Panther on the Prowl

by Nancy Morse

  In the distance through a break in the trees the sun was slowly sinking into the gulf. Fiery patches of orange and purple burst across the sky as if shot from cannons. It was the most beautiful and terrible time of the day, for soon it would be dark and the memories would come flooding back as they did every night. Sometimes just the sheer anticipation of it was more than he could bear.

  Tonight, however, in addition to the dark glimpses into the past, there was something else John was remembering, something he wished he could forget. He turned his head away from the spectacle of the setting sun and his own image in the windows that filled him with disgust, and looked at the woman sleeping in his bed.

  For three days she lay unconscious, like a beautiful star that literally fell from the sky, while he stared at her and remembered, to his intense dismay, what it was like to want a woman.

  Why did the frog hunter have to bring her here to him? Why did he have to feel things just from looking at her that he thought were dead inside of him?

  Even with bandages wrapped around her eyes, she was beautiful. Her tawny hair sparkled in the buttery light that penetrated the thick cypress branches. Her skin, paled by her ordeal, glowed iridescently. Her sightless blue eyes had beamed out blinding quantities of light when he had applied fresh bandages, taking his breath away unexpectedly.

  Her clothes were torn and scorched, but obviously expensive. Her hands were smooth-skinned and soft, bearing none of the calluses that scarred the palms of hardworking Seminole women. Her voice, weakened by the trauma and lulled by the infusion he’d given her, sounded different from any voice he’d ever heard. In it he could hear the culture and refinement that told him she was from a world very different from his.

  She was running away from something, of that he was certain. But he wouldn’t press her to reveal what it was. Who knew better than he did what it was like to run from something? He could not help but wonder as he watched her sleep how safe she would feel in his care if she knew that he had not been able to keep Maggie safe and the awful shame he carried over it.

  Growing up in the company of alligators and os-preys did little to prepare John for the unexpected and unwelcome company of a pampered socialite, which seemed to be what she was. Hell, he didn’t know anyone who flew their own plane. Again he reproached himself for the weakness in him that had him agreeing to let her stay. He hadn’t known he possessed such weakness, having worked so hard to harden his heart, until she’d asked, and he’d looked at her beautiful, pale face and heard her quivering voice and found himself acquiescing.

  Maggie’s death had driven him behind a defensive wall that showed dangerous signs of cracking with Rennie’s intrusion in his life. His all-too-human heart longed for a woman’s love, but a deeper, more primal part of him knew how dangerous it would be for him to love any woman. Look at what had happened to the last woman he loved.

  Well, he’d made the offer, now he would have to live with it. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad after all. He would be gone most of the day. He’d ask Willie Cypress to look in on her. Willie didn’t hunt frogs until night, and it was the least the old man could do to make up for dumping this trouble in his lap. At night he’d be gone, too, roaming beneath the stars as he did every night, following a primal instinct for revenge deep into the swamp and into the depths of his own soul.

  He wondered if someone like Rennie could ever understand the obsession he had to wander the swamp at night in search of some peace for his battered soul. Being a woman, would she see it as some irrational male thing?

  He told himself that his attraction to her was hormonal. Beauty and vulnerability. What man could resist such a lethal combination? It brought out a crazy notion to protect her, although the only thing to protect her from out here was himself. And the best way to protect her from himself was to not get involved, which was really a laugh considering that he was in it up to his eyeballs.

  John left his place by the window and crossed the room, his feet brushing the cypress planks with a noiselessness that came from years of tracking animals through the swamp. For many long moments he stared down at her. The brew he had given her would make her sleep through the night. Beyond the window some voiceless thing beckoned to him. Come. Hurry. The moon rises and it’s time to go hunting. If he left now, he would be back by sunrise and she would never know the difference.

  But he didn’t move, not while there was still a sliver of daylight left and it fell so bewitchingly upon her face. Not while he was caught up in remembering what it was like to hold a woman’s soft body in his arms and feel her breath against his neck.

  For just that moment the memory did not hurt. Instead, it gave him a feeling of undisciplined delight just to feel it again and to realize that he was human after all.

  Chapter 3

  “Don’t worry, she doesn’t suspect a thing. The wedding is in two months. If she finds out after that, I’ll handle it, but for now there’s too much riding on this marriage for anything to go wrong. That piece of prime coastal real estate is worth marrying a woman I don’t love.”

  The words haunted Rennie even now as she tossed and turned in a sleep from which there was no waking.

  She would never forget the look on Craig’s face as he talked on the telephone. She’d seen that look before—cold, inscrutable, wickedly determined—the night they met at a fund-raiser for the senator, when he asked her out and she declined, explaining that she had a faculty meeting to attend. His eyes had gone all cold and distant, and it was impossible to tell what he’d been thinking. In the next moment the chilling expression was gone, replaced by a smile friendly enough to charm a cobra. He’d asked her out for another night, making it clear that he would not take no for an answer.

  She should have gotten an idea then of the lengths he would go to, to get what he wanted. A successful land developer like Craig Wolfson didn’t get where he was by letting opportunities slip by. At the time she was flattered to think that what he wanted was her.

  He liked to boast that one of the advantages of being rich was possessing things that most people could not, like the expensive and illegal Cuban cigar he extracted from a silver-inlaid case and placed between his lips as he spoke. Even now, as she lay upon John Panther’s bed in the middle of the Everglades, her nose wrinkled at the awful smell of the cigar, and she shivered at the words that had been delivered like a slap across her face.

  But as she had stood in the doorway, her shock turned slowly to outrage, and then to anger, raw and hot. She stormed into the room, her face white with fury, and broke off the engagement. She had no memory of taking the private elevator downstairs to the lobby, or of the doorman who held the door for her and wished her a good evening. All she could think about was the cold certainty with which he had assured her that the wedding would take place as she fled in tears.

  Why hadn’t she noticed his condescending attitude before? Or that little smirk that she mistook for a smile? She had such little experience with love, how was she to know that she had been fooled by a clever manipulator?

  The senator would be furious, of course, when he learned of the broken engagement. He’d been eager for the opportunity to combine his interests with those of Wolfson Industries. Hopefully, he would see things differently when he found out what a scoundrel Craig really was. She had to get word to him that she was all right without arousing his suspicions. She shuddered to think that Craig probably already had manpower at work to find her. Oh, God, what a mess.

  She lay there, not daring to move, as if the slightest movement would signal her presence to the outside world. She could tell by the warm breeze that wafted through the air that it was light outside. Daylight had always brought a sense of reassurance. When she’d been a little girl afraid of the dark, her father’s soothing voice had calmed her fears. Then one day it was gone, the voice, the stroke of his finger across her cheek, the tender kiss on her forehead. After that, the only thing that made her feel safe was daybreak, telling her that she had made it through a
nother dark and lonely night.

  It was easier to face things in the light of day, but for Rennie there was no light beyond the swath of bandages. Locked in her blindness, the awful memories seemed only that much more real.

  The powerful effect of the infusion that John gave her last night had worn off sometime before daybreak. But now, no longer lulled into a state of painlessness, she was acutely aware of every ache in every muscle. Even the mere act of breathing hurt.

  “Can I get you more tea?”

  She didn’t know he was there until he spoke in that deep, regretful voice. The air in the room was suddenly filled with him. How long had he been there, waiting in silence for her to surface? Could he read her thoughts as easily as he read her pain?

  She turned her head toward him. In a ragged, untested voice, she said, “Maybe later. What time is it?”

  “A little past three. Are you hungry?”

  “I’d forgotten there was any such thing as food.”

  “You should eat something if you want more tea later. That infusion can be rough on an empty stomach. Yesterday you were too out of it to notice.”

  Rennie struggled to recall yesterday. God only knew how utterly pitiful she must have seemed to him. Too embarrassed to ask what she might have done or said, she stammered, “Was I— Did I—”

  “You didn’t reveal anything I shouldn’t know. So…do you want some soup? I have chicken noodle, tomato and minestrone.”

  “I thought you said we were out in the middle of nowhere.”

  “We are. Why?”

  “I guess I’m just surprised that you can cook.”

  “Because I’m a man or because I’m an Indian?”

  “Neither. I just didn’t think there was any electricity.”

  The edge in his voice softened. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to jump down your throat like that. You learn pretty fast about preconceived notions when you’re Indian.”

  Rennie sat up in bed, wincing from the pain. “It must be like growing up wealthy. You never know who loves you for yourself or for your money.” She realized she had spoken her thoughts out loud and glanced away, muttering, “Or so I’ve heard.”

  The examples were different but the underlying emotions were the same, and it made John uncomfortable to think that there existed something like that in common between them.

  “There’s a generator out back,” he said.

  “In that case, I’ll have the chicken noodle. It’s my favorite.”

  He frowned as he walked to the kitchen. It was another thing they had in common, not that there weren’t a million other people with the same taste in canned soup. Still, it made not liking her that much harder.

  From the other room Rennie ventured, “You asked if there was anyone I want to contact.”

  He forced the cylinder of soup from the can into a saucepan. “Is there?”

  “Yes. But I’m afraid my cell phone is buried beneath the wreckage. Do you have a telephone I can use?”

  The spoon clicked against the sides of the pot as John stirred the soup. “What sort of work do you do?”

  “I’m a professor of anthropology.”

  “Sometimes,” he said, “the farther we get from civilization, the more civilized we feel. Out here you’ll find no e-mail, no voice messaging. Just an endless stream of rushing water to answer to. But I do have a cell phone for emergencies. I’ll get it.” He turned the soup to a slow simmer and went to get the phone. “Here you go.” He touched the phone to her hand and stepped away.

  The tonal beeps came slowly as Rennie felt her way across the keypad as she dialed the senator’s private number.

  “Hi, it’s me. I know I should have called sooner, but I’ve been busy. Actually, I decided to take some time off. I’m staying with a friend. You can’t reach me, but I’ll be in touch.” She hung up, feeling guilty for the evasion, but at least he would know that she was all right without knowing where she was.

  “Out here you may not need one, but thank goodness for the answering machine.” She handed the phone back to him. “Thank you, John.”

  He liked the way his name rolled off her tongue as if they’d known each other for years. He wasn’t aware that they were friends, yet somehow he liked the idea of that, as well. His throat went dry. “It’s no big deal.”

  “I meant for asking no questions.”

  “Oh.” He shrugged. “I figure if there’s anything you want me to know, you’ll tell me.”

  He went back to the kitchen and ladled the soup into a bowl. Thinking that she might still be too weak to get out of bed, he dragged the chair close to the side of the bed and placed the bowl on the seat. He put the spoon in her hand, his strong fingers closing around hers and enveloping her hand in the warmth of his before it pulled away.

  Rennie was jolted by the unexpected heat that raced up her arm to flush her cheeks with color. She spoke up nervously. “Aren’t you eating?”

  “There’s only one chair. I’ll wait until you’re finished.”

  She slid over on the bed and moved her bowl to one side of the chair seat.

  John placed a second bowl of soup next to hers and sat down reluctantly beside her on the edge of the bed. He tried to ignore that warmth of her arm that barely brushed his sleeve.

  “When you’re up to it,” he said, “I’ll walk you around so you can get the feel of the place. If you’re hungry, help yourself to whatever there is.”

  “You’re assuming I can cook.”

  “I’m assuming you can open a can of soup or boil water for spaghetti. That’s all you’ll find.”

  “I’m good at spaghetti. In college I lived on it. It’s inexpensive and filling.”

  “You don’t strike me as the type who’s had to live on a budget.”

  Rennie wasn’t surprised that he knew she was well off. She had practically admitted it only a few minutes ago when she had spoken without thinking. Still, what did he know about her reasons for preferring to make her own way rather than live off her family’s wealth, or how her one stab at independence had not come without a price? Annoyance surfaced in her tone.

  “Why? Because you think I can afford more? Didn’t you say something about preconceived notions?”

  John didn’t like having his own words echoed back at him like that. “I don’t judge people on what I see. I leave that to the hypocrites of the world. But there was nothing preconceived about that Cessna you were flying. You didn’t earn the money for that on a professor’s salary.”

  “That’s true,” she said. “I tapped into the trust fund my father set up for me before he died.” She tilted her head up at him. “I owe no one an explanation or an apology for my background. The only person I owe that to is myself. So, I take it you’ve seen the wreckage?”

  “I went to have a look at it this morning. It’s hard to imagine anyone walking away from that. I guess if someone wanted to be presumed dead, that would be one way to do it.”

  Rennie sucked in her breath. “If you’re suggesting that I crashed my plane on purpose so that people would think I was dead, I assure you, I’m not that devious or that cruel.” Hurt, she pushed the chair away and got up.

  His hand caught her arm. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to imply that you are.”

  “Besides, if I wanted people to think that, why would I have made that call?”

  She didn’t see his broad shoulders lift in a shrug. “You also didn’t tell whoever you called where you are.”

  “Yes, for now. It’s not that I don’t want anyone to know where I am, just…one person in particular. Look, it’s complicated and not very interesting.” Not to mention humiliating, she groaned inwardly. Pulling her arm away, she sat back down. “Is there any chance of the wreckage being seen from the air?”

  John cleared the bowls away and dragged the chair back to the table. “It’s lost in all the soft muck and undergrowth. That’s what cushioned the impact.”

  He heard her soft breath of relief and shook his head. Whatever sh
e was running from, could it be as bad as the guilt he himself was trying to escape? He questioned whether she could ever accept what he had done with no questions asked.

  “I have to go out in a while. I’ll ask Willie Cypress to look in on you. He’s the one who found you. He can be trusted not to tell anyone you’re here.”

  In the brief time Rennie had been with him, she had come to crave his company, what little there was of it and however reluctant he was to give it to her. Eagerly she asked, “When will you be back?”

  “Daybreak.”

  “Oh.”

  Was that disappointment he heard in her voice? He told himself that she was either just lonely or afraid of the dark and that it had nothing to do with him.

  “I go out every night,” he said uncomfortably. “I told you that.”

  “Do you have to go just yet?”

  He glanced toward the window. In a few hours it would be dark, and an aching voice would call to him from the swamp, beckoning to that dark place inside of him, and he would be powerless to resist it. But for now the sky was still light and the lurid urges that haunted him at sunset were at rest. He felt himself waver.

  “Maybe I can stay a little longer.”

  Chapter 4

  “Could we go outside for some fresh air?”

  John heard the plaintive plea in her voice and saw the hand stretched out to him. He admired the courage it took for her to ask, when it was obvious that she was still in some pain and that she was afraid. He took her hand and guided her to her feet.

  Her fingers were long and slender, her skin impossibly soft to the touch, and warm, as if she’d been rubbing her hands before a fire. He was surprised by the confidence of her grip until he remembered that these were the same hands that skillfully piloted a plane. She might look weak and helpless, but he suspected that she was stronger than he, and that possibly even she knew that.