UNFORGIVEN--CHAPTER ONE
UNFORGIVEN
by Lindsay McKenna
Silhouette Nocturne launch book due October, 2006
Copyright 2006 Lindsay McKenna
All Rights Reserved
Visit: http://www.eharlequin.com to order your book!
CHAPTER 1
One shot...one kill. The sixteen-pound sledge hammer came down with such fierce power that the granite boulder beneath shattered instantly. A spray of glittering mica exploded into the air and sparkled momentarily around the man who wielded the tool as if it were a weapon. Sweat ran in rivulets down Reno Manchahi's drawn, intense face. Naked from the waist up, the hot July sun beating down on his back, he hefted the sledge hammer skyward once more. Muscles in his thick forearms leaped and biceps bulged. Even his breath was focused on the boulder. In his mind's eye, he pictured Army General Robert Hampton's fleshy, arrogant fifty-year-old features on the rock's surface. Air exploded from between this thinned lips as he brought the avenging hammer downward. The boulder pulverized beneath his funneled hatred. One shot...one kill...Nostrils flaring, he inhaled the dank, humid heat and drew it deep into his massive lungs. The only way he felt alive was to picture Hampton on every rock face he destroyed. Revenge allowed Reno to endure his imprisonment at a US Navy brig near San Diego, California. Droplets of sweat were flung in all directions as the crack of his sledge hammer claimed a third boulder victim.
Mouth taut, Reno moved to the next boulder. The other prisoners in the stone yard gave him a wide berth since they instinctively felt his simmering hatred, the revenge that was palpable in his cinnamon-colored eyes.
And they whispered he was different.
Reno enjoyed being a loner for good reason. He came from a medicine family of shapeshifters. The genes of his heritage allowed him to transform from human to jaguar at will. But even this secret power had not protected him--or his family. What life did he have left? His wife, Ilona, and his three-year-old daughter, Sarah, were dead. Murdered by Army General Hampton in their former home on USMC base in Camp Pendleton, California. The lusting sonofabitch had stalked his Hungarian born wife while he was deployed to Afghanistan to hunt down Taliban.
Bitterness thrummed through Reno as he savagely pushed the toe of his scarred leather boot against smaller stones that were in his way. A massive black and white striated boulder stood in front of him. The prisoners, all military, knew he'd want the big ones. They were happy to give them to Manchahi. They wanted him to take his rage out on the rocks--not on them. The sun beat down upon Manchahi's naked shoulders, grown dark red over time. With his straight black hair grazing his thick shoulders, copper skin and broad face with high cheekbones, everyone knew he was Indian. When he'd first arrived at the brig and they'd discovered he was part Apache, some of the prisoners taunted him and called him Geronimo.
Only once did they provoke him. Because during that fight with the name-calling prisoners, something strange happened. Leaning down after he'd won the scuffle, he'd snarled into each of their bloodied faces that if they was going to call him anything, they would call him gan, which was the Apache word for "devil."
What had shocked the attackers were the wounds on their faces - deep claw marks. Reno recalled doubling his fist as they'd attacked him en masse. In that split second, Reno had felt as if he'd gone into an altered state of consciousness. Because he was attacked and feared for his life, his jaguar guide had started to come over his physical body to protect him. A deep, growling sound had emitted from his throat as he defended himself in the three-against-one fracas. For an instant, strange changes occurred to his body - so fast, he thought he might have imagined it. His hands morphed into the forearm and paw, claws extended, of his jaguar guide. The slashes left on the three men's faces after the fight, told him he'd begun to shapeshift. A fist made bruises and swelling; not four perfect, deep claw marks.
Stunned and anxious, he buried his secret knowledge of what he was. Instead, he promised the beaten prisoners that the next time he heard the word Geronimo, he'd smash in their front teeth and break their noses. Never mind if his jaguar completely enclosed his physical form, they'd be staring into the yellow eyes of his jaguar guide. He had to keep that to himself and hope never to shapeshift again while in prison. If a guard saw a jaguar instead of him, they'd shoot and kill him. Reno's only defense was to make all the prisoners so damned scared of him that they'd never think of attacking him ever again.
Much as he wanted to meld into background of prison life, there were those whispers about him. Some told him that they'd hear the snarl of a big cat coming from his cell late at night. Reno scoffed. Still, his nights were filled with a set of two large, yellow eyes with huge black pupils staring back at him. And those eyes...Reno never divulged his odd dreams to anyone. His jaguar guide would talk to him in dreams, soothe him, and try to help him during his incarceration.
No one called him anything after that. Just 'the loner.' Alone. Yeah, he was alone, all right. And at age twenty-eight, in a way he never had envisioned. His heart twinged with unrequited anguish. Three years after the murder of his wife and child, Reno still couldn't avoid the red hot agony that slashed savagely through his wounded heart every time he pictured Ilona with Sarah in her arms.
Hampton, an Army general, had adroitly covered his tracks, Reno had to admit. As he hefted the hammer upward, his muscles flexing and gleaming with sweat, he pictured Hampton's face once again on the rock. Revenge. Yeah. You're damned straight it's revenge. His rage mounted as he remembered how the Army General had secretly lusted after his beautiful, carefree wife. Hampton had watched Ilona's daily movements. And on that fateful night in December, shortly before Christmas, the general had broken into their quarters. He'd raped and then killed Ilona to ensure her silence. And his daughter, in the next room, was found strangled to death in her bed.
The steel hammer swept downward with hellish ferocity. As the granite groaned in protest, Reno shut his eyes for just a moment. More sweat dripped off his nose and square chin. Mouth tightening, he opened his narrowed eyes, grunted and swung the sledge upward and then brought it down with such hatred toward the general that the second time, the granite split wide open, shattering into three huge, jagged pieces in front of him.
Oh, Great Spirit, why did you let Ilona and Sarah die? Reno still couldn't understand. All he could do was feel helpless rage. The general was smart like a coyote. He'd thought of everything. What Hampton hadn't counted on was Ilona's reaction to the assault. She'd fought back with the fury of a cougar, which Reno saw from looking at the photos taken of her in death. The Shore Patrol and NCIs had performed DNA testing, and the results identified the general as her assailant. But before Hampton could be arraigned for the crime against Reno's family, the DNA results disappeared from the forensics lab, never to be located again. Both Ilona and Sarah had been cremated before he'd arrived home. Reno had never got to hold them, to say good-bye or give either of them a final, farewell kiss. Now, he was truly a prisoner in so many ways. Denied justice, denied his family, denied the wide-open spaces he loved. Only the pale blue sky above offered some escape from his depressing confinement.
Straightening, Reno wiped his furrowed, wet brow and looked around the rectangular yard enclosed by its twenty-foot red brick wall. What got his attention was the startling cry of a Redtail hawk as it flew over the brig yard. Squinting, he looked up at the bird. Reno could make out its rust-colored tail. As a kid growing up on the Apache reservation in Arizona, Reno knew that all animals that appeared before him were messengers.
For a brief moment, he was lifted out of his mixture of grief and rage. The bird was less than three hundred feet above. The brig yard was large; scattered with thirty prisoners and tons of rocks. The clanging sounds of sledges striking granite didn't drown out the piercing shriek of the Redtail.
Reno called mentally to the winged one. Brother, what message do you bring me? The Great Spirit knew how much he looked forward to getting out of his small, confining cell every day for three hours of brutal, nonstop manual labor. Reno's sanity hinged on being out here in the elements.
Allowing the sledge hammer to drop to his side, Reno concentrated on the hawk who wheeled in tightening circles above him.
Freedom! the hawk cried in return.
Reno shook his head, his black hair moving against his broad, thick-set shoulders. Freedom? No way, Brother. No way. Figuring that he was making up the hawk's shrill message, Reno turned away. Back to his rocks. Back to picturing Hampton's smug face.
Freedom!
Reno heard and felt the piercing voice as if it were speaking directly into his head. Following the Redtail's flight and hearing its message, Reno allowed himself to hope for just a split second. Was he imagining this? Had to be since the general had orchestrated a twenty-year prison sentence for him.
And yet, Reno had spent his childhood out in the mountains of his people's reservation learning to talk to animals. He could commune with the deer, the coyote, the hawks and the reptile nation. Such were his abilities as a shapeshifter to talk with the animal world. Even the golden eagles flying over his people's land would speak with him.
If Reno were set free, he would finally have his vengeance. Unleashed, he was more than dangerous. It was no accident that his last name, Manchahi meant "wolf" in the Apache language. Reno always found his assigned quarry and shot him. Snipers teams disappeared into the steep, jagged Tora Bora mountains, seeking out Taliban leaders. One shot...one kill. That was a sniper's maxim. With forty-two kills under his belt, he was considered the best sniper in the military. Of course, his gift of shapeshifting into a jaguar gave him an advantage in picking up the scent of his enemy.Freedom!
Shaking his head, Reno telepathically sent a message to the Redtail. Ho, Brother! While I honor your coming to me, there is no way I'm going to get free.
Freedom was impossible and Reno knew it. He began work on the next boulder and tried to ignore the pleading call of the Redtail, who stubbornly circled overhead. Reno had seventeen more years left before he could hunt General Hampton down and kill him.
"Manchahi!" a young Navy brig guard near the door called to him.
Now what? Reno turned, the sledge hammer in his right hand, the muscles in his wrist leaping. "What?" he snarled.
"Get in here! You have a visitor!"
Wiping the sweat off his face, he scowled at the eighteen- year-old guard standing with a second sentry in the shade of the doorway. The kid was new and Reno could see he was afraid of him and his fierce reputation.
"You're wrong." The only visitors he'd wanted were his wife and child. They were dead. Gone. But never forgotten. His mother had died of a heart attack when she'd heard that his family had been ruthlessly slaughtered. His father, a Mexican Yaqui Indian, had a stroke shortly after they'd found Reno guilty of assault on the general's aide-de-camp and attempted murder of the general. Reno was only two days into his twenty-year sentence when word came to him that his father had died of a massive stroke. Reno knew he'd really died of heartbreak over his son's unfair sentencing.
Now, Reno had no one. An only child, Reno had few relatives. They lived on the Arizona reservation and there was no way they were going to drive out to see him. Indians didn't talk much on the telephone either; nor did they write letters. Reno never expected any of his relatives to be in contact with him. His only friend was his spirit guide, the jaguar, who was with him, always.
Settling his gaze on the short, blond guard near the door, Reno barked, "Well, who the hell is it?" Couldn't be his lawyer. The bastard had more than likely been bought off by General Hampton.
"You'll find out. Get in here and get washed up. We're under orders to take you to the visitor's room as soon as possible."
Cursing softly, Reno threw the sledge hammer down. This guard was Navy bait, thinking he had authority. Snorting to himself, the only military Reno respected was the Marine Corps. His father had been a Marine. When Reno had gone through boot camp at Parris Island and then advanced infantry training at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina, that's when the Corps had discovered his superior hunting skills. After graduation, they sent him to sniper school. One shot...one kill. Reno wasn't a company player. And being a sniper was the ultimate hermit existence with his partner out in the rough, natural world that he loved so much.
Quickly backing through the door, the sentry bumped into his partner, who was also retreating as Reno entered the shaded, air conditioned hall.
Even the brig guards were wary of him, especially when they found four deep, long claw marks scored in the concrete wall near his bunk. One night, his spirit guardian shapeshifted over him and Reno tested the jaguar's strength to claw a hole in the wall. When the guards discovered the gashes, he told a lie and said he'd chiseled them into the concrete. Prisoners weren't allowed those kinds of implements, so they'd torn his cell apart looking for the tool that had done it. They found nothing. Reno decided that even shapeshifting into the jaguar wasn't going to break him out of this place so he stopped the experiment.
The guards said he wasn't human. Those marks were superhuman. Not something a prisoner could etch into the wall. Reno shrugged and pretended to be bored by their wild accusations and speculation of him. If that made the prison and guard population leave him alone, so much the better.Striding down the immaculate white tiled passageway, Reno knew the drill. The guards followed at a respectful distance. In the shower area, Reno removed his dusty leather boots, shrugged out of his prison trousers and stood naked beneath the cooling streams of water. He washed away the odor of his sweat, the dust of the yard and the grayish, pulverized flecks of rock shards that had stuck to his skin. Scrubbing his black hair with the coarse soap, Reno felt a brief moment freedom in this simple act.
How many times had he imagined he was standing beneath the waterfall deep in the reservation's forest and not in a prison shower room? Memories of his wild, free childhood had served to keep him sane within the prison bars that held his body. Those memories freed his spirit and allowed him to maintain his focus on the next seventeen years... and beyond. Cleansing his face of sweat and clinging rock dust, Reno relished the water sluicing coldly across his features and trickling down his naked body. If only briefly, the act made Reno feel alive. Otherwise, he was dead inside.
Without warning, the powerful vision he'd had last night slammed back into his memory. In his dream, he'd been standing on a rock outcropping where he used to go as a kid to daydream the hours away. It was his favorite haunt, a place where sky met earth in a magical way. Reno saw a black-haired woman with the most incredible and alluring green eyes materialize before him. She stood ten feet away. He'd been mesmerized by the mystical event.
Even more confusing was his emotional reaction to her. His heart welled up with such a fierce and unexpected emotional response that it caught Reno completely off guard. That kind of powerful response was reserved only for the woman he loved, which was Ilona. Not the dream woman. She was dressed like a ceremonial Incan priestess. Her gown was long and white, the material innocently outlining her young, lithe form. Across her proud shoulders, she wore the skin of a gold and black jaguar. Colorful parrot feathers adorned her straight black hair like a crown. Sensing she was from South America by the golden color of her skin, her high cheekbones and those slightly tilted green eyes, Reno watched as she lifted and extended her hand toward him.
"I need your help. Please, come to me. Come now...."He stood there, perplexed by her request. His heart and body were responding to her as if he knew her well. He didn't, of course, but Reno could feel his heart pounding inside his chest like a drum being struck.
"Come where?" he demanded.
Reno saw her full mouth draw into a soft, patient smile. Turning, she pointed toward the south. "There. I will meet you there, shortly. I am in danger. I need your help and protection...."
Reno recalled jerking awake shortly after that. He was drenched in sweat, his heart hammering. That had been one hell of a dream! As he sat on his bunk in the murky grayness of his cell, something told him this was no dream. It was real. His mother had the facility to receive visions and Reno was sure that this was one. Shortly afterward, he'd fallen asleep, unable to comprehend the meaning of the vision's request. She was beautiful. Her eyes reminded him of a big cat's eyes -- widely spaced, large and filled with a mystical radiance. At one time, jaguars had roamed the Southwest. Was there a connection there? She wore the skin of a jaguar. Reno simply didn't know. Visions were never explicit. One had to figure out what they meant, piece by piece, over time.
Shutting off the shower, Reno turned and splashed across the light blue tile floor. Now, he wondered if the vision of the green-eyed woman and the hawk showing up were synchronistic events telling him that his life was about to change. Grimacing, Reno didn't see how. Grabbing a gray cotton towel, he began to dry off his hard, lean body. The guards appeared impatient as they stood on the other side of the passageway.
"Who's waiting for me?" Reno demanded, throwing the towel into an awaiting bin. He took the gray cotton trousers and shoved his legs into them. Disdaining skivvies or boxer shorts, Reno liked to live as freely as he could and hated tight clothing. If he could get away with just wearing the trousers and nothing else, he would. But that was a no-go situation. He grabbed a gray cotton T-shirt and he placed it over his head. As he pulled it down over his chest, he glared again at the guard.
The kid's mouth was tight with impatience.
"Let's go, Manchahi."
Reno sat down outside the shower area on a wooden bench and put on a pair of clean gray cotton socks and pulled on his scarred leather boots. Finished, he stood up, towering over the guards. "I'm ready now."
"This way," the blond ordered, pointing toward the visitor's area.
First visitor in three years. Who could it be? Reno saw the second guard at the door. He knew the routine. Halting, he held out his thick wrists so the guard could put cuffs around them. Next came the leg irons and then the chain around his waist. Considered dangerous, Reno stood there, smiling to himself. He recalled the Redtail hawk who had screamed the word freedom at him. Was his visitor going to offer him that? Reno laughed to himself. As a realist, he knew life didn't hand out such easy pardons. No way in hell would the military would ever let him out."Enter," the second guard told him, stepping away.
Reno entered the huge visitor's center. It was composed of white plastic tables and chairs. The room was empty save for one man standing in the corner. Reno's six senses instantly took over. As a shapeshifter, his senses were highly honed, more so than any normal human being.
His visitor was impeccably dressed in a dark blue pinstripe suit. The man looked like a GQ model sporting a white silk shirt, conservative tie and polished black shoes. He had to be in his late thirties with his pinched face and lipless mouth. His light brown hair was coifed and Reno could smell the hair product from where he was. Flaring his nostrils like the wolf he was named after, Reno caught several other odors around the stranger. Cigar smoke and a hint of alcohol. The man was about six foot tall and built more like a runner more than a weight lifter. He had pale gray eyes; the kind that made Reno immediately suspicious of him.
As his gaze stripped the visitor, Reno became confident he didn't know this person from any experience other than his own instincts. On the table in front of him was a file folder. Reno knew this much about his visitor: The man was an agent of some kind. FBI? No. Probably a spook from the CIA. Reno had worked with enough of their kind in Afghanistan. This dude had that arrogant look that he was better than everyone else, which was a typical spook demeanor.
The chains rattled and clinked as he sauntered with an ease that belied the tension he held captive deep within him.
"Sit down, Mr. Manchahi."
"I'll stand. Who the hell are you?" His voice was a low growl, like thunder rolling across the bluffs of the reservation on a blisteringly hot Arizona day.
"You'll find out soon enough. Now, sit down."
Reno debated his next move. The man wasn't afraid of him, which intrigue him. Curiosity like his cat guardian won out. He pulled out the plastic chair, the legs scraping in protest against the concrete floor. Resting his cuffed hands on the table, Reno watched as Pale Eyes sat down. His mother had taught him to read faces. And all human faces reminded him of an animal, bird, snake or insect. Pale Eyes reminded him of a shifty-eyed Coyote with that long face and translucent gaze that moved in a nervous fashion.
"I'm CIA Agent Brad James."
"So?"
He sat back, hands clasped on the table. "I'm here to offer you freedom."
Freedom. Reno kept his face neutral. Like any good Indian, he knew how to keep his emotions completely out of a conversation so no one could read him. He recalled the hawk. It had cried freedom to him.
Scrutinizing the CIA agent, Reno said, "I'm listening.""Good," James said, smiling. "Because we need your services and talents down in Ecuador."
Surprise rifled through him, but Reno said nothing. He stared hard at the agent, who obviously had a weekly manicure for his well kept, soft, white hands and blunt cut nails. "Go on."
Leaning forward, James said, "I'm an agent who operates out of Quito. The U.S. government has had a plea from the Ecuadorian government for our assistance. There is an emerald mine, the Santa Maria, that is being plagued by a man on horseback. He murders mine guards and has stolen over three million dollars in emerald shipments leaving the mine for Quito, the capital. They call him El Espanto, The Ghost."
James opened the file, picked up a color photo and dropped in front of Reno. "Here's the mine." He threw another photo on top of the first one. "And these are the owners. They're known as The Guild. This terrorist rides at night on a black horse. The mine's located on a mountain and this ghost does his hunting of the guards after dark."
Reno studied at the third photo, which showed a slow-moving wide, green river flowing through a triple canopy jungle. A large mountain rose up and out of the jungle. It was partly stripped of trees here and there, showing a lot of bulldozing scars across the steep slopes.
"And so, this El Espanto is robbing the rich and going after the guards who are legally protecting mine property?" Reno sat back in his chair.
"That's right. In a nut shell."
"And you want me to...?"
James leaned forward and lowered his voice. "We want you to find this sonofabitch and kill him. We want him out of the way. He's caused havoc for two years now, and we've - I mean - they've lost a lot of guards in the process. We need someone who is an excellent tracker and sniper." Sitting up, James jabbed his finger toward Reno. "And that's you."
"Why me?"
"I have the ability to find out who is best for a situation like this. That's all you need to know."
"And if I do this gig for you?" Reno didn't like James at all.
After adjusting his tie, James flipped through the file and pushed several papers toward him. "First of all, you find this ghost and kill him and bring proof of his death to Ecuadorian authorities. Then, the U.S. government is willing to forgive your debt to society, in a manner of speaking. You'll receive Ecuadorian citizenship after you have killed this man, but the U.S. will be off limits to you. Your American citizenship will be permanently revoked. Instead, you will become a citizen of Ecuador."Reno's heart banged hard in this chest and his eyes narrowed on the CIA agent. James was looking far too confident, smug even. This was a city slicker who didn't like to dirty his hands out in the real world. "In other words, I get my freedom if I track down and kill this hombre?"
"That's right. Your sentence will be commuted. You can live the rest of your life down in South America. If you ever try to come back to the States for any reason, you will be picked up and thrown back into this brig and you will die here. No one will know you're here and no one will care." Opening his hands, James continued his hard sell. "It's a great opportunity for you, Manchahi. If I were you, I'd take it. Or, you can sit here and rot another seventeen years. It's up to you...."
Freedom. The hawk had not lied to him. And his vision of the woman calling for him to go south was being validated as well. Reno looked through the photos again. It seemed like a simple, straightforward operation. Nothing that he couldn't handle with ease.
"What's the time limit on finding this ghost?" he demanded.
Shrugging, James said, "The owners want him caught as soon as possible."
"How long has this ghost given the slip to the mine personnel and anyone else they've already hired?"
"Two years."
"So, this is not as easy an operation as it looks on the surface." Reno stared flatly into the man's pale eyes. "I want to know the rest of the story before I agree to anything."
James pointed down at one paper. "You see that? It's signed by the CIA authorizing your release. Read it. It promises you freedom if you find this guy within a year of going down there. Given your illustrious legend of being the world's most deadly sniper and tracker, I would think a year would be plenty of time to hunt down this sonofabitch."
A lot didn't make sense to Reno as he studied the paper and the signature. Agent James produced an Ecuadorian passport and pushed it toward him. Opening it, Reno saw his photo was already affixed within."You will go down there under your real name. This passport is valid. The owners of the mine want you to assume a cover. While you were in the Marine Corps, you were a certified paramedic. Correct?"
"I still am," Reno said. "I've kept up my certification even in here."
Nodding, James said, "Good. The Guild is putting the finishing touches on a small medical dispensary off the mining property, down near the river where the Esmeraldos live." James grimaced. "This killer is likely one of the Esmeraldos, so this will be good cover for you to insinuate yourself with them and find out who it is. You are going to go in as a spy and pose as a paramedic running this charity clinic. You speak fluent Spanish because your father was Mexican."
"He was Yaqui Indian." Anger flooded Reno as the man condescended to him.
James shrugged. "Whatever. You speak Spanish. You look Latino. The Esmeraldos will come flocking to your free clinic because they desperately need health care. You will make friends among them. You will ask about this ghost. They should tell you what they know sooner or later. Armed with that information, when you're not at the clinic, you will be hunting this bastard at night. The Guild has a small house for you nearby. You will be given the weapons you want, no questions asked. Basically, you are a free man down there. But," James's voice lowered in warning, "if you try to escape without doing this job, I can promise you there are people that will put a round through your head."
"If I give my word to take this assignment, I will do it." The urge to sink his fist into the soft, citified agent's arrogant features was very real. Reno didn't like to be threatened.
"You need to know the rules of the game before going in. You will report only to The Guild members about your progress. The head of Santa Maria security will also know who you really are, and you will work directly with him, most of the time. He'll see that you get whatever it is that you need in the way of weapons and ammunition."
"I find this hard to believe," Reno said. "The U.S. government has got its nose into an emerald mine down in Ecuador? That's not government security or a worry."
James mouth thinned. "Why this is being done is none of your business, Manchahi. Your job is to track down and kill this person."
It never entered Reno's mind that he wouldn't be successful in this mission. Freedom. He would be free. Once again, he could be out in nature, walk among the trees, fish in a river, feel the brutal ferocity of a thunderstorm whipping around him and the rain slashing against his flesh. He could breathe in the fresh air of the land, not the stale cigarette smoke trapped in this poorly ventilated brig.
James extended him a pen. "Sign this and you'll walk out of here with me." He produced two airline tickets. "You and I have a flight tonight from San Diego to Ecuador."
After signing the papers, Reno pushed them back toward the agent. "Sounds too good to be true."
"Better than staying in here," James murmured, gathering up all the photos and papers and sliding them back into the file. As he stood, the agent added softly, "But don't ever think that you're coming back here to even the score with General Hampton. Your life, as you knew it, has been erased. Your name, your social security number, and anything about you, is being destroyed as we speak. You are a man without a country. The only way you can have a country and a second chance at life is to go to Ecuador and hunt down El Espanto. Until then, you will be watched and monitored. You're still a prisoner, but the cell is just a little different."
It was better than nothing. And Reno wasn't done going after Hampton, either. As he rose, he smiled his wolf-like smile. "I'll find this ghost. He's dead already and just doesn't know it yet." He'd shapeshift, pick up the scent and track him down.
"That's what I wanted to hear." James gestured for the guard to come forward. "Take the chains off this man. Get him the set of clothing I brought with me." James looked over at Reno. "You'll take two suitcases, plus a paramedic bag -- everything you need to start your new life under cover. After you've settled in at your clinic, call me at this number and check in." He handed him a card. "I'm your handler on this mission."
Nodding, Reno stood while the guard uncuffed him. As the chains fell away, he wanted to cry. Freedom. He was going to earn his freedom, the hawk had been right. What lay in his future? South America. The woman that appeared in his vision last night had been right. What had the Great Spirit set him up for? Reno recalled his mother's wise words after he'd come down off the mountain from his last vision quest before going off to the Marine Corps at age eighteen. She'd said, "Son, your vision is one of turbulence, transformation and violence. Be careful. Stay alert. Listen to your heart, for it will never lead you wrong. Have faith in all our relations; they will show you the way."
As the last of the shackles fell away, Reno allowed, for the first time since his wife and child died, to feel a little emotion. Joy surged through him along with the instinctive wariness of his wolf name. What was the truth behind this mission? Reno knew as he watched the CIA agent waiting by the exit door, that James wasn't telling him everything by a long shot. Reno would have to understand the situation before he went after El Espanto and put him in the cross hairs of his rifle. One shot...one kill...