Good question. The first time he’d met her, Stella Dane had left an impression on him that he hadn’t been able to shake. But he could hardly tell her that. “You’re a good cop, and I want you to take this disappearing woman seriously.”

Her face turned solemn. “I would have anyway. I only asked for a drug test because your story was so strange, and I was concerned.”

She’d been worried about him. The idea pleased him. Most people simply assumed the worst, but Stella was different, which brought on a whole other set of concerns. Mac would be heading back to Brazil in eight weeks. He was spread thin trying to establish a connection with his family. But Stella . . .

She made him think about things he’d never considered before, like not coming home to an empty house. Like having someone to share a late-night meal.

Or his bed.

“So that’s what you were doing when you were shot? Investigating drug traffickers.”

“I’ve been working in that region studying wildlife since I was an undergraduate. I know many of the villagers. Until I went to work for the DEA, I was a simple wildlife biologist studying the effects of deforestation and pollution on giant river otters. Now my expeditions are funded by a fake university that’s actually a front for the DEA. Before this trip, I always worked alone, but my new boss wanted me to have a team.” In reality, his new boss hadn’t trusted him. “So this time I was paired with a special agent and a guide. We were only supposed to observe,” he said. “There’s been an increase in traffic on the Amazon River from Peru and Colombia into Brazil. Our job was to report who was moving what.”

“How did you end up with the DEA?”

“I am a wildlife biologist, but three years ago, I accidentally ran into drug traffickers who’d captured two agents. They were in the process of torturing them. I couldn’t walk away.”

“You saved them?” Stella slid her cardboard cup back and forth between her hands.

“I set the place on fire. When the traffickers left the men inside to burn, I went in after them.”

“Interesting tactic.”

“I was outnumbered twelve machine guns to my machete. Not good odds.” Mac traced a scar in his oak table. Even if he’d failed and the agents had burned, a quick death by fire would have been better than an entire night of having their bits and pieces lopped off one by one. Mac had known from personal experience that drug traffickers were the bane of humanity, but seeing them in action had flipped a switch inside him. Before that night, he’d never taken a life. But he’d killed three men, easily, almost automatically, as the Colonel’s training and Mac’s muscle memory had taken over his body.