Behind the Mask (Undercover Associates Book 4) by Carolyn Crane Page B

that what you want?”
    “No.”
    He had the sense that she wanted to tell him more. He found he wanted that, too. He waited. Then, “Objections?”
    “No.”
    He gazed at her hard, but what he marveled at wasn’t in the looking, it was the way she felt. The contours of her.
    She looked away, eyes full of thoughts. He wanted to know her thoughts. He wanted her face to light again with emotion. He wanted her to sweat some more, too. He wanted everything from her. Everything.
    He sat back. “You know science? Did they teach that to you in high school?”
    “A bit.”
    “You will teach that to the boy.”
    Liza looked down and nodded.
    He had the sense of secrets in her. What? Had she not finished school?
    Hugo’s own schooling had ended when he ran away. Everything he knew he’d learned at the hands of fighting men, and that did not include science and math. He would not allow the boy to be limited in this way.
    She patted her brow with a napkin. The sun had risen beyond the tin roof that had once shaded them. She would most certainly be roasting, but she didn’t complain.
    “The last cook who worked at the house left her uniforms. They will be several sizes too large, but they will be cooler than that.”
    “Thanks,” she said. “So Paolo doesn’t go to school?”
    “He does not like school.”
    She took this in. “And school doesn’t like him?”
    He gave her a longer look now. She was perceptive. More…
    But then the boy was back.
    They returned to the Jeep and the boy drove on glumly, having lost reception and gained a governess sure to disturb his life of reading outer space adventure tales and practicing archery and shooting. Hugo addressed him in Spanish. “You will treat her with respect and obey her in everything, or you will forfeit the phone and all books. Do you understand? I will crush the phone under my boot and rip up your books.”
    The boy didn’t answer.
    “Do you understand?”
    The boy nodded insolently.
    They headed into the foothills, fully at the mercy of the blistering sun now. The boy took to telling him a science fiction tale. Planets, UFOs— Ovnis and extraterrestres. Hugo nodded. Liza sat in back looking bored; she wouldn’t understand the boy’s tale, aside from the explosion sound effects. Hugo wondered what she made of those, what she made of him and the boy. The glaring overhead sun made her shining, sweating face look more angular, more sculpted. She really was beautiful, even with the fake hair and eyes.
    What had driven her to drugs? She’d said she’d quit. Was it true? It was not an easy thing, quitting. What had inspired her to quit? What was important to her?
    She lay down in the back and slept for a few hours, but she woke when they turned off and began the steep climb up the mountainside.
    Eventually, they reached Buena Vista. As they motored through the ruined village, Hugo had the strange impulse to cover it up, as though he didn’t want her to see it as pitiful.
    Her expression was blank as always, but she saw. Somewhere inside, she was reacting. How much of Valencia’s struggle did she know about? Did she think of the region only in terms of drug cultivation and drug wars?
    “The people will return to this village soon,” he assured her. “It will be restored.”
    She nodded as she took it in—the burnt cars, structures hollowed out by the bomb blast, dark gated shops.
    He could see evidence that they’d come and taken the old man’s body away to bury. “The danger is over now. The attacks are over.”
    She nodded. Again, that blaze of intelligence. What was she thinking?
    He looked away. Why should he care?
    The Jeep whirred as they climbed on past Buena Vista. The sky was pure blue today, and the forest lush. The way up to his home was only two miles as the crow flies, but six miles on the winding trail. He himself had to maintain this path, had to move the rocks when they fell. The way was dangerous and beautiful.
    He looked forward to her seeing