Game of Chance by Sandra Cuza

Author:Sandra Cuza
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Open Books
Published: 2015-02-05T00:00:00+00:00

SIXTEEN—The Amazon Basin

He was going to die, that was certain. In fact, he didn't know how he'd survived the plane crash, nor did he understand what had kept him going through the jungle these past days...or weeks...or months. Long ago, Jackson had lost track of time as the nightmare lengthened and blurred into rhythmic repetitions of days and nights, each one bringing new threats.

The first day or two, when hope was fresh and he expected to see a cluster of palafitas, or shacks on stilts, and at least one canoe around every river bend, he'd subsisted on that box of candy, steadfastly refusing to eat the strange vegetation that grew along the riverbank. But then, when the sweets were gone and he'd begun to starve in earnest, he'd devoured anything that might be edible. Just as well die from food poisoning as from snake-bite or a wild animal attack or maybe even a lethal dart from an Indian blow-gun.

Not that he'd seen evidence of any humans, or large animals either, but he felt them surrounding him, just as he'd sensed they were lurking outside the circle of moonlight on the night of the crash. Waiting, stalking, taking their time and knowing that he was bound to lose at some point, they waited to pounce, and the victim's identity wouldn't matter.

Jackson's thoughts turned to his past life and the choices he'd made; most of them appeared, at this point, to be the wrong ones. When he'd met Starr she was nineteen, glamorous, beautiful and attending community college; he'd been dazzled blind. And had stayed that way for many years, he reflected bitterly, glowering at the sluggishly moving river. It was his own fault for pampering her, trying to make himself into the kind of man she'd admire. Even his children were strangers and probably always had been; he was so busy trying to make Starr proud of him that he'd never focused on Sophia and Lorenzo. So preoccupied with his business and status that he failed to notice that his marriage had no substance at all and his connection with Starr stretched only as far as what he could materially provide.

He paused, ears attuned to a sudden, if faint, rustling in the dense canopy overhead. It stopped after a few moments then began again with a fraction less caution. Pressing his motionless body against the twisted trunk of a tree, his eyes probed the constant gloom of the thick rain forest, one hand clutching the metal box. Since the beginning of the ordeal, his senses had sharpened and his nerves tightened until he now seemed to operate on permanent tension and anxiety. The situation was far too dangerous to allow the luxury of deep sleep either day or night, although once it grew dark he forced himself to rest and nap, either in the thick branches of a tree or in some form of ground shelter. He'd discovered very quickly that far too many of these animals were nocturnal. The jungle teemed with activity at night, a fact he'd begun to discover when he stumbled over an armadillo.

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