“I think she’ll be happy to hear that her squadron has been transferred over to you.”
Raising his thick black brows, Morgan said, “I hope so. You’ve met her, right?”
“Yes, a number of times.”
“Anything I should know so I don’t put my foot into it with her? I’d like to get off to a good start with Maya, since I’m going to be her new boss.”
Mike smiled hugely. “She doesn’t suffer fools gladly or for long. She shoots straight from the hip, doesn’t waste words. She was raised an army brat, flew civilian helicopters when she was just a teenager, and went directly into the warrant officer program the army offered. Took her training in Apache combat helicopters at Fort Rucker, Alabama, which is where everyone takes their training to fly an assault helo. When she volunteered for this spook spec ops, she suggested a very provocative idea to the head honchos—let her choose a band of trained women Apache pilots, hand-pick the crews, and come down here to stop the cocaine drug trade from getting into Bolivia. They promoted her from the warrant ranks and made her a captain because she was going to be C.O.—commanding officer—for this mission. She makes Indiana Jones look like pabulum compared to what she and her women pilots do down here.”
“And why does she have such determination to do this? That’s what I don’t understand,” Morgan murmured. “It’s the one piece of her background I can’t integrate.” He gazed over at Mike. “Do you know why she would scuttle a potentially brilliant army career and go into a spec ops mission like this?”
Mike moved uncomfortably. “I know some of it. The rest, you’ll have to ask her.” He propped his chin on his folded hands and placed his elbows on the table. “I know you have Maya’s personnel records. She was adopted as a baby. General Stevenson was an attaché in São Paulo, Brazil, for the U.S. ambassador. At that time, he was a light colonel. He and his wife hadn’t been able to conceive a child. They’d tried everything and nothing worked. One day, a Brazilian Indian woman came to the embassy asking for Eugenia Stevenson. She carried a baby girl no more than two weeks old in her arms. When Mrs. Stevenson came to the back gate to see the Indian woman, she found the baby lying on the walk, alone. That’s how Maya was adopted—she was dropped on the U.S. Embassy’s doorstep. Eugenia fell in love with her, and they went ahead with formal adoption, giving her the name Maya, which means ‘mystery.’” Mike smiled a little. “No one knows Maya’s real origins. I’d say she was part Brazilian Indian and part Portuguese aristocracy, judging from her features and skin color.”
“So, Maya has a stake down here in South America because of her bloodlines?”
“Yes, I’d say so. Just like bloodhounds need to hunt, she needs to be down here with her people, would be my guess.”
“That makes sense with what I know. From what I understand, Inca is her fraternal twin sister,” Morgan said. “They were born in the Amazon. Somehow, Maya was taken to the city, while Inca was left behind in the jungle to be raised.”
“Yes, and Inca didn’t know she was a twin until just recently, when you worked with her on that drug mission in the Brazilian Amazon jungle.”
“Which is how we learned of Maya and her spec ops,” Morgan murmured. “If she’d never shown up that night after Inca got wounded, we’d still been in the dark about her and her mission.”
“I think we got lucky,” Mike said. “Fate, maybe.”
“What else can you tell me about her?”
“I think you know that Inca belongs to a secretive spiritual group known as the Jaguar Clan?”
“Yes. Does Maya, too?”
“Yes and no. She’s a member of the Black Jaguar Clan, a branch of the main clan.”
“What does that all mean? I know you have Quechua Indian blood running through your veins, and you’re more educated about this mystical belief system than I am.”
Mike avoided Morgan’s incisive gaze. He knew more than a little, but he wasn’t willing to bet the farm that Morgan was ready for the bald truth. Mike’s wife, Ann, had had enough trouble grasping what it meant to be member of the Jaguar Clan, when she’d learned her husband was one. Mike hedged. “As I understand it, genetically speaking, there’s a strong spiritual mission bred into the people who belong to the Jaguar Clan. They’re here to help people. To make this a better world to live in. The Black Jaguar Clan is the underbelly, so to speak. They do the dirty work with the ugliness of our world, handle the confrontations in the trenches.”
“And you think that’s why Maya sacrificed her army career to become a pain in the ass to the drug lords down here in Peru?”
Chuckling, Mike nodded. “Would be my guess.”
“She’s more like a laser-fired rocket,” Morgan murmured. “Almost a zealot or fanatic.”
“Isn’t that what it takes to be successful at something like this?” Mike questioned. “And aren’t you a little bit of a fanatic yourself? Didn’t your own background, your unsavory experiences in Vietnam, turn you into a do-gooder for those who couldn’t fight and win for themselves?”
Lifting his hands, Morgan said, “Guilty as charged. I’m the pot calling the kettle black.”
“Glad you can see that you and Maya have the same jaguar spots.” Mike chuckled. “It takes one to know its own kind.”
Morgan raised his chin, suddenly alert. “Is that her?”
Mike cocked his head, his eyes narrowing. There, turning into the entrance of the French restaurant, was a woman who stood six foot tall. Her long black hair, slightly curled from the high humidity, swung loosely about her proud shoulders and full breasts. She wore khaki-colored shorts and hiking boots with thick black socks peeking over the tops. Her dark brown T-shirt had a picture of a cream-colored Condor, its wings spread wide, across it. Over her left shoulder hung a fairly large olive-green backpack. A pair of sunglasses on a bright red cord swung between her breasts.
“Yeah, that’s her,” he told Morgan in a low tone.
Morgan watched Maya with a keen, assessing eye. He knew warriors, and he knew how to size up someone astutely. Captain Maya Stevenson looked like a tourist, plain and simple. She was dressed in what rich travelers from foreign countries wore around here. Only her golden skin and long, rippling black hair suggested that she might be South American. Morgan liked the way she moved; on those firm, long legs of hers—with a bold, confident stride. Maya’s eyes were wide and alert. Their emerald depths showed interest, excitement and wariness all at the same time as she pinned her gaze directly on Morgan.
There was no wasted motion about this army aviation officer. Morgan found himself smiling to himself. The energy, the power, the confidence around Maya Stevenson was something to behold. She was at least a hundred feet away from them, yet Morgan could swear he felt her stalwart presence, as if the sun itself was shining directly upon him. No photo did her justice, he thought. She was beautiful and looked very similar to Inca, her fraternal twin sister. But there were dissimilarities, too. Maya was six foot tall and a big-boned woman. She had a slight cleft in her chin, and Inca did not. Her face was oval, cheekbones high, shouting of her Indian heritage. Yet the aristocratic thin nose, flaring nostrils and full mouth were very similar to Inca’s features.
Morgan was fascinated with this story of twins separated at birth, one becoming an environmental warrior in the Amazon jungles for the rights of the Indians, and the other a maverick military helicopter pilot. While Inca was calm, proud and quiet there was an edginess to Maya, he noted. Maya wore her brazenness, her strength, without fear. He admired that. Getting to his feet,