by Kay Hooper
“Ty?”
She drew a deep breath. “Agreed. Who gets the chalice, Kane?”
He reached for his canteen and unscrewed the cap, frowning just a little but not looking at her. “We don’t have to make that decision for a while yet,” he noted neutrally.
“And when do we decide? When we dock at Ports-mouth or Liverpool, or wherever? When we get to London?”
“You think I’m going to try and give you the slip in Panama,” he said after taking a leisurely drink from his canteen. He was looking at her now, steady and faintly amused.
“You’ve done it before,” she reminded him evenly. “In Madagascar, you managed to have me detained by the police, and in Cairo you left me making arrangements for a ship while you hightailed it across the desert.”
Kane grinned suddenly as a memory surfaced. “You got even, at least in North Africa,” he offered. “Telling those Bedouins I stole one of their camels was a sneaky trick, Ty. By the way, what was the last offer from that sheik?”
She glared at him for a moment, but her sense of humor couldn’t remain submerged for long and a reluctant gleam lit her eyes. “Once I told him I had an employer who valued me, he started sending his proposals to Robert. I told Robert I didn’t want to know what the offers were, but he says he’s keeping a file in case I ever change my mind.”
“Or he ever needs a big favor from the sheik,” Kane said somewhat abruptly. And when she stiffened visibly, he added, “Sorry. Didn’t mean that.”
Tyler’s glare was back, this time holding a chill light. “I don’t give a damn what you think,” she said in a voice that shook slightly. “But I’ll tell you this, Kane. Not everything’s for sale. Even to the highest bidder.”
Kane had gone too far, and he knew it. He didn’t know why he had implied that Sayers would—or could—use Tyler’s sexual favor as a bargaining chip, and was more than a little surprised at both his implication and the savage emotions it had inspired in him. His gaze fell before hers. “I know. I’m sorry, Tyler, really. I suppose I was thinking about how ruthless Sayers and Phillips are in this feud of theirs.”
She got to her feet stiffly. “We’d better move on if we want to make higher ground by dark.”
As he rose as well, Kane reflected wryly that this encounter between them was running true to form in one way; a verbal seesaw with each of them besting the other occasionally but neither getting the upper hand for long.
He led the way in silence as they circled the last of the swamp. They had made better time than he’d expected, partially because the swamp was smaller than he’d been told, and also because they’d been moving quickly. The sun was sinking behind them as they left the swamp and began making their way through the thickening undergrowth of a dense forest. They were heading east now, gradually climbing into the Andes, and the temperature was already falling.
There was still plenty of light when the rain began falling steadily, and Kane glanced back to see Tyler look upward with more resignation than annoyance.
“We’re lucky the rain held off this long,” he said over his shoulder.
Tyler accepted the olive branch, though her voice was a bit stiff. “I know. But since we’re almost into the dry season, I’d been hoping . . .”
“We usually have better luck,” he agreed, turning to offer a hand to help her up a slippery granite outcrop. She came up beside him easily and without fuss, and remembering some of the feats demanded of them both in the past made him ask curiously as they went on, “Were you an athlete?”
She was silent for a moment as she followed him, then said, “If you mean in school, no. My father raised me, and since he spent at least six months of every year on a dig somewhere, I was lucky to just make decent grades.”
“You went with him?”
“Yes.”
He smiled a little at the brief answer. “So that’s where you developed your strength and balance, climbing around ruins?”
There was another silence, and then she said, “Partly, I suppose. And, until I was sixteen, ballet.”
Kane stopped on a rise to check the compass then looked at her with more than a little surprise. “Ballet?”
She smiled very faintly. “When I was fifteen, I was five-two and weighed eighty-five pounds. Between that birthday and the next, I grew five inches, gained thirty pounds, and, um—”
“Bloomed?” he suggested with a grin.
Tyler shrugged, unconsciously drawing his more intent scrutiny to the “blooming” that had turned her ballerina’s slenderness into the rich curves of a woman.
“Let’s just say my possibilities as a prima ballerina went down the tubes,” she said wryly.
“Any regrets?” he asked, trying to keep his eyes on her face as the steady rain plastered her shirt to the ripe breasts beneath it.
She adjusted the strap of the canteen on her shoulder, returning his gaze with the same wary look in her eyes that had been present since this morning. Not the suspicion of a rival; it looked like the misgivings of a woman risking more than defeat in a contest.
It was really beginning to bother him.
“No,” she said finally. “I was getting interested in antiquities by then and . . .”
“And?”
She fiddled with the strap on her shoulder again. “And shouldn’t we be going?”
Kane frowned a little. She was unnerved, and he didn’t know why. What had she been going to say about the year of physical changes that had altered her life? He was curious, but reluctant to disturb the fragile calm between them. So he went on, automatically choosing the easiest path as they continued to climb into the mountains.
It was still raining steadily, and the last of the light vanished as though a switch had been thrown. The footing was slippery in places, and Kane was beginning to look around for a place to hole up for the night when Tyler fell.
“Damn,” she muttered irritably as he knelt beside her. “Of all the stupid—”
“Are you hurt?” he asked briskly.
“My leg.” She shifted her weight slightly, then batted his hand away from her upper thigh. “Not that high, damn it.”
“It’s dark,” he murmured, knowing by the sound of her voice that she wasn’t in much pain.
“And you have eyes like an owl. My ankle—the left one. Just twisted a little; the boot protected it. If you’ll give me a hand up, I can—” She gasped as Kane slipped one arm beneath her knees, the other around her back, and rose easily to his feet holding her against his chest. “Kane!”
Reasonably he said, “You shouldn’t put any weight on that ankle until we can take a look at it, which is impossible here. There should be a level place at the top of this slope where we can build a fire.” He was moving steadily up the slope, apparently untroubled by either the slippery footing or his burden.
Tyler knew very well that his backpack weighed every ounce of fifty pounds since she’d carried it herself while tracking him and the bandits the day before. He was also carrying a canteen and rifle by their shoulder straps. And carrying her. Up a slippery slope. In pitch darkness.
She had put her arms around his neck automatically as he’d lifted her, and now made a determined effort not to think about strong arms holding her. Clearing her throat, she said, “So much for my balance.”
Kane chuckled softly.
That ambiguous response made her say aggrievedly, “I didn’t fall on purpose, you know.”
“You’re whistling again,” he said calmly.
Tyler frowned into the darkness, wondering when she had suddenly become so obvious to him. “I am not,” she denied, even though she knew she’d been doing just that, just making noise to distract them both from unexpected closeness.
“Of course you are.” His voice showed no strain. “We’ve always been a man and woman, Ty, but you’re just beginning to realize it. And you’re shying away like a timid deer.”
She couldn’t trust him, that’s why she didn’t want this! But she couldn’t tell
him that. So, as always, she worked up a flare of anger. “Don’t flatter yourself!”
Ignoring that, Kane said, “I’ve been thinking about it most of the day. I know you don’t trust me. Fair enough. To be perfectly honest, sweetheart, I don’t trust you, either.” He reached the top of the slope and stood gazing around for a moment.
Tyler, who couldn’t see a thing except him even though her eyes had adjusted as much as they could to the darkness, stared at his arrogant profile and opened her mouth to spit the angry words still forming in her mind.
Kane turned his head suddenly, and his grin was a flash of white in the darkness. “But I want you,” he said.
She closed her mouth, then said, “Put me down.”
“Sure.” He carried her several steps, then ducked slightly to clear what was apparently an overhang and knelt to set her gently on dry ground. “Back in a minute,” he said, shrugging off his pack and leaving it beside her. “I’ll see if I can find some dry wood for a fire.”
Tyler sat exactly as he’d left her, staring blankly into darkness. She was vaguely aware of hard rock at her back and dry dirt underneath her, and senses other than sight told her that a granite cliff curved protectively out above her. It couldn’t be called a cave, but Kane had managed to find shelter.
She lifted a hand that shook and slowly wiped moisture from her face. She was wet and chilled, but she knew that the trembling she could feel in her body had little to do with either condition.
I want you.
She had heard the words, the implicit demand before, but not from Kane. When Kane said it, it was no overture, no testing of the waters before a relationship could take a next logical step. When Kane said it, it wasn’t a simple statement of desire. When Kane said it, it was a challenge, a battle line drawn in the dirt between them.
After thinking it through, Kane wasn’t willing to ignore this battle. He didn’t trust her, or she him, but there was desire between them, and for Kane that was enough. He wouldn’t pretend they were no longer enemies, that their rivalry was past. He wouldn’t pretend to care about her.
Or at least, she hoped not. Bedroom lies were the one variety of deceit she would never be able to bear from him.
Tyler knew then that she wasn’t ready for this particular battle. She shifted position in the darkness and began unlacing her left boot, trying to think clearly and finding it almost impossible. All she could bring to mind were memories of the tight, warm enclosure of the sleeping bag and Kane’s hard body pressed so intimately to hers.
God, she couldn’t let this happen. Her own body’s response to him told her that not even her panicky feelings of helplessness and vulnerability could erect a guard between them, and with her mind in turmoil she had to doubt her intellectual will to resist him. It didn’t matter that she didn’t trust him, because her body didn’t care about trust, and she doubted her mind’s ability to control her body. Kane could make her want him, and he knew that as surely as she did herself.
She felt more than heard him return, but said nothing as he began building a small fire a couple of feet from her. The overhang provided a dry space four or five feet deep and about ten feet long, and he had placed the fire out near the edge of the hollow to give them as much room as possible.
“There isn’t much dry wood out there,” he said casually, “but I got what I could.”
She watched the fire flicker as he fed it with sticks and then broke a couple of larger branches with his hands and one knee. The sharp cracking of the wood sounded loud in the silence.
“How’s the ankle?” he asked, sitting back on his heels and brushing his hands together as he looked across the fire at her.
“All right.” Her voice was steady. “Not even swollen.”
He came around the fire, hunched a bit because he couldn’t stand upright in the confined space and knelt beside her. His khaki shirt was soaked and plastered to his muscular chest and shoulders, his shaggy hair was wet, and his face glistened. She had removed her boot, and he took her foot in his hand and stripped off the thick sock, his long fingers probing her ankle carefully. He frowned suddenly. “Your skin’s ice-cold.”
Tyler wasn’t surprised. “Give the fire time to work.”
His frown lingered as he swept her still body with a searching gaze. “The temperature’s dropped a good twenty degrees, and you’re soaked to the skin. We have to get you out of those wet clothes before you catch your death.”
“No,” Tyler said in a brittle voice.
Kane’s eyes narrowed. “Don’t be a little fool,” he said roughly. He half turned away to begin digging in his pack, opening a section she hadn’t noticed before, then dropped a bundle of clothing into her lap. In a flat tone that didn’t invite her to argue with him, he said, “Get out of your wet things and into those. Don’t worry, you’ll be decently covered. Then climb into the sleeping bag. I’m going to get some water and some wood.”
Tyler stared after him as he picked up the pot he used to make coffee and vanished out into the rainy darkness. She wanted to resist him on this, if only because she needed to feel in control of the situation again, but she was too cold and wet to feel like putting up much of a fight.
He had left her a flannel shirt and a pair of sweatpants, and she took a moment to speculate on his reasons for giving her the ruana instead of these last night. She didn’t have to speculate very hard. She removed her right boot and set both of them aside with her socks draped over them, then got gingerly to her feet. Her left ankle twinged, but it was more of a grumble than a pain and she ignored it.
Minutes later she was draping her wet shirt and underclothes over a rock at one end of the shelter, having scrambled into the dry things very quickly, when it occurred to her that the fire lit her dressing room up very nicely for anyone watching from the darkness outside.
The shirt was ridiculously large; she had to roll up the sleeves to make them reach her wrists. And if the sweatpants hadn’t boasted a drawstring waist and elastic at the ankles, she wouldn’t have been able to keep them on.
Dry and warming rapidly, she unrolled the sleeping bag and sat on it with her back against the wall. Her hair was still wet, but she didn’t have the energy to unbraid it. Granted this interlude without Kane’s disturbing presence, she needed very badly to think.
chapter five
HE RETURNED TO the hollow a few minutes later carrying an armful of wood and the water. He put the wood down and arranged the pot over the fire on a hook device he carried in his pack, then sat down a couple of feet away from Tyler and began getting out of his boots.
“Kane—” she began, but broke off when she realized how strained her voice sounded even to herself.
As if his earlier statement hadn’t been followed by an interruption for other things, Kane said, “I meant what I said, Ty.” He set his boots and socks aside, then sent her a glance that was both intense and faintly amused as he began unbuttoning his shirt. “But not here. And not now.”
She was too curious not to ask. “Why?”
Kane looked at her again, hesitating for the first time.
She looked very small and fragile, swallowed in his clothing, the firelight flickering in her wide amber eyes. After a moment he said, “We have company.”
It was the last thing Tyler had expected. “What?”
“Our friend the shooter.”
She stared at him, her mind scrambling to make the shift from personal to professional. “He’s been following us?”
“All day.”
“How long have you known?”
Kane stripped his shirt off, exposing the broad, hair-roughened expanse of his chest. He tossed the shirt to lie across a large rock at his end of the hollow, and half turned to face her. Keeping his voice low, he replied, “When you fell. As I turned back toward you, I caught a glimpse of him.” His mouth quirked suddenly. “Why do you think I charged out into the rain while you changed clothes? If we’d been alone, I would have stripped you myself.”
Tyler decided to let that pass, although her face felt hot at the image his words evoked. “So you were protecting my modesty?” She managed to make her voice dry.
“Let’s just say I made sure he couldn’t get close enough to see anything.”
Her eyes flickered as she glanced out beyond the fire. “He’s out there now?”
“Yeah.” Kane answered her next question before she could voice it. “I’m a little curious about our friend. Doesn’t it strike you as a bit odd that he wasted all that ammunition in the ravine and didn’t hit either of us? That kind of lousy marksmanship generally happens only in B movies.”
Tyler felt slightly sheepish that she hadn’t thought of that sooner, but chalked it up to having been unsettled since encountering Kane. “You’re right. So why would he be trying not to hit us?”
Kane reached into the pack between them and pulled out a second pair of sweatpants, muttering, “God, I hate being wet.” He rose to his feet in the confined space and began unfastening his jeans. “I have a theory,” he added.
“Oh?” Tyler was searching through the pack for the coffee, keeping her eyes fixed carefully downward while he stripped off his jeans and changed into the sweatpants. She concentrated on swearing at herself silently for having used up all the canned milk for pancakes, now she’d have to drink her coffee black and she hated that, she really did. . . .
“You can look now,” Kane said in amusement as he sat down again and cast his damp jeans over the rock where his shirt lay.
With an effort, she stopped herself from throwing the bag of coffee at him. Handing it to him with utter control, she watched as he dumped some into the can of hot water. “No wonder that stuff ’s strong enough to raise the dead,” she said, because she wanted to say something she could sound annoyed about. “Don’t you ever measure?”
“Only when it counts,” Kane said.