A Perilous Eden

by Heather Graham

  It was difficult to be indignant when he was straddling her hips, holding her prisoner. Even in the moonlight, his eyes were ice-blue, and so cold. All around them was darkness, shadows, the furtive, secretive rustlings of the tropical jungle. And there was the whisper and bubble of the water as it cascaded by them, strangely beautiful in the night. Yet it was a sound that warned her it wasn’t over, that they had come to a perilous Eden here, and she still might never leave it She fought against the pounding of her heart and said, her voice soft, defying him, “I had to scream. What did you expect me to do, let those men kidnap a statesman and a friend?”

  He rose, reaching down to her. When his fingers closed around hers, she found that she was trembling. Things were coming out into the open, and all that she could think of was the past. She wanted to believe him, but was it only because she wanted to believe him? Because he had yet to really hurt her? Because he hadn’t forced anything from her, even when he had her completely in his power?

  Or because he had never seemed to care enough about anything or anyone to lie? His name was not Michael, it was Adam. Adam Tchartoff. And he was more of an enigma now than ever.

  She still didn’t trust him; she couldn’t trust him. By his own admission, he had brought Daldrin here on purpose and her by accident. He was a spy, he had told her. A spy on behalf of his country.

  She stared at his hand, at the strong, bronzed fingers, the callused palm. She accepted it, and he pulled her to her feet. Their eyes met, and she watched him suspiciously. Her voice very low, she asked him, “If you are who you say you are, why did my father pretend not to know who I was talking about the day of the memorial service? Why did Daldrin want you around me all the time—and yet not want us to be alone together? Think about it—Mr. Tchartoff. Doesn’t that make you look like a rather suspicious character?”

  “Your father and Daldrin were concerned for you, I imagine.”

  “If you’re an American, why wouldn’t they accept you?’”

  “I’m not an American. Not anymore.”

  She pulled her hand away from his. “Then what are you?”

  “An Israeli.”

  It was all so fantastic. She didn’t know what to believe. And he didn’t seem to feel the need to convince her any longer. He turned and started walking up the incline toward the caves. She hurried after him, forgetting the need to be silent, forgetting everything in a sudden burst of fury.

  She caught hold of his arm, spinning him around furiously. “You told me it wasn’t a holy war! You told me—”

  “I told you to shut up!” he warned her, catching her shoulders. He opened his mouth to speak, then fell silent, dragging her to the ground. She started to protest, then heard the rustle of brush high above them, a rustle that indicated men tramping around.

  Her heart beat faster. As he held her, she could feel his heartbeat matching her own, just as their breath and the tension within fused until they were one.

  “She isn’t here, and she hasn’t been here!” someone said in accented English.

  “She must be on the island,” came the reply. The second speaker was Mohammed, Amber was certain, and they were speaking in English because his Spanish was so limited, and apparently the other man’s Arabic was just as poor.

  “No, she doesn’t have to be on the island!” the first man retorted. “That Adam, that genius with explosives, that priceless fool, he may have taken her. He is more in love with the woman than he is with any cause! We should have killed her. We should have killed her that night on the ship!”

  The other man said something that neither Amber nor Adam could hear. Then the voices faded away, and the soft, subtle jungle noises took over once again.

  They waited. Silent, perfectly still, their heartbeats gradually slowing together. And while they waited, Amber suddenly knew beyond a doubt that it was true, it was all true, every word he had told her. A rush of warmth swept over her as she realized that he wasn’t a terrorist, that he didn’t want to murder men in cold blood, that they were, in a strange way, on the same side. She closed her eyes, feeling the night, feeling his hands on her, still holding her close. She’d been falling in love with him on the ship. She’d never known what force of nature had made her so desperately attracted to him, and she didn’t know what it was that had so seeped into her heart that she’d wanted to forgive him, no matter what. At least now she knew she wasn’t a fool, that her intuition about him had been right. Maybe it didn’t matter, of course, because they still might die. And perhaps there was more, because he hadn’t answered all her questions. There was still a wall there, a wall that warned her to stay away. It hadn’t been only a question of security; he hadn’t wanted her to come close.

  His hold on her eased, and he got slowly to his feet. Once again he reached down to her, but he was gazing up the mountainside and spoke softly. “They’re on to me.” He looked at her, his eyes the shade of the night-touched moon. “We’ll stay here tonight, in the caves. They won’t search again until light, and I’ll head in at dawn.”

  “Head in! You can’t go back! They’ll kill you.”

  “I have to go back. I’m not done setting the fuses, and more important than that, I’ve got to get Daldrin and the others out.”

  “But—”

  “Amber,” he said, taking her shoulders fiercely again, “this is as safe a place as you’re going to find. The falls lead to the mouth of the river, and at eleven tomorrow morning, there will be American boats right off the shore. If I don’t come back, ride the river. Follow it out to the ocean. You’ll make it.”

  “What do you mean, if you don’t come back?”

  He released her impatiently and started up the incline. She didn’t follow him, and he looked at her. “Come on. Let’s find shelter in the caves.”

  She thought about ignoring his order, but that wouldn’t ease her frustration. She followed him, almost slipping on the steep, damp incline. He must have heard her falter, because he turned, took her hand and led her the rest of the way up. They stood before one of the caves, a trickle of water falling from above. He started to say something, then looked down silently. His eyes met hers, and he reached out, sweeping her into his arms. She almost cried out, startled, but swallowed the sound. He took her to the bed of the river, where he knelt with her and carefully bathed her feet. She stared at his tawny head and remained silent. He ripped off the tails of his cotton shirt and bound them gently around her feet, then lifted her and carried her into the cave.

  “They must hurt like blazes,” he said.

  She didn’t answer him. There was little light, so she could barely see him. And there was so much that she wanted to know about him. She reached up and touched his cheek. “What was your first language?” she asked him.

  His eyes fell to meet hers. “Russian.”

  “Russian!”

  He smiled at last, a rueful smile. And he walked deeper into the cave, where he set her against the wall, then sat beside her. “I can’t light a fire,” he told her. “It would lead them straight to us.”

  “I don’t need a fire. Michael—Adam. I need to know something about you,” she said.

  He shrugged. His wrists rested upon his knees, his hands dangling until he lifted them, then let them fall again. “My father was a Russian refugee after the war. My mother was Austrian, but she had been in a concentration camp, and even by 1950, when I was born, the Austrian government was still so swamped with refugees that they weren’t allowing the children born of other nationalities to become citizens. We managed to reach the United States, and I became an American.”

  “Oh.” He hadn’t really explained a thing. But he was still smiling in the darkness; she knew him well enough now to read his features by the tone of his voice. Sometimes. When he wanted to be read, she thought.

  “My father died, and my mother moved to Israel. I joined her there.” His smile faded. She wanted to touch him, but she couldn’t. A coldness was suddenly emanating from him, and though she despe
rately wanted him to go on, she didn’t know if she wanted to hear what he had to say.

  “I met a woman. An Israeli woman. I fell in love, and we married, and we had a child, and I became an Israeli.”

  His coldness settled over her heart. He had a wife and a child, and everything he had shared with her had been an awful, horrible lie.

  “You have a wife and a child,” she whispered. “And yet you’ve come here to risk your life—”

  “They’re dead,” he said flatly. “And I am already dead, Miss Amber Larkspur, and so I risk my life. They died because of a car bomb. It was meant for the army intelligence officer Adam Tchartoff, but it killed a beautiful young woman and an innocent baby girl. It was set by the Death Squad at the command of Khazar Abdul, and that is also why I am here. I could never tell you any of this before because I was afraid you might give me away, you were so frantic. But that’s it now, everything.”

  Everything. And she felt colder than ever. “At the memorial service that day—”

  “I came to the memorial service because I served with the unit. It was your father’s way of contacting me. That service was arranged so he could reach me.”

  “My father wouldn’t—”

  “Your father didn’t do anything wrong. He needed to contact me, and the service was a good thing. It wasn’t a lie. You were there. It was good for the widows and the children and the men. He accomplished two things at once, that’s all.”

  “He told me to stay away from you.”

  “Yes.” He stretched out by the wall without saying more. Amber stood uncertainly and moved a short distance away from him. She stretched out and stared at the ceiling, wondering how she could still be in such grave danger, yet lie there aching anew for what she felt she had lost. “Tell me,” she whispered in the darkness, “did I mean anything to you at all?”

  He was silent for a long moment. Then he said, just as quietly. “Yes. You meant everything. I was alive again.”

  Alive … But he made no move to touch her, and the tenor of his voice had not changed. She had hated him, had fought him for betraying her. But he had never betrayed her. And she wanted to go to him tonight because she might never be able to again. She had slept beside him, afraid of the warmth of his flesh and the power of his limbs, but her fears had been groundless. And now they had only the few hours until dawn. She didn’t know if he loved her—if he ever could love her—but she was sorry for his pain.

  And she needed to touch him.

  She rose in the darkness, but this time she did not move away from him. She walked to his side, and she knew he was aware that she had come, but he didn’t move. He only waited. She got down on her knees beside him, and the filtering moonlight allowed her to see the strong lines of his features and the light-blue fire of his eyes. She opened her mouth to speak, but the words refused to come. She unbuttoned her shirt, pulled it over her head and let it fall to the floor, and still he didn’t say anything, didn’t move, his eyes surveying her. “I—I need you, Adam,” she managed to stutter at last. “I need you tonight. Please …”

  Her voice lingered on the air. She was afraid that he wouldn’t touch her, that the truth, the pain, bare and exposed, might sweep him away from her. “Adam …”

  His arms swept around her, drawing her down, her lips hovering over his. “Adam, may I stay? I need you so badly tonight. I need to touch you and hold you and …”

  He smiled, and the blue fire rose into his eyes. “There is a word in my mother’s country. Shalom. Welcome. I need you, too,” he whispered in turn. And then his lips touched her, fusing with them in a hot, open-mouthed kiss that stole into her soul and swept her breath away.

  The cave floor was cold and damp, and the night was filled with danger, yet none of that mattered. His touch was the fire against the cold. Amber heard the flow of the water, the melody moving beyond the cave. She heard the magic of the night, the chirping of the crickets, the call of the birds. And she heard the echoes of their hearts, and the breeze that swept around them. They were on their feet, facing one another, and their clothing was gone. And there, in the moonlight, Amber stood before him and thought that they might have been alone together in some strange, exotic paradise. Adam might have been the first man, his skin glowing in the pale light that filtered into the cave, the length of him hard and masculine, the call between them as ancient as the earth beneath them. Welcome. He wanted her tonight. She felt the heat of his gaze and knew that his eyes were sweeping over her, and that he found her beautiful despite her salt-dampened hair and rag-wrapped feet. When he looked at her that way, the danger of the night disappeared and they were alone in Eden.

  She cried out softly, and together they closed the space between them. Suddenly she was in his arms again. He caressed her shoulders and held her close as his lips met hers once more, as his tongue moved into her mouth. He made love aggressively, givingly, but tonight she was going to touch him.

  She broke the kiss, then tasted his lips, teasing them with her tongue. Then her mouth moved to his shoulders, to his chest. With slow, sensual desire, she moved her body against his. She teased his nipples with her teeth and nuzzled her face lower against the crisp, tawny hairs on his chest. She touched him, her touch moving lower, until she was on her knees before him. She loved him completely, and he, too, got down on his knees before her, wrapping her in his arms.

  When they lay down on the hard earth she felt as if her bed was in the clouds, because sensation ruled her heart and her senses. All that she wanted was this man deep inside her. He entered her with hunger, with fierce, compelling desire. He moved in rhythm with the pulse of the night, with the tempest of the falls, with hot, driving passion. The crashing of the water seemed to escalate; the drumbeat of the night came harder and harder. His muscles strained and tightened, tension constricting his body, tightening his features. She felt the earth, and yet she wasn’t of it. Soft sounds escaped her as she rose so high it seemed unbearable, and then the shimmering explosion of ultimate sensation came upon her, and the ecstasy of it freed them from danger, brought them from darkness into brilliant, bursting gold light.

  He held her close, their hearts beating in unison, slowing in unison. Amber groaned and turned her head into his shoulder, where she softly kissed his salt-damp skin and lay replete.

  She didn’t know how long they were still. She heard the movement of the water, felt the gentle breezes of the night cooling their naked flesh. But then his fingers threaded into her hair, massaging her nape, and he lifted her head and whispered softly, “You make me feel alive again, Amber.” Then he groaned and kissed her again, and she felt the heat rising within him once more.

  She never knew when his soothing touch became the touch of passion. The night was short, but there were hours there to be shared. Sleep was forgotten. Again and again the precious sweetness exploded within her, and then his lips would touch hers once more, his hand would cradle her breast, and his lips would be hot against the coolness of her flesh, until the need rose all over again. Finally she realized that when the brilliance fell upon them, it was the real light of dawn.

  Adam rose and went to the lagoon, and Amber knew that no matter what they had shared during the night, the day had come to rob them of it.

  When he returned, he dressed quietly. She watched him with her eyes half closed, and he stared at her. Then he lowered himself to his knees beside her once again. “Stay here,” he whispered to her. “And don’t forget. If I’m not back by eleven o’clock, you start out. Follow the river and swim like a champ. Do you understand?”

  She flung her arms around him. “Don’t leave me here alone. Let me come—”

  “You would be in my way, and God knows, if someone got his hands on you, it could be the death of all of us. We both know that. You have to stay here, and don’t leave the cave. Do you understand? Don’t leave the cave. I don’t want to see you.”

  She nodded against his chest. “But I can’t do it. I can’t let you go.”

 
; “You have to,” he told her.

  “If you go back—”

  “I have to go back. You know that.”

  He released her quickly and walked purposefully out of the cave. She knew that he was gone for good.

  Amber reached for her shirt, shivering as she slipped into it. She saw that he had scratched out a message in the sand. Shalom. He had forgotten to remind her last night that it also meant goodbye.

  She rose and climbed into her jeans. Her hands and face were hot and dusty and sticky, and without thought, she hobbled out of the cave toward the water. She shouldn’t drink the brackish water, she knew, no matter how thirsty she was. Still, she dampened her feet in their bindings, and splashed water over her face. She froze then, remembering that he had told her not to leave the cave. But when she looked around quickly, she couldn’t see a thing.

  She heard a rustle in the brush, and her heart thundered, then seemed to stop, and she waited, still and silent, but she saw no one. The sun was beginning to beat down. The world was green and blue and, according to all apparent evidence, peaceful.

  She went to the cave and waited, wondering if she would have the courage to go down the river if he didn’t come back.

  She glanced at her wristwatch. The elegant gold tones seemed so out of place with her ill-fitting jeans, men’s cotton shirt, rag-wrapped feet and salt-encrusted hair. It was a testament to the manufacturer’s skill that the timepiece was still working, she reflected. Or was it? Time seemed to be crawling by. Seconds ticked by more slowly than whole days.

  She paced the floor, then sat for a while again. It wasn’t even eight-thirty, but it felt as if Adam had been gone for hours. How had she come to this? Maybe God played tricks on people. Maybe he had brought her Adam just to show her that she had never really known what she wanted before, that she hadn’t begun to understand love.