The Other Half of Your Heart

by Janis Susan May

  Murchison arched backwards, arms still flailing as he tried to grab the gun, which miraculously, was still moving through the air. The stall wall, made mainly of sticks and odd bits of board, collapsed beneath his weight.

  The scythe blade did not.

  He didn’t scream; there was only an odd gurgle from his throat and a ripping sound from his chest. By logic, between the noise the hysterical cow was making and the sticks snapping, Cara thought she shouldn’t be able to hear the gruesome sounds; in truth she couldn’t hear anything else.

  Cara had never seen anyone die before, but as Murchison growled and twisted against the scythe, the damp metal half moon protruding grotesquely from the middle of his chest, then sagged with a boneless grace no living thing possessed, she knew he was dead. A reddish froth bubbled from his mouth with a painful sound like a deflating balloon and every sign of life was gone. Mechanically the froth condensed to a thin liquid that dripped into the dirty straw and was absorbed.

  She had killed someone.

  No, not quite. She had been fighting for her life, but it made no difference. Because of her, someone was dead.

  Her body felt as if it were a single, stiff piece. She couldn’t move her head. With a supreme effort of concentration, she turned her entire body toward a grim faced Dave Burkhart. He looked at her as if he had never seen her before, as if she were some sort of strange alien creature who had just happened to materialize before him.

  That was all right. She rather felt that way about herself at the moment.

  It took a moment to get her mouth to work.

  “Well,” she croaked, “it seems like I’ve made a definite commitment. Would you mind telling me to what?”

  Chapter Eight

  It was beginning to feel as if Cara had lived her entire life in the jungle and that all which had gone before, her childhood, her job, was nothing but a dimly remembered dream.

  “Can’t we slow down?”

  “And find out who that was? I’ll bet it wasn’t any friend of ours!”

  “Maybe it was someone coming to rescue us.”

  “Like Buck Tarrant?” Dave’s voice dripped sarcasm. “Sure, lady, sure.”

  Cara decided not to start that fruitless argument again. “I still don’t see why you didn’t steal Murchison’s car.” She stumbled only a little on his name. Murchison. The man she had killed. The man who had wanted to kill her.

  It still didn’t make any sense. Nothing made any sense.

  “Like I told you,” Dave repeated almost patiently, extending up a hand to help her scramble over a big boulder, “the car was fairly new. It probably had a computerized ignition system, and those can’t be hot-wired. At least, if they can, I don’t know how. Besides, there wasn’t time.”

  Cara could remember with startling clarity the events after Murchison’s death, even though she didn’t particularly want to. At Dave’s urging, she had cut him free with the little hatchet, and when would she be able to handle an edged implement again without a reminiscent shudder of horror? He had barely gotten to his feet, when the silence of the night was broken by the roar of a powerful motor.

  Cara hadn’t been aware of when the cow had quit screaming or when it had broken free from its tether and bolted, but the night was silent, the barn empty of everything but them and the bleeding horror on the floor, so the oncoming motor sounded somehow ominous. Swearing under his breath, Dave had grabbed her hand and run, dragging her with him.

  They were still running, though where from or where to, Cara had no idea. She only knew it was in the same blasted jungle that had cursed her ever since she had come to Mexico.

  No, not quite true. It was jungle, all right, but it was different from the last time. Then it had been hot, sticky, and thicker; the place where they were now wasn’t so stiflingly hot and felt more like a forest than the other. There were rocks, too, some as big as a house, and at times Cara swore she felt a cool breeze.

  “Where are we? Do you know?”

  “We’re running for our lives, that’s where we are. And keep your voice down,” he whispered hoarsely. “Sound travels out here.”

  “But,” Cara matched his whisper, “where are we running?”

  “Away from them, that’s what.”

  “You don’t have any idea of where we are.” She planted her feet and refused to budge.

  Dave stopped too, then turned and looked at her. The trees here were thin enough for the moon to penetrate, giving the scene a ghostly aura. There was enough light that Cara could see him clearly enough, but she couldn’t read his expression.

  “Yes, I do. We’re someplace where your nasty little friends aren’t, and that’s good enough for me.”

  “My nasty little friends... Listen here, you...”

  “Shut up, Miss Waters! This is neither the time nor the place for your protestations. Now you can stay here if you want, but I’m going to put as much distance between them and me as I can. If you want to come with me, come on!”

  Cara was intensely conscious of the eerie stillness of the night, of the rapidly dropping temperature, of the silent forest. In these alien woods, she would be a sitting duck for anything that was out there. Didn’t they still have mountain lions and bandits in Mexico? And, with her luck, marauding UFOs as well! What other chance did she have but to stay with him?

  “I’m coming,” she grumbled, “but can’t we slow down, just a little? My feet hurt.”

  Once again, Dave stopped and turned around. They were at the edge of a small clearing. The moonlight winked off her sandals and poured over her bare shoulders like gilt. Even smudged and smeared from her adventures, Cara Waters was beautiful. Despite the bleaching moonlight, her tousled hair retained a tinge of copper. She stood tall and proud as an Amazon, having saved not only her own life but his as well, and it was all Dave Burkhart could do to keep his hands off her.

  “Where did you learn to fight like that?” he asked suddenly, more to keep himself from moving to her than from any real desire to know. He could guess the answer, whether she told him the truth or not.

  “Television,” she replied, “and believe me, no one could have more surprised than I when it worked...when I actually killed someone.” Her tone dropped from defiance to bleak despair. She hid her face in her hands as if to hide from the enormity of the deed, descending in that one gesture from avenging goddess to weak and frightened mortal.

  She is good, Dave Burkhart couldn’t help thinking in reluctant admiration.

  He shook his head as if to clear it of unacceptable thoughts. If he went soft now, neither one of them would get out of this alive, let alone see justice be done, though surprisingly justice didn’t seem so important now. He deliberately hardened his heart and his tone.

  “A lot more than your feet will hurt if you don’t come along now.”

  “Don’t you dare threaten me,” Cara snapped weakly, swabbing at angry eyes with the backs of her hands, but she started to move.

  Dave did slow his pace and seemed to be listening with as much intensity as moving forward. Sound did carry a long way in the still night, and he had been more interested in covering ground than in stealth. Speed equaled sound, he knew, so if they were being pursued by someone who wanted to catch up with them, that someone would have to be making some noise.

  “Are they catching up to us?” Cara asked in a breathless whisper.

  She is smart, Dave conceded, but then he had always thought that. “Can’t hear anyone, but that doesn’t mean anything.”

  They had stopped in the shelter of an enormous old tree, their shadows blending seamlessly into the moonshade it cast. Once Cara’s gasping for breath had quieted, the noises of the night crept up.

  “What’s that?” she whispered.

  “Sounds like a river. Come on. That’s our road to town.”

  Cara opened her mouth to tell him that she had never learned how to swim, then closed it again as he grabbed her wrist and plunged ahead. There would be time enough for that
later; right now she had enough to do in keeping up with him. Her sandals were made for nothing more strenuous than dancing on polished parquet. They slid and twisted beneath her feet, and offered neither any support nor any protection from the litter on the forest floor. On the big rocks, they were positively treacherous, giving no security whatsoever.

  The rocks got bigger as the noise of the river got louder. There was no way to step down or up; the only way to navigate was on all fours. Cara crawled and slithered and scrambled over boulders as big as Volkswagens, trying very hard not to think of how dirty they must be or of what the soft stuff in the crevices where she put her fingers really was.

  Dave Burkhart sat gingerly on a lip of rock and slid off into a pool of shadow, grunting as he hit the ground.

  “Are you all right?”

  He nodded; he had thought the ground further down and the sudden impact had jarred the breath out of him.

  “Dave?”

  Of course. He was deep in the dark; she couldn’t see him. He looked up to where Cara was fearfully peering over the rock edge. Moonlight and shadow distorted distance. The edge of the rock was only a foot or so above his head. He wished the light were better so he could see her face; from this angle, it was nothing but an oval of shadow. This was the first time she had called him Dave.

  “Okay...just a bit of a rough landing.” He reached up his arms. “The ground’s uneven. Let me help you down.”

  Cara balanced on the rock’s edge, then swung her legs over. She could see Dave’s hands reaching up out of the shadow as if out of dark water.

  “Come on...I’ll catch you.”

  Cara cautiously scooted closer to the edge, then froze. What was the matter with her? Normally she didn’t have any trouble with heights and, as Dave Burkhart wasn’t an excessively tall man, this wasn’t much of a height.

  “Don’t you trust me?”

  “Why should I?” she asked, then slid forward into his waiting arms.

  Dave’s hands caught her waist with unerring accuracy, breaking the frightening few milliseconds of freefall. Gently, using his own body as a brake, he lowered her to the ground.

  Ridiculous! Cara thought, gasping for breath as she slid down the lean strength of him. How stupid of her to make such a big thing of such a little drop. Still her hands stayed on his shoulders long after the need for bracing was over. Her heart thudded, making her entire body thrum to an overwhelming, primal feeling. He was so comforting and so strong. In his arms, she felt so safe...Cara drew a shuddering breath.

  What kind of a creature was she? Here she was, seriously thinking about marrying one man and yet responding like an emotional schoolgirl in the arms of another. Not only another man, the same man who had kidnapped her. From the moment he had snatched her off that tourist-filled street in Puerto Vallarta, her life had turned into nothing but danger and confusion, but now, standing in a darkened forest with his arms around her and Heaven only knew who after them, she had never felt so safe in her life.

  For one of the few times in his life, Dave Burkhart didn’t know what to do. His first instinct was to pull this beautiful, maddening creature closer, to claim the sweet promise of her lips and then...

  Lord, how many times was he going to have to remind himself who this woman was? Her attractiveness, her vulnerability, were nothing more than tools to her, and he was not going to be another notch on this creature’s belt!

  “Okay?” he asked. It took an act of will for him to remove his hands from her waist.

  Cara stood with her sandal-shod feet firmly planted on the weatherworn rock, but as his touch was removed, it felt as if the earth itself heaved beneath her and there was nothing against which she could balance.

  “Yeah,” she said, gasping for breath in spite of herself. Gradually the world stabilized. Cara decided that fatigue and hunger had just made her light-headed. For the past few lifetimes, she had been trying not to think of the dinner Buck had ordered for them. Chicken of some kind and enchiladas and flan and fruit...her mouth watered. What had become of that lovely dinner?

  Cara gulped. What kind of a woman was she becoming? Worried about a dinner, indeed! She should be worried about Buck.

  At that moment, her stomach chose to rumble protesting and loudly. She could feel Dave’s questioning gaze, even in the dark. “I’m hungry,” she said softly.

  “So am I,” he said and gave a tiny chuckle. “When we get out of this, I promise I’ll buy you the biggest dinner Puerto Vallarta has to offer.”

  What would it be like, Dave wondered, to sit opposite this exquisite creature in some elegant restaurant, then to hold her in his arms as they danced beneath the smiling moon on some seaside terrace, and then, later, in private, knowing that she belonged to him and to him alone...?

  “Then you think we’re going to get out of this?”

  Her voice had just a hint of a quaver. She sounded vulnerable and frightened; he longed to reach out and pull her into his arms, to comfort her with kisses.

  What was the matter with him? Dave Burkhart gave himself a mental shake. Her attractiveness was part of her stock and trade. Who knew how many poor suckers she had pulled in with that wide-eyed act? He didn’t intend to be one of them, no matter how enticing the idea was. Though, ever since he had first seen her, that little-girl look of innocence had driven him wild. During all their adventures, the thought of what might have been had they met another time, under other circumstances, had haunted him. Unfortunately, he knew what he was and he knew what she was, and that was that.

  Marshaling his emotions and his desire, he made his voice rough and businesslike. “Not much of a woodsman, are you? People always settle along a river. Find one, follow it downstream, and you’ll find a town eventually. Which is what we should be doing. Come on.”

  His impersonal tone went over Cara like a bucket of cold water. That was what she got for allowing herself to feel attracted to him. And that was something she couldn’t understand; she was all but engaged to one of the sweetest, best-looking men she had ever met in her life. Buck had planned this special trip for her, then worked tirelessly to get her back after this hooligan had kidnapped her and dragged her through the jungle like some sort of slave. She found it incomprehensible that this criminal could set her entire being thrumming with a longing that was positively painful. Well, she wasn’t a creature of raw emotion, she was a rational woman who could look beyond the desire of the moment, however intense and irrational it might be.

  “All right, Mr. Woodsman,” she replied in a voice equally devoid of emotion, “let’s go.”

  It may have been a river, but it was hard to think of it as a way to anywhere. Wide as a two-lane road, the water gurgled, splashed, and frolicked its merry way over a bed of huge boulders. No boat bigger than a child’s toy of folded paper could have had a chance of navigating that bubbling, twisting torrent.

  Cara looked at the moon-bleached froth and felt hopes she didn’t know she had been cherishing fall. Dave Burkhart rubbed his hands together in delight and gave out with a much louder “All right!” than was advisable.

  “What are you so happy about? We’ll never get across this.”

  “Not here, but we don’t have to. And I know where we are now. This is the Rio Cuale.”

  “The what?”

  Even with his face hidden in shadow, Cara could feel his scathing gaze. “Don’t you know anything about where you are? Who planned this trip?”

  For a moment Cara was tempted to tell him exactly what she thought, then let it go as a waste of breath. “I thought we were going to New Orleans for the weekend. Puerto Vallarta was a last minute surprise.”

  “Buck Tarrant’s surprise,” Dave said in a strange tone.

  “Yes.” Cara’s voice was small and sad. It had been such a lovely surprise, too; right now, she should be... How had everything gone so wrong?

  Because of you, she thought with sudden viciousness. This horrid kidnapper was the man who had taken her, dragged her through the ju
ngle, and exposed her to all kinds of awful people...and who made her pulses pound in a way she had never known before.

  “The Rio Cuale,” Dave was patiently explaining, “is the river which runs through the middle of Puerto Vallarta. It’s the only river of any size in this area that I know of. It’s probably the reason for the town existing at all, if you come to that.”

  “You seem to know a lot about the area,” Cara hissed. “Makes your job easier, I guess.”

  “I read,” Dave answered evenly. “Come on.”

  The luxurious growth was even thicker by the river, making it difficult to follow the water. More than once they had to detour inland, dodging between boulders and trees, stumbling over rough, damp ground, more than once keeping track of the river just by hearing it. Most of the time Dave held Cara’s hand, a fact that made her uncomfortable. She knew without it she would not only be lost, she would be hard put to keep her balance on the uncertain footing, but even so impersonal a touch as his hand around hers still made her tingle.

  Ridiculous! Juvenile! Absolute...

  Cara’s feet went out from under her and she sat down hard. Instantly Dave was at her side, his hand over her mouth, stifling her instinctive scream.

  “Are you all right?” he whispered in a sound no louder than a sigh.

  All right? She hurt! She had sat down hard on ground that was far from even and covered with a painful variety of points and bumps. If it had done any good, Cara would have wept. Her injured foot had ceased to hurt long ago, passing into a blessed state of numbness. There were scratches on her legs and arms and blisters rising on her feet and she was so hungry she was about ready to consider chewing on a tree.

  Slowly she nodded her head. If it would get her out of here, back to Buck, a bath, a meal, and a bed, she would swear before a judge that she was all right.