by Lyn Stone
That aside, his ordinary instincts were usually pretty good.
Martine practiced patience while Corda made up his mind. She understood his dilemma and admitted to herself that he would be a fool to take her at her word. She had no identification on her, though even that would not convince him. ID could so easily be faked.
“Your weapon?” he said, holding out his hand.
“If we’re ambushed along the way, I’ll be defenseless,” she reminded him. She watched him extract the mags from the AK’s, including hers, and tuck the extra ammo in his belt.
He shrugged. “And if you are not who you say you are, sweetie, and that chopper we meet is full of government troops, I’m pretty much screwed six ways from Sunday.”
She sighed, turned over the Beretta she’d taken from Humberto’s desk. It would be useless to reassure Corda that she was not his enemy. Better if she did what she could to facilitate his trust. “It pulls a fraction to the right,” she told him.
Corda looked at her oddly, as if she’d surprised him with her compliance. She felt his dark gaze slide over her as he did a slow visual check.
Pure male appreciation gleamed right through the careful scrutiny by the agent. Martine fought her response to his obvious admiration of her body without much success. Her temperature rose automatically and she knew she probably blushed.
He was a great-looking guy and in better physical shape than anyone she knew, even her brother who obsessed with working out. There were those bronzed, finely honed muscles rippling everywhere. Jet black hair set off intoxicating eyes the color of well-aged bourbon. His sensual, mobile lips quirked way too often with a hint of sexy mischief. Yes, definitely, a killer smile. But Corda’s looks weren’t the main attraction for Martine. It was his humor. Show her a man who could laugh in the face of danger and she was hooked big-time. This man laughed in the face of death. Tempted though she was to start something with him and see where it led, now was definitely not the time.
“You have a backup?” he asked.
Martine held her arms out to her side, palms up. “Where would I put it?”
The small size man’s uniform Humberto had given her hugged her body like a lover, except where the trousers bloused over her boots. Maybe he wouldn’t check there. The bone knife she carried was thin and the grip of it fairly slender, making no obvious bulge as even a small pistol might.
He nodded and seemed satisfied. “Okay, let’s hit the road. Which way?”
“North,” she said. “I’ll lead.”
His smile mocked her. “Wouldn’t have it any other way.”
She moved quickly through the undergrowth. Every few minutes, she checked the tiny, special compass built into the back of her watch, which she had turned upside down on her wrist.
Neither of them spoke, which was fine by her. The man was entirely too savvy. She was afraid he would figure out this was her first attempt at a field assignment and decide to take over. If she could just hold it together until they got on that chopper, she was home free. Then she could pretend airsickness or something that would explain giving way to the nausea roiling inside her.
She’d killed two men today. But she couldn’t think about that now. She wouldn’t. Read the compass again, she told herself sternly. Look professional. Look tough.
Suddenly, he grabbed her arm and jerked her to a halt. “Smoke,” he whispered.
She sniffed. He was right. Oily smoke and another stench that almost overrode it. Oh God, the helicopter.
Carefully, he took point and led them silently through the brush until they could view the clearing ahead. The chopper sat gutted by fire, the pilot still inside.
Within the cover of the trees just beyond that, she spied two uniformed soldiers, armed and alert, scanning the surrounding woods.
The breath she’d been holding expelled suddenly. She quickly bent double and retched into the bushes. A strong hand slid under her stomach and held her. “Steady now,” he whispered. “This is not the time to lose your cool, baby.”
She wiped her mouth on her sleeve and sucked in a deep breath. “I’m not a baby,” she snapped, her voice almost inaudible.
He didn’t argue.
Martine straightened, carefully moved back through the tangled growth of forest and headed west. “Let’s go.”
“Where?” he asked, but he was following her.
“Bogotá,” she answered. “Plan B. We’ll have to fly out commercial.”
“You are kidding, right?”
“I might lie a little, but I never kid,” she said.
Six hours later, they stopped for the night, found a little overhang in the hill to protect them from the incessant rain that had been drenching them all afternoon. Both were soaked to the skin, too exhausted to do anything but slump against the rock at their backs. She was awake now, though. Joe could tell by her breathing.
It was time they got to know one another. He kept recalling that possible glimpse into the future that consisted of nothing but her face wearing a horrified expression, abject fear. The memory replayed now when he closed his eyes, a much too up-close and personal view of Martine.
If it was a premonition, he couldn’t prevent seeing it for real sometime in the near future. The best he could do was try to figure out the context of it ahead of time. Unfortunately, he’d only been able to do that a time or two in his life, a life interrupted by little snatches of what was to be.
Why such weird anomalies deviled him, Joe had no clue, even after exhaustive study by so-called experts on psychic phenomena. After a few months, he had dropped out of the study initiated by the university and never mentioned his “glimpses” to anyone again.
Right now all Joe wanted was to gain more information about the woman who would eventually star in the reality version of his latest episode and prepare to deal with it ahead of time if there was any way he possibly could.
“What scares you most, Martine?” he asked her, keeping his voice soft, playing to the intimacy that had been forced on them by the elements.
“What is this? Truth or Dare?” she shot back.
“Just truth. Settle down now.” He slid one arm around her and drew her close. She tensed a bit, but he knew it was only a token resistance and ignored it. “I’m chilly, aren’t you? Not coming on to you here or anything, just sharing a little body heat, okay?”
“Fine,” she snapped. “I’m tired, wet and hungry and not in the mood to get personal, so just behave yourself.”
“I will,” he promised. “I’ve got to tell you I have nothing but the greatest respect for you, Martine.”
“Thanks. Hold that thought.” She shifted her body so that she fit closer, but Joe didn’t mistake it for encouragement. She was cold and trying to get more comfortable, that was all.
He stifled the urge to pull her head down to his shoulder. Instead, he carefully charged ahead with his disguised interrogation. “You’re one of the bravest people I’ve ever met, so don’t get me wrong. But tell me, does anything frighten you to the point you can’t function?”
Her silence stretched on for a full minute. “Mediocrity,” she declared finally.
Joe laughed and squeezed her shoulder, liking the firmness of her warmth beneath the rough wet sleeve of her uniform. Her right breast pressed firmly against his side, her hip against his leg. His body responded normally, but he wasn’t uncomfortable with that. Not yet anyway. He just enjoyed it, determined to press on with his original intent to find out everything he could about her.
She wasn’t giving up a thing unless he went first. Maybe not even then, but he’d try anyway.
“Dying alone scares me,” he admitted, sticking strictly to fact. Somebody as savvy as she was would spot a lie in a situation like this, he figured.
“We all die alone, Joe,” she said.
“I know, but I mean dying the way I would have if you hadn’t come along. No one would ever have known I was dead. My family would hope, pray and search for years maybe, thinking I was a
prisoner somewhere or a victim of amnesia wandering around waiting to be found. The dying part I could handle, but I’d want somebody to know where I bought it and why, you know? I’d also like to be holding a hand when I go. Somebody who would care one way or the other.”
“Something to think about,” she granted him, her voice thoughtful.
“Now you. What’s your greatest fear?”
Again she considered his question before she answered softly, reluctantly. “Subjugating myself. Not being able to make my own decisions. Being helpless and dependent. My mother was like that. My father was…never mind. I’d rather not go into it.” He thought he heard her curse under her breath.
There was a wealth of information in that revelation, one he was sure she hadn’t intended to make.
But she still wasn’t getting what he meant, Joe thought with a shake of his head. “No, I mean an immediate scare. What would nearly stop your heart? Make you sweat bullets?”
“Oh.” She was quiet for a minute. “Being tied up, I think. Confined so I couldn’t move freely. That would probably do it.” She laughed quietly. “I remember once when Matt and I were small. We were playing soldiers and he took me prisoner. Bound my hands with cellophane tape.”
“Ah. Well, I expect he was sorry he did that when you got free,” Joe guessed.
“I beaned him with a plastic baseball bat and blacked his eye,” she said with another small chuckle.
“Good for you. Bet he hasn’t tied up a woman since then. See? You saved him from a life of kinky sex.”
She ignored that observation. “He was a horrible brat. I suppose we both were.” Joe heard the affection in her voice, recognized it as exactly what he felt for his siblings.
“Why are you doing this, Martine?” he asked, trying to stay conversational and not betray the intensity of his need to know what drove her.
“I told you the truth. My brother didn’t join me when he should have. I wanted to get to Vargas and find out if he had heard from him. And to get you out of there as planned, of course.”
“The other reason,” Joe demanded softly, wanting to know more about what she’d revealed earlier, about the subjugation thing. About her parents and how their behavior might have led her to this point.
She sighed and leaned against his shoulder. “Could you cut the chatter now and get some sleep? We have a long walk tomorrow.”
“Sure,” he agreed, knowing she’d given him all the confidences he could expect for now.
He still didn’t know enough about her. Considering his overpowering interest in her as a woman, maybe he never would get enough. It might be better to drop it. She wasn’t what he needed, not at all what he was looking for now that he’d decided to settle down and leave this kind of work behind.
As terrific as she felt in his arms, he was going to have to bypass Martine and find somebody different.
At least he had found out one thing that could put that godawful look of horror on her face. In light of that, he ought to prepare for them to be captured. It was probably going to happen in spite of whatever he tried to do to prevent it.
Chapter 3
They had been struggling through hanging vines and palmetto fronds for hours. Joe had taken the lead, wishing like hell for a machete even if it would leave a trail a kid could follow. Though it wasn’t that late in the day, the denseness of the forest blocked out most of the sunlight.
They would have to stop soon or he was going to disgrace himself and drop in a heap at her feet. Outdone by a girl. If he was a few years younger and had the energy left for any show of pride, he’d worry about that. However…
“I need a rest,” he said in all candor, hoping she wouldn’t kick him in the butt and tell him to keep walking.
“Thank God,” she muttered, stretching her arms above her head and flexing her fingers, rolling her shoulders, generally making him sweat even more than he already was.
Joe flattened the vegetation to make a nest large enough for them to recline.
“I’ll never take another steam bath as long as I live,” she announced.
“Me neither.” Joe stretched out and sighed with relief, thinking how nice it would be to have gills. The humidity was at least ninety-nine-point-nine percent. It was probably raining outside the canopy above them. He was as wet as if he were out there in it.
He risked a look at her to see how she was faring. Dewy was the word that came to mind. No rivulets of sweat for this chick. As Mama would say, girls didn’t perspire, they glowed. Even in the near darkness, Martine glowed. Golden. Untouchable. Except that his leg was resting right next to hers. She raised hers just then and broke contact.
Joe grinned. “What’s the matter, kid? I make you nervous?”
“Where are you really from, Corda?”
“What state?”
“No, what planet? You think every woman you meet is fair game. Catch up with the world, will you?”
Joe laughed out loud. It felt so good. Here he was in the middle of the damned jungle, half dead from exhaustion, lying next to a beautiful woman while looking about as unappealing as a guy could look and he was loving life at the moment. Just loving the hell out of it. He’d never felt quite so alive.
She turned her face to his, a look of concern clouding her features. “You’re not cracking up, are you?”
He laughed again, couldn’t seem to stop. Even so, he managed to shake his head. She sat up, peered down at him and slapped him. Hard!
“Damn! What’d you do that for?” he snapped, rubbing his face. She had a mean right palm.
“You needed that,” she said, lying down again. “And no, you do not make me nervous. You make me tired. Now be quiet and save your energy. We have a long way to go yet.”
Martine smiled to herself as she lay turned away from him, her face pillowed on her hands. He was keeping his distance, at least for the moment, but she didn’t think he would for very long. His eyes gave it away. He wanted her. Badly.
She wanted him, too, but didn’t plan to let him know yet. It had been a long time since she had wanted anyone, not since her senior year in college. Her engagement to Steven had been such a fiasco, it had almost turned her against men forever.
This time—if she decided to give in to this need of hers—she did not intend to relinquish one iota of control, not one. She suspected that Joe Corda would turn out to be a lot more demanding that Steven Prescott, engineer, had ever thought about being.
Her father’s death had been a wake-up call for her. Seeing how her mother behaved after being left alone had changed Martine’s life forever. Talk about totally lost!
The quiet unassuming daughter had realized she was becoming her mother all over again. Ripe for picking by a man who would rule her with an iron hand, dictate every aspect of her existence, choose her friends, even her clothes. Steven had been well on his way to achieving that until Martine suddenly and unequivocally rebelled. Thank God she had.
As for starting up something with Joe Corda, Martine knew very well that what was too easily gained would never be fully appreciated.
He was a lot like her brother. Even good men like these two thought of sex as a simple hunger. They’d hook up with whoever was handy and reasonably attractive, do the deed and never look back after the sun came up. It was the nature of the beast and she didn’t blame them. However, though Martine was not looking for permanence, she at least wanted to be remembered past lunch the next day.
There would be plenty of time to explore what she was feeling for him, and also decide what course she should, take, once they got out of this godforsaken country.
She wriggled out a comfier spot in the damp bed of fronds and barely managed not to jump when his arm slid around her, settling across her waist. His body rested along the length of hers, not snuggling precisely, just barely touching. Almost teasing.
Martine didn’t panic. She also didn’t mistake it for an attempt at seduction. She had felt his finger wrap snugly around her belt loop. He m
erely wanted to make certain she didn’t crawl off and leave him there when he went to sleep. She was the one with the compass.
Oddly enough, his ability to reason while he was aroused gave her comfort. She really liked intelligent men, practical enough to control their impulses when it counted.
The next day passed much the same as the first. Joe could not believe the guts this woman had. It just boggled his mind. Once out of the forest, she led the way through the hills, directly to the outskirts of the city without getting lost once or encountering a single soul on the way.
Her instincts were damned near perfect. She never complained. She had never lost her cool again after that one upchuck when they had found the fried chopper. That little upset had lasted, what? Two seconds?
This morning as soon as they woke up, she had disappeared behind some bushes, giving him time to take care of his own business, then marched right back and took up the journey. Her stamina equaled and almost outstripped his.
The forest canopy had thinned enough to show that the rain had stopped, but the mud made the going rough. They’d been walking at a fast clip for hours and he could do with a rest.
She must have read his mind. “We’re stopping up ahead. There’s a stream.”
Good as her word, she led him right to it.
“You’ve come this way before,” he guessed.
“Yes, just this far in. I thought it wise to set up an alternate plan before I hired the driver to take me to Vargas.”
While he was kneeling, scooping up water and washing his face, she was digging in the dirt. “What are you looking for, roots?” he asked, wiping his hands on his shirt.
He’d had it with snatching berries along the way. Roots would be good. Even grubs were sounding tasty at this point, his squeamish dislike of them during survival training notwithstanding.
“Candy,” she informed him, continuing to scoop the earth out of the shallow hole. “Ah,” she said with satisfaction, pulling a plastic bag out of the hole.