The Mercenary

by ALLISON LEIGH,

  “For us both.”

  “That’s ridiculous. Why is it better for me to be someone you’d dismantle a motor over!”

  “Because I want you,” he said flatly. “And I don’t want to want you.”

  The words seemed to hang there in the night. Marisa swayed slightly. He couldn’t have said that. Could he?

  “Not trusting you at least keeps you at a distance.” He grimaced. “And don’t pretend that you’re unaware of it.”

  He most certainly had said it. “I don’t—”

  “I saw you in the river, too, M. I saw you watching me.”

  Her lips parted. And though the dark, verdant forest was rich with oxygen, she suddenly felt unable to breathe. He lifted his hand and seemed to wince a little when she flinched. But he continued the movement and touched her chin.

  She shivered at the grazing touch.

  “Even before then,” he said, “I wanted you. Even covered in mud. It didn’t matter. You know what it does to a man to want a woman he can’t afford to trust?”

  She swallowed, tried to moisten her dry lips. Just then she couldn’t be any less than honest, no matter how much it revealed. “Perhaps the same thing it does to a woman who wants a man after she’s vowed never to trust another.”

  His jaw cocked. His eyes were hooded, unreadable in the night. His thumb smoothed over the point of her chin and brushed back up to tease the very corner of her lips.

  She stopped breathing altogether.

  “Helluva note, isn’t it?” he finally said. He dropped his hand and moved away.

  Marisa felt as if the temperature had suddenly dropped ten degrees.

  It was just the wind, she told herself. It often picked up at night. He hadn’t been going to kiss her. It was a ludicrous thought. “I wouldn’t have done anything to the boat,” she said after a moment. “Though I don’t expect you’ll believe that.”

  He sat down by the fire and poked the glowing embers with a stick, causing a small fountain of sparks to spurt up from the wood. “Don’t expect anything, Marisa, and life is easier all the way around.”

  Why did those words sound so unbearably lonely? He was only referring to their situation. Wasn’t he?

  “My abuela used to say that people rise to your expectations,” she said after a taut moment. “She also said that people sink to them just as easily.”

  “Is there a point in there?”

  She knew he was only baiting her. And it almost worked. She waited a moment to let the irritation settle. “I guess it’s only that if you expect nothing, then nothing is just what you’ll get.” Which was a sad thing, as far as she was concerned. She stifled a sigh and headed toward the shelter. “Good night, Murdoch.”

  Neither one of them thought about the blisters on her heels. Not until hours later when it began to rain again.

  Hard, driving rain.

  Cold, stinging, miserable rain.

  At the first hiss of raindrops hitting the remains of the fire, he’d flipped over the boat atop their clothes and gear to keep them dry. He’d huddled in a rain poncho, feeling that godawful ache in his chest from ribs that had taken one beating too many in the past few days, knowing that Marisa was under the shelter as dry as you please, for about as long as he’d been able to stand it.

  “You’re getting soft in your old age, Murdoch,” he muttered to himself when he finally gave up and headed toward the shelter. He flipped off the rain poncho and ducked into the shelter, prepared for an argument from Marisa, because he wasn’t entirely certain that she was sleeping. She’d been silent for hours, but that didn’t necessarily prove much.

  Several staccato cracks of lightning lit the shadows under the sharply pitched tarp and he could see that Marisa was stretched out on her stomach, her profusion of curls streaming around her shoulders. And below the ruched up bottom of the sweatpants she’d finally put on, her bare heels stared up at him accusingly.

  It wasn’t like him to forget anything, but he’d clean forgotten about her heels.

  He went back into the driving rain, guided only by the intermittent flashes of lightning and felt around the increasingly muddy ground for the tube of ointment. The bandages would be useless at this point after laying in the rain. There were only a few left in the first-aid kit, so they’d have to use them in the morning when she’d have to put her shoes back on to continue the trek.

  He found the tube quickly enough, though he was soaked through by the time he did. Wondering just how wet it would be if it were the rainy season, he used the water still in the pan to wash the mud from his hands, then stripped out of the sopping shirt and tossed it onto the bush. The only blessing was that the slanted rain was not headed right through the open side of the shelter, leaving that space relatively untouched.

  He silently slid in beside Marisa and carefully tucked her outflung arm back beside her to give himself some room. She didn’t stir, and he was glad for it. He didn’t know what stupidity had taken hold of his mouth earlier to admit what he had. If he was lucky, the rain would ease up and he’d be out of the shelter again well before dawn and she’d never know he’d invaded her space this way.

  Sitting forward without either taking out one of the supports holding up the shelter or dripping water all over her was no easy task, but he managed, as he carefully slathered the broken, blistered skin on her heels with the first aid ointment.

  She made a soft sound. Not a moan. Not a sigh. But somewhere in between, and it felt as though that half-husky sound shot straight into his bloodstream.

  Tyler very nearly slid right back out into the driving rain. It was damn inconvenient the way his body had a mind of its own. If it were any other time, any other situation, he’d have pursued Marisa until they both got what they wanted. And then he’d have walked away, knowing neither one of them had expectations of anything more.

  But it wasn’t any other time.

  As Tyler stretched out on his back and stared into the inky void that was alleviated only by the harsh flashes of lightning, he reminded himself that a man’s life hung in the balance while he was merely being inconvenienced by an untimely case of the hots for his so-called traveling companion.

  Unfortunately the perspective didn’t do a damn thing to keep him from hearing the soft sound of her breath, from feeling the dry, cozy warmth of her curvaceous body scant inches away from his rain-soaked one, from smelling the scent of his soap on her body and in her hair.

  So Tyler lay there.

  Counting the strikes of lightning until the minutes between them began to lengthen, and the storm slowly rolled onward.

  And even then, Tyler lay there.

  Wanting the woman beside him. Knowing he could never reach for her.

  Not even if he did trust her.

  Six

  “What on earth do you think you’re doing?” The husky, soft voice was next to Tyler’s ear, not at all matching the sentiment behind the words.

  Beyond the confines of their shelter, nature all around them was alive and kicking. Birds were calling, monkeys were screeching. It felt, just then, as if he and the woman in his arms were the only two people on earth. Marisa’s almond-shaped eyes were barely open. Soft with sleep, they were…bewitching, dammit. And he was hard as a rock.

  He stretched, groaning. “I’m gettin’ too old for this,” he muttered. He was stiff everywhere, most particularly against the softness of the woman sprawled across his chest. His hands just sort of naturally wanted to head back down to rest on the small of her back. Right where his fingertips could explore the sweep of her hips, the curve of her rear. His teeth ground together and he redirected his hands safely to her shoulders.

  Shoulders that he gently lifted and pushed off him. “What am I doing?” His lips twisted at the irony. “Getting up.”

  The rain had stopped, thankfully. And the morning was full of pale, silvery light. Even though he knew the danger of it, he couldn’t help but look at Marisa and wonder whether her eyes would get more golden or more
brown when she was being well and thoroughly loved. In a minute, he knew that drowsiness in them would clear and she’d probably scramble away from him like he was the odious thing she believed him to be.

  But right now she looked warm and soft and way too appealing with her body draped in his T-shirt.

  Which meant he definitely needed to get away from her. Right now. “Make sure you get the bandages on your heels today. We’ll be hoofing it from here on out.”

  He ducked from the shelter, and Marisa rubbed her eyes, watching him go. He’d obviously slept in the shelter with her. Yet she hadn’t awakened when he’d snuck in.

  Somehow, that bothered her. No, that wasn’t quite right. It bothered her because it didn’t bother her that she’d slept through him joining her under the tarp where there was little extra space after one person, much less a man of his size.

  And despite the expected bit of ache from sleeping on the ground instead of a mattress, Marisa realized that she’d slept well. Surprisingly well.

  It confused her, and Marisa didn’t much like being confused.

  Sighing, she sat up and examined her heels. They were sore, even without touching them. She also realized they’d been covered with the ointment that she knew she’d never gotten around to using.

  Which meant that Tyler had done it. Another thing that she’d slept right through.

  “You’re mine.” Gerald’s handsome face was red with fury when she’d refused, yet again, to get that ridiculous tattoo of his name put on her body. It had started out as a joke. Or so she’d thought. Until one morning, after he’d actually brought a person to their home to do the job and she’d had to lock herself in her room to make her refusal clear. The locked door that had seemed to protect her from the tattoo artist had not protected her from Gerald, though. He’d picked the lock while she’d slept and she’d awakened, panicked, when he’d been sliding up her nightgown. He’d been holding a red pen in his hand. And while he held her down, he’d written his name, messily because of her struggling, across her hip.

  Marisa shook her head, clearing it of the memory. She didn’t want to think about what had happened after that.

  So she started to crawl out of the shelter, stopping only when her hand landed on a soft piece of something. Her bra and panties. Obviously Tyler’s doing, as well.

  She bundled them up in her hand and crawled out of the shelter and stood. Near the trees, Tyler had spread out his gear and seemed to be repacking it. He wore those cammies and hiking boots again, and a tan shirt hung loose from his broad shoulders. He looked over his shoulder at her once, then turned back to what he was doing.

  Everything was wet though it wasn’t raining now, and she knew then what had spurred him to take shelter under the tarp. It had had nothing to do with her at all, and everything to do with sitting out all night in the rain.

  It should have comforted her to know that.

  He’d left one of his shirts on the ground right by the shelter. Obviously it was meant to wipe her feet, because it already bore the evidence that he’d done the same. She did so, then slid her toes into her shoes that had also been placed, conveniently, right there. There was no way she could fully put the shoes on, yet. Her heels were simply too raw. And they’d have been worse if not for him putting on the ointment while she’d slept.

  She didn’t want to think that it was thoughtfulness that had prompted Tyler’s actions. It was far more likely simple expedience, she told herself as she headed down the riverbank for some privacy.

  The dawn light was strengthening when she returned. He was obviously in the process of condensing his gear down to the small pack he’d used the previous day, and one other, larger one. For a moment she wondered where he’d gotten it, but then realized it was one of the bags he’d already had, the straps cleverly repositioned.

  The shelter was gone. Something else was missing as well, she realized. “Where’s the boat?”

  He kept right on buttoning up his shirt. “Gone.”

  “Well, thank you. I noticed that.” She gave him back the plastic holder containing the hand soap that she’d taken with her. “Gone where? And why?”

  “We don’t need it anymore.”

  It was no more information than she’d expected him to impart. She supposed he’d probably deflated it and done something clever with the little outboard to keep it from ever being found or used again.

  She’d wet down her hair again at the river in an attempt to tame it, and now she tugged and pulled it into a braid that she tied off with a narrow strip she’d made by tearing out the sleeves of the T-shirt. She’d used the other sleeve as a sort of washcloth, and all things considered—sweatpants several sizes too large, and a T-shirt with no sleeves—she felt at least presentable.

  She still had not covered her heels with the adhesive bandages, and he’d left several sitting out, along with the tube of antibiotic ointment and another pair of socks. So, while Tyler was absorbed in whatever it was he was holding, she perched on a rock and dealt with her heels. The shoes were a tight fit when she put them on, but they were just going to have to do. It wasn’t as if she had an alternative, after all. Then she used the insect repellent and the sunblock that he’d left out, as well.

  Her stomach rumbled, loud enough for Tyler to hear. She was too practical to be terribly embarrassed, though, when he just tossed her one of his protein bars and indicated the banana beside him that she hadn’t noticed.

  She practically fell on the fruit, so happy was she to see it. “Where’d you find them?” she asked after she’d peeled it and consumed nearly half of it. It was far too ripe, but she didn’t care. To her, it was practically heaven.

  “I wrestled a monkey for it.”

  “Right.” She rolled her eyes and finished it off, then eyed the gadget in his hands with curiosity. “You brought a pager all the way out here? What on earth for?”

  Tyler let his palm go flat, and the small square thing sat in plain sight. “It’s not a pager,” he said. “It’s a GPS system.” He watched Marisa’s expression and felt something inside him go cold at the gleam that entered her eyes. And he’d thought he was as cold inside as a man could get.

  “I’ve seen them,” she said. “One of my regulars at the restaurant has one he takes camping. Only his was larger. More like a television remote.”

  “It’ll get the job done.” His assurance was flat, but it didn’t seem to dim her excitement.

  “Can you use it to get us rescued?”

  “I told you already. We don’t need rescuing. Westin does.”

  Her smooth forehead crinkled. “You’ve said that before. But if we got help, then we could get to him more quickly. And time is critical, is it not?”

  “Using this thing before I need to could end up bringing El Jefe right to our doorstep.” If they weren’t already. He watched Marisa, and wondered what she’d do now. It had been a calculated risk, bringing the receiver right out into the open. He said nothing about the fact that it was also a transmitter; that it was going to get his and Westin’s butts out of la Fortuna when he needed it. “That’s why I didn’t use it to determine our location.”

  She had brains. She’d probably figure out the rest on her own. And if she was going to prove herself, one way or the other, he figured today was as good a day as any. Because with each passing hour, the more certain he was that El Jefe was on to them.

  First Westin had been captured—an unusual thing in itself. Then Luke had been injured trying to get to Westin using, as it turned out, his own clandestine resources. Now Tyler’s own efforts had been seriously curtailed.

  There just weren’t that many coincidences in the world as far as Tyler was concerned. And if Marisa really was part of the enemy, he wanted her to make her move before he got anywhere near la Fortuna.

  “Well, we certainly don’t want El Jefe’s thugs to come calling.” As if she’d lost any interest in the device on his palm, she balled up the banana peel and tossed it aside. Then she looked up at
him, and went oddly still.

  Tyler started to tuck the deactivated device in his pocket. When Marisa moved suddenly, snatching up the machete that was near his feet, he froze.

  This was it, then.

  He’d wanted her to make a move, and she was. Only it wasn’t toward the GPS device, after all. His muscles flexed as he prepared for her to move. He knew he could stop her, and felt a fleeting guilt because, when it came down to it, he really didn’t want to hurt her.

  Then she moved. He pivoted. And the broad blade of the heavy knife passed right by his face in a blur of motion before stabbing into the tree bare inches behind him.

  He barely had time to utter an oath when Marisa shuddered, backing away from him. He turned to see a vividly patterned snake, not dead but writhing madly against the tree where the machete had very effectively pinned it. Marisa turned away, looking as if she wanted to retch.

  And Tyler knew a moment’s unease that maybe, just maybe, he was wrong about her.

  He finished the job she’d begun and the fer-de-lance fell, harmless, into the tangled ground cover where it would end up food for some other creature.

  Marisa was still shuddering. “I knew someone who died from one of those,” she finally whispered. “He was only nine. I’ve hated the forest ever since.” She tossed her thick, long braid behind her back and visibly shook off the memory. “Am I supposed to carry one of those?” She pointed at the packs.

  He also didn’t want to admire her practicality. But there was something about the way she focused on the matter at hand that got to him.

  He handed her the daypack, and hefted the larger one on his back. She lifted the daypack experimentally as if testing its weight, then tucked the uneaten protein bar and the tubes of ointment, sunblock and repellent inside before slipping her arms through the straps. “What about the rest of our stuff?”

  “Nonessential.”

  “Sort of like my suitcase,” she said, her voice smooth.

  “Sort of.” He wiped the single smear from the machete and sheathed it.