Island, The First in the cave sun series
Her Story
Attorney Craig Malcault has survived an assassination plot over his possession of top-secret intelligence. He thought he had rebuilt his life at his new law firm in New York City, with a tycoon's taboo divorce case to pay the bills. But when the provocative, hypnotic lady client refuses to desert her cruel, blood-thirsty husband, Craig knows his enemies are a step ahead in the game.
Business has been lucrative in the code-named territory in Latin America that Craig saved from annihilation a decade ago. A tinder box of mercenaries, a clandestine army, and international spy rings, the territory holds the key to armed combat in global conflict hotspots. It is worth its name, Ara Pacis, Altar of Peace, in gold. No wonder Craig's client hunts for answers with a secret agent whose audacity pits him against the military trades of governments. Craig knows the man to be too high risk for anyone's good.
Then Craig's closest colleague is murdered in a mutiny instigated to protect the classified leadership of Ara Pacis. That leadership's concealed army can be assembled anywhere, at any time. Especially now. Craig returns to Ara Pacis to investigate if the recent killings that have alerted the Department of Defense are a battle for valor and freedom or revenge executions for hire. But he must start there where politics end. His client's naked devotion to the fearless leader of Ara Pacis and her ruthless husband's know-it-all lies about that army’s wars spell hostilities on a plane higher than the law can punish.
Excerpt
Craig’s prayerful gesture jolted his memory, and he knew what he had done.
Sudden violent tremors electrocuted his body, his skin faded into a ghastly pallor, and his presence, as if liquefying, turned into a specter that howled in pain while it grasped for the coolness of the waves. “I love him, I love him madly, forever,” Cherido screamed in desolation. “Madder than any heat of hell. Tell me, Craig, what is a greater love than to kill the one you love the most, then when he loves you most… We killed most of them! What greater joy and what greater pleasure than in death itself?” Cherido had been belatedly surprised by Craig’s query about the body and paused to straighten himself. He turned neatly set features upwards into the paling tumultuous heavens and exuded an unquestioningly determined righteousness. His gaze hallowed by truth and ardently devout, he listened patiently to an inner voice. “We killed most of them,” he repeated. Cherido folded his hands to entreat Craig’s vicarious respect and adoration for the prodigious deed, but then his body dropped to the ground in the whispering water. Cherido clutched his head, his chest trembling. “Satan and the devil,” he groaned. The coming night pushed the remaining sun rays across the beach, casting and shredding them into the immaculate disk of the water.
“Are we any better?” Craig dared to comment.
“Stay away from him!” Moura called from the edge of the jungle behind. She reminded Craig that a ruthless murderer hid inside the whimpering child, a predator licking his lips inside the dissipating specter. Limp and losing sense, Cherido’s body rolled into the shallow water. Blood foamed on the waves, washing him clean. In the last minutes before darkness, the sky burned invisible with nefarious energy, and the river exuded a welcoming coolness, making Cherido whole.