Free Betrayed by Jeanette Windle

come forward, the Assistance to Distressed Citizens Abroad Fund had paid for a cremation and the return of two surviving minors to their point of origin.
     
    Later that evening she’d shown the report to Evelyn. “I was just wondering . . . I guess this means Jeff—I mean, my birth father—never finished his Mayan book. So what happened to all the pictures he’d already taken when this happened?”
     
     “I have no idea. I have only the prints he gave me of his Casa de Esperanza pictures—he always developed his own.” Evelyn shook her head. “He was paranoid about his copyrights and losing his pictures. He didn’t want anyone getting hold of them before the book was finished. He couldn’t just send photos off to his publisher by computer like you can now, and he certainly wouldn’t have been foolish enough to drop them in the Guatemalan mail system. It’s gotten better, but back then if you wanted to send something stateside, you found someone traveling north and asked them to courier it for you. If Jeff did that, I have no idea who or where. He didn’t leave anything here.”
     
    All in all, another closed door.
     
    A side note was that Vicki had run into both of Holly’s male interests, as Vicki had cataloged them. The first had been the embassy staffer Holly had introduced as Michael Camden.
     
    As the clerk was running off Vicki’s photocopy, Michael had walked past, then swung around immediately and walked back to Vicki. “You’re Holly’s friend from the airport the other day. Vicki, right?”
     
    “Yes. And you’re . . . Michael? The defense attaché from the DAO.”
     
    “Michael Camden. The defense attaché would be my boss. I’m simply a lowly attaché attached to the defense attaché’s office, if that isn’t too redundant.” For a lowly attaché, he certainly managed to project a persona of cool authority. He glanced from Vicki to the clerk behind the counter. “Is there any way I can be of assistance?”
     
    “No, I’m just doing some research.” Vicki was not going to discuss her birth parents with a stranger before she’d even shared that information with her sister. “But thank you for asking,” she added with belated politeness.
     
    Michael knit his dark eyebrows together. “Holly was going to set an appointment with my secretary to get together. I still haven’t heard from her. Do you know how I can get in touch with her?”
     
    “No, I’d like to get ahold of her myself,” Vicki answered. “But she’s not in town right now anyway. As far as I know she’s up at the wildlife preserve where she works.”
     
    “If you hear from her, let her know I’d still like to sit down with her.” With a courteous nod, he walked away.
     
    Vicki’s second encounter was Joe, the WRC handyman and pilot. He’d been walking rapidly toward the high guarded gate of the embassy just as Vicki was flagging down a taxi to return to Casa de Esperanza. At first she didn’t recognize him. In his tucked-in, buttoned-up shirt and pants, his blonde mane slicked back and tamed, he looked more like a businessman than the surfer she’d met.
     
    Vicki would have liked to ask him for news of Holly, but she was already in the taxi when she realized who he was. He’d glanced up just as the cab was pulling away. He raised a hand in greeting, the corner of his mouth sloping down in that derisive smile of his, before striding into the embassy.
     
    Which brought Vicki back with annoyance to her sister. Holly, I love you, but honestly! If Holly was going to keep sulking much longer, it would serve her right if Vicki just booked that ticket home.
     
    I’ll call the office and have them radio a message that I’m winding down here. Then it’ll be her call if she wants to see me before I leave.
     
    Vicki checked her watch. Just enough time before lunch for her students’ favorite part of the morning studies—the Bible lesson that was an integral part of any Casa de Esperanza project. At