by Ruth Owen
“I don’t think they were certain until a little while ago,” she explained. “They think of the twins as an equation—the Eden equation—and I don’t think they wanted to tell us until they were sure of the solution.”
“Well, I wish to hell they’d told me,” Sam cursed, shifting the car roughly into a lower gear. “This is all my fault. I should have been at camp, protecting the equipment. If Einstein loses his family because of me—”
“It’s not your fault,” Noel stated. “You said yourself that defiling the sacred lands was a death sentence on this island. You couldn’t have known that the Deveraux were desperate enough to risk that. Besides, if you’d stayed at camp we wouldn’t have …” She bit her bottom lip, giving him the sweet, slightly crooked smile that always struck straight to his heart. “I don’t regret it, Sam. Not a minute of it.”
Neither do I, God help me. He swung his gaze back to the road ahead, but his thoughts were consumed with the woman beside him. He’d never known that he could want someone this much—with this constant, aching yearning that had as much to do with giving love as getting it. Loving Noel had healed something deep and essential inside him, something he’d thought he’d lost forever on that lonely, rain-slick road. For the first time he could think of the accident without the killing pain, knowing that the Gina who’d loved him would forgive him, and want him to move on with his life. For the first time he looked forward to tomorrow, knowing that Noel would be part of it. His Noel.
He remembered how he’d watched her eyes when they’d made love, her beautiful sea-green eyes that revealed her sweet, vulnerable soul. He’d felt an almost unbearable joy as he’d seen her ice wall melt, knowing that his love had freed her of her own troubled past. She’d fit against him like she was made for him, for his hands, his hips, his … He gripped the wheel, fighting a surge of desire as he remembered how they’d taken each other to heaven again and again. No—paradise. A paradise of love, laughter, and the chance to build a bright future on the ruins of the past—
And exactly what future would that be? an inner voice chided. The one where she gives up her successful career and moves into a third-rate bungalow with a glorified beach bum—
“I think I see a light ahead.” She interrupted his sober thoughts.
Sam pulled the Jeep to a halt. Standing, he leaned on the top of the windshield, narrowing his eyes as he searched the immense rock face of the mountain. At first he saw nothing—then he saw a single red taillight appear some fifty yards above them up the steep road, where a vehicle had driven out from behind a limestone outcropping. “It’s the Deveraux, all right. That busted taillight on their truck is almost a trademark.”
“So what do we do now?” she asked as she stood up beside him.
“We do nothing.” He climbed out of the Jeep and reached into the flatbed for a canvas backpack. “I climb the cliff with PINK’s extra battery,” he explained as he shoved his arms through the straps. “I should have plenty of time to reach them before they make the pass. You stay here with the Jeep until I get back.”
“I’ll do no such thing.” She jumped down from her seat and walked around to face him. “It’s two against one. Besides, it’ll be dark soon, and you can’t climb a sheer cliff alone at night.”
“It’s hardly a sheer cliff.” Sam glanced up at the steep but far from perpendicular hillside. “And as for being alone …” He reached again into the back of the Jeep, this time retrieving a slim, twelve-gauge rifle. The dying sun glinted off the long barrel as he slid it effortlessly into holster straps of the multipurpose backpack. “This should even up the odds.”
Noel’s gaze flew from him to the gun, then back again. She said nothing, but even in the faint light he could see the blood drain from her face. She was pale as a ghost—but her emerald eyes shone with very real terror.
“Nothing’s gonna happen to me,” he promised, answering her unspoken question. “I’ll be back before you know it. Anyway, Einstein’s back at camp sending out a distress call. The police will probably be here before I even get to the Deveraux.”
“We don’t know if his transmitter’s working. And even if it is, there’s no way to let the police know which road they’ve taken,” she replied with uncompromising honesty. She glanced up at the red taillight, watching it wink like an evil eye against the darkening mountainside. “I’ve made a decision, Sam. I don’t want you to go. We’ll find another way to help PINK.”
“There is no other way.”
“There must be,” she stated as she shook her head. “I can’t let you risk your life. I won’t let you go. As your boss, I’m ordering you not to go.”
He reached out, tenderly cupping her resolute chin. “Then I quit.”
“You … you liar!” She balled her hands into tight fists as her eyes sparked with emerald fire. “You told me you never stick your neck out for anyone, but ever since I’ve known you you’ve done nothing except stick your neck out—for the islanders, for me, and now for PINK and Einstein. Dammit! Why can’t you be the macho jerk I thought you were? Why did you have to go and be the bravest, most wonderful guy …?”
With a soft cry she was in his arms, kissing him with a passion so sweet and wild it nearly took off the top of his head. He crushed her against him, letting her love wash over him like a warm wave on sun-drenched shore, pretending that her love would be a part of his life for years rather than days.…
But he had a job to do. With a tortured groan he pushed her away, holding her at arm’s length as he gave her a gentle shake. “I’ll be back for you, sweetheart,” he promised. “Count on it.”
She watched him start up the cliff face, hanging on to his final promise like a drowning man to a life preserver. He turned just once to wave down to her—then his figure disappeared, blending into the darkening gloom of the mountainside. For several long minutes she stood statue still, staring at the red taillight, pressing her hand to her heart as if the pressure alone could stop it from pounding. Two against one, her mind whispered. Two against one …
She scanned the dark, ghostly gray rock of the shadowed mountainside. Frankly, it looked plenty steep to her. A week ago the sober, sensible Dr. Noel Revere would never have considered even attempting such a climb. But a week ago she’d never stepped on a pig, been married by a teenage witch doctor, walked in a valley where the gods had lived, survived a cave-in, jumped off a waterfall, or met a blue-eyed outlaw who’d stolen everything from her, including her heart.…
“To hell with waiting.” She squared her shoulders and marched for the hillside. “It’s time Sam learned that even heroes need help once in a while.”
Donovan’s Irish luck was finally taking a turn for the better.
Concealed behind one of the large volcanic boulders of the desolate mountaintop, he looked down at the Deveraux’s equipment-packed truck, which had apparently blown a front tire on one of the road’s notorious potholes. Fat Emile crouched down beside the ruined wheel while cadaverously thin Jacques stood nearby with a flashlight, spewing instructions and insults at his younger sibling.
“So much for brotherly love,” Sam muttered as he reached behind him and gripped the stock of his rifle, smoothly sliding the weapon from his backpack. Given a choice he’d have walked straight up to the larcenous brothers and rammed his rifle right into their ugly mugs. But he didn’t have that choice. According to his watch and Einstein’s calculations, PINK had only about fifteen minutes of power left. First he had to find her and replace her battery with the charged one in his backpack. Then he’d deal with the Deveraux.
He slipped out from behind the boulder, moving with a panther’s stealth toward the truck. The desolate, barren landscape of the dormant volcano offered little protection, but it hardly mattered—the brothers were far too busy berating each other to notice him. He moved along the opposite side of the truck until he reached the back, where he carefully opened the heavy material flap. Scattered inside was a junk pile of Noel’s valuable computer equipment, some of
it already destroyed by the brothers’ careless handling.
A low buzz reached his ear. Gently, he pushed aside a ruined diode meter and breathed a sigh of relief as he caught sight of PINK’s power light. She was alive!
Sam raised his head and listened, making certain that Jacques’s curses were still going strong. Then he reached in and carefully extracted the slim, blesedly intact notebook PC from the surrounding equipment. “Hang on, PINK,” he whispered as he brought the lightweight case near his lips. “I’ve got a new battery for you and the kids. Just give me a sec—”
His words died as he felt the cold, razor-sharp edge of a knife against his throat.
“You should have stayed at the pool with your pretty wife, Jolly-mon,” said the burly Emile with a cruel laugh. “Now we gonna have to make her a widow.”
“Isn’t this damn mountain ever going to end?” Noel grumbled as she hoisted herself up over another inch of rock. The coarse pumice rock scraped against her knee, adding another cut to an already sizable collection. Sighing, she wiped the back of her hand across her brow, wondering if she looked half as gritty and dirt-caked as she felt. “After we rescue PINK, Donovan’s taking me straight back to level ground—preferably with a hot shower, a shopping mall, a five-star restaurant …”
… And a real marriage proposal.
She winced, trying to shove the bittersweet fantasy from her mind. She had more chance of finding a Club Med constructed overnight on St. Michelle than she did of finding a ring in Sam Donovan’s pocket. The computers might have found a successful solution to the Eden Equation, but that didn’t mean she would. She knew she should be concentrating on helping PINK and her babies, but all she could think about was how saving PINK would bring her one step closer to leaving, to never seeing him again.
Come on, Noel. No matter how you feel, you’ve got a job to do. Ignoring her skinned knees and bruised heart, she gripped the upper edge of the boulder she was currently scaling. With a very unladylike grunt she hoisted herself over the rim, and tumbled over the other side before she even realized she’d reached the top.
She rolled down a slight slope, not realizing until she righted herself that she’d landed within a yard of a half-fixed tire on the Deveraux’s truck. She started to get up but stopped, wincing as her already tortured knee came down hard on a socket wrench. Well, at least the Deveraux aren’t around.
Her relief turned to horror as her gaze moved to the piece of road illuminated by the truck’s headlights. The two mismatched brothers stood side by side, grinning like a pair of demons from hell. The gaunt one had just dropped PINK’s PC and the canvas backpack to the ground beside him, while the shorter, pig-faced one gripped the stock of a long-nosed rifle. And kneeling in the dirt in front of them was Sam, his arms locked behind the back of his neck, execution style.
No! Dear God, NO! Terror mounting, she watched as the pig face lifted the rifle barrel and used it to cruelly prod the back of Sam’s head.
“Beg, Jolly-mon. Maybe we let you live.”
“Go to hell,” Sam growled.
No, darling, tell them what they want. Whatever they want.
“Okay, maybe we not kill you quick. Maybe we find your lady—”
Sam twisted around. “You even think about laying your filthy hands on her and I’ll—”
His sentence ended abruptly as the emaciated Deveraux viciously kicked him in the ribs. “Enough, Emile. Kill him and let’s go. We come for money, not women—”
“Why not have both?” Noel asked, stepping out from the shadow of the truck.
Sam struggled to get up, but halted as Emile shoved the gun into his tender ribs. “Noel, get the hell out of here!”
“Not without you.” She sauntered into the yellow headlight beams, her eyes fixed on the beady eyes of the Deveraux brother. “I believe Emile and I have some unfinished business from the night at the church. Maybe we could work a trade?”
“Lady, you pretty and smart.” He wagged his bulbous head as he handed the gun to his frowning brother.
“Emile, I don’t think—”
“Silence, Jacques! You can have her when I’m done. It won’t take long.” He waddled over to Noel and pushed her against the grille of the truck, grabbing her breast as he planted a slobbering kiss on her mouth …
… and crumbled in a heap to the ground as she clocked him with the socket wrench.
“Emile!” Jacques leveled the gun at her, but Sam was too quick for him. He struck out with his foot, catching the tall man’s ankle and knocking him off balance as he pulled the trigger. Furious, the gaunt man recocked the rifle and pointed it directly at Sam’s heart. “Say your prayers, Jolly-mon—”
A scream of sirens cut the night. Distracted, Jacques started to run—but his escape was cut short by the sudden arrival of a half-dozen police Jeeps. Gendarmes poured out over the road, surrounding Jacques, Emile, the truck, and its contraband.
“You guys got here just in time,” Sam said as one of the men helped him to his feet. “How did you find us?”
“We didn’t,” the officer answered, pointing. “He did. Said he heard that little box calling for help.”
Sam followed his gaze, and saw Papa Guinea step down from one of the Jeeps. Dressed in jeans and a loose shirt, he could have passed for any island boy, but he moved with complete command. Heedless of the chaos around him, he walked over to PINK’s PC and knelt down, clipping the new battery into place.
“Maybe there is something to this voodoo magic stuff,” Sam mused as he watched the shaman perform the high-tech maneuver like a seasoned programmer. “What do you think, Noel—”
He froze, realizing that she hadn’t moved from the grille. As he watched she slid down to the ground beside the crumpled body of Emile, her descent leaving a thin trail of red across the truck’s headlight.
“Noel!”
[Received via Local Area Internet, no discernible link address]
P-text: Who’s there?
I’m here, little one. You’re going to be all right. All of you will be all right.
P-text: But how can I hear you. You don’t have an electronic address.
My mind speaks to your mind, no matter what physical material we are made of. Physical and spiritual energy are not so very different. Someday you’ll understand this.
P-Text: Einstein? Is he …?
He is well. He helped me to locate you. The love between you is strong, just like the love between Jolly-mon and the foreign woman. I only pray it is strong enough.
P-text: Noel! I heard Sam cry out her name. He sounded scared.
He has good reason.
P-text: [Receiving digital graphic download feed into processor from unspecified source. Resolution grainy, but clear enough to pick out Sam holding Noel’s unconscious body in his arms.] Oh no, it’s just like what happened to Gina. You’ve got to do something. Help them the way you helped me.
I can’t change their fates, little one. The demons of the past still live in their hearts, and only the gods know if their love will be strong enough to set them free.
THIRTEEN
“There’s someone here to see you, ma’am,” said the nurse.
Noel’s heart took a sideways thump. She looked up at the pretty, smiling woman standing in the doorway of her spartan but scrupulously clean hospital room. “Is it—”
“The fella you be expecting? Well, I can’t say for sure, but he’s carrying enough flowers to open a shop,” she answered in the breezy cadence spoken in the island nation’s capital city. “I fetch da man.”
Sam! Noel thought as the nurse left the room. He was here at last. It had been three days since she’d been airlifted from St. Michelle to the hospital on the main island, but this was the first day they’d allowed her visitors. So far the only person who’d come by to see her was an apologetic government official, who’d assured her in precise, textbook English that the police had recovered all her equipment—including the Al computers—and sent it back to Sheffield in M
iami under the highest government protection. Though she was grateful to hear that Einstein and PINK were back home again, she couldn’t help wishing that someone else would walk through her door, a tall, blue-eyed scoundrel with a wolf’s smile, who’d promised he’d come back for her.
And now he had! She scooted up on her pillows, wincing a little at the residual pain of the incision near her shoulder. Jacques Deveraux’s stray bullet had buried itself in the soft muscle near her collarbone. Luckily it hadn’t caused her any permanent damage, but it had taken the doctor nearly an hour to extract it and the tissue would take time to heal. Still, the pain was a small price to pay for Sam’s life. Sam, who was about to step through the door of her hospital room with an armload of tropical orchids from Eden Valley, their own private paradise.…
But the flowers proved to be hothouse roses. And the man—
“Hayward?” she said in surprise as her former boyfriend stepped into her hospital room.
“I came as soon as I heard.” He set the huge, ribbon-wrapped bouquet on the windowsill and pulled a cane-backed chair to her bedside, brushing off the already clean seat before he sat down. “Darling, are you in pain?”
“No, not really,” she answered, struggling to keep the disappointment out of her voice. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”
“I had to come.” His voice was tight with an emotion that was as foreign to the Hayward she knew as snow was to this climate. “When I heard you’d been shot on that godforsaken island I realized how much you meant to me. I want you back, Noel. And I’m prepared to make it official.”
He reached into his suit pocket and pulled out a small, black velvet case. Snapping it open, he revealed a conservative, impeccably tasteful diamond engagement ring. “I know this seems sudden,” he said as he slipped the ring on the finger of her limp hand, “but I’ve given it a great deal of thought. We belong together. We share the same likes and dislikes, the same tastes and temperament. I know you felt that I spent too much time at my job, but that’s not a problem anymore. I got the promotion I wanted, so I won’t have to put in so many weekends.”