Prologue

      Had he heard voices?

      Slowly, Marco Esposito opened his eyes, dreading the sight of the dappled shades of the jungle surrounding him. God, if he got out of here alive, he’d never wear green again.

      He held his breath, straining to hear above the warbling, whistling clamor of the creatures in the canopy above his head. Must’ve been wishful thinking. Or hallucinating.

      His tongue felt thick and swollen. It took effort to unstick it from the roof of his mouth. He was dying for a drink, but he’d finished the last of the water late yesterday. Kind of ironic, since he was soaked from head to toe by the steamy humidity in the air.

      Something was crawling over his hand. He fought back a shudder and hoped it wasn’t one of the brilliantly colored little tree frogs whose poison would finish him off a lot faster than the blood he’d already lost, considerable as he thought it was.

      He knew better than to move, and not just because of threatening creatures. The pain was bearable as long as he lay completely still. He wanted to check his watch, but even the movement of his arm sent hot daggers of fire lancing up his right leg, so he didn’t. He squinted up through the leafy veil of the rain forest that soared in a tangled jumble of vines, thick tree trunks and leaves overhead.

      Daylight. Unless he’d been dozing a lot longer than he thought, this was the second day, then. Relief swamped him. By day the jaguar he so feared would be lying low, waiting for night, when its sharp predator’s vision was unparalleled in the close, black regions of the terrain through which it passed.

      He’d kept the flashlight on last night, shining it at random spots around him until the battery weakened and finally died. If he wasn’t found today, the jaguar would find him tonight.

      By rolling his eyes to the left, he could just see the humped outline of what had been a small plane, wingless and shattered among the ferns. The pilot was still inside, dead since the moment of impact. The other body lay on the ground beside the plane. He’d covered it as best he could with a heavy tarp, broken open a couple of capsules of ammonia and prayed that any passing predators would be too afraid of the strange scents to come too close for a while.

      Grief tightened his chest. Stu had been a good researcher, a trusted friend and damn good on expeditions like this. He’d died less than an hour after