Ari stared up at him. Right now, she felt Rafe’s sadness. It was expressed in the line of his mouth, now compressed, and in the way his deep voice was serrated with old, unresolved grief. “You didn’t do that, though? You went to Stanford and got a Ph.D. in biology instead.”
“I defied my father from the time I was old enough to know what the word no meant,” he said.
Laughing politely, Ari said, “Kirk, my brother, was a lot like that, too, growing up.”
“Maybe it’s a boy thing?” Rafe mused, enjoying talking with her. There was a surprisingly deep maturity and understanding he hadn’t thought possible in Ari. Realizing she was old beyond her years made him hungry to converse with her.
“I don’t know about that. I wanted to say no, but when I watched Kirk and Janis get it from my father, I knew better.”
“Ah, yes, the knock-down, drag-out fights…I know them well.”
“You didn’t turn out to be like your father at all?”
“No, I am like my mother. She is a medical doctor and a fine scientist. Her love is virology and microbiology. It was she who taught me the love of the jungle surrounding Manaus. My father disapproved of her taking me with her on her field trips to find new viruses in the rain forest. I fell in love with the trees, with the land, the animals…the people. From the time I was eight years old, I knew what I wanted to be—a backwoodsman.”
“A forest ranger?”
“One and the same, yes.”
“Did your father finally understand? Did he bless your decision to do what you’re doing now?”
Brows knitting, Rafe looked down at his long, large-knuckled hands. There were so many scars on them, white and pink ones, older and newer ones. “No…” he admitted slowly, pleased at Ari’s understanding of him. “When I told him I was going to Stanford—that I wouldn’t be following in his footsteps—he disowned me.”
“No!” Ari gasped. She nearly came out of the chair, then stopped herself, staring at his rock-hard profile and seeing the anguish clearly evident in his face. “Surely he eventually forgave and forgot?”
Shaking his head, Rafe gave her a rueful glance. “No, not to this day. My mother sent me money to go to Stanford. I held a lot of odd jobs to make the rest of my tuition. She couldn’t always send me money because if my father had ever found out, all hell would have broken loose, for sure. He never understood my love of the people who live in the basin.” He made a wide, sweeping gesture toward the bank, where thousands of trees, palms and ferns lined the river like an unbroken corridor in different hues of green, ranging from evergreen and olive to chartreuse.
“How terribly sad.” Ari felt hot tears steal into her eyes. She saw him give her a sharpened look. “Sorry, I cry at the drop of a hat. My father hates to see me cry.”
Leaning over, Rafe slid his fingers along the clean line of her jaw. Her eyes flared with shock, surprise and something else…pleasure, perhaps. But that was not why he’d followed his heart and touched her. “The Jaguar Clan has a saying, my wild woman. That if we cannot shed tears from our heart for those who suffer, then we are made of stone.” Grazing her flaming cheek, his fingers tangled briefly in the gold of her hair along her temple. If he didn’t stop, he’d kiss her. Shocked, Rafe pulled away and moved uncomfortably back to the wheel. Where had the words wild woman come from? He’d spoken them like an endearment, something intimate and private that he wanted to share only with her.
Without thinking, Ari put her hand to her cheek where he’d touched her like a butterfly grazing a sweet, honey-filled flower. The tenderness in Rafe’s normally hard expression shook her to her soul. This man…this person who seemed to know the very center of her heart, had touched her as she’d never been touched before. No one had ever sent burning tingles of pleasure across her sensitized flesh as he had. No one had held her heart with such tenderness. Blinking back tears, Ari could only sit there and absorb the moment. She couldn’t think, could only feel. Her heart throbbed like a rainbow burning high in the blue sky above them. Surely this was how a rainbow felt, she thought as she moved her fingers lingeringly across where her heart lay, open and vulnerable.
Gathering her courage, Ari whispered, “In my eyes—my heart—you’re a knight in shining armor. Look how you care for and protect the Indians in the territory you have responsibility for. The people must love you for your dedication to them. I’m so sorry your father can’t realize your dream, your vision. I hope someday he will.”
Quirking his mouth, Rafe said, “Not a chance, Ari. He’s set in stone. The stone that the Jaguar Clan refers to. He’s all head. He’s buried his heart and feelings a long time ago. I’m afraid he’s got an ego the size of São Paulo, and São Paulo has fourteen million people in it.”
“But,” she said, opening her hands, “how do you stay in touch with your family, then?”
“I have my ways.” He smiled a little savagely. “My two younger sisters and brothers live in Manaus beneath his shadow, doing what he wants them to do with their lives. My mother and I have a secret code so that when I call her on a certain phone line, she knows it’s me. I usually meet her at my home, which sits on the outskirts of Manaus.”
“At least you get to see them.” Still, Ari saw the damage that his father had done to him. Saw the agony in his eyes and the way he stood rigidly at the wheel. Her heart ached for him. “I didn’t know you had a house in the city. I thought you lived here,” she said, gesturing to the houseboat.
“I do live out of this,” he told her. “When I’m not tracking illegal miners, drug runners or drug lords on the land, I use a small aluminum skiff with a motor to move around in the back channels of the Amazon. I keep the houseboat tied up in a channel near the Juma village. They watch over it when I’m away on a mission.”
“Then the house in Manaus is…”
He smiled. “I work for the State, so I have to have residency there. About twice a year I go in and report on what’s happening in my territory, create a budget and tell the board how the money will be spent for the coming year. That kind of thing. It usually takes a week to do that.”
“And that’s when you see your family?”
“Yes.”
She heard the satisfaction in his voice. “In my eyes, you’re still a knight,” she said, and gave him a small smile.
Rafe nodded. “A tarnished knight banished from his land and from his family. Not exactly storybook material, am I? More of a disappointment.”
Frowning, Ari shook her head. “You have problems with your father just like I do.” She rested her elbows on the journal and planted her chin in her cupped hands. “We’re lucky to have the moms we did—or do.”
“My mother’s a pearl,” Rafe said. “My father doesn’t deserve her, but for whatever reasons, she hasn’t walked out and left him.”
“Mmm, I understand. Maybe our fathers should get together?”
“From the sounds of it, World War III would start.” Rafe snorted and then gave her a wry smile. He looked down at his watch. “Well, in another hour we’ll be at the village…and your new home.” How would she react? Rafe was curious.
Heartened, Ari smiled and sat up straight. “I can hardly wait to see it! I would read books to my mother about the AmazonBasin, about all the trees, plants and beautiful, undiscovered orchids that grew there.”
“Does what you read stack up against the real thing?” he asked, as he gestured to the triple canopy jungle to the right of them.
“Yes. A thousand times over!” Ari clapped her hands. “Even from here I can see what I think are red and pink bromeliads peeking out here and there. Sometimes I wonder if it’s my overactive imagination, or just tricks of shadows and light as the sun runs and hides behind the clouds.”
“You’re seeing right,” Rafe replied, congratulating her. “You’ve got a keen eye. A trained one, as a matter of fact.” He pointed to a twisted and gnarled rubber tree that grew near the edge of the jungle. “See that? The tree with the grayish looking bark?�
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“Yes. A rubber tree, right?”
He grinned. “Right. Look up toward the top of it, on that one branch that looks like an arm bent backward. See those long, spiky leaves shooting out from the joint area?”
Excitedly, Ari followed his direction. “Yes, I see it.”
“That’s a bromeliad. A red one, if I don’t miss my guess. The red bromeliads have very dark green, pointed or lacinated leaves that look like a porcupine with her spines up.”
Thrilled, Ari looked intently as the houseboat floated past the tree. “Wow…I see it! I wish we could stop and I could go climb the tree….” And then she laughed. “Of course, I’m scared to death of heights! I don’t know what I’m going to do about that. I know a lot of orchids grow in the branches of trees.”
Rafe chuckled. “The Juma will help you gather the ones you want. Besides, a lot of orchids are found on tree trunks or on rotting logs that have fallen to the earth. I don’t think you’ll want for orchids.”
Ari couldn’t sit still, she was so excited. Pushing her fingers through her hair to tame it into some semblance of smoothness, she confided in a low, hushed voice, “Rafe, I’m just afraid I’m in a beautiful dream. I’m afraid I’m going to wake up and it will be gone.”
Chapter Five
It was early evening when Rafe moved the houseboat snugly in the calm, muddy channel. Rays of sunlight shot like spokes on a wheel through the gathering cauliflower-shaped clouds on the western horizon.
“These channels are known as igarapes,” Rafe told Ari as he placed the plank from the houseboat to the earthen bank of the channel which was about forty-feet wide. “You’ll see banana trees everywhere, palms, embauba trees, mangos and lots of coffee bushes.” He grinned and leaped to the shore, then stepped halfway up the well-worn, partially painted plank. Holding out his hand to Ari, he said, “Welcome to my humble abode—the Amazon jungle, señorita.”
Ari didn’t know where to look first. As she turned to Rafe, she couldn’t help but smile. He seemed so proud and confident. She stared at the hand he held out to her; it was large with long, artistic fingers, the nails blunt cut, and calluses across his palm. This was a man who worked in nature. Indeed, she thought as she leaned forward, placed her foot on the plank and slid her slender fingers into his, he seemed more and more like the Green Man of European myths and legends. The Green Man was nature personified. Someone who was in complete harmony with all around him.
“Thank you, Señor Antonio,” she said in fluent Spanish. His fingers were strong and firm, yet it was obvious he monitored the amount of strength he exerted as he held her hand and guided her down the rickety plank. As she stepped foot on the reddish-colored earth, she gazed around at Rafe’s camp.
There was a hammock strung between two mango trees and a circular pit for a fire nearby, with four smoothly cut logs around it that acted as chairs. A black iron tripod was set up over the pit, with an iron kettle suspended from it. A few feet away was a gray canvas tent. The tent was large, and she could see boxes and other items stowed within it. A well-worn footpath that led directly into the jungle.
Reluctant to release his hand, she came to Rafe’s side and eased her fingers from him. “I’m here,” she whispered in awe, “I’m really here.”
“And the beings of the jungle welcome you,” Rafe said. He enjoyed her wonder, the hope burning eloquently in her face as she slowly took in every leaf, tree and bush that grew around the small encampment. Her face glowed with excitement. The jungle was alive with noises announcing the coming dusk. Crickets sang. Frogs croaked. In the distance, monkeys were chattering and alternately screaming and whooping at one another as they found their nests in the arms of trees for the coming night.
Heart swelling with joy, Ari turned when she saw something out of the corner of her eye. A small man, wrinkled and thin, his ribs pronounced above the dark green loincloth he wore, appeared silently out of the jungle on the footpath, his feet bare. He was old and his weathered features reminded her of an ancient oak tree. His eyes were dark brown, and his hair was thin and gray. When he met and held her gaze, he smiled. Ari couldn’t help but smile back. The old man had most of his front teeth missing. She wondered how he was able to eat. In his hands, he held something about the size of a cantaloupe wrapped in red cloth. She noticed he wore several strands of seed necklaces interspersed with parrot feathers around his thin, wrinkled neck.
“Ah, Aroka,” Rafe told her conspiratorially. “He’s the chief of the Juma village. Come, you must meet him.”
“How did he know we’d arrived?”
Grinning, Rafe slid his hands into hers and brought her along with him. The gesture was automatic. The look in Ari’s eyes was one of acceptance and happiness, if he wasn’t mistaken. Around her, Rafe was finding that he was becoming completely instinctive and spontaneous. His head warned him that he shouldn’t give in so easily to his desires, but his heart, so lonely and so long without a woman who loved this incredible jungle as he did, said it was perfectly all right. Rafe deferred to his heart—at least this one time. He couldn’t help it—he was enchanted by Ari’s happiness at being here.
Ari saw Aroka smile even more broadly as they halted in front of him. He spoke in an Indian language she didn’t understand. As he spoke, he looked directly at her.
Rafe reluctantly released Ari’s hand and stood between them, acting as interpreter. “Chief Aroka is officially welcoming you to his village. He has invited us to have dinner with him and his family tonight. Today he caught and killed a wild pig, which has been roasting all day in your honor. He says that you look like the sun goddess and wonders if your hair glows at night.”
Ari laughed gently and reached out and touched the chief’s shoulder. “Tell him I’m afraid not. Thank him. Can we go eat with them?”
Rafe swallowed his complete surprise. He hadn’t expected Ari to be so willing to socialize with the natives just yet. “Of course. Half the time I’m eating with the chief and his family, anyway. If it wasn’t for his wife, I’d starve at times.”
Aroka nodded as Rafe accepted the invitation. The old man’s pleasure was mirrored in his tobacco brown features, but then he lost his smile and began a solemn speech to Ari.
Rafe smiled a little and translated. “The chief knows that you have come to draw the many orchids that live in the Great Mother Goddess’s breast. He says that he had a dream last night, before you arrived. This gift he brings to you in welcoming you to his humble village, was what was shown to him by the goddess. He consulted his medicine woman, a priestess of the Jaguar Clan, and she said to present you with this orchid upon your arrival.”
Ari gasped. “An orchid?” She had to stop herself from reaching out for it. Aroka saw her hesitate, and laughed. Bowing deeply, he handed her the gift, which was wrapped in the frayed, red cotton cloth.
The instant the bundle settled in her hands, Ari quickly pulled away the cloth, which fluttered to the ground. What she held in her hands made her give a cry of joy. Of surprise.
“Oh, Rafe! Look! Look at this! Isn’t it exquisite? Beautiful?”
The woman I’m looking at is exquisite and beautiful. Rafe bit back the words. Where had they come from? Instead, he said, “It is.” His voice was strained.
Gazing up at him, Ari drowned in the cinnamon warmth of his gaze and the gentle, hesitant smile he gave her. Instantly, she felt heat charge up her neck and flood her face. She was blushing badly, and her heart pounded at his sincere look. Tearing her gaze from his, she found the words choked in her throat, felt terribly shy in his suddenly larger-than-life presence.
Rafe realized he’d sounded less than enthusiastic. Her crestfallen expression squeezed his pounding heart. “Please,” he urged her, “look at the beauty of the chief’s gift. This is a Gustavia august orchid. The family is Leychidacea.” The pink color on the petals reminded him of her blush, the white of the color of her skin.
Grateful, Ari stared down at the orchid that filled her hand. The leaves wer
e oval, thick and leathery. There were two blooms on the orchid, one fully open, the other partially. The blooms reminded her of roses in shape and color, the pink ranging from fuschia to pale pink at the bottom of the petals. Intermixed with the pink was white and, at the base of each petal, a glaze of pale yellow. The center of the orchid held hundreds of tiny white filigree stamens that arced and bowed toward the deep gold center. Her hands grew hot holding the flower and tingles raced up her fingers and into her forearms. She felt as if in a dream; she was living a dream. Her mother’s dream.
So much came flowing gently back to Ari as she stood between the two men on that bank while dusk softly approached. The shock that she was really here in the AmazonBasin living the dream she and her mother had planned suddenly overcame Ari. Tears welled in her eyes and quickly streaked down her face, dribbling off her chin as she reverently held the orchid in her hands.
“This—this is too much,” she said in a choked voice. “Please…thank Chief Aroka. I never expected such a beautiful, incredible gift. I really didn’t….”
Rafe laughed pleasantly and eased his hand across her slumped shoulders. He couldn’t help but touch her because her fears overwhelmed his protective heart. “Well, get used to it, my wild woman. Down here in Amazonia, the Indians are the most generous people in the world. They will do anything for you. They will feed you, clothe you, even if they are starving and have no clothes to wear themselves. Such is the nature of their generosity and heart.”
As Rafe slid his hand in a comforting gesture across her shoulders, Ari sniffed and balanced the huge orchid in her left hand. The white roots, a promise of new growth, looked like thick, gleaming worms beneath it. “Thanks, Rafe. Sorry I’m crying. It’s just all a little overwhelming….”
Taking a linen handkerchief from his back pocket, he placed it in her right hand. “I understand, mi rainha.” Rafe chided himself for the Portuguese endearment. It meant “my queen.” Being around Ari was disconcerting. It was as if he were no longer in control of his well-ordered world.
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