"We're getting wet to the skin," she tried to pull out of his arms, scared, confused, and excited by the blaze in his eyes. "Please, Roque—"
As she spoke his name, he said something that was half-strangled in his throat, then he swung her up into his arms and raced with her back to the hut she had just left. He pushed her up the ladder and she staggered inside, rain-wet, yet laughing. No man – surely no man treated a woman so roughly unless he cared for her as crazily as she cared for him !
He lit the lamp and they faced each other in its smoky light. He looked rather grim, and dangerous, his black hair plastered to his forehead above eyes that burned. Her eyes were as intense as the violets they resembled, and no longer laughing.
"Why should you worry about me ?" he said again.
"Y-you know why – " she drew a step away from his tall, dark maleness; his look of being tried to the edge of something she didn't dare to put a name to.
"I don't know, but I would like to," he advanced on her retreat, and suddenly it was quiet outside and all around them. The rain had stopped as suddenly as it had started, and in the silence Morvenna heard the pounding of her heart.
"You've been good to me, senhor," she said breathlessly. "In your way—"
"My bossy way, eh ?"
She nodded, and her smile came, and then went again. "He looked so fierce, the Incala you fought with – for Raya."
"Raya was a child, you realize. Both children were Brazilian and I wished them to be brought up at the fazenda." He was close now, and she could see every detail of his face, lean, proud, with something added that took her breath away. Her breath that seemed to die as his hands touched her waist, holding lightly, holding with intention.
"Let me tell you something," he spoke with a fleeting smile. "Raya came to see me the day after the fire at the Indian village. She told me that she loved Flavio, and that she wished for my consent to their marriage. She had been a little afraid of my reaction because of Flavio's mixed blood, but as it happens I like the young man. He is a hard worker and full of initiative, and most sensible men settle down once they become family men. I gave my consent, and their marriage will take place at Manaos in a few weeks, when they will return to Janaleza for a ceremony that will please the islanders."
"But I thought — " Morvenna couldn't go on, his closeness was too much, added to what he had just said.
"I know what you thought." He stroked the damp hair out of her eyes. "It was at times convenient to let you think that I wanted Raya. It would not have done, carestia, to let you guess in the heart of the rain forest that I wanted you."
The incredible words in the silence of the hut, and then his warm hands were cupping her face. "Minha querida ?" It was a question, a doubt, and she had never seen him doubtful before. She touched his hair, the strong neck, his shoulders.. . it was as though touch had to tell her that he really had called her his darling.
She felt him go tense at her touch, and then his lips
were on hers without mercy. The fierceness of his embrace and his kisses were a pain she revelled in. In a timeless void her lips and her arms clung to him.
Then he held her with more quietness, there against his shoulder, and her heart sang.
"We, too, will be married at Manaos," he murmured, "but the islanders will expect to celebrate our marriage as my parents' was celebrated. We will walk under the hibiscus arch together, cara, into the jungle, then in their eyes we will be husband and wife."
She couldn't speak. It was too wonderful that a dream could come true, and she might find she only dreamed if she spoke.
"Lift your lashes," the old command was in his voice. "Look at me."
She did so shyly, and for a long moment he read in her eyes what she couldn't speak of — not yet. "For a terrible moment," he gave a shaken laugh, "I thought my plans for the future did not appeal to you."
"I love them," she said huskily. "I love you — Roque."
"Rock ?" He mocked her mispronunciation. "Do you think me a hard man ?"
"I am not going to tell you what I think, senhor." Laughter came into her eyes. "I don't want a conceited husband !"
His arms tightened again when she used the word husband.
"Roque, is it true ?" she whispered. "Do you really love me ?"
"From the moment I found you on the shore, my beloved castaway." He kissed her hair. "But it was something I could not speak of because my home is on a jungle island, my life is here, and I could not tell if you
could settle here, or even if you could love a man of a different nationality and culture from your own. Then came these days alone in the jungle, and I knew that you had the courage to live here. I could only hope that you had the love to live here with me."
"I have the love," she smiled. "The thought of going away on Friday was unbearable. I think I should have got lost again in the jungle rather than board that steamer."
"Don't worry," he quirked a black eyebrow. "Having found that you had courage as well as everything else I desired, I intended to bribe the Incala paddlers to get us lost on the return journey to the fazenda. One way or another I was keeping you here, my Senorinha Fayr."
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