Hunter's Woman

by McKenna, Lindsay

  “I’d already thought about that. Do you know how far back from the channel the Juma village sits?” Catt found herself falling into companionable conversation with him—once again. Oh, Ty Hunter had always been easy to talk with. How many times had she replayed those wonderful, stolen moments from the past? Far too many. Catt recalled the endless tears she’d cried when he’d abandoned her. In her greatest hour of need, when she’d craved Ty’s comfort, his arms, his support, he hadn’t been there for her. Tears pricked the backs of her eyes now, and she blinked several times to push them away. Looking at him, she dropped her gaze to his strong, capable mouth. Hotly, she recalled how wonderful his kisses had been. How his mouth had moved with such silken power across her lips, taming her, guiding her, cajoling her and meeting her hunger with his own.

  Taking a shaky breath, Catt closed her eyes and rubbed her brow.

  “Headache?” Ty asked gently, as she continued to gently massage her wrinkled brow. He ached to reach out and rub the tension out of her shoulders as he had in the past.

  “Yes,” she muttered uneasily. “It’s a migraine coming on.”

  “Some things don’t change, do they?” And he smiled a little as she opened her dark blue eyes and stared at him. The silence stretched between them. Ty recalled that headaches, the migraine variety, had always plagued Catt. In the past, when they had been going together, he would turn her around and gently knead and massage her tight neck and shoulders, and miraculously, the oncoming migraine would disappear. And when he looked in her eyes now, he saw that she remembered, too, how he had cared for her. And then he saw anger wash the warmth in her gaze away. Realizing he’d overstepped the bounds of their present, tenuous relationship, he said, “Sorry, I just don’t like to see you in pain.”

  Her fingers slipped from her brow and she sat up, fury sizzling through her. “Really?” Sarcasm made her voice brittle, nearly acidic.

  Heat raced up his cheeks. Ty realized he was blushing beneath her blistering stare. Well, didn’t he have it coming? “I have a friend, a homeopathic doctor,” he said, trying to steer their conversation back on track. “She saved my life with this alternative medicine when I contracted Congo fever in an outbreak over in Africa. They had flown me to London to die. The priest had already given me the last rites when Dr. Rachel Donovan-Cunningham came in, gave me one of her little white pills and told the priest to go away, that I wouldn’t be needing his services.” Ty’s mouth stretched a little as he held Catt’s furious gaze. Already, as he began his story, he could see her anger fleeing, replaced with curiosity. That was one of the many things he had loved about Catt: her emotions were so open, so easily read on her face. Yes, she had a temper, but it never lasted long. She was like a Texas thunderstorm, erupting suddenly, but quickly returning to calm. In some ways, she hadn’t changed at all, and he gloried in that small discovery.

  “I’ve heard of homeopathy. So it saved your sorry neck?”

  Hunter chuckled. “For better or worse, yes, it did.” He gestured toward her left shoulder. “I remember you got migraines from a tight neck and shoulders. Dr. Donovan-Cunningham taught me a lot about homeopathy as I recovered in that London hospital. As a parting gift, she gave me a repertory and materia medica on the medicine. Over the years, I’ve gotten more training when I could. I’m not at her level, but I can use it for acute situations like your migraine if you’re interested.”

  Catt didn’t like the idea of Ty helping her. All too vividly, she recalled how he’d made her migraines go away before—with his marvelous, kneading fingers that worked a special magic on her tight flesh. Glaring at him, she said, “With you on board, my migraine is coming back. I’ll take anything to make it and you go away.”

  Ty understood. “If I thought jumping overboard and swimming back to shore would cure it, I would.”

  “Try it.”

  Stung, but trying not to show his hurt, he took out a pad of paper and pen from his shirt pocket. “If you can answer a few questions about your symptoms, maybe I can find the right remedy to get rid of it. But unfortunately, I won’t be able to rid you of myself just yet.”

  “Fire away,” she muttered, as she ruefully rubbed her neck to ease the tension.

  He opened the pad and asked, “What does it feel like?”

  Grimacing, Catt growled, “Like someone is pulling all the skin on the back of my head and neck so tight that it’s going to crack and break.”

  He wrote some notes down. Pleased that she was going to cooperate despite the fact that she saw him as her archenemy, Ty asked, “The pain? Can you describe it?”

  “Dull and aching. Why are you asking me so many questions? Why can’t you just give me the pill for migraines?”

  “Because in homeopathy, we take all the symptoms of your case first, look them up in the repertory as a unit and then find the one single remedy that fits most of your major symptoms.”

  “Humph.”

  “This isn’t like the pharmaceutical drugs you’re used to,” he warned.

  “Obviously. What else? This thing is coming on slow but sure.”

  “When did it start?”

  “When I saw you.”

  He nodded and looked at his watch. “So it’s a slow-moving migraine?”

  “You know it is.”

  Unruffled, he said, “What makes it feel worse?”

  “Having you sit here. Having you on this tug with me.”

  The corners of his mouth rose slightly. “I won’t find those symptoms in my repertory. Any others?”

  She tried to remain immune to his charm, to that little-boy smile lurking around his mouth. Why did Ty have to be so damned ruggedly handsome? He could charm a snake if he wanted to. Nostrils flaring, she lifted her head and rubbed her neck. “I just had a cup of coffee, and that helped ease it a little.”

  “So, it gets better with stimulants?”

  She eyed him. “I guess you could say that. Coffee is a stimulant of sorts.”

  “That’s right,” he agreed. “What else?”

  It hurt to think at this point. Catt wished Ty would go away, and at the same time, her heart was absorbing his nearness like a desert that hadn’t seen rain in years—a decade to be exact—and that made her scared of her own emotions toward him. Fumbling for a response, she muttered, “Bad news.”

  “Me,” he said, scribbling again. “Anything that makes your symptoms worse?”

  “With this damned humidity cranking up, I always feel horrible. So I guess you could say heat and sunlight like we’re having right now, okay?”

  Ty finished writing and got up. “I’ll be back in a bit with a remedy.”

  “Don’t worry, I’m not going anywhere.” She watched as he nodded and carefully picked his way past the boxes stacked on the deck of the tug. The humid air felt somewhat cooler, but not much. Catt had the desire to leap into the cool waters of the muddy Amazon. She squelched that idea because among the denizens that lived in these fabled waters were schools of flesh-eating piranhas. No, she had no desire to be stripped to her skeleton by those hungry little monsters.

  Rubbing her neck once more, Catt sighed heavily. Being around Ty was like holding her hand over an open flame and letting herself be burned. What recourse did she have? None. Her migraine was intensifying. It was because of the shock of seeing him once again, she knew. If only her stupid heart would let him go! Why did she feel hope? Joy when he was nearby?

  “I feel like a damned thunderstorm—up one second, down the next,” she muttered under her breath. She saw Ty sitting down on the deck, a book in hand and another at his side, deep in concentration. Turning, Catt looked out across the bow of the tug. The Amazon River was nearly half a mile wide at this point, a yellow-gray color against the jungle along the banks. Trees of varying types, including palms, were so thick that light rarely reached the jungle floor, and she could see the darkness within. A flight of red-and-yellow macaws flew overhead in a V pattern. Their color stood out against the clouds that seemed to perpetu
ally hang overhead. Would she ever see direct sunlight again?

  “I think I got your remedy.”

  Catt jumped. She didn’t mean to, but Ty’s voice was so close, she couldn’t help it. Jerking to look upward, she saw he was standing in front of her, a couple of white pellets in the hand extended in her direction. Eyeing them and then him, she growled, “What is it?”

  Ty saw that strain was deepening around Catt’s eyes—pain from the oncoming migraine encroaching. “It’s a remedy called Gelsemium. In layperson’s language, it’s yellow jasmine.” He crouched down in front of her and kept his hand extended. Catt was eyeing the pellets jadedly. “In its natural state, the herb is poisonous and could kill you. But—” he pointed to the pellets “—these are made so that there’s no longer any of the crude substance left in it to hurt you.”

  “Then what’s left?” Catt demanded. “Air?”

  He grinned. “Energy. I know we don’t have time to talk much about this kind of medicine, but trust me that the energy signature of Gelsemium is in these pellets.”

  “And these things will stop my migraine?”

  He heard the disbelief in her voice. He saw the distrust in her eyes. “Yes, it will.”

  She stared at him. “Give me one reason to trust what you say, Hunter.”

  His heart ached in that moment. He knew her question grew from the way he’d made her suffer in the past; he could hear her pain in her low, hoarse tone. As gently as possible, he rasped, “This isn’t about me. This is about you and trying to help you be pain free. You don’t need a migraine going into an outbreak situation. You don’t have to trust me in order to take this remedy. If it works, you’ll know it in twenty minutes. Your migraine symptoms will start to go away.” Holding her challenging blue gaze, he moved his hand a little closer to her.

  Disgruntled, Catt held out her palm. “Give them to me.”

  He tipped his hand. Their fingers met and touched briefly. Catt instantly jerked hers away. The white pellets fell to the deck of the tug. Ty heard her mutter a curse of desperation mixed with anger.

  “Just stay put,” he told her, unwinding and straightening to his full height. “I’ve got more. I’ll bring you another dose.”

  Feeling foolish, Catt refused to look at him. Ty was being incredibly tolerant and gentle with her despite the sarcasm, the anger she continually aimed at him. Her fingers tingled where they’d briefly touched his. A wild flurry of heat had jolted up through her body from that contact. It had shocked her. Scared her. Feeling very stupid at jerking her hand away as if it had been scalded, Catt watched him pick up a black plastic case that looked like a small fishing tackle box. He wound his way back to her and sat down on the trunk opposite her.

  Opening the case, Ty showed her some two-dramsize amber bottles with black caps on them. “I carry fifty homeopathic remedies with me all the time.” Maybe if he showed her some of what he knew, she’d settle down and not be so jumpy. But Ty knew why she’d jerked her hand away. She hated him so much she didn’t want to be touched by him. The hurt moving through him was as wide as the Amazon they floated on. There was nothing he could do; he felt the wound in his heart expanding. He felt his need for Catt all over again, along with the pain of knowing they could never be together again.

  Taking out one bottle, he handed it to Catt, making sure he didn’t touch her hand in the process. “Here’s the Gelsemium. Open it and put a few pellets on the palm of your hand. And then put them under your tongue. They’ll melt away real quick. They’re sweet-tasting, so you’ll like them.”

  Doing as she was instructed, Catt hurriedly recapped the bottle and handed it back to Ty. Because she was distracted, her fingers brushed his again. This time she forced herself not to jerk away and drop the bottle.

  “Look,” she rasped, “I’ve got more work to do….”

  Ty understood. He put the bottle back in the case and closed it. “No problem. Let me know if your migraine goes away?”

  “Yes, sure….” Catt didn’t believe for a moment it would go away because of this “energy” medicine of his. From her point of view as a medical doctor, it was snake oil or hocus-pocus at best. As he rose and left, she dragged in a sigh of relief.

  Being around Ty was like being around a raging fire that was out of control. Catt was both attracted to and afraid of him. What was she going to do? How would she handle his nearness at the village? Someway, Catt realized, she had to get Ty away from her. A plan began to form in her aching head. Yes, if she could just keep him away from her and her silly, pining heart, maybe, just maybe, she could survive this time with him.

  Chapter Four

  “My headache’s gone,” Catt said grumpily. It had taken every bit of her courage to walk down the length of the tug as it chugged into the hazy sunset, and admit that to Ty. He was sitting on the rough wooden deck of the ill-kept tug, notebook in hand, writing. She stood over him, her hands on her hips, feeling tense and full of turmoil. Ty was here, with her. That fact still overwhelmed her. What sick twist of the cosmos had occurred? In all these years, Catt had never envisioned meeting with her first love again—nor had she wanted to.

  Ty put his notebook aside. He looked up into Catt’s strained features. Understanding what it had cost her pride to admit he was right—and he knew she had a lot of pride—he purposely remained seated before her. Right now, she was jumpy as hell around him. Ty knew if Catt could walk on water and leave this boat, she’d do it because he was here. The thought made bitterness coat his mouth.

  Looking at his watch, he murmured, “Thirty minutes. Not bad. All your symptoms are gone?”

  “Yes, even the ones I forgot to tell you about. No more nausea. My eyes aren’t hurt by this light.” She looked up at the cloudy sky. “Not that it’s that bright, but when I get a damned migraine I want complete darkness around me.” Why did Ty have to look so vulnerable to her? He sat on the gray, peeling deck, his long muscled legs bent to brace himself, his strong back and powerful shoulders resting against the bulwark of the tug. The slight breeze riffled his dark, walnut-brown hair and the naked urge to thread her fingers through those strands shocked Catt.

  “Good,” Ty murmured. “Homeopathy can work miracles from time to time.” And then he chuckled a little. “It saved my life, and that’s what got me interested in it, as I said. Dr. Donovan-Cunningham was a good teacher, too. Since then, I’ve used it off and on. A couple of months ago, my brother Reid was over in Africa on assignment with Casey. Did you hear about that?” He looked up expectantly at Catt. She had drawn her arms across her chest, but she didn’t look as tense, so he kept up his quiet patter. In the past, his low, soothing voice had always helped quiet the highstrung tension that lived within her.

  “Well, you probably didn’t,” he said, answering his own question. “Anyway, while Reid and Casey were staying in one of the villages there, Reid got sideswiped by a black mamba.”

  Catt’s eyes widened. “You’re kidding!”

  “Nope,” he said gravely, “and you know, in terms of the venom they carry, they are the deadliest snakes in the world. You don’t survive a bite from them.”

  Rubbing her head, Catt muttered, “Yes, I’m well aware of that.”

  “Anyway, Reid got bitten through his pants, and only a little venom got into his bloodstream, but it was enough for him to go down for the count. Casey had him flown from Yambuku, Congo to Johannesburg, to one of the top hospitals there. Reid went into cardiac arrest a number of times on the flight, and if it hadn’t been for Casey knowing CPR, he’d have died on that flight. By the time they got him to the hospital, he was in a coma. They put him on life support and told her he’d die in a matter of hours or days.”

  “How terrible,” Catt said, her arms dropping to her sides.

  “Yes, it was. She got on the first phone she could find to call for help.” Ty purposely left out the fact that he and his brother both worked for Perseus, because he didn’t want Catt to figure out why he was really here with her. She’d sta
rt putting things together and asking a lot of questions he didn’t want to have to answer. “She told me Reid was in critical condition and expected to die. And she wanted to know if there was something I could do for him.”

  “Your homeopathic pills?” Catt guessed, intrigued.

  “Bang on, darlin’.” The moment the endearment left his lips, Ty regretted it. Damn! He shot an apologetic glance upward and saw the shock written on her features. He’d always called her “darlin’” when they had gone together. Now the word had slipped effortlessly off his tongue without him even thinking about it. He saw the tension return to Catt’s eyes along with anger and hurt. “I’m sorry,” he said quickly, “I didn’t mean—”

  “Just get on with your story,” Catt said in a brittle tone. She tried to shake off the feelings that flowed gently through her because of the endearment. Had Ty done that on purpose? As she glared down at him, she saw the genuine apology in his expression and the sadness in his cinnamon-colored gaze. No, it was probably a slip from the past, that was all, she decided. Trying to steady her heartbeat, she wrapped her arms across her chest once more, feeling defensive.

  Mentally chastising himself, Ty muttered, “I called Dr. Donovan-Cunningham and told her what had happened to Reid. She suggested I fly over with a high potency of a remedy called Lachesis Muta. That’s venom from a bushmaster snake that lives right here in the Amazon.” He gestured toward the shore of the mighty river.

  “A poison to antidote a poison?” Catt murmured. “Interesting. Did it work?”

  “Yeah, it did,” Ty said with satisfaction. He saw the tension draining from her face once more. If nothing else, Catt had a voracious amount of curiosity as a scientist and medical doctor. Enough to help her forget his stupid slip of the tongue. The last thing he wanted to do was hurt Catt. He’d done enough to her already. “It was a sixteen-hour flight from hell, but I had the vial in hand. I met Casey in the waiting room on the critical-care floor, dissolved one pellet in a little bit of water and I immediately rubbed some on the inside of Reid’s wrist.” Ty smiled a little. “What happened next scared the living hell out of me.”