It was exactly what he wanted. They would be excruciatingly polite to each other for the remainder of the trip, and once they were back in Washington, they would go their separate ways. He would make sure that she and the kid were financially taken care of, and that would be the end of it.
He thought again of the baby, lying on the bright blanket on the jungle floor, waving her arms and legs and looking around, almost as if she was wondering where she was. A tiny arrow pierced his heart, flooding him with pain. He refused to think about what she would look like when she was two years old, or five, or ten. He wasn’t cut out to be a father, and she would sure as hell be better off without him.
He heard Lexie stumble behind him, and he stopped and spun around. She’d snatched at a vine to steady herself, and before he could think, he grabbed her shoulders and pulled her upright.
“Are you all right?” he demanded.
She backed away, slipping out of his hands. “I’m fine. You’d gotten a little ahead of me and I was just trying to catch up. I didn’t see that dead vine in front of me and I tripped on it. That’s all there was to it.”
“I’m sorry. I’ll try to go a little slower.” He’d been trying to run away from his thoughts, and guilt swamped him again. He hadn’t even thought about how he would be pushing her.
She brushed her hair away from her face and wiped the sweat off her forehead. “Go as fast as you like. I don’t want to be caught any more than you do. I have just as much to lose.” She glanced down at the baby, then back up at him again with a fierce look. “More.”
Anger welled up in him as he realized that she thought he wouldn’t care if the baby was caught by El Cuchillo, but he stopped himself before he corrected her. He hadn’t given her any reason to think otherwise. In fact, he’d done his best to ignore the baby’s very existence.
It was for her own good, he told himself. But that didn’t mean he wanted to see her caught by El Cuchillo. “I’ll try to be more careful,” he said. “But you’re right. I know it’s hard on you, but we need to move as fast as we can. If they start looking for us in the jungle, I want to have as much of a head start as possible.”
“I didn’t ask you to stop,” she reminded him in the same cool, detached voice. “You’re the one who turned around.”
“I may be a bastard, Lexie, but I’m not going to keep walking when you fall down, hoping you’ll catch up to me.”
She had the grace to flush at that. “I never said you would.” She pointedly looked past him at the endless miles of jungle in front of them. “Maybe we should continue this discussion later.”
He looked up at the sky and frowned. “We’re going to have to stop soon, anyway. We need to find a place and settle in before it gets dark.”
He saw the fear sweep over her face and how she struggled to subdue it. Not for the first time that day, he felt a jolt of admiration for her. She’d kept up a brutal pace for the past several hours and hadn’t complained once. Now she faced spending another night in the jungle, but she refused to give in to her fears.
“Are there any streams or rivers around?” she asked. “I need to wash out Ana’s diapers so they can dry overnight.”
He hadn’t thought of that problem, but he pulled out the map he’d stuck in his back pocket. “If we’ve covered as much ground as I think we have, there should be a stream not too far away. We’ll stop there for the night.”
She licked her lips again. He knew she did it when she was nervous, but he wished she would stop. It was driving him crazy. “Are we going to sleep in the open?”
Forcing his thoughts away from her mouth, he shook his head. “The worst scenario is we sleep in my tent. I’m going to try to find another hollow tree like the one we slept in last night.”
She shot him a curious look as he began to walk and she stepped in behind him. “How did you know how to find that tree?”
He looked over his shoulder and smiled slightly. She sounded more normal than she had for a while. “I just looked for fig vines.”
“What does that have to do with it?”
“Fig vines strangle a tree and eventually kill it. When that happens, the inside of the tree rots away and it eventually falls down. We just need to find one that’s already dead but hasn’t fallen yet.”
“And that no animals have found,” she muttered behind him.
“We can deal with any animals we find.” He was feeling more cheerful, and he started looking for signs of water. Lexie was sounding more like herself and less like the remote, chilly woman he didn’t know.
Ahead of him the bushes and undergrowth became abruptly more dense, and he walked a little faster. “I think that stream is up ahead,” he said over his shoulder, and she began to move faster, too. Before Lexie cleaned the diapers, they could replenish their water supply and get enough to cook the freeze-dried meals he’d packed.
A few minutes later they stood on the edge of what had obviously been a stream at one time. Now it was just a wide strip of mud. He saw her shoulders slump, and he longed to pull her to him and comfort her.
“It’s all right, Lexie,” he said gently. “There’ll be water somewhere close. The ground is still wet here.”
She straightened and turned to look at him. “Don’t try to make me feel better, Caine. I know as well as you do that there isn’t going to be any water in that stream until the rainy season starts. And that’s not for a few weeks yet.”
“There’ll be water.” He handed her another full canteen from his pack and took her empty one. “You stay here. I’m going to follow this for a while and see what I can find.”
Lexie nodded as her hand closed around the heavy metal container. Caine stood over her long enough to watch her sink down against the base of a tree, then he strode off along the muddy edges of the streambed.
Untying the knot that held the shawl with Ana in place, she lowered the sleeping baby to the ground and slipped out of her pack. The muscles in her shoulders burned with an ache so deep she was sure she wouldn’t ever be able to lift another thing. Unscrewing the cap to the canteen with fingers that shook, she gulped the water down. She’d been trying to drink as they walked, but she still found herself with a raging thirst.
The water was tepid, but it tasted wonderful as it slipped down her throat. By the time she’d drained the last drop from the canteen, she was beginning to feel better. Her muscles still ached and she was aware that she needed food badly, but the horrible thirst was gone.
Ana slept on, and Lexie felt her own eyelids drooping. The last conscious thing she did was scoop Ana close as she felt herself dropping off to sleep.
She awoke with a start as she felt a hand on her shoulder. “Lexie, wake up.”
It was Caine, and for a moment before she opened her eyes she luxuriated in the intimate words. The bed seemed hard, but she didn’t mind as long as Caine was there to whisper to her.
“Come on, Lexie, dinner’s ready.” His voice was impatient, and she reluctantly opened her eyes. Twilight surrounded them, and she bolted upright in fright. Where were they?
It only took a moment for her to remember. They were in the jungle, and Caine wasn’t her lover imploring her to wake up for him. She looked around, disoriented by the darkness, and realized that Ana wasn’t lying next to her.
“Where’s Ana?” she demanded, twisting to look behind her. “Where did she go?”
“Relax, Lexie. I moved her over by the fire. It looked like you were going to crush her.”
She scrambled to her feet and stumbled over to where the fire glowed brightly in the darkness. Ana was lying on her shawl, wide-awake and staring at the dancing fire. She seemed perfectly content, and Lexie felt a gnawing dissatisfaction. She was the only one who was supposed to be able to take care of her daughter.
“Thank you,” she said stiffly to Caine. “I appreciate your watching her.”
He shrugged. “I didn’t want you rolling over her. She might have started squawking, and I couldn’t take that chance
.”
“Thank you for your concern.” She couldn’t disguise the pain in her voice. “I appreciate it.”
“Lexie...”
She spun around and glared at him. “I thought you said dinner was ready. I’m starving.”
He hesitated as if he wanted to say something else, but then he shrugged again and moved to the other side of the fire. The flames illuminated the planes of his face, hardening the lines in the uncompromising light.
He indicated an aluminum bowl that had steam rising gently from it. “Here’s dinner. I hope you like beef stew.”
Her stomach growled in response, and she moved over to pick up the bowl. They were both silent as they ate. Ana slept on, and outside the circle of flickering firelight Lexie could hear the sounds of the jungle settling in for the night.
Scraping the last bit from her bowl, she set it down and looked over at Caine. Still eating, he gave her a slightly surprised look. “Did you get enough to eat?”
His pack was open, and while she’d eaten her dinner she’d noticed the pile of dehydrated meals in their foil packages. There were enough for both of them for three more days. “Yes, thank you, I’m fine,” she said politely. Her stomach protested, but she ignored it.
“There’s a bag of nuts in there, if you want them.”
She had to force herself to pretend to consider it. Finally she said, “I would like a few, I think.”
Reaching over to his pack, he drew out a bag and handed it to her. It felt pitifully light. Obviously, when Caine had planned his meals, he hadn’t taken into account the appetite of a nursing mother. Even back in the village, she’d been hungry all the time. She didn’t want to think of how hungry she might get before they got to Limores.
Taking a small handful of the nuts, she handed the bag back to him. As she savored each one, he finished his bowl of stew and stood.
“I found water a little farther downstream. Give me your bowl and I’ll clean up.”
“You made dinner,” she protested. “I’ll clean up.”
“Save the polite gestures for when we get back to civilization,” he said, but the tone of his voice was gentle. “I don’t want you near the water at night. It’s too dangerous. And give me the dirty diapers, too.”
“I can do that in the morning.”
“If you do it in the morning, they won’t have time to dry before we have to leave,” he explained patiently.
She wasn’t sure why she was so reluctant to have him clean Ana’s diapers. Before she could think of an excuse, he stepped over to her backpack.
“Did I see you wrapping them in liana leaves?”
Squatting in front of her pack, he reached in just as she scrambled over to it. “I’ll get them,” she muttered. Pulling out several cool lumps wrapped in rubbery leaves, she piled them on the ground. “But if I fall asleep before tomorrow, wake me up so I can wash them myself.”
Gathering the dirty diapers in their green wrappings, he shot her an amused look. “I have washed clothes before, you know. What’s the matter, Lexie? Afraid I’ll mix up the rinse cycle and the spin cycle?”
Ana began to stir, and Lexie knew he was right. The last thing she wanted to do was try to find her way to the water in the rapidly darkening jungle. In a few more minutes everything would be black. The only place she felt safe was by the fire. Or close to Caine.
“You’d better hurry,” she said, turning away to edge closer to the fire. “It’s getting awfully dark.”
“I have excellent night vision.” To her surprise, he leaned over and brushed his lips against her hair. “I’ll be right back. Don’t get too scared. The fire will keep animals away.”
By the time she spun around, he’d disappeared into the darkness. She sat and stared into the night for a long time, wondering why he’d kissed her. Especially after he’d gone out of his way earlier to make sure she understood just how he felt about her.
Ana’s whimpering finally registered, and she turned to pick the baby up. Looking around, she spotted a small tree not too far from the fire. As she unbuttoned her blouse, she leaned up against it and closed her eyes. The nap she’d taken that afternoon hadn’t begun to help her bone-deep weariness. She felt as if she could sleep for two days straight.
She roused herself when Ana finished eating and changed her diaper, then leaned back against the tree as she held the baby loosely in one arm. Her arms and legs ached with the strain of walking over uneven terrain all day, the muscles in her back burned and throbbed, and her stomach already felt empty again. She should grab another handful of nuts, she told herself, but she was too tired to do even that. Her eyelids had begun to droop when she heard a rustling in the bushes in front of her.
Caine was back, she thought, rousing herself. Surely he would have found a place where they could sleep. Sliding upright, she started to stand when she saw the firelight reflected in a pair of yellow eyes.
She froze, her arm tightening around Ana. As she stared, mesmerized, at the unblinking gaze of the animal in the bushes, she heard a low rumble that seemed to make the ground vibrate beneath her. It swelled and got louder until the growl filled the air of the suddenly silent jungle.
Chapter 7
Caine made his way through the darkness, the distant glow of the fire his guide to where Lexie waited. It had taken longer than he’d expected to collect and purify the drinking water and wash the diapers and the bowls, and he cursed himself for neglecting to bring the flashlight. Lexie had put on a brave front when he left, but he remembered how reluctant she’d been to enter the jungle the previous night. He hoped she hadn’t gotten too scared.
When he heard the growl he was fifty feet away from the fire. He began running, searching frantically for Lexie. Hoping she would have enough sense to stay motionless, he drew the long hunting knife smoothly from his boot as he moved through the brush. As he got closer and the growl became a roar, he reached down and grabbed a thick branch outlined by the firelight.
He could see her crouching against the trunk of a small tree, frozen in place. Her wide eyes stared, unblinking, at the tangle of vegetation in front of her.
Don’t move! he wanted to shout. Whispering prayers to a God he wasn’t sure he believed in, he reached the bush where the animal crouched just as the roar reached a crescendo. Knowing that the animal was about to leap, he brought the stick down onto its hiding place with all his strength.
The animal roared again, but this time with pain. When Caine slashed at the bushes with the branch he held, the animal turned and charged toward him. Tightening his grip on the knife, Caine slashed at the approaching jaguar with the branch. The animal stopped so close to Caine that its sickly sweet breath fanned his face, then the huge cat abruptly whirled and ran off. The black spots on his yellow coat gleamed for an instant in the firelight, then he was gone.
Caine stood and stared in the direction the jaguar had disappeared for a long time, listening. Then, dropping the stick, he turned around to where Lexie still crouched against the slender tree, Ana clutched tightly to her chest.
“It’s all right, he’s gone,” he said.
She stared back at him with wide, shocked eyes. “What was it?” she whispered.
He slid his knife back into its sheath and squatted in front of her. “It was a jaguar. It’s okay, Lexie. He’s gone.”
“How can you be sure?” The frantic fear she must still be feeling resonated in her voice. “You can’t see past the end of your nose in this darkness. Maybe he’s sitting a few feet away, waiting for another chance.”
“He’s not, Lexie.” Pulling her to her feet, he wrapped his arms around her and the baby both. He couldn’t help himself. “Do you hear all the noise from the jungle? If the jaguar was still around, everything would be quiet. That’s how I know he’s gone.”
One of Lexie’s arms crept around his neck. “I saw his eyes, Caine. He was staring at me.” Her voice trembled next to his ear, and he tightened his arms around her. “He was staring at me and Ana.”
“Shh,” he murmured. “He’s gone, and he won’t be back. And from now on I won’t leave you alone at night. All right?”
Her arm tightened around his neck. If she held him any closer he would have trouble breathing, but he didn’t care. Even though he knew she did it only because she was scared, his body stirred and responded as she pressed against him.
He smoothed his hand down her back, trying to ease the trembling that racked her. “It’s okay, Lexie.” Bending his head, he whispered his lips over her hair and drew her as close as he could without crushing the baby.
At the touch of his lips on her hair she raised her head, staring at him with wild eyes. In the flickering light of the fire he watched the fear gradually fade, to be replaced by another emotion. It was only reaction to the fright, he told himself. She just wanted to reassure herself that she was still alive. But he couldn’t stop himself from lowering his mouth until his lips brushed against hers.
For one shocked moment she froze. He could see her eyes, wide open and staring at him, could feel her muscles tense to spring backward. Then she melted into him.
Her mouth softened under his, drinking in his taste. The arm she’d clamped around his neck loosened, and he groaned when he felt her fingers slide tentatively into his hair. When he pulled her into the vee of his legs, against the hard bulge of flesh already straining the zipper of his pants, she didn’t move away. Instead, she tried to press even closer to him.
When she rose up on her toes, sliding against him as she reached to mold herself around him, he was lost. All his dreams, all the fantasies he’d had over the past eleven months didn’t even come close to the reality. Lexie was in his arms again, and the passion that radiated from her set a fire in his soul.
He staggered backward, his knees suddenly rubbery, and sank to the ground. She went with him willingly, still holding on to him with one hand and the baby with the other. Easing her onto her back, he slid one leg between her thighs and braced himself above her.
Slowly she untangled her hand from the baby, leaving the shawl and its occupant lying next to her on the ground. Holding on to his shoulder with one hand, she traced the contours of his face with the other. Her hand moved gently, almost reverently across his forehead and cheek, finally stopping when she traced the outline of his lips.
To Save His Child Page 10