Hearts on Fire: Romance Multi-Author Box Set Anthology

by Violet Vaughn

  Mission scrubbed. Location change. New targets at Kulinda went to Cheboi, and to Nicky, New targets: elands from Kulinda. TAKE NO ACTION.

  I knew Nicky would be cursing me out for that last bit. I was cursing myself out.

  And what of Jasiri? Would another round of gunfire be all it took to drive her over the edge?

  We’d driven another few miles when Hodari turned to me with a grin. “The boss has another surprise for you.”

  The muscles in my stomach clenched with tension. Had Hodari seen me texting? Was he planning on ditching me? An ambush maybe?

  “Kulinda’s got an elephant. We got another item added to our list. Ellie tusks. I took one out about a week ago. This one’s yours.”

  I covered the shock that jolted through me with a derisive laugh. “I brought 7mm ammo. That might annoy an elephant but it’s not going to drop one.”

  “Look behind the seat.” He flicked on the cab light.

  In other circumstances I would have admired the beauty and fire power of the elephant gun resting on a quilt over the floorboard.

  “It fires .458s. Big suckers. You got to be a man to take the recoil kick.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding me. The last time I saw that elephant it was in a boma by the compound. No way we can get in and out with tusks before we have guns on us. The elands, sure, if we hit them by the lake. The ellie’s just grief all around.”

  “The boss was pretty insistent.”

  “I bet he was. He lost a bid on that elephant. Needed it live then. He couldn’t get it legal, so now he wants it dead. Revenge. Which I’ve got nothing against revenge except when it makes someone stupid. And especially if that someone wants me to do something even stupider. You want those tusks, let me out right here and go get them yourself. I’ll either bring the flowers to the hospital if you’re lucky or to your grave if you’re not.”

  “The boss doesn’t like people telling him no.”

  “So I’ve gathered. But I’ve had enough of other people telling me when, where and why to risk my life. If Brandon expects me to jump just because he says so…”

  Would my refusing undo any chance I’d built to stop Brandon’s operations? I was willing to sacrifice a brace of elands to the cause, why was one problem elephant that would probably have to be put down anyway any different? What made her—its—life worth more? How would Nicky put it down? Dart it first, then put a bullet behind its ear? I could do the same with one bullet from that elephant gun behind me. I could give the elephant a clean death, no more grief, no more pain, just oblivion forever. A mercy that would also ingratiate me with Brandon. Win-win.

  “Stop the truck. Don’t tell him I said no. Let me have the pleasure of doing that myself.”

  Stupid elephant. Apparently I wasn’t ready to give up on it just yet.

  Hodari’s grin this time was at its widest yet. “You got balls. I can respect that. Besides, who gets to bag an elephant their first time out? We can come back for it later. Ivory keeps. The boss knows that.”

  “Later,” I agreed. “When they’ve moved it out of the boma. When we can take it without getting into a firefight over a few thousand dollars.”

  He looked at me funny then. “If that’s not worth it, what is?”

  How much deeper than the heart of Africa did I need to go—could I go—to get away from men like Hodari and Brandon?

  I shut down my feelings then and let training and instinct take over for the rest of the night. It was ridiculously easy to cut through a fence, shoot two elands, shear off their horns and then go out for beers after when you knew there’d be no opposition, no pursuit, and you could leave the clean-up to someone else. The only concession I had Hodari make was that we went in on the west side of the lake, as far from the boma as possible.

  In the morning, Brandon was all smiles, and while there was no mention of the elephant, I knew I had passed whatever tests he’d meant for me—loyalty, balls, marksmanship, keeping my cool.

  “I expect my partner to treat me like a partner in the future,” I told Brandon. “I’ve had enough of lying and subterfuge. I’m either all in or all out. Let me know now so I don’t waste either of our time.”

  “Of course, Mr. Lawson.” Brandon’s smooth voice with its British highlights could melt butter. I had a feeling he, like Hodari, didn’t hear no from too many women. “You’ll find I’m fiercely loyal to those who are loyal to me. And that I reward loyalty well. In this business it’s all about trust. I’m sure you understand.”

  No veil to that threat; it was perfectly clear. I gave him a curt nod. Not that I believed he knew I was already planning to betray him, only that he meant to forestall any thought of it from anyone new here, not just me. “And tonight?”

  “You’ll kindly do some culling at the Selous Game Reserve.”

  “It would,” I assured him with a smirk, “be my pleasure.”

  The hooded glare he shot me would have left a lesser man trembling in his mamba-skinned boots.

  29

  Nicky

  Hyenas had gotten to the elands between the time Abasi’s men had quick-repaired the fence after Peter left and in the morning when I drove out with Steve and Abasi. They’d taken pictures earlier in the night, so we had an official record even if the meat was spoiled for the Makonde tribesmen.

  “This whole thing just feels worse because it was Peter, right?” I asked Steve.

  His grim face softened. “You know it’s more than that.”

  He was right, of course. The first thing Steve had done when I’d told him and Abasi that Peter was on his way to Kulinda was to grab the tranq rifle. We all waited then at the boma, watching Jasiri who refused to leave her calf’s remains.

  When they came, the shots—two quick cracks—sounded farther away this time, more muffled. Jasiri heard them, distinctly. A shudder rippled through her. We braced ourselves for another flare of rage.

  And…nothing.

  That complete non-reaction cut me deeper than any bitter trumpeting or posturing. It was a sign of defeat. Of failure. Of a life so beaten and traumatized there was no possibility left of recovery, of redemption.

  When Steve and Abasi left to check the fence long minutes later after it was clear Jasiri posed no threat to us, to the boma or to herself, I crawled into the back of the Land Rover and wept. For Jasiri, for Peter, for my heart that was breaking on every front.

  Maybe Tanzania and the whole eco-tourist sanctuary idea was misguided folly. What madness had I fallen into when I allowed the man I was sleeping with to shoot my animals without repercussion? Or when I was disturbed by an elephant not trying to tear her way through an electrified fence?

  Where was the balance and simplicity I had come here to find?

  So, yes. Steve was right. It was more than the dead elands, more than Peter, more than Jasiri.

  It was me.

  It was a bleak morning as I stared into my soul and realized that I was falling out of hope.

  * * *

  At lunch, Peter called to let me know the sting at the Selous Game Reserve was back on for tonight.

  At 7 o’clock, he called again. The mayor of Liwale had been murdered and the sergeant and his men were caught up in a manhunt for the killer.

  “They won’t be at the reserve.”

  I let the meaning of that sink in, to settle deep among all the other disappointments.

  “But you’ll still be there, won’t you?” It wasn’t really a question.

  “Yes.”

  He respected me enough to not apologize or explain his actions. I knew his reasoning as well as he. I was just apparently having a harder time resolving the conflict between what was right and what was less right. Or wrong and more wrong depending on my perspective of the moment.

  “Do you want to call this operation?” Peter asked. “We won’t get a second chance.”

  Maybe I hesitated too long. Maybe he really thought I needed convincing to continue on, to see this one big good in the world we could
do all the way through to the end.

  “There’s…something I didn’t tell you about last night,” he said in a voice that was quiet and measured.

  I was sure nothing could make me feel worse than I already did.

  “Brandon still wants your elephant. Only now, all he cares about is the ivory. Hodari brought a frigging elephant gun with us. I told him I wouldn’t do it.”

  I swallowed. “Does he suspect you?”

  “Only for being a man with sense. He can’t expect anyone to fire off an elephant gun less than half a mile from an armed compound. I guess it could have gone south, but Brandon didn’t press it and he seemed to get a kick out of someone with the balls to stand up to him. Though I sure as hell wouldn’t try that tactic a second time. Plus, he’s one of those men with a very…very…long memory.”

  “Then Jasiri will never be safe.” I looked out at the gray shape withering almost by the minute in the setting sun. “If she ever leaves the boma…”

  I was wrong. I did feel worse.

  “She’ll be safe if Brandon is behind bars.”

  I sighed. “No, I don’t want to call this. And I would have said no even before you told me about Jasiri. But now that you have, I want to say thank you.”

  It was his turn to hesitate. “How is she?”

  “Not good. It also looks like her milk let down so she’s going to be in some crazy discomfort from that until she dries up.”

  “Is it just her or does God hate elephants in general?”

  Despite all, I had to smile. Peter was calling Jasiri her again. “Maybe it isn’t her but us that God’s hating on right now.”

  * * *

  My phone chirped mid-morning. Peter. I didn’t want to hear anything about the previous night, but that wasn’t why he was calling.

  “Brandon wants a three-day cool-off from activity. I think something might be up with the rhinos that’s triggered some official interest. Anyway, looks like I’ve got some unexpected days off. I’ll be home in a couple of hours.”

  Home. What would prompt a slip like that? I wondered.

  30

  Peter

  How could returning to the sanctuary feel both so right and so wrong?

  I wasn’t sorry Nicky now knew something about my past. I wasn’t sorry that she was conflicted about the elands I’d killed. Hell, I was conflicted enough about them myself. I wasn’t sorry because it took pressure off of me. Because it was far easier to distance myself when the other party was distancing too.

  At the same time, a part of me looked forward to being closer again to the very party I was trying to distance from. Could I be any more screwed up about this?

  I met the Land Rover turning onto the sanctuary road and let Nicky and Melea drive in ahead. They stopped at the clinic, each of them with a handful of papers and samples when they got out. I followed them inside.

  “One of the Makonde herds,” Nicky said as she dumped paperwork and microscope slides on the counter in the waiting room. “Brucellosis and West Nile Virus. The herd’s first tests. Another convert.” She flashed me a quick smile, and my breath caught. I’d almost forgotten how utterly beautiful she was when she was happy. Had it really been so long since she was?

  She left Melea to sort and file the papers while we headed to the kennel area to check on the patients there. Only one of the three airy indoor/outdoor runs was occupied, and that by a large black-and-tan hound with long ears, an exuberant tail, and a surprisingly deep bark that could fast grow obnoxious. Luckily, he was happy with only a few welcoming woofs.

  “That’s Barney,” Nicky said by way of introduction. “He belongs to one of the sanctuary’s patrons who’s boarding him with us while the family goes down to Cape Town for a couple of weeks. He gets to play out in one of the corrals for a couple of hours in the mornings. And I have a feeling he’ll wind up sleeping on Melea’s bed at night.”

  There were occupants in two of the four welded-frame cages that were covered with one-inch hardware cloth, decorated inside with heavy branches and dried foliage, and backed up to the canopied and sheltered outer wall that was mainly steel bars set six inches apart and stretched over with the same steel hardware cloth to keep out unwelcome predators. In one, a bush baby slept in a leaf nest. In the other, what appeared to be a big, spotted kitten about the size of a beagle looked out with huge, round eyes and pled with us with hungry cries for lunch.

  “One of the tribesmen rescued the bush baby from an owl night before last and brought it here yesterday,” Nicky said. “It doesn’t seem to be hurt, so I’ll release it in the boma tonight. The cheetah cub is only here until tomorrow. Rasheda’s located a surrogate mother for him and volunteers have driven him over from Malawi. One more volunteer will pick him up here and take him on up to a preserve just east of Selous. We’ll fix him a bottle in a few minutes, and you can have a turn at feeding him, if you want. That is, if you think you can take Melea, ’cause I’m betting she’ll put up a pretty good fight.”

  “Oh, I’m ready for her. How often will I get the chance to boast at the bar that I fed a cheetah? What do you think that baby weighs? One hundred, 120 pounds?”

  Nicky laughed. For a moment, the flute of it sounded so much like Sameera’s I had to do a double-take to convince myself she wasn’t here. Why did I think I was anywhere near ready to let her go?

  On the inside wall, by a bathtub and a counter that doubled as an exam table with cabinets below, stood a rack of five commercial steel cages—two larger ones on the bottom with three smaller ones stacked on top. Next to the homemade runs and cages, the all-steel ones looked especially cold and sterile. Inhospitable. They had only one resident currently—the honey badger, lodged in one of the larger cubbies, with newspapers and blankets under it and a drip bag hanging outside feeding fluids to it through a catheter bandaged firmly to a hind leg. The steel cages were easy to clean and bleach between animals, of course, but it still made me uncomfortable seeing the honey badger in one, although it did seem so sick it probably didn’t know or care where it was.

  “We should get confirmation from the lab today about whether it’s distemper or not. Once we have that, if they don’t need anything else, I’ll put him down. I’ve given him something for pain and to help him sleep for now. When the time comes I’ll just inject the narcotic directly into the drip tube. He probably won’t even wake up between now and then.”

  “If it is distemper, is Barney okay being here?”

  “It’s transmitted by direct contact, which they won’t have, and Melea and I are washing after we handle the badger. And Barney’s been vaccinated against it since he was a puppy, so the risk of him being affected is pretty minimal. You’re more likely to get it than he is.”

  There was one patient, however, I was most anxious to see. “How’s Crocket doing?”

  Nicky’s face fell. “I think you’re going to be disappointed,” she warned me.

  I followed her out to the barn. Zuri was in the first corral, looking particularly peeved that she’d been put up while Melea and Nicky were gone. Nicky opened her gate as we passed by, and the little kudu bounded out, the splint barely hampering her. “Thank God young bones heal fast,” Nicky grinned, as I craned my neck toward the next corral, catching sight of black and white stripes.

  The filly was on the ground, hind legs hitched under her, forelegs stretched out in front, her nose nodding over her knees. It took me a moment to realize she was drowsing in the shade, and hadn’t simply fallen there. Likewise, it took her a moment to realize two humans had snuck up on her and were staring, watching her sleep. She shook her head, the stiff bristle of mane snaking along her elegant neck, and stretched her front legs out even further as she looked at us.

  I got a sinking feeling. “Can she stand?” I whispered.

  Before Nicky could answer, Crocket rose remarkably smoothly to her feet, made a half-circle and hobbled over to a spot of shade a few yards farther away from us where she stood on her three good legs, the fourth b
earing some weight of its own.

  Beside me, Nicky shook her head. “Looks like she’ll be healing up faster than I anticipated. We’ll likely only have her one or two weeks instead of two or three.”

  I glared mock death at Nicky for making me worry, all the while trying not to laugh. I was about to lose the attempt when Barney started baying in an end-of-the-world voice so loud out here it had to be deafening inside.

  Nicky and I exchanged equally perplexed looks when Melea’s frantic, “Doctor Nic! Doctor Nic!” rang out, competing with Barney’s howls. “Hatari! Hatari!”

  Danger.

  We ran.

  Melea met us at the door, eyes wide with fear. “I don’t know how it got in, Doctor Nic!”

  “How what got in?”

  “Mamba!”

  Nicky’s face drained of color. “You’re sure?” Melea nodded. “Where?”

  Melea’s face crinkled. “The bush baby!”

  “No, no, no!” Nicky cried as she ran for the back room, with me only a step behind.

  Halfway through an incredibly small break in the hardware cloth, a dark-scaled snake was pushing through the bush baby’s cage wire, coming into the clinic. Barney was still keeping up his thunderous baying and the cheetah cub’s back was arched up against a branch near the back of its cage while it snarled impotent threats the snake’s way.

  Behind us, oblivious to the danger, knowing only her people were here, Zuri slipped through the doorway. The combination of Barney’s impossibly loud baying, the cub’s snarling and Melea’s screaming was enough to frighten and confuse anything. Zuri danced away from Melea’s quick lunge for the kudu’s neck, not appearing to even see the mamba that was now almost all the way through the wire wall.

  Even if the mamba wasn’t here to hunt, a face full of kudu hooves would surely be enough to provoke it to attack. Either the kudu or us or Barney. The cheetah seemed safe enough for now assuming no larger holes in the hardware cloth around its cage.