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Christine Feehan
“How did you know they were designer clothes, jungle boy?”
He grinned at her. “I get around. You’d be surprised where this jungle boy has been.” He leered deliberately.
Rachael laughed, then sobered, her gaze drifting over bis face. “Nothing about you would surprise me, Rio.”
Just like that she managed to put a lump in his throat. “Come here and let me carry you.” He held out his hand.
“I’d like to try to walk, even for a short distance. It feels so good to be managing a bit on my own.” Her fingers found his and clung.
Rio brought her hand to the warmth of his mouth, pressed a kiss into her palm. “Just a short distance. You haven’t been able to bear any weight on the leg and I don’t want you to overdue it. Tama’s potion will only help so much.”
“I know.” Her ankle and calf were throbbing, but she was never going to admit that to him, not if she wanted to walk on her own. He had a stubborn jaw, and his eyes could go from shimmering fire to ice cold in a heartbeat. Rio was a man who could get bossy very quickly given the right circumstances. She smiled to herself and took the first step, tugging at his hand. “I can’t wait for a hot bath, come on.”
He frowned but he went with her, keeping a watchful eye on how she walked. “Out here, Rachael, you always have to be alert to your surroundings. The birds are going to sound a warning and you have to notice, you have to hear the different notes. They’ll call to you, and depending on what frightens them, you can pick up what’s intruding into our neighborhood.”
“I’ve caught it a couple of times.” She tried not to limp. Walking on her own seemed a miracle to her. She looked around at the trees laden with fruit. Everywhere she looked color exploded. The massive tree trunks came in all colors and were covered by life-forms. Lichen, fungi, fern and
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everywhere. At first there was quite a bit of light, the shorter trees along the river allowing the sun to blaze down, but as they went deeper into the interior, the taller trees sheltered them with denser canopy.
“Look at these tracks, Rachael.” Rio crouched down to study the myriad of tracks near a shallow pool. He touched a larger paw print with four distinct toes. ‘This is clouded leopard. Probably Franz watching our backtrail. They started following me when I went to work, even when I crossed borders, so it was safer to train them. I couldn’t stop the silly things from following me everywhere.”
“Are you worried about Fritz?”
“No, he’s had wounds before. He knows how to hole up in the forest. He’ll come back when it’s safe. I didn’t want him at the house alone. If the spotted leopard found him, it would have killed him just out of sheer meanness. Look at this one.” He pointed to a very small track much like the clouded leopard track. “This is a leopard cat. They’re about the size of a domestic cat, usually reddish or yellowish coats with black rosettes. This was a busy place this morning.”
“What’s that strange track? It looks like it has webbing on the feet.”
“That’s a masked civet. They’re nocturnal.” He looked up at her. “Are you ready for me to carry you?” He straightened slowly. “Or do I have to pull rank and give you an order? You’re limping.”
“I didn’t realize we were in the military.”
“Anytime we’re under a death threat, we’re under military rules.”
Her laughter rose to the forest canopy, blended with the continuous call of the barbel, a bird that seemed to love the sound of its own voice. “Are you making up rales as we go along?”
“It was quick thinking on my part. Aren’t you impressed?” He swung her into his arms. “I want to know a little more about your mother’s family. Did you meet
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Christine Feehan
“I don’t remember hearing of my mother’s parents at all. My brother spoke of our birth father’s parents. He said we went to visit them in deep jungle once. They gave him treats and my grandmother rocked me. But they died around the same time as my father. He was on a trip and he never came back.”