Follow Your Star, Jennifer Bohnet [best fiction novels to read txt] 📗

involved in dangerous waters. These people you’re involved with will cast you aside when they have no further use for you. They’ll throw you to the lions without a second thought.’

‘I don’t happen to agree with you, but if it happens – it’s my problem not yours.’

‘The fact that you’re my son and you’re besmirching the family name makes it my problem.’

Nanette could hear the tension in Jean-Claude’s voice as she edged nearer the study door.

‘Just remember the twins too. They need their father around. Not languishing in jail for some unrealistic get-rich-quick crime he was stupid enough to get involved with. And, Mathieu, never forget, you can be thrown out of the Principality. If the Grimaldis can do it to one of their own, then it can happen to anyone.’

To Nanette’s ears, the silence following Jean-Claude’s last remark seemed to last forever. She was just about to knock on the door and call out, when Mathieu spoke again. This time he appeared to be measuring his words carefully.

‘Papa, please trust me on this. I do actually know what I’m doing and in a couple of months you, and everyone else, will realize it too.’

‘I hope so, Mathieu. I sincerely hope so,’ Jean-Claude said quietly.

Both men turned as Nanette opened the study door.

‘Hi. The twins are waiting for you down by the pool, Mathieu,’ she said.

‘Sorry – I forgot the time. I’ll see you later, Dad,’ and Mathieu left.

Jean-Claude looked at her. ‘How much did you overhear?’

Nanette shrugged. ‘Enough to realize how worried you still are about Mathieu. Has something else happened?’

‘No – other than I have now met Boris and took an instant dislike to the man. Also’ – he hesitated – ‘there are rumours flying around about an illegal cartel involving several high-profile personalities.’

‘But you don’t know for sure that Mathieu is involved in that?’

Jean-Claude shook his head. ‘No. But I have reason to believe Zac Ewart is – and, as you and I both know, he and Mathieu are very close.’

Vanessa stumbled over some exposed roots of an immense tree that towered above her as she followed their machete-wielding guide along the muddy track, taking them deeper and deeper into the forest.

All day they had hacked their way into the depths of the steamy, lush forest. Now their destination, a native village, was only an hour away.

Trudging in single file behind Ralph and the others, Vanessa felt both tired and exhilarated. The clean oxygen-filled air, heavy with moisture, had initially somehow bestowed a feeling of euphoria and excitement on her, but now her clothes were beginning to smell and feel damp from all the humidity.

Her skin was itching where unknown insects had bitten her. Her head was sweaty from the wide brimmed hat she was wearing to deflect the sun and to stop the legions of creepy crawlies above her in the rain forest’s canopy, from falling into her hair. She longed for the day to end.

Their trek had taken them between columns of trees so tall their tops disappeared from view, with long liana vines hanging and wrapping themselves around the trunks. Vast spider-webs had spanned the green vegetation, where some leaves were as huge as the parasol Vanessa dreamily imagined sitting under and relaxing.

At ground level everything appeared to be in a state of flux. Strange smells wafted up from where plants were growing, decaying, dying, surrounded by lots of bugs, snakes and other things that Vanessa just knew were waiting to take a bite out of her.

As the day wore on, the sounds of the jungle had become familiar. Sloths shaking the treetops looking for a resting spot, the echoing cries of the howler monkeys as they swung through the trees and the ever-present noise of the cicadas mingling with birdsong became background noises to the group as they hacked their way through the rain forest.

The village clearing appeared unexpectedly. One minute the guide was leading them along a muddy track beneath the jungle canopy, the next they came to an abrupt standstill as their way was barred by a group of native Indians holding their hunting spears at arm’s length.

For one heart-stopping moment, Vanessa thought they were about to be attacked, but it was simply the welcoming party come to escort them into the village.

The primitive palm thatched huts on their stilts stood around the edge of the clearing, where the village animals, including a fat pig and several roosters, were roaming freely scouring the land for scraps.

Walking to the centre of the encampment with curious villagers eyeing them from a distance, Vanessa noticed a small child standing close to her mother watching the strangers with wide brown eyes.

Vanessa smiled at her and was rewarded with a shy smile in return before the little girl turned and ran after a baby pig, before settling down in the dust to stroke and play with it. Looking at her, naked and beautifully brown, with her bare feet planted firmly on the earth, the phrase ‘being at one with nature’ came into Vanessa’s mind. This little girl was definitely in harmony with the natural world that she lived in.

Briefly Vanessa envied her the simplicity of her childhood – and her life to come.

The chief shaman came forward to welcome them and showed them to the hut reserved for visitors.

They’d barely had time to sling their hammocks between the beams and change their damp clothes before a young woman appeared inviting them to come and eat the special meal the villagers had prepared in their honour.

There were bowls of yucca soup, rice,