarcoated the epithet, then fell in step beside her.

Wynne rolled her eyes. She could stand one libido-horned Texan for a few minutes. She stepped into the path of the lights that shot out through the front windows and glanced inside. It was a large solarium type room. A yellowish haze of cigarette smoke bathed a sea of white and black faces. She recognized the LZCG treasurer, Mr. Masamba, and the vice president, Mr. Njobo. They were talking, their wives at their sides, nodding. Thankfully, the commander was nowhere to be seen. She really didn’t want to explain why she had lied earlier and radioed that her 10-20 was the Rufunsa game-managed area and not Sausage Tree Camp. She couldn’t risk tipping off the poachers. She didn’t know who at the LZCG might be monitoring the transmissions.

Abruptly the door opened, and Hellstrom himself stood in the doorway as if he were expecting her.

“Wynne, so nice to see you. Jack.” Hellstrom’s sophisticated English voice held a warm welcome. His yellowish gold eyes brightened. “Come in, come in. A pleasure.”

“I got a bone to pick with you, Noah,” MacKay said, stepping past Wynne.

For once Wynne didn’t mind the Texan. He had gained Hellstrom’s full attention. She followed MacKay up the steps, adrenaline flowing, her body wired. Stay cool. Breathe. Search his house for evidence, then leave. How hard could that be? Yeah, right—about as easy as falling off a cliff with no parachute.

Once inside the foyer, Wynne paused next to MacKay, still feeling that roller coaster ride sensation that left her stomach in her throat. A set of closed double doors stood to the right and left of her. Muffled voices and Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata drifted from behind them.

MacKay was rambling on about the jeep breaking down. The guy knew how to beat a topic to death. “You need a new mechanic. That radiator had a leak. You couldn’t miss it.”

Hellstrom was listening, nodding, with a gracious smile, but his deep-set gold eyes were on her. His straight black hair tapered to a razor-sharp widow’s peak on his tanned brow. Several strands fell on either side of his temples and made him look younger than his thirty-something years. His features were sharply chiseled, beautiful in a Michelangelo’s “David” sort of way. He was a walking Ralph Lauren ad. Charisma oozed from him and she found herself unable to look away.

Was he wondering why she was here? She felt the roller coaster take another dive. Just breathe. Smile. Be friendly.

MacKay seemed to realize he’d lost his audience and he said, “Better have your vehicles checked out by someone competent.” Then he remembered Wynne and said, “Look what I dug up.” He gestured toward her.

“Wynne, how have you ended up with my guest?” Hellstrom’s voice held a hint of an apology.

“I found him lost down by the river. Next time a guest ventures out alone at night, I’d make them take a guide along—for their own safety. And make them aware of the park’s hours.”

“Of course, how remiss of me.”

“And you might want to instruct them about firearms.”

“Of course.” Hellstrom pulled at a ruby cufflink.

“Don’t read the riot act to the man. It’s my own fault.” Oddly MacKay’s grin had been replaced by a sober expression. “I thought it would be all right to look at the park. He didn’t know I took off and went sightseeing.”

Wynne thought MacKay had jumped at that too easily. And there was a note of falseness in his voice. He was covering something. He and Hellstrom were probably better acquainted than MacKay had let on.

“You’ll know better next time, won’t you, Jack?” Hellstrom said smoothly.

“Sure.” MacKay nodded, not at all contrite, just unusually curt with his one-word reply.

“I’m sorry he took you away from your duties, Wynne.”

She waited for the invitation. It didn’t come. Hellstrom seemed to be giving her an entry for an exit.

“I should go.” Wynne turned to leave.

MacKay said, “Wait. You’ve come this far. You can’t leave now.”

Hellstrom shot MacKay a glance, but the four hundred-watt smile never left Hellstrom’s face. “Quite right.” He took in her appearance. “But you might want to freshen up a bit.”

Wynne glanced at her torn shirt. The slingshot was wrapped around her waist, bits of leaves stuck in it. Her hiking boots were slathered in river mud. The mosquito remedy still caked to her neck and her face was beginning to itch. She hadn’t realized just how grubby she was. In her line of work, she was used to getting dirty. She had never been more aware that her femininity had taken a back seat since coming to Africa.

She maintained a smile and felt her cheeks straining in an attempt to be civil. “You’ll have to forgive my appearance. I’ve been working.”

“I wonder how she cleans up?” MacKay said, while his blue eyes roved over her body. “Versace might look real nice on her.”

Wynne smiled sweetly at MacKay, though it was slowly killing her. “I’m afraid I’m all out of designer dresses. There isn’t much use for them in my line of work.”

A door opened and a beautiful woman in a strapless black evening gown glided through. The woman’s complexion was so smooth and white it looked transparent. Her dark curly hair fell in waves to her shoulders. She was model thin, maybe in her late twenties.

A cacophony of voices followed her into the foyer, along with the cloying scent of her perfume. She gently closed the door behind her and muted the sound. She stepped over to Hellstrom and touched his arm possessively. “Noah, dearest, we’ve run out of champagne,” she spoke in a British accent.

Slight annoyance flashed across Hellstrom’s expression, then it disappeared into his usual polite demeanor. “Jacqueline, you’ve met Mr. MacKay, but I don’t think you’ve met Wynne Sperling.”

“Charmed, I’m sure.” Jacqueline gave Wynne an uninterested passing glance, then her gaze settled on MacKay. “Jack, it’s always a pleasure.” Her smile turned sensual.

MacKay’s blue eyes glittered as he winked at her. “The pleasure’s all mine, darlin’.”

Did MacKay flirt with every woman within eyeshot? Or was Wynne picking up on a kinky factor between the three-some? Did they pass Jacqueline around like a pool cue? Maybe she’d found Hellstrom’s dark side. If she had any doubts that MacKay and Hellstrom were more than business associates, they were gone now.

The pool cue turned her attention back to Wynne. “And are you one of Noah’s customers?”

“I’m a ranger. We kinda work together.”

“Oh.” Jacqueline leaned so close to Hellstrom her breasts touched his arm.

Gracious as ever, Hellstrom said, “And she’ll be staying for the party. Wynne, I’ll have a servant show you where to freshen up—”

“Thank you.”

“I should change, too.” MacKay winked at Wynne and said, “I’ll definitely see you later, darlin’.”

Wynne wanted to say “Fat chance,” but she had to play the game. She watched him walk out the front door, grinning like a hyena. He must be staying in one of the guest quarters.

“My servant will show you where to go,” Hellstrom said to Wynne, then clicked his fingers.

A short slender African came running down the hall. His head reached the top of Wynne’s rib cage. He was enrobed in a white gauze tunic and scandals. The Pygmy looked more child than man. How he heard Hellstrom’s summons over the music and conversation puzzled Wynne. He kept his head bowed as he listened to Hellstrom’s orders.

Hellstrom spoke a dialect that Wynne recognized as one of several languages Pygmies used, then said to Wynne, “Tungana will take care of you.”

“Thank you.”

Tungana motioned for Wynne to follow him, but didn’t lift his eyes up to her face.

Wynne trailed Tungana down the hall, feeling Hellstrom and Jacqueline’s gaze on her. She wondered about the extent of the relationship between Hellstrom and MacKay, and when they were out of Hellstrom’s hearing range, she casually asked Tungana, “Is MacKay an old friend of Mr. Hellstrom’s?”

“Don’t know.” Tungana spoke in broken English and shook his small head.

“You’ve never seen him in Mr. Hellstrom’s company before?”

“Don’t know.”

Okay, she was getting the parrot message. He was loyal to Hellstrom and he wasn’t going to talk. A lot of people were loyal to Hellstrom, including MacKay, it seemed.

They passed the dining room, decorated in ornate antique French furniture. Guests huddled around a massive table laden with enough food to feed ten Zambian families for a week.

The memory of the tour flashed back to her, and she knew the next room they passed would be the music room. It had been in this room where Hellstrom had approached her, and she had felt his attraction for her. Had she been imagining it? He hadn’t pursued her in any way since. Maybe she had read more into it than really had been there. She was good at reading animals. But men? They were a whole different species.

A grand piano graced the music room’s center. A musician in a tux sat playing Bach now. Commander Kaweki’s balding head caught her eye, the chandelier light bouncing off his dark, shiny scalp. He stood behind the piano, speaking to Colette, his wife and another couple Wynne didn’t recognize.

Colette had short curly ebony hair and wide, impish green eyes. Her smile lit up her face. A simple, yet elegant black gown covered her hourglass figure. Colette was originally from France, but had worked as a missionary in Lusaka, the capitol of Zambia, before Kaweki married her. The only time Wynne ever saw the commander smile was when he was with his wife. He appeared enthralled by what she was telling the other couple now and didn’t notice Wynne and Tungana move past the doorway.

After they cleared the music room’s entrance, Wynne relaxed a little. She really didn’t want to explain to Kaweki what she was doing here until she’d had a chance to nose around.

“You really don’t have to show me the way,” she said. “Just point me in the right direction. I can find it myself.”

“Oh, no, no. BaK para would not like that.”

BaK para meant “master” in the Pygmy language, a term of fear and obedience. Wynne frowned as she said, “You know, Tungana, you’re employed by Mr. Hellstrom. He’s not your master.”

Tungana nodded, but still wouldn’t look at her.

“How long have you been with Mr. Hellstrom?” She asked as they slipped past an African couple, strangers to Wynne.

Tungana avoided all small talk by merely shrugging.

At seeing Tungana reduced to servitude and away from his home, Wynne couldn’t help but think about the life he’d left behind. Pygmies had a wonderful nomadic lifestyle, centered on their love for the forest world and their family. She had visited the Belgian Congo once when she first arrived in Africa. She spent several days with the BaMbuti Pygmies and fell in love with their warmth and gentleness and the simplicity in which they lived. The sad thing was they had existed for millennia, even ancient Egyptians wrote of seeing Pygmies in the heart of Africa, but now their hunting and gathering way of life was quickly eroding. The destruction of rain forests and the overhunting of food sources were taking their toll. Nothing saddened her more than the slow extinction of a once proud, self-sustaining culture. Part of the beauty of Africa was its diversity and even that was disappearing.

“Do you miss your family?” Wynne asked.

Tungana nodded, an unmistakable sadness in his eyes. Then he seemed to realize that he’d actually answered her and slipped back into self-protective mode.

The din of the party drifted away as he led her up a flight of stairs and into a deserted wing of the house. She recalled the area from the tour.

He paused before a door. “Tungana draw you a bath. You like?” he asked, his words clipped.

“I can manage alone. All I need is a hairbrush and a washcloth and towel.”

“Brush in closet.” He opened the door to the room and waited for her to step inside.

“Thank you. I can find my way back.”

The bedroom was done in a Spanish motif. Red wall-paper complemented the rich mahogany furniture and fourposter bed. A woman’s photograph hung above the bed. Her hair was coal-black and worn in a French twist. Golden eyes, similar to Hellstrom’s, stared out from the photo. Her dark hair accentuated her pale skin. The photographer had captured an isolated, detached gleam in the woman’s eyes. They reminded Wynne of a doll’s eyes, inanimate and blank. Wynne didn’t remember the painting on the tour and said, “Who is that?”

“BaK para’s mama.”

“Oh.”

Tungana walked to the closet and opened the door. A row of women’s dresses hung neatly in the closet.

“Wow, does Hellstrom keep those for his female guests?” It looked like thousands of dollars worth of designer labels.

“He best host.” Tungana nodded and seemed to be looking for one particular evening dress. He pulled out a slinky red gown and a pair of red heels.

The gown might fit her, but it was a little more revealing than she would like. It was ankle length and low-cut with rhinestone spaghetti straps. The same red rhinestones formed starburst patterns randomly all over the dress.

Tungana laid the evening dress on the bed. “For you?”

“But I don’t—”

“BaK para want you to wear.”

Leave it to Hellstrom to anticipate every female guest’s need by supplying them with dresses. If it would bide her some time to search the house, she’d comply. “All right.” She nodded.

Tungana left the room and closed the door behind him.

She pressed her ear to the door and listened as the soft tread of his footsteps faded.

She hurried into the bathroom. When she looked into the mirror, she didn’t recognize herself. A mud wrestler, after a fight, probably looked better than she did. She recalled MacKay’s comments about her cleaning up okay. Her female vanity wanted to show him just how well she cleaned up. But then she reminded herself, it didn’t matter what a woman looked like, he’d flirt with anything breathing and wearing a bra.

She scrubbed the remnants of mud off her face, neck, arms and her boots. Then she untied her hair. She brushed the bits of mud out of it around her face. There wasn’t much she could do about the limpness. Her hair always had the texture of thick straw. It hung down her back, stick-straight.

She quickly changed into the dress, wrapping her slingshot around her thigh and sliding her knife into it. The shoes actually fit her size nine feet, but the heels felt strange. It took a few strides to get used to them.

She surveyed herself in the full-length mirror behind the bathroom door. Wide hazel eyes stared back at her from an oval tanned face. She didn’t like the pronounced dimple in her chin and her mouth seemed too wide, genetic gifts from her father that couldn’t be helped. But her tanned skin was clear and glowed from the scrubbing—so she wasn’t drop-dead beautiful and her cheeks weren’t sunken and she didn’t have sticks for arms and legs like Jacqueline. She was built of sturdier stuff. She’d like to see Jacqueline freeing a baby rhino from a mud bog.

The thought brought a smile to her face as she decided she didn’t look half-bad in the dress. She had to go braless and a hint of her nipples showed through the lined silk. The dress actually clung to her curves in a flattering way, and the starbursts on the dress only made her body shimmer. Not bad. It was the first time since coming to Africa she had felt feminine. It felt pretty good. She cracked the door, checked that it was clear, then slipped back out into the hallway.

The moments ticked off in Wynne’s mind, keeping time with her heartbeat. She remembered one room that had been off-limits during the tour. Hellstrom had said it was his office, and they wouldn’t find anything of interest in it.

She reached the door.

Locked.

She heard guards laughing in the hall ahead of her. Before they rounded the corner, she darted into the opposite door. She was standing inside a linen closet. She moved so the shelves wouldn’t cut the back of her knees and she realized her dress was caught in the door. She couldn’t open the door. The guards were too close, their voices right in front of the closet. What kind of excuse could she use for being in there: “Can you point me to the ladies’ bathroom, I seem to be turned around.” That was lame. Oh, God!

She held her breath.

The voices faded.

She dared let herself breathe and opened the door.

A clear coast.

She stepped out, lifted her dress and pulled out her dagger. She shoved it in between the doorjamb and the lock. The lock clicked open.

Wynne stepped inside. A desk lamp bathed the room in dim light. It was a massive room. Shelves of books lined the walls. Above the shelves was a gun case that covered the whole perimeter of the room. Guns of every make and description were arranged in a collage of shapes, numbered brass placards beneath them. He must be anal about his guns.

African tribal masks formed a patchwork of color on the wall behind a massive mahogany desk. She recognized the local Bemba tribal masks, and the monkey shaped expressions of the Boa. They weren’t the mass-marketed copies bought off the Internet. These were aged, the wood cracked from wear. The real thing. Probably worth a fortune and sacred to the people who had made them.

Across from the masks, a computer and copier sat on a credenza. She didn’t have time to bring up the computer. Hellstrom probably had a code to open it anyway.

She stepped over to the desk. Books on Africa were stacked in piles. An Underwood manual typewriter—a dinosaur—sat in the middle of them. A spot had been cleared for a small mountain of typed pages. A manuscript? She picked up the first page and read: Musings of an African Safari Owner by Noah Hellstrom. Add author to Hellstrom’s accomplishments.

On the edge of the desk, she spotted a picture of Hellstrom standing over a felled elephant. She grimaced. Next to it was a photo of a couple. She recognized his mother, the same deadpan face from the portrait in the bedroom. The man wore the uniform of the British army, medals emblazoned across his chest and shoulders. He had a sour expression like his face would crack if he ever smiled. Hellstrom’s father?

Guards approached the door, talking.

She tensed, ready to jump beneath the desk.

They strode past.

She let out her breath and walked to a filing cabinet. She had no idea what she was looking for, but when she found it she would know.

LZCG ledgers were in the top drawer. Another drawer, more ledgers for his tour businesses and a row of books. She read the titles: Mein Kampf by Hitler, biographies of Churchill, Patton, Mussolini, Genghis Kahn and Alexander the Great. Did Hellstrom have a secret god complex?

Another drawer revealed old tax forms, business licenses and rubber-banded envelopes of past due notices on loans from the World Bank. There were a lot of them. Hellstrom must be in financial trouble. Three of them were from Springhill Mental Health Sanitorium. Why did he have past due notices from a mental hospital?

She spotted the drawer on his desk. She should have checked there first. Isn’t that where all the crucial stuff was always hidden?

She tried it. Locked. She grabbed the letter opener and worked the lock. James Bond made it look so easy. “Come on…” She jiggled the opener in frustration.

The lock clicked open.

“Thank you.” She peered inside and found a bundle of letters rubber banded together. The return address label read, Edna Hellstrom, Springhill Mental Health Sanitorium, Yorkshire, England. Were there some unglued genes in Hellstrom’s family? If only she had the time to read each one.

She found the rest of the drawer empty. So where would he hide illegal documents? She felt for a secret compartment on the desk. Nothing.

She closed the drawer and stood in the middle of the room and really looked at it as Hellstrom would. Something drew her gaze to the tribal masks, and a large mask near the bottom caught her attention. It was painted white, the facial features outlined in black. It was a striking, almost frightening, ngil mask. The male societies of the Fang tribe wore the gorilla mask during initiation of new members and for persecuting wrongdoers. It was a mask of dominance and retribution. If Hellstrom had a hidden narcissistic side, he would be attracted to it.

She lifted the mask, expecting to find a safe hidden behind it. What she found was a wooden sleeve secured to the back of the mask by screws. The open top-end of the sleeve revealed a blue folder, stuffed with papers.

She reached for the folder, but instinct stopped her. This was way too easy. She sniffed the leather pouch and recognized the woody scent of nuts: Physic nuts, to be exact. Africans ground the nut with palm oil to make rat poison.

Wynne grabbed several sheets of paper from the typewriter and used them as makeshift gloves to pull open the folder. It was stuffed with bills of lading for a company named LiBolo International Trucking. It had a South African address. Crates containing dry ice, some flown in from Zimbabwe, had been trucked to Botswana, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, South Africa, Malawi, Namibia and almost every city in Africa. Some even went to the U.S., England, and China. The bush meat would have been packed on dry ice, then shipped.

She’d found what she was looking for.

She had never seen such a well-organized, sophisticated ring. Usually the operations were kept locally. Dealers contracted and paid hunters up front for the number and kinds of meat. The hunters hired a crew of bearers to cut out the tusks, butcher the meat, and dry it. In villages near game-managed areas, there could be fifteen commercial poachers operating at any given time. After the kills, the hunters met the dealers and trucked the meat to marketplaces in Zambian cities where it was sold illegally. Wynne had been in on many of these stings, arresting the commercial poachers with the meat. But this dealer operation was outside of Zambia, so it hadn’t been discovered.

The bills of lading only proved LiBolo International trucked something on dry ice. Even if she could convince the Zambian government to investigate this company, proving Hellstrom was tied to it would be another hurdle. It would take prosecutors and accountants months, maybe even years, to go through international courts and subpoena the company records from South Africa. And she couldn’t take the paperwork to the LZCG board. It would be too risky without definitive proof he owned the company.

She heard voices in the hall. How long had she been gone? Fifteen? Thirty minutes? She had to hurry.

The voices were getting louder. They sounded angry. Doors were slamming.

Her hands shook and the ersatz paper gloves were getting in her way. Hurry, Sperling, or you’re toast. She managed to stuff the folder back in the wooden sleeve, crumple her makeshift gloves, clean side out. She tossed them in the trash, then plopped the mask back on the wall.

The door’s lock was turning. She ran to the door just as it opened.

Chapter 4

Wynne gazed into Hellstrom’s face. For a nanosecond they stared at each other with a wrong-restroom look.

Hellstrom recovered first and waited for an explanation.

“Sorry, I—um, was looking for the party and somehow got lost.” Lame city. He’d never buy that.

“A lost ranger? Don’t you have a keen sense of direction?”

“Only outside. Give me the outdoors and I’m fine. You can always find your way by the sun or the lay of the land. But in closed quarters, forget it. All the walls and hallways look the same to me.” Could he tell she was lying? It didn’t show in his face.

“I thought this door was locked.” His golden eyes probed her face.

“It wasn’t. I just walked right in.” Wynne wanted to step past Hellstrom, but he was holding the doorknob and blocking her way. “Now that you’re here, can you show me the way back to the party?”

His gaze fell to the red dress. For a moment her body held his attention, then his expression softened. “You look so different in that gown. Quite stunning.” He stepped inside and closed the door. “I thought the red would look good on you.”

“Thank you for letting me borrow it.” Wynne felt trapped as she watched him close the door. “We really should get back.”

“You’ve caught me.” He stepped closer, his eyes taking on a strange dynamic glow.

“Caught you?” Wynne tried to sound surprised, while her insides churned. Was this it? A showdown? If he knew she was on to him, he might move the operation. Or worse, eliminate her before she could find proof against him. Every muscle in her body tensed as she waited for his answer.

“Yes, my wretched attempt at novel writing.” He motioned toward his desk, his gaze glued to the dress. Or her body in it. She wasn’t certain.

“Novel writing?” Relief flooded Wynne as she glanced toward the desk. That’s when she noticed the mask…hanging crooked. Just a tiny bit off kilter. But definitely not how he’d left it. Oh, God! Had he seen it? From his angle, the stack of books on his desk blocked the bottom of the mask. Hopefully he wouldn’t notice.

“I really just stumbled upon your office,” she said. “So I really didn’t see much.”

“It’s fortunate the door wasn’t locked.” He cocked a brow at her and grinned, but it was a tight smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “I believe in fate. There are no coincidences. I was meant to find you at this moment.”

And I was meant to find those bills of lading. “I have to disagree. I think man controls his own destiny.”

“You speak your mind, don’t you?”

“I am pretty direct.”

“You’re one of a kind.”

“Not really.”

“I must disagree. Most women of my acquaintance flatter and dissemble. But you, you know your mind and are incredibly honest. I admire that. I think I can trust you with my secret.”

“Your secret?” She wanted to look toward the mask, but held his gaze.

“My writing secret.” There was an intimate depth to his voice that she’d never heard before.

“Sure, I won’t tell anyone.”

“Thank you.” He smiled, his even white teeth gleaming. “At least not until I get it published.” He paused, his eyes dipping to her breasts. “Now that you know my secret, it’s only fitting I know one of yours.” He stepped closer, their bodies almost touching.

She could smell the starch in his white shirt, mixed with a musky aftershave and smoke from the party. A strand of straight black hair had fallen over his left brow, giving him a handsome, rakish look. If she didn’t know what a hypocrite and fraud he was, she might have been attracted to him. He was only a few inches taller than her and she was forced to look him straight in the eyes.

“I’m a pretty open book.” She shrugged and then pointed to his gun collection. When she did, she stepped to the side so that in order for him to face her, his back would be toward the mask. “I did notice your gun collection when I came in. It must be worth thousands.”

“It is, but you’re avoiding my question. You must have a secret.”

Wynne almost glanced at the mask, but forced her eyes back to his face. She had to give him something and make it sound convincing so she said, “Um, my mother and I are estranged.”

His expression turned inward. “My own dear mother is ill, I don’t see her as much as I would like.”

So the letters she had found from the mental institution must have been from his mother. She recalled his mother’s photo and the peculiar look in her eyes. Now Wynne knew the reason for it.

She really wanted to change the subject and get out of this office, but as long as it kept him occupied and not looking at the mask, she’d have to go with it. She sensed he didn’t want to talk yet and waited patiently.

After a moment, he came out of his musings, but dark shadows lingered in his eyes. “My father was a bloody bastard. He gambled away all of my mother’s inheritance. He died leaving her penniless. Don’t get me wrong, I love my mother and I don’t mind aiding her now, but it all could have been avoided.”

She recalled the past due notices in his desk. How much aid could he afford to give his mother? He hadn’t paid his own bills or her mental hospital bills in months. “I’m sorry,” she said, trying to sound sympathetic.

“Don’t be. It wasn’t the worst of my father’s contemptible qualities.”

“There’s more?” She really didn’t want to hear anymore, but she had to keep him talking.

“He had a wicked temper.” Hellstrom paused and appeared lost in bleak memories. After a moment, he said, “My mother stood up to him. Sometimes I wish she hadn’t.”

Wynne suddenly could see Hellstrom, a frightened little boy, cowering in the corner, while his mother protected him from a beating. This was getting way too deep for her, so she said, “I’m not that brave. I ran to the other side of the globe from my mother.” Wynne frowned at that self-realization.

“I’m sorry,” he said, then cleared his throat. “I digressed about my mother. Please, tell me about yours. Why are you estranged?”

“I committed a cardinal sin.”

“What was that?”

“I refused to go to law school and become a partner in her law firm. You don’t say no to my mother. She couldn’t understand I wasn’t cut out to work behind a desk. And she never understood why I came to Zambia.”

“Solicitors can make a difference. You could have worked in environmental law. What made you come to Africa to become a warden?”

“Partly my father. He’s a vet for the National Zoo in Washington, D.C. and used to let me go to work with him. He instilled in me a love for animals. But that isn’t exactly what brought me. I guess it was…” She paused.

“What?” He stood there transfixed on her face, his golden eyes glowing with a rapt yellow light.

He seemed totally absorbed by the conversation, so she continued. “I guess I was about twelve. And I was watching this National Geographic special on the plight of African elephants. I can’t even remember where it was in Africa, all I remember seeing was this herd of females with their calves. The local government declared they had to be killed because they were destroying crops. Hunters had cornered the herd and circled them. As you must know, when you kill a herd of female elephants, the oldest alpha female turns to protect the calves and younger elephants with her body. Then the other females join her. They make a circle around the calves. The shooting started, and I’ll never forget watching them go down. One by one. Then the calves. The look in their eyes. The fear…the pathetic resolve, as if man had failed them. I somehow felt the bullets enter my own heart. I knew in that moment that I had to fight to protect them, to protect all the wildlife here.” Wynne had overemphasized her last words, still feeling the painful impact of the memory.

She glanced at Hellstrom. She’d told the story partially to make him feel guilty and to see how he’d react. But his eyes gave away nothing.

“Would you have them destroy the crops?” Hellstrom asked, his voice terse.

“No, but they could have been moved. They could have been taken to zoos, or other wildlife parks. They could have done something, anything, other than the easy way out. Wildlife is a gift to man. He should be a steward of that gift. The answer is rarely a bullet.”

“I agree.” His voice softened slightly. “Conservation is always the better choice.”

“I know you feel that way or you wouldn’t be chairman of the LZCG.” Wynne searched his eyes for the deception behind his words, but his expression remained inscrutable, hidden by a mask of what looked like sincere concern.

“Quite right. We can help the animals together.” His gaze moved over her lips as he stepped close again and touched her jaw, tracing it with his fingers. “You’d like that, wouldn’t you, Wynne? I like seeing the fire alight in you. Your eyes a moment ago were like torches when you spoke about the elephants, brilliant defiant hazel torches….”

Oh, God! His fingers felt like a spider crawling along her skin, and yet a part of her felt an undeniable magnetism in his touch. Every nerve in her body grew aware of him. She wanted to pull away, but she couldn’t risk him seeing the mask.

He gently wrapped his hand around the back of her neck and pulled her face toward his. He leaned in to kiss her.

Abruptly, the door opened.

Hellstrom stepped back, but not before Jacqueline walked inside. Relief washed over Wynne.

Jacqueline stood there, her gaze shooting fire at Wynne. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you. I came to see if I could offer some makeup or anything, but—” she cut her eyes at Hellstrom, tears gleaming in them “—I see you don’t need any help.” She turned and swept out the door.

“Jackie, love, wait!” Hellstrom paused long enough to say, “I fear she’ll pout all night. I’d better go after her. We’ll continue this later.”

“I look forward to it.” She would play along if it meant finding concrete evidence against him.

He waited for Wynne to step outside the office, then turned to close the door.

That’s when he saw the mask.

His gaze held for just a split second, but long enough. His expression changed right before her eyes. The charismatic public pretense melted, and the emotion in his face turned raw and ugly. His gaze dissected her, piece by piece. She felt like a specimen under his microscope.

In that instant she realized he fed off the weakness of others, like animals of prey. It hadn’t been the fire in her eyes as she’d spoken of the elephants that had turned him on, but the pain he’d seen in her face. As she did with any animal of prey she met his gaze squarely and showed no signs of vulnerability.

Briefly they mentally circled each other in a he-knew-that-she-knew moment. An old African legend said that true enemies shared their souls, their strengths and their blood. Wynne felt that connection with Hellstrom like a blow to her gut, and she sensed that when it came down to the final battle, only one of them would survive.

He broke the momentary trance and slammed the door and locked it. Now that there was no need for pretense between them, he wasn’t smiling, nor did he glance at her. He hurried past, yelling, “Jackie, wait!”

Wynne followed in his wake, wondering if she had the strength to take Hellstrom on.

Wynne found the bedroom Tungana had taken her to and slipped inside. She went to the bathroom, put her hair back in a ponytail, then changed into her working clothes. Hellstrom had given orders to Tungana for her to wear the red dress. It was just another avenue of his manipulation, and she had to let Hellstrom know she wouldn’t be controlled by him.

If she was going to face Hellstrom, she’d do it in her own clothes, battle clothes. She retied the slingshot around her waist, then secured the dagger at her ankle. Next came her combat boots. As she stared at the ranger in the mirror, she felt ready to face Hellstrom again. This time on her terms.

The thought of leaving occurred to her, but she needed to question MacKay and probe him for information about his involvement with Hellstrom.

A few moments later, she left the room and strode down the steps, toward the dining room, avoiding several servants whose arms were laden with crates. A girl trailed behind them, a basket loaded with food and canned goods balanced on her head. Wynne knew this hallway led directly to the house’s kitchen and back exit, close to the garages. Hellstrom’s party preparations certainly had to have been done by now. So where were these provisions going? And for what?

“Someone moving?” Wynne casually asked the girl, blocking her way.

The girl looked maybe fifteen, with beautiful bronze skin and eyes that appeared shy and frightened of everything. “Don’t know, miss. Please, I’m behind.” She nodded to the men in front of her.

Wynne knew this girl wouldn’t talk, so she let her pass. She started to follow them, but someone tapped her on the back. She wheeled around and saw Tungana looking up at her.

His lips pursed with suppressed fury, and she realized she was seeing another side of Tungana that he kept well hidden. The voices she’d heard outside of Hellstrom’s office must have been Tungana and Hellstrom looking for her.

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