Then the flame went out. Inspired by the success of that brief light, he tore another piece of material off his shirt, dipped it in wax and wrapped it around a stone. This one he lit and tossed over the edge too. It spluttered for a moment before it went out but he had enough light to see Kirsten reach for the vine and wrap her hands around it.
Then they were back in the dark except for his candle. ‘Stand up, Kirsten. Can you do that?’
‘I’m t-t-trying.’ He heard the sound of movement and pebbles on rock. ‘I’m up.’
‘OK. You’re going to walk up the slope, slowly, and I’m going to be your handrail. I’ll pull, you just have to stay on your feet and keep moving forward. You can lean back on the rope, I will not let it go.’
The next ten minutes were the longest in Hunter’s life. For Kirsten, they lasted for ever. She kept her eyes glued to the flickering candlelight shining on the roof above her and kept moving towards it despite the burning pain in her clamped hands which became unbearable. She thought she could feel the warmth of blood running down her wrists but she didn’t look and after a while the pain was so sharp she thought she would faint from it. But then she was at the top.
Hunter pulled her over the edge and dragged her against him as he sank against the opposite wall. He wrapped himself around her and it was the most incredible feeling in the world. Then she drifted off to sleep.
After a while Hunter couldn’t hold out any longer. ‘Kirsten.’
‘What now?’ She frowned and didn’t open her eyes. She was having the best dream!
‘Kirsten, wake up!’ Hunter’s voice was sharp. ‘I need you to crawl ahead and get out of the tunnel.’
She drew a shuddering breath and woke up to incredible pain in her hands and the cold and the realisation she did need to move so Hunter could get out of the cave as well.
‘I’m sorry.’ She shuffled forward and resigned herself to the pain as her hands touched the floor of the tunnel. She made herself move, knee following knee, hand following hand, one after the other with no stopping. After what seemed like hours, she rounded the corner and saw the circle of light at the entrance. She had enough room now to turn around or even stand up, but she just turned her head.
‘I see the entrance,’ she said, but Hunter wasn’t behind her. He wasn’t anywhere near her.
‘Hunter?’ He didn’t answer and she realised there had been no sound behind her for a while.
‘Hunter?’
He couldn’t answer. Once he’d seen that she was going to make it, his phobia had kicked in. The walls of the cave heaved against him and he pressed himself back against the cold rock as if to make more room for his lungs to breathe. He felt like a fool, and useless, but it was bigger than he was. Kirsten was safe and that was the main thing. Maybe he’d always been destined to die in a cave.
When she called his name he willed her to keep going because he knew she didn’t have the strength to do it twice.
She called his name again and he moistened his lips and tried to answer. The most he could manage was a whisper to tell her to keep going.
He could feel the roof crushing him, despite the fact that his candle said it wasn’t, and he scrunched himself into a ball as if to ward it off. Then something touched him.
‘Hunter?’
He opened his eyes and Kirsten was there. He felt her breath on his face. ‘Come on, I’m cold!’ she said.
He felt the sting of tears in his eyes and he blinked them away. ‘I can’t move. I’m sorry. Please, go.’
‘Claustrophobia?’
‘You bet,’ he whispered, and he heard her sigh. Then she snuggled up next to him and took his hand. ‘You came in here to save me. That was very brave. And if you can’t move then I guess I’ll stay, too.’
He blinked. ‘Please, go. I can’t move but you can. Go!’
‘Nope.’ She pulled his shirt until his head came down to her level and pressed her icy lips to his. ‘I’m cold. Please, come with me.’
He shuddered and shut his eyes and then she pulled his shirt again until he knelt forward. She backed away from him towards the entrance. But her face stayed close to his. ‘Kiss me, Hunter.’
His groan came from deep within him as his muscles unlocked and he leaned towards her. His lips touched hers and he savoured the mingling of their breaths and the taste of her against him. He pressed himself against her freezing cold little face. She backed away a little more.
‘Again. Kiss me again.’
And he followed her, one knee step and one kiss at a time, until they came to the bend. He could see the light up ahead and he knew they were going to make it. It was all because of her. And then he knew. He would do anything for this woman.
He would enter a hundred caves to find her because she was the one for him. All this confusion and lack of trust and gossip and innuendo was nothing compared to what he felt for Kirsten.
He’d been a fool to trick himself into abandoning her because of his own fears. Fears that he’d never recover if she, too, betrayed him.
When they reached the outside, Keith was still propped against the entrance and Hunter saw him sag back against the wall as if totally exhausted from the tension and unable to believe they were back. Hunter knew how he felt.
Hunter’s overwhelming relief at the widening walls of the cavern was cut short when Kirsten sagged onto the floor as she reached the cavern and a fear greater than any he’d had in the cave crashed in on him.
He scooped her up and pressed her cold cheek to his, and she barely moved. She was freezing. He carried her to the fire and kicked the remaining pile of wood onto it to build it up. With fumbling fingers he stripped off her shirt, peeling it away from the deathly pale whiteness of her damp skin, and spread it in front of the fire to dry. Then he pulled off her shoes and wet socks and her trousers until she sagged against him in a tiny pair of pink lacy panties and bra, all cold legs and arms as she shivered.
Quickly unbuttoning his shirt, he pulled it open and then tugged his trousers off and dragged her back against the warmth of his chest and legs in front of the fire. She sighed into him, burying her face in his chest as if to hide from the cold deep within her. He wrapped himself and his shirt around her, closing her inside the cocoon of his own body heat.
‘You’re so warm,’ she murmured. ‘Don’t leave me.’
‘I’ll be here as long as you need me.’ He hugged her tighter. ‘You’ll be fine as soon as we get you warmed up.’ He cupped her cheek in his hand and dropped a kiss on her lips without even realising he’d done it.
Then he saw Keith’s raised eyebrows and Hunter stared him down. Keith made a great show of turning his body away as he manoeuvred himself into a more comfortable position, facing the direction of the clearing.
Kirsten slept against him for an hour as he cleaned her torn hands with his handkerchief dipped in water, and rubbed her feet. Every now and then she’d make a little moaning noise that tore at his heart. He couldn’t believe she nearly died inside the cave. If he hadn’t come back to the cavern when he had, if he hadn’t been able to force himself inside the cave, he’d never have found her in time. What was it with this woman and danger?
Hunter could tell she was finally warming up and he worried that he should have put some IV fluids next to the fire to heat as well so that he could centrally warm her, but he hadn’t wanted to leave her to set it all up. Then she opened her eyes and smiled up at him and it was as if the sun had come out in the cavern.
‘Hello. Did I go to sleep on you?’ She wriggled a little but made no move to leave his arms.
‘You were tired.’ He smiled down at her and he dared to believe she’d be fine. ‘Could you not go into any more caves, please?’
Kirsten decided she could cope with that. She shuddered. ‘If that’s what you want.’
His shoulders shook with suppressed laughter that was more relief than amusement, and she loved the feeling of being so close to him. His chest hairs prickled against her cheek and
she snuggled into his skin. This skin-on-skin stuff was pretty darn good.
‘Yes, it’s what I want.’ He became serious. ‘Thank you for coming back for me.’
She didn’t want to think about how close he’d come to staying in there, and couldn’t bear to contemplate how much mental anguish she’d caused him by having to crawl through the cave to rescue her. ‘You wouldn’t have been in there if I hadn’t decided to explore.’
‘We’ll talk about that later. You gave Keith and me heart failure.’
They both looked across at Keith, where the pilot was gently snoring, and Kirsten smiled. ‘I think he’s over his heart failure.’
Hunter lowered his face to hers. ‘I’m not over mine,’ he said, and brushed her lips with his as he eased her back out of Keith’s line of sight. ‘I need much more reassurance.’
When Hunter kissed her this time, there was no place for regret or fears of later. This was right. Her exhilaration was tempered by a persistent dread that suddenly Hunter would remember that he didn’t trust her and pull away. His mouth moved on hers, as if seeking reassurance that she was fine, and Kirsten answered his need with her own desperate hunger and wrapped her arms around his neck. His hair was thick and springy under her fingers and the reality of them both being alive and together brought tears to her eyes. She blinked them away before he could see her emotion.
Kirsten felt cherished and tiny surrounded by this big strong man who had faced his deepest fear to save her from her own foolishness, and finally allowed her to see some of his secrets and insecurities. He still hadn’t said he trusted her but she’d come to the conclusion that she’d just have to work harder to convince him. Because she couldn’t shut Hunter out of her life any longer.
She’d take him on his terms, any terms, because they’d been given this chance of living again and there was no way she was going to waste that gift by being too proud or too frightened to show her love. The risk was all her own.
Hunter enticed her mouth open with nudging kisses that promised wonderful things. When his kiss deepened she could do little but answer his heat and fuel the fire between them. She’d waited so long for this feeling of unity, this melding of breath and erotic tango of his tongue with hers, that she felt as if she could die with the tragedy and joy of this moment. This living, breathing, moving mating of their mouths should never end and the moment lengthened into a timeless dream she had no wish to wake from.
Then Hunter’s hands trailed softly from where they splayed about her waist up to trace the undersides of her breasts and the circling, sensual movement did nothing to assuage the months of denial and hunger she’d fought within herself for this man. Impatient now for the branding of his touch, she tugged his hand across her skin until his fingers unclipped her bra and slid it out of the way. She sighed with delight as he finally, possessively cupped her breasts and settled her aching nipples deep in his palm. Then he steepled his hand and encircled her flesh between his fingers, kneading and murmuring his delight wickedly in her ear while the slight roughness of his skin sent jagging spirals of heated sensation low in her stomach.
Kirsten slid her hands down from around Hunter’s neck and ran them possessively along the solid muscle of his chest, savouring the firmness and planes under her fingers, then travelled around his waist to his back. His skin was so warm and sculpted and she groaned her appreciation against his mouth. When the kiss ended she murmured against his cheek, ‘And why have we never done this before?’
Unable to answer at that moment, he groaned deep in his throat, lowered his head further and grazed both nipples with his teeth before circling the aching tips with his mouth and feasting on her. When he lifted his head he stared into her eyes and his voice was ragged with desire. ‘Because I knew I’d never stop.’
Exactly what she’d wanted to hear. ‘That’s reassuring,’ she whispered breathlessly, and teased as she arched against him. She had to sink her hands into his hair to press his head more firmly against her breasts, but the flames of his suckling made her ache for a more total possession than this.
Then he returned to kiss her again and they plunged straight into the previous heated hunger that had started this, and she couldn’t resist the jerking slide of her hands down his naked back. Driven, her fingers eased further down to cup the firm flesh of his bottom and she raised her hips to grind against him.
Hunter plundered her mouth to answer such a flagrant request. Kirsten swirled in a red mist, only vaguely aware of his body’s movements as he shucked his underwear off so that he lay hard against her. Then, with both hands flat against her hips, he slid her lace briefs down until he could hook the elastic in his toe and slide away the last barrier between them. With his nakedness against her, his kiss gentled and she lay drugged against him, trembling with a need that possessed them both.
‘This is crazy,’ he whispered.
‘I know,’ she breathed, and he kissed her once more, swiftly. Hunter lifted himself up on his elbows and the veins in his arms stood out as he supported his weight. His corded muscle glinted with firelight and she lay pliant and soft with want, mesmerised by the magnificent male poised above her. The tenderness she saw deep in his eyes stung her throat with tears.
He lowered himself towards her and she closed her eyes, had to, as she welcomed him. And then they slowly and deliberately joined as one. Her indrawn breath whispered his name and sinuously her legs rose up to wrap around his thighs until he was so deep and hard within her she was lost in unfamiliar territory.
He rocked slowly and then withdrew. Bereft, she clutched at his back, urging his return, until he smiled and answered her, deeper and more powerfully. She bit her lip to hold back the throaty moans she couldn’t prevent. Gradually the tempo of his thrusts increased until his mouth came down to stifle her gasps and their breath mingled as she clutched at him with stiffened fingers and dared to venture to the edge of the unknown. And then she was falling, her whole body shivering and squeezed with his possession until, for both of them, the cave exploded into a million bolts of molten heat. A sunshine of clenching joy that left her limp in his arms while he held her tightly against him as if he’d never let her go.
Afterwards they lay together, breathless, and gradually the sand beneath their bodies impinged on their consciousness. Both glanced across to the cave entrance and the sound of Keith snoring gently. Kirsten chuckled and Hunter shook his head. ‘I can’t believe we did that, with Keith just over there,’ she whispered, and that was when he saw her hands were bleeding again.
‘You’re a bad influence on me.’ His tone was light and very quiet but Kirsten’s stomach sank as she saw the underlying return to reality for Hunter.
Hunter stared at her torn hands and hated himself for not remembering. Lord knew how much pain he’d caused her while his body had taken over. And that hadn’t been all he’d forgotten in his lust for this woman who deserved so much more. The supposed disciplined planner realised he’d let Kirsten down in another unforgivable way. Sleeping with Kirsten had been a selfish and irresponsible thing to do but it had changed him for ever. He just prayed she wouldn’t regret it. ‘I don’t suppose you’re on the Pill?’ He heard himself say it and saw the disappointment in her face.
When she said, ‘I can take the morning-after pill,’ and reached for her bra without looking at him, he should have been glad that she would take care of that, but he wasn’t. Her ‘Don’t worry about it’ made him feel even worse, but the last thing he wanted was to cause Kirsten any pain from an unplanned pregnancy, or complicate a situation that he had a hard time comprehending as it was.
He hugged her shoulders to apologise for shattering the mood with practicality and she rested warm and soft against him for a second, before she turned away to get dressed. He could feel the distance growing between them and he doubted if she realised that he was almost shattered by the revelations of the last hour. So many of his preconceived ideas and plans would now have to be changed. His head was spinning and he fo
ught down the temptation to take her in his arms again. So many ghosts to be laid before he would be free to love Kirsten as she deserved to be loved. But not here. Not now—when Keith’s survival still depended on rescue. He dressed quickly and passed her shirt from in front of the fire where it had almost dried, and she turned her back on him again to dress.
Kirsten faced into the darkness of the cave she’d crawled out of—and it felt as if she was back in a darker place. What had she expected? Promises of undying love? Of course he’d thought of the consequences. The lump of tears solidified in her throat and she felt sick. She loved him, and she’d always treasure the beauty of the last hour, but she’d known he feared commitment. To expect anything long term from Hunter was the risk she’d been willing to take, though maybe she should think about it more now that the moment was less heated. At least she had this day of memories—Hunter saving her, weak with relief that she was alive, his tenderness as a lover and holding her as if he’d never let her go. If only she could forget the ending. She shivered and pulled on her damp shirt.
It was then they heard the Chinook.
CHAPTER EIGHT
HUNTER listened to the thump of the rotors for a moment before the enormity of the situation sank in. They had been rescued. He snatched up the flare and ran out into the clearing. This was something positive he could do.
Back to the real world, Kirsten sighed, reminding herself she was glad to be rescued. She brushed an arm across her eyes as the sound of the Chinook grew louder. The rest of her damp clothes went on awkwardly because her hands weren’t working properly, and as she finger-combed her tangled hair she realised that her fingers and palms were swelling. How strange she hadn’t noticed the pain while making love, or maybe they’d just thawed out now. She went to wake Keith.
The Pregnant Midwife Page 10