by K. F. Breene
He kissed the back of her neck, salty sweet. Her firm butt rested comfortably against his crotch, snuggled in tight. God, he wished he could always wake up this way. But in a real bed. With a kid or eight sleeping within the house somewhere.
He hoped she was pregnant. He hadn’t really been thinking about it at the time, but if he was honest with himself, in the back of his head he’d hoped he ended up exactly where he was. And he hoped her belly grew huge with their baby. It was time. Her, babies, a settled life—God, he loved her. He’d never loved anything in his whole life like he loved her right that moment. Knowing her now, and merging the present with their childhood—perfection. They were soul mates; it was undeniable. She’d see that before long.
But now to start the day.
He stalked to the area he’d heard the sounds the night before. He’d purposely not woken Sara to avoid starting a panic. The snuffling and footfall had been that of a small animal, so he hadn’t been overly worried.
As Sara was stirring, he found the tiny tracks along the outside of the clearing. Skunk. Not deadly, but horribly unpleasant if pushed to spray. Luckily, there wasn’t much chance of that if they stayed still behind the fire.
“I think we should move on,” he said as Sara sat up, groggy-eyed. “Runoff should become streams and rivulets down the way. If we can find one of those, we can get some water and hopefully food.”
Sara’s hand found her stomach. “Sounds good.”
“Eat the rest of those nuts and drink that water. I’m okay for now.”
She shook her head as she stood, hands kneading her back. “That’s for you. I could stand to lose a pound or two.”
His eyes quickly skimmed over her skinny frame. Not likely. She’d probably barely eaten since her breakup. Good news was, she wouldn’t be as hungry now. Bad news was, that asshole leaving her had severely messed up her head. She might be over the man, but she was far from over the trauma of the event.
He bent to get his pack. “Might as well head out now—we don’t have any breakfast.”
Sara reached for her fanny pack. “I’m sorry, Mikey—um, Mike. For everything. I just think that needs to be said.”
“All good things to those who wait.”
She snorted, giving him a smile. That feisty gal was still in there. If anything would bring her out, surviving would. He had to believe it.
They started at a steady pace, careful of the foliage and vines. After a while, though, when he didn’t hear any sounds of water, and Sara started to slow, he paused.
“We have to get out of these trees. Get a survey of the land.” He judged the land and its slope, peering out between the treetops, looking for land above. A hint of grassy slopes had him walking before he thought to clue her in. Apparently, though, he didn’t need to. She followed him immediately, not questioning his choice of direction.
“I’m now trying to find high ground. Get a view of what we’re up against,” he explained.
“Cool.”
“You’re not worried I’m leading you to your death?”
“What’s the difference?” she replied without concern. “At least you’ve got that GPS. Worst case, I’ll hang out with your dead body and get rescued.”
“Wow.”
“When in Rome, as they say.”
He laughed. “There’s survival in you, after all.”
“The desire, not the know-how.”
“Ohhh… I don’t know.”
After another hour with a grisly pace up a gradual incline, she said, “I have a really bad headache. I’m kind of dizzy, too. I figure that’s the hunger.”
Something in his chest dropped, anxiety filling him. Dehydration was no joke. Headache came first, which he also had. If it progressed further, and with the heat, the body would suffer with chills and vomiting. Those were signs the system was shutting down. Further still, and she might not make it through. Not without help.
“We’ll find something soon. Just keep your ears open for sounds of running water. We aren’t in the desert. I don’t think we have to resort to drinking our pee.”
“Oh gross! Geez, I hope not.”
After another few kilometers, she said, “Seriously? Have you drunk your pee?”
He grimaced, thinking back to that stint in the desert. “Yup. Had to. I couldn’t find water. It saved my life—this was before the four-day emergency shoe, when I thought it was okay to go on extreme survival missions without telling anyone.”
After a silent beat, she said softly, “And what if you did have a kid? If one day you might not come home when you had people depending on you…”
Mike stopped suddenly. Sara bounced off the back of him. He turned to her and grabbed her shoulders, so she’d listen. He held her startled gaze. “I would never leave you. Will never. I have over a million dollars saved up, Sara. That is plenty for you and a baby. Or a few babies. I live cheap and I make a lot of money from different avenues. I’ve saved it all up for a family. For you. But I wouldn’t ever do that extreme stuff if I didn’t have a safety outlet. If I didn’t have a crew I could call just in case. Not with you depending on me. Please believe that.”
Her gaze bounced around. She was afraid to look him in the eye. Hurting. Insecure. “I wasn’t talking about me. Or, you know, looking after me. Just, you know, in case…”
“I was talking about you. I will always look after you. I should’ve done so before now, I just wasn’t grown-up enough to realize you needed me sooner. I’m sorry.”
She shrugged, tears coming to her eyes.
“Don’t,” he whispered, and kissed her forehead. “I hate to see you cry. But more importantly, because you don’t have enough water in your system to produce tears without it being harmful.”
“Comforting à la survival expert.”
“Exactly,” he said softly, wrapping his arms around her.
“Okay, enough of the pity party.” She pushed back and raised her chin despite her quivering lips.
He ran his fingers down her cheek, taking a moment to stare at her beautiful face, tired and dirt-smudged. His gaze found her lips, and he couldn’t help himself. He bent to her, his lips touching hers with a spark of electricity. He lingered, running his tongue along her bottom lip, wanting to deepen the kiss and follow it up by exploring her body. Instead, he backed off, noticing her wide eyes and rigid stance.
She wasn’t ready to connect their history, her lust, and her deepening affection—she wasn’t ready to love him yet. She still had to get over the insecurity and heartache she was battling.
That was okay. He wasn’t lying when he said he’d wait.
“My bad,” he said with a smile as he turned.
“Payback, I suppose,” she muttered. “After all, I did make you kiss me in our youth often enough.”
“I thought you didn’t remember our youth together… Wasn’t that the deal? Selective amnesia?”
“Now you’re just gloating.”
He laughed and led on. As they ate the distance to that grassy area, he couldn’t help but think of her choice in Phil. In her ardent desire to hold on to her ex even though she had to have known it was a dead end. Granted, like many women, she’d been duped by all the fairytales into thinking “Will you marry me” meant “happily ever after.” Then, to have that child’s dream fail… well, that would rock a person sideways—especially a girl, who had been fed that idea since she had been a kid.
But what about before that? It couldn’t have been coincidence that, when she finally matured enough to have deep feelings for someone, she chose a guy with the same height and general appearance as Mike. Then she held on with a steel grip, past reason. Past reality.
If only Mike had left a year later. Just one more year for her feelings for him to slowly switch over into real love. Like his had.
But she hadn’t had that year. Instead, subconsciously she must’ve been trying to find what she’d lost when Mike moved away. Lord knows, he’d been trying. Trying, and never finding. The big
gest heartache he’d ever had was losing her. Everything else had paled in comparison. When he spoke of knowing what she was going through, he relived what he’d felt for years after he’d moved away from her. Sex had distracted him for a great many years in his teens and early twenties, and making something of himself to be able to support a family had distracted him, but he’d always known he’d return for her. She’d always been the one.
“Oh thank God,” he heard behind him, cutting through his reverie.
They were working their way up a hill coated in knee-high grass and brush, having shed the canopy of trees about fifteen minutes ago. Sara had stopped and turned back the way they’d come, staring down at the thick trench of green lining the mountainside.
“We’d been stuck in the thick of that.” Sara pointed at the strip of green amongst the brown, choked with vegetation and impossible for any rescue party to see what walked within its depths. If they were really surviving, without the safety blanket of the GPS, they would’ve had to send a forest-wide smoke signal to get noticed.
“Surviving is about risk and reward,” Mike said, on teaching autopilot. “In this instance, the energy we expended to get here was well worth the risk.”
“Let me guess—because we get a big reward of eventually getting seen?” Sara gave him a toothy grin.
“Some people aren’t as hell-bent on pointing out the obvious. You know, so I can actually teach.”
“Some people are more polite than I am.”
“Truth.”
As Mike surveyed the green dip in the mountain, a black shape lumbered out way to the right. Before he could decide if he would tell her, she threw out a finger and exclaimed, “Look! A bear!”
“Just one, though.”
“No. She has a baby. Look at the small shape to her right. Wow, cool. I’ve never seen a wild bear before. Although it won’t be cool when it tries to eat us.”
Mike leaned toward her, trying to get her line of sight. Then he caught it, away to the left, the large shape she saw, plus the little figure. Two bears and a baby. Not good.
“Okay, well, they’re over there, and we’re here. We need to find water. So let’s head down until we finally find something. Land this fertile won’t hold out for long.”
She nodded, the half-smile not leaving her face. “Did you know, I’ve always wanted to work with animals. I was a huge Steve Irwin fan—you know, the Crocodile Hunter?”
“We used to watch him together. You know, before you knew me?”
“Oh yeah!” She punched him, gesturing him on as if she was a tour guide and this was a zoo. “I was devastated when he died. People remember Princess Diana, or JFK. I remember Steve Irwin. I was in Mexico with my A-hole ex-boyfriend and I heard it on the news one morning. My heart sank. Anyway, I always wanted to do what he did. And look, I get to see dangerous bears in the wild! How cool is this?”
“Except that you’re starving and thirsty…”
He could just see her shrug out of the corner of his eye. “The craziness of ending up here has worn off a little. I can do this. I mean, with you, obviously. And I actually know a few things about this area. I looked it up when I got the job. Once we find water, I might dazzle you with my knowledge of the plant life. I don’t hunt, no, but gatherers fed the village eighty percent of the time. So I think I’ll be handy.”
“Just have to find water.”
“Now who’s being obvious?”
They walked on, the sun beating down on them, taking their last resources. It wasn’t long before she slowed down, her body fighting the fatigue and dehydration, unused to the elements without resources. In contrast, his own body went into overdrive, having done this many times in the Special Forces, and often on his survival exploits.
Once again his anxiety for her safety came to the forefront of his mind. Hers, and perhaps a baby’s. His baby’s.
A warm flutter of hope filled his stomach.
Duke would pay dearly for putting her in danger. Dearly.
* * *
“I hear something!”
After walking without rest for hours, Sara clutched his arm in an iron grip. Her head cocked as she listened, her eyes staring off into space.
“Water!” Her face lit up with a beautiful smile that had his eyes blinking and his groin tugging. “Thank God, I was getting worried.” She slid her hand down his arm and slipped her fingers into his. “I’m starting to get really dizzy from the headache.”
He let a breath tumble out of his mouth. Things were getting dire. Sara was visibly flagging, trying to keep on but without energy to do so. Mike had argued with her until she took the last of the water, but it was so little, it didn’t help much. “Excellent discovery. I was verging on concerned.”
“Just concerned? The constant clenched jaw and sour look didn’t stem from a stronger emotion? You weren’t fretting, for example?”
Eyes scanning, he couldn’t help a smile as he started through the grass toward the sound. “In Special Forces, we don’t worry, and we certainly don’t fret. We do, occasionally, get concerned.”
“Who are you fooling? Concerned is just a masculine way of saying worry. Admit it. You were wetting your pants like an old woman. You probably thought I’d drop dead because I’m a chick.”
“Not because you’re a chick, no. More because you are a soft city slicker.”
“We’re from the same place, Mikey Frost. Just because you’ve been flashing your private parts at the wildlife for a few years longer than me doesn’t make you Rambo all of a sudden.”
“You’re talking to someone who served in as a Green Beret. Do you really want to push this argument?”
Sara grunted, hand still holding his. He turned his face to show her his victory smile and got a scrunched nose for his efforts.
Mike three—Sara zero. Just like old times.
They passed into the shade of a cluster of trees, the coolness making them both sigh. A few more steps and they beheld the best sight a dehydrated, thirsty wanderer could: a flowing stream.
“Can we drink it now?” Sara asked in desperation, taking a step toward the small ravine.
Mike shook his head as he scanned the area, mind whirling. “The water looks clear, but we’re at least halfway down the mountain. There’s no telling what’s been leaked into the water further up. There’s animal waste to think about, bacteria. No, we need to boil it.” He turned to her. “Let’s find some shelter for the night, get a fire going, and then we’ll be ready for the water. We’ll use whatever daylight we have left to search for some food.”
“No more walking today?” she asked with a sagging body.
He leaned toward her, her feminine aroma competing with sweat and sun-warmed skin. He had no idea it would be such a pleasant elixir.
His hand found the rise of her butt as his face dipped in close, wanting to sample. Ignoring the painful pit of his stomach and the monster headache—all he felt was his pounding erection. He moved closer, inches from her now, his hand falling to her firm butt.
“Hello? I’m dying of thirst,” she reminded him, a crease working into her brow. Heat had seeped into her gaze, though. Hot and eager. Her body leaning in, sexually welcoming his touch. But there was still a glimmer of fear. Of uncertainty.
She wasn’t ready. But she was closer. The waiting continued. For now.
He wiped his mind clean and nodded, back to business. “Let’s get some shelter.”
Chapter 15
Sara waited while Mike scouted the area, her mind foggy and her stomach aching. She was nauseated from the intense hunger, not to mention the confusion settling over her brain from fatigue. This was all nothing to her dry, cracked lips and desperate yearning for one—just one—drop of water. She couldn’t remember ever being so thirsty in all her life.
Her feet stumbled as she followed Mike down the ravine, her eyes stuck on the flowing water greedily.
“It’s actually a lot deeper than I thought. Hmm.” Mike’s beautiful eyes scanned the b
ank they were approaching, settling on a fallen log crossing the stream ten paces to the right. He looked back in the direction they’d come.
“Must be our lucky day.” He scanned her shoes before looking back at the log.
As he led her by the hand to his intended crossing, she asked, “Why don’t we just stay on this side? Hang out near a tree or something.”
“I’m hoping the other side has something more to offer in the way of food sources. It can’t be any worse, so the risk is worth it.”
Sara waited as he gracefully stepped up onto the log, his substantial muscles working in perfect harmony. He bounced a couple times with each step, making sure the wood would hold. It didn’t take him long to effortlessly cross, stepping onto the far bank with an expectant expression.
“It’ll hold. Just keep your balance and come on over.”
“Oh sure, no problem.” Sara’s brow furrowed in dazed concentration as she stepped up onto the log. It wobbled, throwing her balance to the right. She stepped back onto the bank, her arms windmilling.
“You can do it, baby,” Mike said earnestly.
“Don’t call me baby—it’s weird,” she said as a shock of butterflies assaulted her stomach. It was also extremely distracting.
“Yes, ma’am,” he said, a grin tweaking his lips.
Arms out to the sides, she stepped up again, prepared for the wobble this time. Her body quivered as she kept her balance and stepped out further. The fast-moving stream gurgled below her, rushing under the log in a clear, beautiful gush. Just looking at all that water—that delicious, clear water…
Her tongue seemed to thicken with her pressing thirst, her throat tightening up and all her focus homed in on that water. She was so thirsty. So unbelievably thirsty.
She stepped on the edge of the log—more of a branch, really. No more than the size of her thigh.
“Good job, almost there,” Mike said, reaching out to her.