“Sacred,” Rafe whispered huskily as he watched her eyes open. “As soon as Inca arrives, I will leave. You will be as safe in her hands as mine.”
“Indeed? More so in mine, mi irmao, my brother.”
Ari gasped as the husky voice of a woman broke the tender moment. Jerking a look in the direction of the voice, her eyes grew huge.
Rafe grinned crookedly, released Ari and turned. Inca was standing less than six feet away from them. He hadn’t heard her approach; but then, she was the jaguar goddess; she knew how to walk in complete silence, like the animal who was her guardian spirit. He met her willow-green eyes, which sparkled with amusement. As usual, she was in jungle camouflage fatigues and black army boots. A pair of bandoleers crossed her sleeveless olive-green T-shirt. In her right hand she carried her rifle, which he knew was never far from her grasp. Her hair, long, thick and black, was caught up in a single braid that hung lazily across her right shoulder.
“Inca…” Rafe said, rising and drawing Ari up with him. Rafe knew how intimidating Inca could be, but for whatever reason, he saw that she was shielding them from the usual thunderstorm of energy that always swirled around her. He saw Inca’s eyes soften as her gaze fell on Ari. Yes, Inca understood instinctively that Ari was not the strong, powerful woman that she herself was.
Inca’s full lips softened as she spoke. “So, you are the great artist I have heard about?” She began as she moved bonelessly around in front of them. Offering her hand to Ari, she continued, “My brother, Rafe, has high praise for you, Ari. I am Inca. It is an honor to meet you.”
Ari stared up at the woman. She had never met anyone like her. Inca stood at least six feet tall, with a medium-boned frame that was all lean muscle and firmness from her slender, golden arms to the curve of her long thighs. Her skin glowed from a slight film of perspiration, and it seemed to Ari as if life throbbed around her like a million suns shining all at once. Yet as Inca eased her hand forward, the sincere look of welcome in her eyes gave Ari the courage to slide her hand into hers.
“Hi, Inca.” She felt the firmness of the woman’s handshake. Releasing Inca’s hand, she looked up at Rafe. “Are you brother and sister?”
Laughing huskily, Inca said, “No, but Rafe is like a brother to me.” She reached over and embraced Rafe quickly, then released him. “And I, his younger sister who is always around when he gets into trouble.”
In his mind, Rafe cringed at her wording, because he knew it would only serve to upset Ari more.
Inca stepped back and amended her words by saying, “Rafe rarely gets into trouble, though, and I like to come and visit him. We play chess together. And I always win.”
Unsure of Inca, who moved with such grace and confidence, Ari said little. She saw the warmth and care between this woman and Rafe. He looked relieved to see her.
Rafe slid his arm around Ari as they stood there. “I’ve got to go downriver.”
“Yes, I heard,” Inca said as she placed her rifle against the log and then divested herself of the bandoleers. Tugging her damp T-shirt back into place, she pulled the canteen from the web belt around her waist, unscrewed the top and lifted it to her lips. After taking a long drink, she recapped the canteen. “Go carefully, my brother. The Valentino Brothers are the men who took the nephew.”
Nodding, Rafe muttered, “I thought so. Have you been able to pick up their tracks?”
Shaking her head, Inca shoved the canteen back into her belt. “No. I had to be elsewhere.” Looking down at Ari, Inca grew thoughtful. “I can stay here until you return. There is nothing that pressing for me, right now.”
“Good,” Rafe said, inwardly relieved. Inca wasn’t always available. As a matter of fact, Amazonia was her territory. All of it. Inca was superhuman in some ways and the Indian people desperately needed the healing and protection she supplied them with.
Inca smiled slightly and moved over to the log. “This is your sketchbook, Ari?” she asked, scooping the pad up. “May I look at it?”
Panic struck Ari. Before she could say no, Inca had carefully opened the pad and was looking hard at her drawing. Words of protest jammed in Ari’s throat. She stood there, feeling helpless and trying to protect herself against Inca’s rejection of her work.
Inca slowly turned her head, her gaze locking with Ari’s frightened one. “Why do you cringe when someone gazes upon the beauty of your skills?” She tapped the drawing. “You have captured the otherworldliness of the orchid. Has she not, my brother?”
Rafe felt Ari sag a little, all the tension bleeding out of her once she realized Inca liked the drawing, too. “Yes, Ari has captured the heart and soul of our orchid people.”
Eyes gleaming, Inca handed Ari the closed sketchbook. “You must let me go with you. I want to watch you create. I have never seen anyone draw or paint as well as you do. It will be an honor to help you find some beautiful orchids for your book. Your mother will be very pleased.”
Shaken, Ari looked up at Rafe and then back at Inca. Had Rafe talked to Inca of her past? Her mother? The reason why Ari was here in the first place? She saw Rafe’s lips part, his brows drop, but he said nothing. Giving Inca a strange look, Ari almost asked Inca if she could read minds, but decided against it. Suddenly Ari felt a little intimidated by Inca. The woman was a leader, there was no doubt. The way she carried herself, the way she held her chin at a proud angle, and the way she spoke showed her confidence. There was firmness, power and conviction behind her words. Although Inca’s English was rudimentary, Ari noted as she turned to Rafe to speak more privately, she was fluent in Spanish and Portuguese. Ari was able to interpret some of what they said, but not all of it.
“I will guard her, my brother,” Inca said, dropping into Portuguese.
“Good. She needs a role model like you.”
Inca grinned wickedly. “Your soft little rabbit will turn into a jaguar by the time you return. Then what will you do?”
Rafe returned her grin with one of his own. “Revel in it. As you can see, she’s a shadow of herself.”
“I see much. Do not worry. You will be gone at least seven days. When you return, your flower will have blossomed even more.”
Rafe reached out and gripped Inca’s proud shoulder. “Thank you, my sister. I don’t know how you do it—you are here for so many—but I’m grateful to you for helping me.”
“Humph. Go, before I break down in tears.” Inca smiled and gripped his arm in a gesture of friendship. “I will send a spirit guide with you. Where you go, the dark forces gather.”
“Thanks, I’ll take all the help anyone can give me,” he told her. Rafe reluctantly turned to Ari. “I’ve got to go now. Inca knows her way around here. Anything you need, just ask her.”
Feeling bereft as Rafe left her side, Ari stood there helplessly. Inca came and stood nearby, watching with her as Rafe mounted the plank to the houseboat. “Little sister, do not worry so much. He is in the hands of the Great Mother Goddess, who loves him dearly. She will not see him walk to his death. Rafe protects her children here, in her womb.” Inca gestured toward the jungle nearby.
“This is a lot more dangerous than he’s letting on, isn’t it?”
Shrugging negligently, Inca rested her hands on her narrow hips. “What is danger? A child reaching for a hot kettle suspended over a fire? A man falling in love with a forbidden woman? Going to track a kidnapped child? Humph. There is more danger in the man loving the woman than in any search for a kidnapped child, believe me.”
Stymied by her mysterious response, Ari stood there and tried to understand Inca’s words. A man loving a forbidden woman. What was she talking about? How could love be forbidden?
Inca sighed and went to the blackened coffeepot at the edge of the dying fire. Handling it deftly, she grabbed a clean mug that sat near one of the logs. Pouring the thick, fragrant black coffee, she glanced up at Ari. “You are norteamericana. He, sulamericano. Is that not forbidden?”
The words crawled through Ari as she watche
d Inca straighten and sip the coffee, her willow-green gaze narrowed on the muddy Amazon River in front of them. She stood with one hand on her hip, one booted foot lifted up and resting on the log. Even when she was slouched and seemingly at ease, there was nothing relaxed about Inca. She was like an animal, constantly alert, with a fine tension sizzling around her.
“Well?”
Inca’s voice snapped through her. Fighting the intimidation she felt around the woman warrior, Ari asked, “Why can’t people from North and South America get along?”
Chuckling, Inca sipped more of the coffee. “Why not, indeed?” She lowered the cup, the smile disappearing from her oval face. Her eyes turned darker green as she held Ari’s gaze. “Only courage can see the two nations meet and melt into one. You must find that courage here. Now.”
Stymied again by Inca’s statements, Ari watched as Rafe emerged from below, a knapsack over one shoulder and a rifle in his right hand. A frisson of fear shot through her.
“He will be safe,” Inca assured her calmly. “Do not blow things out of proportion, Ari.”
Ari felt no sense of safety. Still, when she walked to meet Rafe as he put his gear into the small aluminum, motorized skiff, Inca’s words swirled in her head. Ari had heard so much about the infamous jaguar goddess. She didn’t seem like a murderer to Ari. Just the opposite. Inca seemed like someone who cared deeply about all things—even Ari as she panicked over possibly losing Rafe to a bullet from a drug runner and kidnapper.
“Take care of yourself?” Ari called as Rafe stepped into the boat.
He smiled slightly for her benefit. “For you, mi flor, I will.”
Ari bit back the rest of her feelings. Rafe’s kiss still tingled madly on her compressed lips. She folded her arms against her chest, feeling vulnerable. “I’ll miss you, Rafe—our talks, making breakfast….”
As he pushed the skiff away from the bank of the channel, he sat down at the stern. “Even washing and drying dishes?” He teased.
Ari laughed a little and stepped closer. He reached toward the motor and pulled a cord. The little engine chattered to life, a cloud of bluish smoke rising in the wake. “Yes, even that.”
Lifting his hand, Rafe called, “I’ll see you in my dreams….”
Somehow, Ari thought, as she watched Rafe steer the skiff out of the channel and downriver, he always knew the right words to say to her.
Inca came and stood next to her. “Little sister, you and I are going to be very busy the week he is gone.” She slanted her an amused glance. “You will not have time to worry about him. You will only have time to worry about yourself,” she declared, and laughed deeply, the sound soothing Ari’s troubled heart as she watched Rafe’s boat disappear in the distance.
Chapter Seven
True to her word Inca kept Ari very busy for the next week, taking her on guided tours of the jungle to search for orchids. Now, as Ari stood looking up at a thirty-foot waterfall Inca had led her to, she gasped with delight. There among the mosses and ferns she could see a deep pink and crimson Cattleya orchid. She couldn’t determine which type, because it hung on a grayish-colored dead limb that extended out over the water, which sprayed in an arc to the oblong pool below.
“It’s beautiful!” she whispered excitedly to Inca, who stood at her shoulder. Looking around, Ari added, “What a wonderful place. It feels so peaceful here.”
Inca grinned knowingly and studied the orchid halfway up the rocky incline beside the waterfall. “This is one of my favorite places to rest and sleep. It is safe here.”
They had hiked five miles into the jungle to find the specimen. Now, as Ari shrugged out of her knapsack, she realized she faced an even greater obstacle. “I don’t know how I can draw the orchid up there, Inca. I’m afraid of heights.”
Giving her a glance, Inca shrugged. “So? Climb up there and sit on that black rock near the dead limb. It is a perfect place to draw the orchid from. The spray from the waterfall will not reach you there, yet you will be close enough to study the orchid fully.”
A squiggle of fear threaded through Ari’s stomach. All week long Inca had shepherded her along, and each day posing a new challenge to her in some way. The fearless woman warrior seemed to pick out situations where Ari had to confront her fears. And each day, Inca had been there to cajole her and support her as Ari stepped out of her routine way of life and walked through her fears. Ari couldn’t complain, because Inca had been showing her orchids of incredible color that weren’t in any of her orchid identification books—orchids that were undiscovered—until now. As she drew and took photos of them, Ari knew that when she sent documentation to the orchid society to register them, the world would gasp in awe at their beauty. Not only that, but if the orchids were truly undiscovered until now, she would be able to name one after her mother, something Ari wanted to do more than anything. And in honor of Inca, she would name one of them after her as well.
“If you want to draw that orchid,” Inca told her, as she pointed up at it, “then you must conquer your fear of heights, Ari.”
Standing there, Ari felt another frisson of anxiety. “It’s my greatest fear,” she muttered.
Inca threw back her head and laughed. Then, placing her rifle against a tree, she turned and held Ari’s gaze. “Do not defer to your weakness, little sister. You are a woman. Women are naturally strong. Stronger than any male of any species.” She walked over, picked up Ari’s knapsack and opened it. Taking out the box of colored pencils and the sketchbook, she said, “You were raised to cower in front of men. To be a true woman, you must embrace your own powers, fears and all, and do what you must do. That orchid has been seen only by my eyes and those of the insects and animals. You said you wanted to name an orchid after your mother. What better way to honor her than with this one, eh?” Inca peered into Ari’s face. “Well?”
Gulping, Ari felt the power of Inca. Her willow-green eyes were narrowed and thoughtful. All week Inca had taught her to make fear her friend, let it walk beside her—but not stop her.
“W-what if I fall?”
Inca straightened and smiled mirthlessly. “Then you will pick yourself back up, dust off your muddy pants and try again. Do you think life accepts quitters? No. Life only honors those who are strong. Those who can endure and keep going. So, what will you do with this day, little sister? Will you pine and whine down here, at the foot of the hill? Or will you take the challenge and meet it the best way you can? There is no dishonor in failing. There is dishonor in not trying at all.” A bit of scorn laced her husky voice. “In my realm, a woman or man who does not try does not live.” She touched the front of Ari’s pale pink blouse. “What does your heart say to do?”
“Get up there and draw that orchid.” Ari replied, studying her companion’s playful expression. Inca’s attitude right now belied the military garb she wore. Every day she was armed and alert. And although she never said they were in danger as they made their five-and ten-mile hikes through the jungle, Ari sometimes felt that they might be. Still, being in Inca’s powerful presence, she rarely felt unprotected.
“And what is your head screaming at you to do?” Inca’s mouth curved.
Ari sighed. “You know without asking me. I’m scared.”
“What is it shrieking at you?”
“That I can’t do it. That heights make me dizzy….”
“And where did this fear come from?”
“I don’t know.”
“Yes, you do.”
Stymied, Ari frowned at Inca. Rafe would say nearly the same words to her. Was it an Indian thing? A South American way of looking at life’s obstacles? Thinking back, she murmured, “My mother was afraid of heights.”
“And did you see her being afraid of them?”
“Yes, many times.”
“And so, as a child, you took on her fear. Before that, you were like the monkeys that climb effortlessly up the trunks of trees and swing limb to limb.”
Ari stood there, looking at the sunlight th
at sometimes peeked through the canopy to touch the spray of water. When it did, she would see a brief bit of a rainbow arc halfway down the waterfall to the pond, below where they stood.
“Sometimes I think you read my mind,” Ari accused her petulantly. “Yes, I remember when I was six my mother had to climb up on a ladder to rescue me from a tree I’d climbed. I remember her face. It was so white. She was so shaky and unsteady on that ladder.”
“But she conquered her fear to come and rescue you, did she not?”
Ari saw Inca’s carefully drawn point and grinned up at her companion. “You missed your calling, Inca. You should have been a teacher.”
A pleased smile tugged at Inca’s wide mouth. “We are all teachers to one another, little sister. So, go climb and paint your orchid for your mother.”
It wasn’t easy for Ari, despite Inca’s support. Still, she took the items from Inca, placed them back into the knapsack then shrugged the bag across her shoulders and slowly moved to the right side of the pool. She marveled once more at what an incredibly beautiful place this was, with many huge, gray-trunked trees supported by root systems that looked like flying buttresses. There were shiny-leafed coffee bushes here and there, and ferns grew luxuriantly along both sides of the falls, nourished and humidified by the spray of water.
Ari’s heart was beating hard in her chest. Fear ate at her. Looking around for the best path up through the curving ferns, she hesitated as she spied black rocks jutting out here and there, most of them covered in a springy, yellowish-green moss.
She heard Inca’s low, growling tone right behind her, as if she were leaning over and whispering in her ear. “Life rewards those who take the risks. Do you want to see yourself as a quitter? As someone who refuses to meet the challenge?”
Jerking around, she saw that Inca was a good twenty feet away. Rubbing her temple, Ari wondered at the closeness of Inca’s voice. The woman warrior was sitting up against one of the buttress roots, field stripping her rifle on a clean white cloth, a small can of oil nearby.
Man of Passion Page 10