Jungle of Deceit Read Online Free PDF Page B

truth, so he flapped a hand in front of his face. “Remnants from my last photo shoot.”
    “ Mmmm hmmm.”
    Time to change the subject. He unfastened a button on his shirt, but the nonexistent breeze didn’t billow the cotton as he had hoped.
    “ How do you do it?” Mitch asked, glancing over her attire. “I mean, the tank top and shorts, how come the mosquitoes aren’t feasting away on that—”
    A slight bow of Alex’s lips was concealed by her hair as she leaned forward and delved her hands into her knapsack. Nimble fingers extracted an unmarked plastic bottle.
    “ My own blend.” She extended it towards him. “It works wonders. Nothing will touch this skin as long as this ointment is on it.”
    Nothing?
    Mitch eyed the container and then took her offer to sniff it.
    “ Put some on,” Alex ordered. “I don’t care if they gave you inoculations. I don’t want any of these insects to be tempted by you.”
    Who cares about the insects?
    Mitch rubbed a hand over his jaw and felt the tender tang of a bruise there. Good. Pain . Focus on the pain. There was absolutely no time to harbor lecherous thoughts about the doctor.
    But as he rubbed the salve onto his arms, Mitch felt Alex’s gaze and his glance jerked up just in time to catch hers flee. It’s okay, Doctor. I’m watching you too.
    “ So, why are you here?” Alex repeated.
    It was hard for him to keep the bitterness out of his voice. “I suppose Nicholson told you I was fired.”
    “ From which job?”
    He flinched and grabbed a flat stone. Hurling it across the water, it skidded and disturbed a cloud of gnats. “Would it do any good to say neither was my fault?”
    Heck, the Chronicle just released him less than two days ago because he refused to recount the events of the museum heist. With Mitch being the only reporter on the scene, the newspaper reveled in their exclusivity, but when he relayed that he saw nothing—that he was unconscious during the heist, the editor didn’t sympathize.
    Bottom line was that they had been looking for an excuse to unleash him all along. It was no secret that he was miserable working for the glorified tabloid. If it hadn’t been for Kosovo, he would still be a correspondent. He would still be doing what he loved.
    Maybe traveling to the heart of the Guatemalan jungle in search of guerillas was absurdly dangerous, but in these early hours of the morning, trekking alone through the rainforest made him feel alive in a way he had not experienced in years.
    “ I’m not particularly concerned who is at fault.” Alex used the throaty inflection that he came to associate as her business voice. “All I’m concerned with is the fact that you’re under my supervision now, and I need to know what I’m dealing with. I need to know if I have a problem here. Did you come here because you failed elsewhere?”
    In his periphery, Mitch noticed that he had Alex’s undivided attention. Uneasy under the scrutiny, could his ego allow for her to believe him so inept, or should he defend himself and tell her what really happened in Kosovo?
    “ I’ll be honest with you…” It was odd to utter those words and actually mean them. He didn’t think he’d been honest with anyone since that Serb village.
    Mitch cleared his throat and continued. “I didn’t want to be here. I didn’t ask to be here. I have no clue what it is you’re up to in the jungle.” The humid air, or Alex’s stare, made breathing difficult. “Phillip Nicholson made me an offer I simply could not refuse.”
    A smile toyed with Alex’s lips. “Yeah, that would be Phillip. Persuasion before dignity.”
    Persuasion before dignity?
    Had the museum director persuaded Alex as well?
    “ How well do you know him?” There was no intention on his part to pose the question with a pitch of implication, but regardless, it happened. Mitch awaited the backlash.
    An arched eyebrow and a slight pinch of the lips were the only facial reactions. Alex’s words bore