I needed to disappear for a while, but how would I survive in this ghost town? Santa Rosa was way worse than I’d expected. Most of the restaurants, cafés and bars were boarded up, and the only sign of life was a group of moody teens sitting on the steps of a white-washed stone church. I scanned the plaza again, looking for Brendan Callaghan. Where the hell was he? The bus had left ages ago. Peachy, just peachy. Alone on a dark street in a run-down jungle town, no signal on my phone and not a taxi to be seen.
Sighing heavily, I swung my backpack over my shoulders, swatted a mosquito away and headed for the Grand Amazon Hotel; a crumbling stone mansion that had long seen better days. The empty lobby reeked of pine air freshener and mildew. Startled by a stuffed jaguar head mounted on the wall, I didn’t spot the desk clerk until he stood to greet me. The way he looked me up and down, I guessed I’d failed the dress code. Considering his rumpled appearance, the man had a nerve.
‘Hola,’ I said, hoping to win him over with my fluent Spanish. ‘I need to get to the wildlife refuge. Could you–’
‘Get out. Get out of my hotel.’
I turned to see who he was speaking to, but the lobby was still empty. ‘I think you’re mistaking me for someone else.’
‘There’s been no mistake, señorita. You’re not welcome here.’
I laughed awkwardly. ‘I can see why you have no guests.’
He stormed out from behind the desk and stood in front of me. Up close, his eyes were bloodshot and I sensed weariness beneath his scowl. He moved a hand towards my elbow as if to frogmarch me to the door. I glanced at the brass nametag pinned to his shirt pocket. ‘Lay one finger on me, Victor Ramirez, and you’ll find yourself flat on your back.’
It was no empty threat and, rather than prolong this bizarre conversation with someone who smelled of alcohol, I turned and left. Wilting under the weight of my backpack, I trudged away from the hotel. The relentless beat of cicadas seemed to drum faster and louder. What was I doing here? I had needed to get away from London, but my bright idea to lie low at a remote wildlife refuge in the Amazon was beginning to look like one big mistake.
‘Hey, Jane. Jane!’
I stared at the man sprinting towards me. It had to be Brendan Callaghan. Marco had told me to expect a tall, sandy-haired guy with crazy tattoos. Even in the dim light cast by the flickering streetlamps, I could see there wasn’t an inch of skin on his arms that hadn’t been tattooed in bright colours.
He stopped in front of me, stuck out his hand and grinned.
‘Sorry, didn’t mean to leave you stranded.’
Still reeling from my encounter at the hotel, I shook his hand without smiling or speaking.
His grin slipped a little. ‘Hey, I have a good excuse for being late.’
He unfastened a safety pin from halfway down his filthy chinos and lifted a flap of torn material. A bloody scratch ran the length of his leg. For someone so lean, his legs were surprisingly muscular. Taken aback by the feeling of a missed heartbeat, I looked away and stared at the illuminated fountain in the middle of the plaza. Brown water trickled from the blow-holes of five algae-encrusted stone dolphins.
‘That’s what happens when a puma wants to play with you,’ he said. ‘I had to clean the scratch and wait for the bleeding to stop. Make sure you understand everything Marco tells you about handling the animals.’
I turned back and nodded. I had a brown belt in Jiu-Jitsu, but I didn’t rate my chances of taking down a puma.
Brendan pulled a small daypack off his shoulder, opened it and handed me a chilled bottle of water. ‘I thought you might want one of these.’
‘Thanks,’ I said, finally able to smile. ‘I was hoping to buy a cold drink at the hotel, but the owner practically threw me out. I’m not sure whether he’s drunk or crazy. Maybe both.’
‘Drunk, maybe. Crazy, no. Pissed off, definitely. Victor Ramirez has barred all volunteers from setting foot over his threshold.’
Now it all made sense. ‘Well, a tip-off would have been nice. I was expecting the usual friendly welcome rolled out to tourists.’
He pulled an apologetic face. ‘There’s a long list of places we’re not welcome. Don’t worry about it now. It’s a long story. Marco will explain everything.’
Despite the heat, a shiver ran down my spine. I’d just run out on a bad situation in London. The last thing I needed was more trouble.
Brendan flashed me a wide-mouthed grin. ‘I’ve forgotten my manners. Let me carry your pack. It must weigh a ton.’
I gave him a withering look. ‘I can carry my own pack.’
‘That’s cool.’
He flicked his fringe back, and as he grinned again, I realised there was something familiar about his blue-green eyes, his wide-mouthed grin and the look on his face that suggested he was about to do something he thoroughly enjoyed. It was possible we’d met before. I’d spoken with lots of Irish guys on the backpacker trail. They could always recommend the best bars and the best place to get a cooked breakfast.
‘Did we stay at the same hostel in Cambodia?’ I asked.
He looked surprised. ‘I’d remember if we had met.’
I stared at him, unconvinced.
‘I haven’t been to Cambodia yet. I’ve travelled to India, Sri Lanka, Borneo, Kenya, Tanzania, South Africa, Argentina, Peru–’
‘Okay. I guess you have a double.’
He grimaced, opened his mouth to speak, then fell silent.
‘Are you okay?’
He gave me a blank look followed by a watery smile. ‘Sure. Come on, let’s go.’
We set off down a narrow cobbled street. At first, he didn’t talk, which suited me as I wasn’t in the mood for conversation. After a few minutes, he started up.
‘Marco tells me you’re a psychotherapist, or was it a psychologist?’
I rolled my eyes. ‘As far as my patients are concerned, I could be either. But I’m a physio. I fix bodies, not minds.’
‘I can relate to that. I work in pubs to fund my travels, and there’s always some poor fella sitting alone on a barstool with a sad tale to tell. It seems we’re all destined to screw up.’
The bitterness in his voice was unexpected. His fringe had fallen over his eyes again, and he didn’t bother to flick it back.
‘I bet it’s a relief to work with animals,’ I said. ‘Pretty straightforward, I’m sure.’
He chuckled. ‘You’ve obviously never met a psychotic monkey or a parrot with anger management issues.’
‘Not sure I want to,’ I said, feeling slightly alarmed.
‘Don’t worry. Nobody has had to get stitches yet. It’s the mosquitoes you need to watch out for.’ He stopped and held his arms out, zombie style. ‘Look how they’ve attacked my tats.’
At first glance, I had thought his tattoos were long-stemmed tropical flowers. Looking at them again, I saw the flowers had faces with big, dark eyes and cute, snub noses. What the hell was that all about?
‘Yeah, mosquito bites,’ I said. ‘Aren’t they the worst? So where are you parked?’
Looking a little crestfallen, Brendan dropped his arms. ‘I’m afraid we’re walking all the way. Marco has the pickup, and there’s no taxi service in Santa Rosa. Not since the airport closed down.’
Not thrilled to hear this because I knew the refuge was a ten-minute walk from the town, I decided he could carry my pack after all. I unclipped it and dumped it at his feet. He swung it onto his back, groaned, staggered around for a bit, then pretended to collapse under the weight of it. I refused to laugh.
‘Brendan, over the last two days, I’ve endured one thirteen-hour long-haul flight, a four-hour connection delay on a two-hour internal flight, and to top it all, a stifling hot, over-crowded, bone-shaking eight-hour bus journey seated next to a woman who had no sense of personal space.’
He laughed, then apologised for laughing. ‘Okay, sounds like you’ve earned some downtime. Let’s get to the refuge. You can put your feet up once we’ve prepped the morning feed for the cats. I hope you’re not squeamish about touching lungs, liver, heart or any other entrails the butcher has delivered this week.’
‘Hang on. I thought the working day finished at five.’
‘Yeah, five past when you’re finished. I’m the only volunteer right now, and I have to feed and muck out four big cats, twenty-six monkeys and seventeen birds. The puma needs to be walked, and there’s the never-ending backlog of maintenance work. Clearing trails, repairing fence posts, building–’
‘Are you for real? Marco’s website states his refuge is run by up to twenty volunteers at a time.’
‘Yeah, he has room for twenty. Ten beds in the male dorm and ten in the female. Unfortunately for Marco, another animal refuge opened in the south. It’s close to the airport, and everyone is volunteering there instead of making the tortuous journey to Santa Rosa. Marco’s wife, Isabel, is trying to promote our refuge as the authentic off-the-beaten-path experience, but she’s not having much luck.’
Despite not wearing my pack, my body suddenly felt weighted down. I’d applied to volunteer at the refuge in the south, but they’d wanted a reference from my last employer. Nobody at the clinic would have written me a reference. Not after the way I’d stormed out on a Monday morning. I tried not to glare at Brendan. I’d assumed I would be part of a large group at Marco’s refuge. I liked having lots of people around. It was easy to bounce from one light conversation to the next. I’d tried the two’s and three’s company thing when I’d backpacked around Asia. Every few weeks, I joined a different group of backpackers. Hooking up like this was better than being on my own, but I didn’t enjoy the late night cosy chats or all the personal questions I had to deflect when I had a nightmare.
There were no streetlights along the road to the refuge, and the moon had not yet risen above the canopy. Brendan had a hand-held torch, but its dim light did little to guide our way. I took my new head-torch out of my pocket and strapped it on. A moment later, a mouse-sized moth landed on my nose. Something brushed past my ear, buzzing and clicking, then something hard ricocheted off my cheek.
I bent my head and flapped my hands, trying to bat the bugs away, but it didn’t work. Ripping the torch from my head, I caught Brendan’s gaze. He erupted with laughter, while managing to appear sympathetic to my plight. I laughed along with him. What was I thinking? One of the first things I’d learned, when I had to hide out with my aunt Bea in Costa Rica, was to tie my torch onto a long stick. Bea would have a good laugh at her Jungle Jane if she could see her now. Still chuckling, I wiped tears from my eyes. I hadn’t laughed since the day Terri Carter had showed up at my workplace, throwing my life into turmoil. It had been such a shock. Terri turning up without warning after so many years. I had no idea how she tracked me down. I never used my real name. But there were thousands of miles between us now, and nobody knew I was here. I looked at Brendan. He had stopped laughing. His expression seemed pained, and he was biting his lip.
‘Did a bug sting you?’ I asked.
He glanced at me as if he’d forgotten I was there. ‘I’m fine,’ he said flatly.
I switched off the torch and put it in my pocket, wondering what was up with him. We walked on in silence. After a while, his mood recovered, and he was soon chatting away again, telling me about his favourite animals at the refuge and the stories behind their rescue. Although he’d been volunteering at the refuge for only a few months, it sounded like he was running the place. We’d stopped to watch a long line of leaf-cutter ants, each carrying a leaf several times its size, when I heard the noise of an engine. I looked at the road, expecting to see another logging truck, but a dark-coloured saloon car was speeding towards us.
‘Watch out!’ Brendan yelled.
He grabbed me and yanked me off the road. The car sped by, driving through the spot where we’d been standing. I coughed as clouds of diesel fumes stung my eyes, nostrils and throat. The car moved back into the lane before it disappeared into the night.
Brendan spun around to face me. He put his hand on my shoulder. ‘Hey, are you okay?’
I nodded as I moved away from him. My heart raced. My body felt tense, and I had a sudden longing to be on the floor mat at my Jiu-Jitsu class, taking somebody down. Somebody who was taller and stronger than me. That feeling I got when I succeeded, there was nothing like it.
‘What a maniac,’ I said. ‘Driving at that speed. Obviously, drunk out of his or her mind.’
Brendan shook his head. His face, lit by the torch, was drained of colour. Even his freckles seemed paler. ‘That was no drunk driver. The same thing happened last week when I was walking home at night. I had to jump into a ditch to avoid being hit. I didn’t mention it to Marco or Isabel because I thought it was a drunken idiot who hadn’t seen me.’
‘Are you saying somebody tried to kill us?’
He let out a hollow-sounding laugh. ‘Of course not. There’s no crazed tourist killer on the loose in Santa Rosa. I suspect a local is trying to remind us they’re not too thrilled about having us around.’
‘Brendan, what the hell is going on here? This dump of a town is crying out for tourists. I’ve been here five minutes, and I’ve been thrown out of the only hotel in town, and now somebody has tried to kill me.’
‘Didn’t Marco tell you about the feud?’
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. ‘Marco mentioned nothing about a feud or the crazy hotel guy, and he certainly never mentioned the homicidal maniac intent on killing innocent people who’ve come to Santa Rosa to bottle-feed baby monkeys. Must have slipped his mind.’
Brendan’s expression suggested I was making a big drama about nothing, but his colour hadn’t returned, and he kept checking the road. ‘Hey, they’re long gone,’ he said. ‘Don’t panic. They wouldn’t have hit us. At that speed, we’d be dead. Come on, who would commit a double murder over a petty feud? Somebody wants to scare us. That’s all. They’re hoping we’ll leave the refuge and get out of Santa Rosa.’
‘Well, they’ve succeeded because I’m out of here first thing tomorrow morning.’
Brendan looked distraught. ‘You can’t leave. Marco would be devastated. The research budget for the biological station where he works has been cut. He’s doing the work of three biologists now. Isabel helps with the animals when she can, but she has a full-time job teaching. She cleans the school on weekends for extra cash, and she teaches literacy classes four evenings a week. We’re stretched to the limit, and we need all the help we can get.’
I craned my neck and listened for a car. Other than the sound of croaking frogs and chirping cicadas, all was quiet.
‘What’s this feud about?’ I asked.
He moved closer and touched my shoulder. ‘Don’t worry. I won’t let anything happen to you.’
I wanted to grab him in a chokehold to make a point. ‘I’m more than capable of looking after myself, but I want to know what’s going on around here.’
‘I’ve said too much already. Marco will explain when he sees you.’
‘What’s the big deal? Why can’t you tell me now?’
‘Because I could say the wrong thing and then Marco loses a volunteer. Anyway, it involves a private matter between him and Isabel.’
I nodded. The need for privacy, I understood and respected. I groaned as a wave of jet lag pounded me to pieces. All I wanted to do was eat and crawl into bed. ‘Okay, but I’m leaving first thing in the morning.’
‘I’m sure you’ll change your mind once you’ve spoken to Marco.’
I didn’t bother to contradict him. Head spinning, I followed him onto the road. We set off again at a much faster pace than before. Brendan had stopped talking, and I had space to think. It didn’t matter that this terrifying ordeal might have been a bullying scare tactic as Brendan had said. The driver could have lost control of the car and hit us. For the first time since leaving London, I wondered if I should have stayed and faced up to Terri Carter. What’s the worst she could do? I wasn’t a thirteen-year-old child anymore. At twenty-six years of age, I could stand up to one tabloid news hack. Although, Terri wasn’t a reporter anymore. Now, she was a television producer with an entire crew behind her.
Suddenly, a cat with beautiful striped and spotted markings bounded across the road ahead of us.
‘An ocelot,’ Brendan said, grinning and staring after it. ‘First time I’ve seen one in the wild. What an amazing encounter for your first night. It’s a good omen, Jane.’
As the cat disappeared behind the trees, I caught the scent of a night-blooming flower. An orchid, perhaps. Maybe Brendan was right. How could I return to London and the job I’d grown to hate? The stuffy treatment cubicle I was stuck in for most of the day. The long-term patients who lay down on the therapy table, week after week, to spill out personal problems I could never shake off. It was all too much to bear. But it was obvious the refuge was not, as I had thought, the ideal place to lie low for a while. I would have to move on somewhere else. The organic farm in Argentina had been an option. Shovelling dirt and picking root vegetables hadn’t appealed as much as lazing in a hammock, bottle-feeding baby monkeys. But now the farm was looking like the better deal. In a few days, I could be hanging out with a fun group of international volunteers, sipping a mellow Argentinian red while watching the sun go down. By the sound of it, Marco would be disappointed to lose a volunteer, but I couldn’t let that stand in my way. Dizzily light, I took a deep breath. I was safe now. The cameras would not find me here.
