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

there by a little known Frenchwoman and she was looking forward to an hour or two wandering around the exhibits.

Sitting on the bed in her air-conditioned hotel bedroom, Vanessa pressed the ‘save’ key on Ralph’s laptop before shutting the computer down and sliding it into the travel bag.

In a few minutes they would be on their way to the airport and the adventure would really begin. Their honeymoon had been wonderful, but now she was looking forward to spending the next few months with her new husband in one of the world’s most exotic places. They would no longer be alone but part of a team. She hadn’t yet met Harry and Nick, the cameramen, but Ralph had assured her they’d all get on. He’d worked with them both before.

‘They’re both passionate about the environment and I know they’ll do all they possibly can to make sure the documentary shows the jungle as it is.’

Vanessa knew Ralph was determined his documentary was going to record the lives of the ‘real’ native Indians as they struggled to survive in a changing forest and it was one of the reasons he’d refused a sponsorship offer from a large multinational company.

‘Staying independent, I can show the truth,’ he’d said to Vanessa when he was outlining his plans. ‘No-one can tell me what to film or say.’

Deciding she had time for one last shower before Ralph returned and they left for the airport, Vanessa quickly undressed and stepped under the warm water. Wrapping herself in the hotel’s large bath towel afterwards, she crossed to the window and glanced out at the bustling street scene below.

Tomorrow this room would be a memory, and the chaotic scenes outside would have been replaced by forest and vegetation inhabited by strange sounding animals.

Their first few days in the Amazon jungle were going to be spent in the comfort of an ‘eco tourist’ camp before they and the crew moved off to explore more inaccessible areas with a native guide. Harry and Nick had flown up earlier with all their supplies and would have organized the next stage of the journey by the time she and Ralph arrived.

Vanessa turned to smile at Ralph as he closed the door behind him.

‘Everything packed? Good’ Ralph said. ‘Ten minutes and we’re off. Think I’ll have a quick shower too. Might be sometime before we get the luxury of hot water again.’

Once they were both dressed, they picked up the backpacks Ralph had insisted were far more practical than suitcases in the jungle, and went to find their taxi for the trip out to the airport.

The office of the company that operated the small Cessna plane Ralph had chartered to fly them up to an outpost on the Amazon River, was situated at the edge of the airfield. Only internal flights operated from this rundown airstrip and walking towards the shabby hut where they had to check-in, Vanessa found herself worrying about the safety of the plane she was about to board.

‘They do have regular maintenance and safety checks, don’t they?’ she asked Ralph.

‘Of course. Don’t worry. José and Carlos are very proud of their planes. Carlos told me they are the best in Brazil. Ah here’s José,’

‘Senhor Ralph and a senhora. We are ready for you. We go and—’ The shrill ring of a telephone interrupted him and he glanced towards the desk. ‘Bom-dia,’ he answered before immediately falling silent. When after several moments he replaced the receiver his eyes were bright with tears as he turned to face Ralph and Vanessa.

‘That was another pilot telling me that a mutual friend has been shot down near Manaus.’

José swore angrily. ‘The authorities apparently mistake it for a drug-running plane. The fools! But this time it is a big mistake – an American missionary and her family were on board. Now we shall have an investigation.’

Vanessa gazed at him horror struck. Manaus was a place on Ralph’s itinerary. They were due to camp near there in a few weeks. She moved closer to Ralph, who placed a comforting arm around her shoulders.

‘Do they often shoot planes out of the sky?’ she asked.

José nodded vehemently. ‘It happens,’ he said shortly.

Vanessa shivered. Of course she’d known they were going into a drug-smuggling area, but she didn’t do drugs, no-one she knew did drugs and she hadn’t expected the drug trade to impinge on her life.

Images of the twins came into her mind. What if she and Ralph had been … no! She couldn’t, wouldn’t, follow that thought. Ralph had warned her about the dangers of this trip, from mosquitoes to alligators, but the shooting down of planes had never been mentioned.

Ralph glanced at José.

‘I need to have a private word with my wife. Give us a couple of minutes, will you, please?’

José nodded. ‘I’ll wait by the plane. We need to take off in the next quarter of an hour so don’t take too long for this private word.’

As José strolled off to prepare the plane, Ralph took Vanessa gently in his arms.

‘Are you sure you want to go through with this? I know you’re thinking about the consequences for the twins if we’d been on that plane. After this flight into the jungle, I promise our exploring will be done on foot, or by water. So, after today the next plane you get on will be the one taking us home.’

He gently kissed her on the forehead.

‘But on the other hand, if you’d rather I continued on my own and you go home now, I’ll understand.’

‘Do you know what time we can expect Mathieu?’ Jean-Claude asked, as he and Nanette sat on the terrace overlooking the swimming pool of his villa. ‘If at all?’

‘No,’ Nanette said. ‘I think he was hoping to be back before the twins went to bed tonight.’

‘Has he said anything to you about his spot of recent trouble?’ Jean-Claude asked.

Nanette shook her head. ‘Seems to have blown over. He was worried that the authorities wouldn’t let him leave but.…’ She shrugged.