Force Of Nature

by Peggy Webb

  “Buckle up,” she said, and when she fastened her own buckles he watched her, then did the same. No fumbling, no hesitation.

  There was no doubt about it: this man was extremely intelligent. She planned to take a show-and-tell approach with him. Though he hadn’t tried to utter a word, he listened intently to everything she said. Maybe he understood more than she’d thought.

  “I’m going to start the engine now. It will be very noisy. I know you crashed in a small plane, but I’m a very good pilot. Don’t be afraid.”

  She needn’t have worried. He watched every move she made, and when the engine roared to life he didn’t even blink. That shouldn’t have surprised her. He’d lived on the edge for twenty years where every act was a matter of survival, even getting his food.

  “This is going to be a long trip, so just settle back and relax.”

  She wished he wouldn’t stare at her that way. He made her hot all over just by looking at her. Take this morning, for instance…

  When she’d wakened up with him wrapped around her and looking at her as if he planned to have her for breakfast, she’d nearly joined the wild herself. If he’d touched her she would have done anything he wanted. Anything.

  So what in the world was she going to do with him in her house?

  Educate him. Help him reclaim his birthright.

  Oh, yeah?

  Hannah was glad her brother wasn’t here. Daniel would see through her in a minute.

  “Let me tell you about the place where we’re going. I live on five hundred acres on the Mississippi River, so you shouldn’t feel caged in. There’s plenty of room for you to roam.”

  He never took his eyes off her. How much did he understand?

  “My land used to be part of a plantation, but everything burned in the War Between the States except a silo. It’s handmade slate, really quite beautiful. I used to think about converting it into a place to live, but it was one of those things I never got around to. My cottage is small, but since I travel a lot, size doesn’t seem to matter.”

  She had a sudden vision of herself in close quarters with Hunter. Night and day. For how long? How long would it take to educate him? To civilize him?

  It was a pity she couldn’t consult experts, but hers had to be a solo mission. She gave a rueful chuckle. Weren’t they always? She was too stubborn to take orders and too irascible for polite company.

  As she flew south she pointed out the different states and kept up a running commentary that was both geography and history lesson. He listened and looked, but nothing moved him from his cocoon of silence.

  More than once Hannah wondered what she had gotten into and why, but she wasn’t about to back down. Once she committed to a project, she would go through hell and high water in order to see it through to the end.

  What can the end be for Hunter Wolfe?

  She firmly shoved the question from her mind. Why borrow trouble? She’d never been one to worry over what might be. Her philosophy was to grab life by the throat and live to the fullest every moment of every day. When she came to the end of her life she didn’t want to regret the things she hadn’t done. Sure, she’d probably miss a few things along the way, but it wouldn’t be from cowardice or lack of trying.

  They arrived home at sunset. Hannah banked the plane so they appeared to be floating on a golden path that led straight to the Mississippi River. She always tried to time her trips so she would be flying into the setting sun, and the sight never failed to take her breath away.

  “That’s my home down there. Beautiful, isn’t it? I know Denali is spectacular, but no matter where I travel I’m always glad to get home. I guess it’s true what they say, There’s no place like home.”

  She turned to smile at her passenger. “Dorothy, Wizard of Oz. I’ll have to introduce you to the old books and movies. I love them.”

  She had a sudden vision of her parents sitting side by side on the sofa holding hands and laughing at old Laurel and Hardy movies. She’d call her mother as soon as she got Hunter settled in.

  As she taxied to a stop, Hannah thanked her lucky stars that she had a private airstrip. There was no one to gawk as Hunter emerged from the plane like some primitive war god, complete with ancient weapons.

  Typically, the capricious Mississippi weather fooled her. She hadn’t expected cold weather—that happened only sporadically from October through December with the real “cold spells,” as her grandmother called them, holding off until January and February—but she had expected something cooler than the heat that wafted up from the tarmac. It felt like being in a steam bath.

  “You’ll want to get out of that bearskin. I have some clothes for you inside.”

  He followed her through the front door, but she’d never seen a more cautious entry. He was as tense and suspicious as if he expected something wild to attack him from every quarter.

  The clothes were lying on the sofa. “Good, my mom came through for us.”

  She walked over and picked them up. Now what was she going to do? Would he remember?

  “These are your clothes.” He didn’t move, didn’t respond. “You take off your skins.…” She took off her own flight jacket to demonstrate, then pointed to him. “Take off clothes. See.”

  Lord, she might as well have said, Me Jane, you Tarzan.

  All of a sudden his weapons clattered to the floor and he started stripping off bearskin.

  “No…wait… Not here.” His boots flew to one corner of the room, his tunic to the other. “No…wait a minute…”

  God, his chest was gorgeous. Broad, muscular, all that great chest hair tipped golden from the sun.

  His hands were on his pants. “No…not here,” she said, but she didn’t sound convincing, even to herself. And when his pants fell to the floor and he stood before her gorgeously, gloriously naked, every coherent thought flew from her head.

  “Oh my…”

  Hannah did what any sane woman would do: she feasted her eyes. There was no telling what else she might have done if he hadn’t walked out the door. Stark naked.

  “Thank God, I don’t have neighbors,” she muttered to herself as she followed him. What else was there to do? She hadn’t brought him all the way from Alaska to lose him on the first day home.

  He was up ahead, setting a fast pace. “Wait,” she yelled. He didn’t slow down. “If you think you can get away from me, you’d better think again.”

  She’d grown up racing her brother along the bluffs of the Mississippi. She wasn’t about to let a wolfman from Alaska beat her.

  She started running, gritting her teeth against the pain that shot through her ankle. It took her ten minutes to catch up to him.

  “See, I warned you. You can’t get away from me.”

  He didn’t slow down, but he did turn and smile at her. Hannah felt as if she’d won a journalism award.

  “I would have caught you sooner if it hadn’t been for this bum ankle.”

  He was headed to the river. It was just ahead, its waters still tinted pink and gold from the sun. What was he planning to do? Jump in and try to swim home?

  She wasn’t long finding out. One minute he was on the bluff, and the next he was flying through the air. Hannah raced to the edge in time to see him slice through the water. In a natural, unstudied way he had executed a dive that would be the envy of Olympic contenders.

  She couldn’t dive in after him. The bluff was too high. She’d break her neck…or worse…crash two feet short of the water and break every bone in her body.

  She could make her way down the bluff, but it was deeply wooded, and she’d lose sight of him before she reached the bottom. Besides, there was her ankle. There was nothing to do but wait and see what was going to happen.

  The water closed around him, and for a moment he was back in the icy waters of his home with nothing more to think about than where his next meal would come from. He dived deep, and when he came up he saw the female on the bluff.

  Hannah, she called hersel
f. Hannah. Her name.

  Hunter. His name.

  Confusion crashed around him once more, and no matter how far out he swam, it followed. There was so much to learn, so much to understand.

  In addition, there were the urgent stirrings of his loins. Every time he looked at Hannah.

  He longed for his wilderness. Life was elemental there. He ate, he slept. And soon he would mate.

  It was time.

  He glanced upward, and the pull of her was stronger than the moon. Hunter stepped from the water and began to climb.

  Oh, God, what am I going to do with this gorgeous naked man? This gorgeous naked, wet man?

  “I’ll bet you’re hungry,” she said. His face said, Yes, and his eyes swept over her as if he meant to have her for the meal.

  Hannah tried to keep her eyes focused on his face. “There’s food in the house. Follow me.”

  Call her coward, but she turned from him and practically ran toward her cottage. Thankfully, she saw that he followed.

  The first thing she was going to do when she got back was see if she couldn’t get him to put on some clothes.

  Chapter Fourteen

  November 6, 2001

  I’ve become a bona fide liar.

  Oh, I didn’t mean to. It just happened. First there was that incident with Larry Baird, which I kept from Michael, and now there’s Hannah. She called a little while ago, and wouldn’t you know, Clarice was here in the house. Belle Rose. I couldn’t bear to stay at the nursing home tonight. I don’t know why.

  Well, yes, I do. I can’t bear to lie beside Michael and not have him touch me. I can’t stand to lie there hoping and hoping while nothing ever happens.

  Anyhow, Clarice breezed in and plopped a chicken casserole on the kitchen table.

  “I’ve brought our supper,” she said, “and afterward we’ll watch X-rated movies.”

  “I don’t have any X-rated movies,” I said, and she pulled two out of a sack and said, “Now you do.”

  She’s such a good friend, such good company. Lord, I remember how we laughed the last time she decided it would do us both good to watch an X-rated movie. “See something we can drool over,” was the way she put it. It was right after Michael got over that bout of pneumonia, I think.

  Anyhow, I set the table with those china plates I love, the ones Michael brought from Japan, and we were both eating our second helping when Hannah called.

  “Mother,” she said, and I knew right away something was wrong because my children never call me Mother unless they’re upset.

  “What’s wrong, Hannah?”

  “I had dinner with a naked man…fish that he ate raw, mind you…and then I tried for an hour to convince him to put on his clothes… I guess I’ll have to do it for him…and now he’s holed up in his bedroom with the door shut and I’m scared to go in there and scared not to because I just don’t know what he’s going to do next. God, what am I going to do?”

  Clarice was all ears, and besides, how could I advise my daughter when I don’t have the faintest idea how to deal with any situation these days, let alone one as bizarre as she described?

  “Well, Hannah, I guess you’ll just have to make the best of things.”

  “That’s it! That’s all you can say?”

  “Yes. Clarice and I are going to watch a movie.”

  “I see. You can’t talk because Clarice is there.”

  “That’s right.”

  I felt like such a fraud, blaming Clarice. But that was easier than telling the truth: I’m falling apart piece by piece and nobody notices. Not even Clarice. Not really.

  If she did she’d be hauling shrinks through the door…in addition to X-rated movies.

  That’s one of the reasons I love Clarice. She believes in the curative powers of laughter.

  “I’ll call you tomorrow,” I told my daughter, and after Hannah hung up, Clarice and I spent the next three hours watching things that made us laugh so hard we cried.

  I needed that.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Hannah lay in bed with her eyes wide open. How could she sleep when she didn’t know what Hunter would do next? She was so frustrated she wanted to hit something, so she punched her pillow. Hard. Then she struck it again.

  What if Hunter decided to leave and find his way back to the wilderness? There was no way she could stop him.

  So far she hadn’t done a very good job of leading him gently into society. Maybe he would have been better off if she’d simply told her big fat lie to Jack, then left Hunter in the wilderness. Certainly she would have been better off.

  “Hind sight is twenty-twenty,” she muttered as she pummeled her pillow once more.

  A sound caught her attention. The guest bedroom door opening.

  “Thank goodness for squeaky hinges,” she thought as she started to leap out of bed, then thought better of it. Perhaps he was just going to the bathroom. If she followed wouldn’t she look foolish?

  Not that she cared. In general Hannah didn’t give a rat’s behind what people thought of her as long as she thought well of herself.

  Her father had taught her about self-esteem. And her mother.

  Lord, that was another thing. If she’d left Hunter in the wilderness where she’d found him, if she’d never made that phone call to Jack in the first place, she would be at Belle Rose now helping her mom and seeing about her dad.

  She didn’t hear footfalls, but then what had she expected? Here was a man who had spent twenty years sneaking up on caribou. He would know how to walk without sounding like a St. Patrick’s Day parade.

  Why didn’t she hear his bedroom door again? How long did it take a man in the bathroom at night? She wouldn’t know, never having observed her father and her brother that closely. And she’d had neither the time nor the inclination to find out otherwise.

  Men were just plain too much trouble. Besides, they cramped her lifestyle and weighed her down with expectations which she would never in a million years meet. Nor would she want to. She’d learned that the hard way her senior year in college when she and George Crayton III, had shared a few meals and a less-than-satisfying romp or two.

  What was taking Hunter so long?

  She listened for a while, then flung back the covers and raced toward the front door, groaning “What was I thinking?”

  Hunter Wolfe didn’t know about toilets, and how in the world was she ever going to show him short of demonstrating? Just another small detail she hadn’t thought of before she’d snatched him out of the wilderness.

  He was obviously outside somewhere, and she was going to find him…no matter what he was up to.

  She banged through her front door and raced around her cottage, but he was nowhere to be found.

  “Hunter, Hunter Wolfe! Where are you?”

  Her only answer was the call of an owl deep in the woods. What had she expected?

  “Think, think…”

  If she had been plucked from the wilderness and set down in unfamiliar territory, where would she go?

  To the river. She was off and running, never mind that her left ankle felt as if hot pins were being jabbed into it. Tomorrow she had to do something about that. There was an Ace bandage somewhere in her cottage, left over from a sprained ankle she’d got when she was covering a story in the Andes two years ago.

  In the distance she saw the river, pale and shining in the moonlight. Hannah rounded a copse of oak trees, and there he was, Hunter Wolfe with his face turned toward the water.

  He whirled around when he heard her, and all of a sudden she was vividly aware of her own body—tingling and hot—much, much too hot. In spite of the chill in the night air and the fact that she was wearing only an oversized white sleep shirt with a slogan that read, Give In To Your Animal Instincts… Save the Mountain Gorilla, in big red letters right across her breasts. Her traitorous breasts that were suddenly tight and turgid and not at all shy about advertising her condition.

  Just as he was advertising his…
>
  She couldn’t move, couldn’t think.

  “Hunter,” she whispered, and he took a step toward her. “Let’s go back…” His eyes burned through her and words became redundant.

  He took another step, then another, and Hannah drew a deep breath.

  They were inevitable.

  He touched her hair, her cheek, her lips, and the gentleness was so unexpected she felt the sting of tears. They ran down her face and into the corners of her mouth. She was drowning in tears…and in the molten silver of his eyes.

  He bent down and nuzzled the side of her neck. Shivers shook her from head to toe. Her bones melted, and suddenly her knees wouldn’t hold her.

  He caught her as she started down, his movements swift and sure as he arranged her…hands and knees on the forest floor, fragrant with the scent of pine.

  She whispered his name as he slid her nightshirt out of the way, then yes, yes, yes as he thrust deep inside. Her cries blended with his, echoing through the night woods in a sound both primitive and strangely sensual.

  The moon hung low over the river, the waters whispered her name and the trees bent down to listen. Hannah was one with them, one with every good and perfect creation of nature.

  She was no longer a woman on her knees in the forest with the wolfman driving into her with a force that would have knocked her to the ground if he hadn’t braced her. She was moon and comet and stars. She was earth and sky and water. She was wisdom and knowledge and sensation. So much sensation she couldn’t contain it.

  Her pleasure cries rang through the forest. He was insatiable, primitive and wild…and so erotic she convulsed time after time. Every inch of her body was sensitized. Even her scalp. She was aware of the roots of her hair and each individual pore in her skin, of the coursing of her blood and the racing of her heart.

  Each breath she took intensified the thrill, and from a distance she heard herself saying, Please, please, please, then Oh, Yes! as his warmth flooded her. Her own explosions shook her so hard she would have fallen if he hadn’t held on, held on tight.