“Yeah, well. We’ve been busy.” He took out his cell phone and dialed the general.

“I think you should take a rest, a few days off,” Carl said. “You look exhausted.”

“We’ll all get plenty of rest when we’re dead,” Russell said, listening to the general’s phone ring.

Katherine came down the hall as he closed his telephone. She was dressed in clean jeans and a black mid-length coat. Her hair was pulled back. She crossed the room and gave him a kiss, and he kissed her back on the lips. He’d made love to her out there in the jungle, and he’d lied to her, and it was all designed to make her believe in him so he could get her on a plane and out of the country. He didn’t feel bad about it. Maybe, he thought, as he held her, it was all the lying he was doing that was making him strange in the head.

“Are you ready?” he said.

“Yes. Let me get my suitcase. Are you bringing much?” she asked. “My sister is picking us up at the airport, but she only has a VW.”

“No. Not much,” he said. “I’m sure it will be fine.”

Selva had sent him a big chase car, an American Suburban filled with his bodyguards. That was part of the deal. The Chevy Suburban was following him to the airport to make sure nothing happened. It was a short drive from Carl’s apartment.

He listened to Katherine make plans for their future. She said they would stay with her sister in New York until the paper reassigned him. Then they would see. She might quit her job, she said. She reached over and held his hand as they drove. He wanted to tell her then. But it felt mean, putting her straight about the way things really were, so he didn’t.

“What about the car? Your car?” she asked.

“I’m leaving it there at the airport,” he said. She nodded. “I checked my stuff in early,” he said. “That way we could get two seats together.” More lies.

He’d lied when he told her he had no intention of going on with Mahler. He’d told her the night they made love out there that he was going to give the plantation to the government and leave. Get away from it all. That it was all crazy. How could anyone try to hold onto a Mayan city, he’d said, holding her naked in the heat of the jungle night. The fire burned high to keep the mosquitoes away, the light falling on Mahler’s head as he slept across from them. It had all been a lie— everything he’d told her. He was going to try to hold onto a whole fucking Mayan city. Why not? Hold on long enough, anyway, to get what he wanted out of it.

Once he had her in the airport, it would be over. He’d gotten Selva to mark Katherine as persona non grata; if she tried to come back, she wouldn’t get past customs. She would never see the country again. It was a mean thing to do, he knew, but he’d felt he had to do it for her own good. Carlos had promised him she would be safe at the airport.

“I’m so glad you love me,” she said. “I don’t think I’ve been in love before. Not like this, anyway.”

He couldn’t look at her. Instead he looked into the rearview mirror and saw Selva’s chase car following close behind them.

•••

He wondered, as they made their way across the black tile concourse at Aurora airport, if he didn’t love her more than he thought. It wasn’t like Beatrice. He knew that; what he felt for Katherine was different. He cared about what happened to Katherine, about the men she would have in her life back there in the States. About who she would become, about another country she might go to, and his not being there to protect her. For a moment, as they approached the ticket counter at American Airlines, he wondered what his life would be like if he left right now with her.

But the craziness inside of him wouldn’t let him do that. He might love Katherine, but he wanted to possess Beatrice. He wanted to prove to Beatrice he was just as good a man as Carlos. He realized that part of his love for Beatrice was tied up in stealing her from the General.

Aurora airport was surprisingly busy. The red-eye flights for the States were leaving soon. An American, a United, and a Taca flight left for the States almost simultaneously every night. They’d bought her a ticket for Miami. The general’s brother-in-law ran Taca Airlines, so it was all set.

Russell saw the Taca ticket counter on his right. He glanced behind him. Two of the men from Selva’s chase car had followed them into the airport, and were behind them.

He put her suitcase down. Katherine stopped and looked at him. He knew she was expecting them to go to the American Airlines counter, because that was the only flight to New York.

“Look . . . I’m sorry, Katherine. You’re going to Miami. After that, you can go wherever you want,” he said.

“What are you talking about?” She reached for his hand. He pulled his away. One of Selva’s bodyguards went on to the Taca counter and picked up the ticket that was waiting for her.

“You have to leave. I can’t go with you,” he said. He couldn’t look her in the face. A customs official came up to them and asked for Katherine’s passport.

“I don’t understand, Russell. You said you loved me.” She sounded like a little girl.

“I do.” And he realized he really meant it.

“What’s this mean?”

“Señora, pasaporte,” the man said. The other bodyguard stood beside her now.

“It means I can’t go with you. Not right now,” he said. He watched the customs man take her passport and walk towards the gate. The other bodyguard, holding her ticket now, came up to Russell and nodded.

“Listo?” Ready? the bodyguard said to him.

“You have to go with him. He’s going to go with you to Miami, just in case. I was worried that on the plane—someone —I don’t know, I just was worried. This way, you’ll be all right,” he said. “He’ll watch over you all the way there.”

“Russell, please don’t leave me. I love you.” Katherine was looking at him, tears in her eyes now. He hadn’t expected that. He thought she would get angry, but not that. “I love you. I know you love me. She’s not good for you. I want to be your wife. She can’t ever do that, Russell, can’t you see that? She belongs to him. Why can’t you see that?”

“I’m sorry I lied to you,” he said. “Don’t you see, I had to. You weren’t going to leave.” He nodded to the men. One of them picked up her suitcase. She started to sob. He couldn’t stand it, and turned around.

“Please . . . Russell! Please.” He heard her sobbing, and kept walking. There were all kinds of people coming for the red-eye to Miami. He forced himself to keep walking across the busy, well-lit concourse, and then out the big sliding glass doors and out into the night, which smelled of diesel and decaying city. The smell hit him in the face. He noticed that Selva’s backup car was gone. He stopped for a moment by the taxi stand. He heard the drivers asking him if he wanted a taxi.

“Taxi, Señor?” He wanted desperately to turn around. Somewhere in his gut, he knew Katherine was right. Beatrice wasn’t the right woman. But he couldn’t help himself.

“Taxi, Señor?” He closed his eyes for a moment and remembered Katherine the way he wanted to remember her: the way she had been that first morning driving down to the coast, her hands on the steering wheel, so sure of herself and her place in the world.

“No, thank you. Not tonight,” Russell answered, and walked on.

TWENTY-TWO

There’s going to be a devaluation of the quetzal. I just heard,” Antonio said.

They had all met at De La Madrid’s house, the entire would-be cabinet, including Senator Valladolid. The senator was scheduled to be De La Madrid’s foreign minister. Probably a mistake, Russell thought, glancing at the old man.

“Are you sure?” Russell said.