by Maya Wood
Sighing, she hoisted herself onto the rock where she had left her riding boots and towel nearby. She squeezed her feet into the leather, now tight and unyielding against her wet skin. As she stooped to gather her towel she saw a terrifying movement of gray just feet from her hand, now quaking violently. Snatching the towel she fell backward into a cluster of leafy plants spurting emerald tufts between the cracks of jagged rocks, one of which stabbed her upper thigh. As she caught the wind in her lungs, she let out a bloodcurdling scream. Where was the knife? Where was the Taipan snake? She waited for its triangular head to dart from the grass, its angry fangs sinking deep into her flesh.
She hadn’t stopped screaming by the time Trevor burst through the bush, his eyes wild, his body rigid as it prepared to defend. “What is it?” he shouted over her shrill cries, his body looming over her as he surveyed the shadowy cover of leaves and brush.
“Snake!” Alexis finally managed to cough. Trevor looked down at her, his eyes pausing for an instant on her pale, curvaceous, nearly-naked form. Alexis pointed to where she had seen the shadow of movement
“I don’t see anything!” he hissed. Moving cautiously in front of her, he kicked at the ground to startle whatever Alexis had seen lurking there just moments before. Finally she heard him roar, a sound which drew from his gut. When she looked at him to see the horror of what he saw, she realized that he was looking at her. “God damn it, woman!” Bending down, he swooped low, and returned clutching a small, terrified serpent. “It’s just a Keelback!”
The snake swung nervously from his grip, and Alexis whimpered sheepishly. It was tiny, in fact, compared to the Taipan, and totally harmless. Trevor tossed the reptile into the brush and Alexis scrambled to her feet. Hastily wrapping the soiled towel around her, she saw that Trevor was glaring at her.
“I’m sorry,” she offered. “I thought…”
“Well, that’s precisely it,” he snapped. He dropped his head back, relaxing his shoulders and returned his heavy, burning gaze. “If you thought it was a dangerous snake, why on earth did you see fit to holler and thrash about? Most of these snakes won’t attack unless they perceive a threat, which is likely if you jump around and scream bloody murder.”
The silence of the jungle weighed at her shoulders, and though she stared at her boots, she could sense that Trevor had not broken his gaze. When she dared to meet his eyes, she saw they were no longer locked at her face, but inching slowly over her exposed skin, glistening wet from her bath. They stopped at her thigh where the towel barely covered the rising slope of her bottom. Just as she began to feel the flame of indignation ignite at his boldness, he nodded at her. “You’re bleeding,” he said, the edge of his voice softened with concern.
Alexis touched the thin stream of blood oozing slowly from the small gash in her thigh. “It’s fine, I think. Just a rock from when I fell.”
He raised his eyebrows, as if deciding he were free to continue punishing her for her mindless blunder. “Here,” he growled as he passed her the change of dry garments she had brought to the waterfall. “It’s going to get dark soon. Stay close to the camp. Got it?”
Alexis pouted by the fire, the wood burning neon yellow and blue as it popped and hissed, sending miniscule shards of orange embers scattering to the air. Her hair hung loose around her shoulders, the deep reds catching light as she watched the flames dance hypnotically against a black backdrop. She and Trevor had said little to each other since they’d returned to camp. He enjoyed watching the embarrassed slump of her shoulders, and her nervous eyes dashing sideways to avoid his gaze. She was hot with shame for her remarkable lack of composure at the waterfall, and she welcomed the silence in its deflection of his criticism.
He had warmed a tin of anchovies over the fire, and they spread it over discs of fried dough. She savored the heartiness of the bread, and the oily skin of the fish, remarking how much more she enjoyed the food that felt earned through the hours of riding and climbing through mountains, cooked over the open flame of a campfire. She might have dreamed of such a moment in the whispering wilderness, the sky afire with stars, the crackling of the wood consumed in flame, all alone with an irresistibly handsome man. It was terribly romantic, and she shot a disappointed look at her companion, who squatted by the light on his haunches, carving the end of a stick with purpose.
She wondered how she’d ever arrived to such a place and time as this. What had ever compelled her to put her confidence in a man so unknown and apparently rogue as Trevor McFadden? For all she knew, he could be one of the sinister characters Henry Patterson had described to her over tea. Almost every word they’d exchanged since they’d met had been laden with palpable, mutual loathing, and she swiftly concluded that he was nothing more to her than the services he provided, and in every other way despicable.
These were the thoughts unraveling in her mind when Trevor sunk against the woolen pad of his bedroll and rested the curve of his neck against his bundle. He lied with his chest open to the sky, one leg drawn up, an arm under his head. She could see his eyes were open, staring at the leaves above them, gold in the firelight. When he spoke, his voice was so quiet she almost didn’t hear him. “How’s the leg?”
She brushed her fingertips over the loose cotton of her skirt and felt the swollen flesh of her thigh. “A little tender,” she admitted, surprised by his concern, and taken aback at how soft he had made his voice. She pulled a thick lock of glowing hair behind an ear and turned her face to him. She couldn’t see his eyes beneath the shadow of his heavy brow.
“Trevor,” Alexis breathed in the still.
“Yes?”
“I…I was wondering about you, about where you come from. McFadden is Irish, isn’t it?”
Trevor rolled onto his side now, and the shadow from his face vanished with the warm glow of the fire. She could see the sharp line of his aquiline nose, his bow-shaped mouth and full lips. She watched his silky locks of hair tumble softly over his forehead, around his strong, square jaw. And watching her were those dark, limpid pools which had just hours before seemed fiercely intrusive.
“My grandfather was from Ireland.” He revealed this detail so conclusively that Alexis believed the conversation to be over. She began to settle against her bedroll when he continued. “He left Ireland at a young age. He was…a thief. He was sent to Australia, actually, to serve his time. And when he’d paid his dues, he met a beautiful aboriginal woman named Binda. My grandmother.”
Alexis shifted nervously against the earth. She did not want to probe or offend him. “So they raised a family together?” she asked, hoping it was an innocent question.
She saw Trevor’s brow lift as he considered the details of his story. “Well, they had my father and no other children. From what I understand, they had a happy, quiet life, and my grandfather was lucky to escape the temptations of crime and easy money. I suspect my grandmother had a calming influence over his spirit.”
Feeling more confident now, she asked, “And your father?”
Trevor’s lids dropped as he studied the soil and grass matted down beneath his bedroll. He plucked at a silky blade and pressed it between the pads of his fingers. “My father must have inherited that wild spirit, except he used it for his own gain, often at the expense of others. He looked as white as my grandfather, so he could easily blend in wherever he went. And when he met my mother, Girra, also an aboriginal, she was taken by his charm.”
“Was that so bad?” Alexis asked him softly.
Trevor cocked an eyebrow. “He married her, but…he saw her as little more than a servant of his own selfish needs and whims.”
Alexis stared at her hands. She had no idea what to say.
“And like my grandparents, they had only one child. Me.”
Searching her mind for words of empathy, she said, “At least your mother had you. It sounds like you love her dearly.”
Trevor locked his eyes with hers. “She died,” he said flatly. “She died shortly after giving birth to me.”
He looked up at the sky now, as though reviewing the past against the black screen of the night. “My father left me with my grandparents just after she passed and I never saw him again.”
“I’m so sorry,” Alexis whispered. But Trevor put his hand up, not to dismiss a triumphed sorrow, she noticed, but to stem the revival of it.
“My grandparents died when I was eighteen, and I left the day after I buried my grandmother. I came here, to New Guinea. This is my home now.”
Alexis bit her bottom lip and combed the long tresses of her hair with her fingers. She cleared her throat. “My mother died when I was young, too.”
Trevor looked up at her, his eyes warm with knowing.
Alexis nodded. “She died when I was ten. My father was doing some research in South America and he took her on one of his trips. She didn’t make it home. It…it was just me and my father growing up.” As she said the words, she was swept up in the peace of sharing them with someone who could understand the immeasurable chasm of losing a parent.
Sighing, Trevor leaned back against his bedroll. The shadow returned. As the fire crackled, Alexis curled tightly above her woolen blanket. Neither of them spoke, but the air was thick, as though for the first time they truly pondered the possibility of each other’s humanity.
Chapter Fourteen
The horses grunted as they slowly negotiated the nearly impenetrable hills of the Southern Highlands. Trevor would dismount, wielding the long menacing blade of a machete as he slashed the dense brush until they reached, at painstaking speed, the trodden paths made by clusters of tiny communities. Though each of the eight days of their journey replayed the same rituals of early mornings, afternoon rests and relaxing nights by the fire, Alexis felt jangled by the mounting physical stress of the trek and the psychological challenge of plowing further into the unknown.
As she religiously committed her daily encounters to her journal, she reflected on the tenuous line of love and hate. It was the theme of her entire experience, Trevor included. Just when they would disarm themselves from the frustrating, volatile relationship with heartfelt discussions of their past, some petty ugliness or disagreement would arise and both would seize the opportunity to pierce the other’s point of weakness.
Alexis had discovered by now that Trevor was insecure about his lack of formal education. Trevor, since day one, had exposed her naivety and insecurity about her lack of worldly knowledge. He pounced on her every misstep, dangling it before her as he viciously scrutinized her faults. For this she punished him venomously, almost sadistically, with toxic sarcasm.
Today they rode in heavy gut-wrenching silence, frequently locking each other into poisonous glares of contempt. Alexis stroked the wiry mane of her horse, its sides flaring gently beneath her saddle as it obediently trailed the other two. Above, the sky swirled gray, the bottoms of the black clouds heavy and bulging. Trevor swatted a mosquito at his neck and craned to look at the sky as the first rip of thunder peeled across the heavens. She heard him growl under his breath, and finally he slowed until she could see his face below the rim of his weathered hat.
“What is it?” she asked, exerting all self-restraint to manage a tone of civility.
His face was cinched into a permanent scowl, her attempt at diplomacy rejected. “It’s about to piss rain.” He motioned west, his tan muscular arm flexing as he pointed. “If I remember correctly, there’s a rock formation about ten minutes that way. We can set up our tents and hope for the best.”
“There isn’t a cave?” Alexis asked innocently.
Trevor snickered, his lips curling disdainfully. “The timing of the storm doesn’t suit you? I’m real sorry about that, Red.”
Red. Alexis tensed. They had fought about this now a number of times. It wasn’t that she had anything against nicknames, just that he seemed to use it at the moments he was attempting to debase her. The more she complained about its usage, the more he seemed to delight in the word hissing from his mouth.
Sure enough, they approached a small clearing where gargantuan slates of rock jutted slightly outward from the hillside. It wouldn’t cover them, but possibly offer some reprieve from the torrential rains which the sky promised to unleash. Now that she had watched Trevor over the last week, she knew how to set up camp. She began pulling the gear from the horse’s side.
“What are you doing?” Trevor snapped, shooting a look of incredulity.
“I know what to do now, okay? It’s not exactly complicated, and I wouldn’t dare burden you with the task of babysitting a woman,” she snarled.
Trevor gaped at her a moment, then shook his head and threw his hands in the air. “Whatever you say, Dr. Scott,” he cackled with sharp laughter, gathering the materials to set up the tents.
Alexis pretended not to notice him as she began the laborious task of assembling the different parts. She found she hadn’t quite memorized every step of the process, and she shot quick glances at Trevor’s work whenever she thought he wasn’t looking. Her tent was a worrisome sight, flapping impotently in the gusts of wind now beginning to swoosh through the clearing. Trevor had unsaddled the horses, covered the supplies, and begun to erect a natural windbreak by his tent. Alexis looked at him forlornly. Sensing her remorse, he turned slowly to her, an ecstatic gleam in his eye.
She lifted her chin, her jaw flexed forward, and she crossed her arms in stubborn defiance. But as her head fell back to take in the gaping black mouth of the sky, she understood her foolishness. All at once, the rain plunged to the earth, gauging an instant river into the soil. The horses whinnied nervously under the trees as the thunder tore and lighting scarred the atmosphere. Alexis flinched at the blinding white daggers shooting low and she scurried to her tent, holding the entrance flaps tight in her bloodless knuckles. Worse than the terror of submission to nature’s fury was the humiliating defeat of her arrogant independence, her feigned expertise, her struggle to dominate Trevor.
She swallowed with difficulty, her eyes dry and raw. She had imagined her courage, bravery and know-how with fierce conviction. Huddled pathetically against the canvas walls, pummeled by wind and rain, she knew that she had been as vain as any human being, that she had fancied herself as the heroine of an adventure. She felt utterly depressed, too deflated to worry that the mud at the lip of the tent began to bubble inside, or that the corners of her shelter began to lift as the air sucked under, pulling ferociously at the stakes she had hammered into the ground.
Her chest suddenly felt too small to contain the lashing of her heart and she squeezed her eyes shut. The storm seemed to hurl a squall against the shelter, and the flaps burst open, gutting the tent like a fish. Alexis watched with horror and she screamed as her arms flailed to catch the canvas thrashing wildly in the wind. The roar of the downpour drowned out every sound, and she flinched in surprise when she saw a dark figure crouch at the mouth of the tent. Trevor.
His hair was wet and matted against his hard face, his eyes black and roiling. He said nothing. She felt his arms snake beneath her and scoop her from the floor. Instinctively she coiled her arms around his neck and her jaw fell slack as the closeness of his body registered deep in her stomach. He catapulted to the opening of his refuge and sank to his knees. For a moment neither moved, her arms still locked around him, their faces just inches apart.
He reclaimed his arms, and she sank to the floor and crouched low in the corner. Alexis chewed her lip, suddenly doubtful of which place was less terrifying. Trevor unwound his bundle, retrieving a soft thin towel. Clutching it, he looked at her, his nostrils flaring, his jaw grinding. His eyes were violent, so much that she almost didn’t notice the apprehension.
“Here,” he said, his voice gravel. After she had buried her face in the fabric’s warmth, dried her dripping ringlets, and removed her leather boots, she noticed how sturdy Trevor’s tent was. She knew the storm had not relented the slightest, but its bellow was muffled and the walls seemed to disregard the brutal insistence of the wind. Alexis also noticed, with v
exed spirits, how small the tent seemed now with two of them. There would be no avoiding physical contact if either intended to rest.
Trevor’s eyes followed Alexis’ gaze, and when she glanced at him with this budding thought, a smile curled at his lips as though he understood her revelation. “It’s going to be cozy in here tonight, Red.” Stretching theatrically with a wide yawn, Trevor sprawled out along the length of his bedroll and patted the narrow tract of free space by his side. “Don’t worry. I won’t bite.”
Alexis wanted to punish him with an overdramatic gesture of rejection, but she flinched as she felt the burning tension knot inside her as she imagined her body against him in that tiny place. Suddenly her breath felt short, and the tent suddenly became warmer. She cleared her throat, obstinate and unmoving in her squat at the corner of the tent. “Won’t this thing flood?”
Trevor shrugged his shoulders mercilessly, an attempt to hold her in suspense. He rubbed the black stubble on his chin as he reconsidered, deciding the pleasure of belittling her would be more satisfying. “As a matter of fact, if you had let me do my job and set up your tent, you might have been spared a long personal evening with yours truly. However, you decided you knew better when you did not.” He flicked his hand upward. “If you noticed, the weather conditions are slightly different than the other nights. And if you had paid attention, you might have noticed that I dug trenches to keep the water out.” He smiled, oozing conceit. “But,” his voice swelled with happiness, “you have all night to think about that.”
Alexis seethed, scowling at him through narrowed eyes, even as he handed her a meager ration of crackers and hard aged cheese. They ate in silence, and Alexis noticed with infuriation the smug look plastered to Trevor’s face. She fought the uncharacteristic urge to slap him, breathing hard to suppress the desire. She was still curled into a ball at the tent’s corner when Trevor pulled the fabric of his cotton shirt from the snug waistline of his pants. He’d half unbuttoned it, the collar hanging open over the large expanse of his chest. Her eyes fixed on the tuft of dark course hair at the center of his torso.