The door swung open. It was him. 'I saw your expression as you came in here. I couldn't go to sleep with this between us.' He came swiftly into the room and closed the door behind him. 'Am I to call you Miss Baker for the next five weeks?'
Chrissy sat upright. Naked except for a cotton sheet, she clutched wildly for it. For once he didn't appear to notice.
'Well?' he asked. 'Tell me.' He came to the edge of the bed. They were looking at each other through a haze of white net. 'You look like a bride,' he murmured. 'Chrissy? Christine? Which must it be?'
'Friends call me Chrissy...' she blurted, knowing there were tears on her cheeks but unable to wipe them off without releasing her hold on the sheet bunched beneath her chin.
He thrust the netting aside. 'Can you bring yourself to call me something other than El Senhor?' He stood tall and dark and powerful beside the bed as if ready to possess her.
When her eyes widened he murmured, 'Well? What about Rodrigo—Rod --' he shrugged his heavy shoulders '—whichever you prefer.'
He sat on the edge of the bed, the white netting trailing over him, and reached for her with one hand while wiping her cheeks with the fingers of the other one. 'Angel, we can't say goodnight like that. Not with something like that between us. Never like that.'
As his arms circled her, holding her carefully against his broad chest, her senses became alert. Everything became a hundred times more vivid—from the distant cries out in the forest to the pungent vanilla scent of his skin, the hard shape of his muscles against her burning skin, and the tiny lines in the corners of his eyes. Her hands automatically met behind his back.
She had never felt so close to anyone. She could see the black, glossy raven-wing of his hair against her cheek and measure the wild pulsing in his neck at the side of her mouth.
It was all new, holding a man like this, being held by a man, by this man, this special man, who held her with such tenderness. It was like entering a world that had been lying in wait just over the threshold from ordinary life—she felt more alive than at any other time in her entire life. It was so magically new. He was her newfound land.
CHAPTER FIVE
'Eyes of emerald, hair of gold, skin of pearl...' Rodrigo ran a finger experimentally over Chrissy's shoulder, making her shiver with anticipation until the clamouring of common sense began to scream a long drawn-out 'no' in her head.
He was trembling with suppressed emotion and she could feel the tension building inside him. But she was helpless to do anything about it. Soon it would break down his defences and her own Would crumble at the same instant. He had come to her when she was at her weakest, feeling lost and vulnerable. Now all she could do was gaze trustingly into his silver-cobalt eyes, waiting for him to take her fate in his hands.
But he was waging a battle against fate too. He didn't kiss her. She heard him give a sharp groan as he pressed his mouth feverishly against her hair, then, with a reluctant thrusting of his hands, he released her.
He got up, the mosquito netting swishing back into place until all she could see was his dark shape looming in the shadows on the other side. His expression was difficult to discern.
'I didn't mean to hurt you this evening,' he told her in a voice that was strangely level. 'There are too many barriers between us so we should not be surprised there are misunderstandings.' He seemed to incline his head. 'We are friends again?'
He took her silence for assent. She sat upright with the sheet wrapped round her waist where it had fallen in the suddenness of his embrace. Then he went out.
Friends? She was aghast. How could he use such a word with this wildness between them? Then she remembered the ring with the crest on it. Did it really mean he was married? She didn't know. There had been no mention of a wife and he didn't have the air of being tied to anyone.
She lay back on the pillow. Whether he was married or not, she had to stop feeling like this—it was too dangerous. He was too dangerous. He was too handsome, too powerful, too—too sexually lethal. He was more of everything that spelt bewitchment than any man she had ever imagined.
Then she wondered why he had bothered to come to her room. He seemed to have the idea of putting things right between them. But now she felt worse than ever. What was she to make of him? How should she be when he blew both hot and cold? At the beginning she thought he disliked her as much as she first thought she disliked him—yet her own feelings had changed, and his passionate embrace just now seemed to show they were both being driven by the same lethal attraction.
Next morning she missed seeing him at breakfast, though she knew he was still around. Instead of lingering at the house she spent the morning with Tomas gathering specimens from the canopy—she standing patiently at the bottom of the ascent tree while he carefully brought a profusion of blooms to her. The huge waxy flowers were mainly unidentifiable, only a few of them already recorded in Gavin's notes. She was pleased with their haul and decided to get to work on them straight away in the relative coolness of the lab. They were easily sorted into two groups—the scarlet nectar-filled ones attracting insects and small mammals and the others, pale in colour, that attracted fruit bats by their rank odour.
Curling her nose, she made two trips to the lab, carrying the pale bunch of orchid-type varieties at arm's length and wondering if she would be able to put up with the foetid odour for long. Inside, she opened a window at the far end of the lab, placing them in jars of water and deciding to deal with them first. She ranged the poinsettia-types near her work-bench where she could breathe in their sweet perfume as she prepared drawings.
Tomas went back to the kitchen. He was a nephew of Senhora Suarez, she had gathered, but how he had turned up at so opportune a moment to have this job alotted to him she hadn't been able to find out.
She worked steadily for the rest of the morning. Every time a stray thought about Rodrigo—Rod—careered into her mind, she methodically repressed it. It was no good allowing herself to start out on the path if she wasn't going to complete the journey—what she eventually wanted was marriage and children and true love. Giving in to her turbulent feelings for Rod would leave her broken. He was out of bounds. It was best to stop now before it was too late. Fortunately he seemed to feel the same way. His abrupt exit last night after he had proffered that near-apology showed that he wanted to keep her at arm's length too; because of the dislike he claimed to feel and also because he was perhaps more faithful than she had imagined to the woman for whom he wore the gold wedding band.
It was as if she had been offered the keys of paradise only to have them snatched away again.
Lunch was a solitary affair on the veranda at the back. Senhora Suarez and Chrissy chatted for a few moments, and with the extra help of hand gestures Chrissy managed to glean the fact that Eloise and Pierre were staying at the small town down-river where the paddle-boats docked, but she couldn't understand what had given rise to this change of plan. Hans and Lars were both off again on their separate trails. And as for anyone else— she was training herself to avoid his name—there was the usual mysterious absence.
As she got up to go Senhora Suarez returned. 'El Senhor has a message for you.' Seeing the housekeeper gesture towards the far end of the corridor, Chrissy guessed she was supposed to go to his lair. So he had been there all through lunch. Fair enough. So they were avoiding each other! But she still approached his room with caution.
He was sitting at the desk with his feet stretched out on a corner, immersed in a conversation in Portuguese on his mobile phone.
He indicated a chair when she came in and she waited reluctantly for him to finish so they could get it over. Message? she wondered. She hoped things were all right at home.
'Your two colleagues have decided not to return. Some mild complication.' He turned to look at her. 'Madame Martin asks would you pack their few belongings from their quarters? I will have someone send them on.' He turned back to the phone and began to dial again.
'Is that all?' At least it wasn't
bad news from home. But she was slightly taken aback by his abrupt manner.
His head turned sharply to look at her. 'All? Yes. Can you manage it?'
'I expect so.' She rose, and even as she went out he was talking rapidly to someone on the other end of the line.
Thinking there was no time like the present, she went outside and crossed the blazing yellow stretch of earth between the main house and the palm huts. She would gather the Martins' things together right away. Today the bamboo hut seemed alive with the whirr of insects and the continual rustling of the wind in the palm-leaf thatch. As before it glowed inside with the soft orange of filtered sunlight.
There was precious little to get together. Eloise seemed to have taken the make-up with her. One or two shirts and blouses drooped on hangers on the central pole and there was a battered-looking pair of boots hanging by their laces from a spar. She was just about to take them down when the door rustled open and Rodrigo entered.
'Be careful,' he warned. 'The jungle reclaims everything as soon as it can. Already you may find unexpected creatures inhabiting the corners.' He came over and up-ended one of the boots. A lizard dropped out and ran across the earth floor. 'See? Luckily not a poisonous kind.' He looked down at her. 'I should have warned you but I was preoccupied when you came in. My managers are having problems with one of the fruit crops. I'm going back up-country at once. Will you promise to be careful?'
Chrissy bit her lip and nodded. 'There isn't much to do anyway.' The air seemed buzzingly alive, vibrating with a wealth of life in which they seemed a tiny part. She found it impossible to tear her glance from his. Strips of yellow sunlight painted his face but his eyes were as clear and endless as the sky itself.
He raised one hand and brushed her hair with his fingertips. There was a moment when they hovered on the brink of something else but he said quickly, 'I don't usually spend so much time here. When I leave I shall stay up at the hacienda. By the time I return you'll be in Europe.'
She nodded. There was an air of completion about the way he spoke. He was telling her that, whatever world they had hovered near, the gates were now closed. That was how it had to be. She was relieved they were in agreement on one thing at least and that there were going to be no problems—other than the one of schooling her heart to forget that overwhelming sense of home-coming when he held her in his arms last night.
When he went out she stood for several moments, just staring at the space he had occupied, and wondering if it was love, this painful, breath-tightening hunger—or whether it owed more to anger. She couldn't forget the things he had said and done that had rankled. Only later—back to that kiss, back to the embrace—had he begun to appear in a different light.
Angry with herself for mooning over him like this, she quickly gathered all the contents of the hut together, even to the extent of stripping the sheets off the bed, and carried the whole lot back to the house. He must have left already, she thought when she saw the door at the far end wide open and Senhora Suarez busy with a sweeping brush within. She piled everything neatly in the kitchen and went to let her know what she had done.
Once outside again she walked blindly back towards the forest. There was no point in going into the lab. It was too hot to work and even though it was humid under the trees there was enough happening to keep her mind occupied inside safe boundaries. She reached the ascent tree and gazed up the massive trunk towards the scaffolding of boughs from one of which the scarlet climbing-rope was dangling. Having watched Tomas ascend as well as having that first demonstration from Lars, she knew exactly how to go about the business of climbing up.
Feeling the sort of recklessness that came from the pangs of unrequited yearning, she decided she might as well have a go. Carefully grasping the two hand-hooks, she next placed one foot in the sling, then hung on as the rope jerked wildly when she lifted her other foot and put it in place. After a pause to allow the rope to settle she pushed the hand-grip upwards, remembering at the same time to shift her weight into one stirrup as Lars had instructed her.
Bit by bit she edged up the rope. Her shirt was dripping by the time she was half-way up. No hurry, she reminded herself, I can take my time. It was easy to rest in the stirrups until she felt ready to proceed. Then she was off again until finally, after only one more short rest, she reached the first stage.
Now sitting astride the branch as she had seen Tomas do, she made sure she was holding on tightly before she risked a glance upwards. The rope snaked up another twenty feet or so before vanishing into a mass of foliage. Up there it would be as different as could be imagined— moss and algae covering the branches in profusion. Wondering if there should be some sort of safety rope, she took a deep breath and forced herself to go on.
At last, feeling wet and hot, she reached the final stage. Now it was a question of clambering through the branches to the upper layer. With a shout of triumph she at last emerged out of the humid twilight into fresh air and sunshine.
A limitless meadow of leaves stretched all around her. The wind blew refreshingly through the crowns of the trees and here and there one or two isolated giants emerged from the dimpled canopy. As she looked around a swarm of fluff-fairies from the silk cotton trees billowed like thistledown and somewhere out of sight she could hear a troop of chattering monkeys.
There were parrots clambering about as clumsily as she was herself and countless other birds unrecognisable to her untrained eye. She could see humming-birds, though, and watched several of them hovering delicately above clumps of scarlet flowers. A monkey paused close by and drank nectar from a bell-shaped flower before swinging off after his friends.
There were one or two dangers to watch out for, she reminded herself. Tiny twig-thin snakes, the tiger cats they called margay and, worst of all the harpy, a crested eagle, a ferocious and speedy hunter. But she had seen no sign of the huge platform of twigs on which a single nestling would be raised and she reminded herself that the worrying dangers were the small things—wasps and poison tree frogs and probably a million other as yet uncollected and unnamed creatures that swung and flew and crawled in profusion within the canopy of leaves.
After collecting several interesting-looking flowers that Tomas had missed she eventually decided "to face the descent. This was decidedly easier than going up, even though she had to be careful not to crush her flower collection as she slid back into the damp twilit world beneath. She reached the ground in triumph. Tomorrow she would return. Tomas could come up if he wanted, but she could easily do without him now—especially as there was going to be nobody around to stop her!
There was still nobody at the house, apart from Senhora Suarez and her husband, when she returned, and again she ate alone. When she put her concern for the two men into words Senhora Suarez shrugged graphically. 'Men!' she dismissed them all. 'Who know, eh?'
This time Chrissy did retreat to her room to read and managed most of the novel before sleep claimed her.
She was awoken early next morning by the sound of a light knock on her door. Dragging a sheet around her, she emerged from beneath the mosquito netting and opened it warily this time. But it was Hans.
He was looking worried, his freckled face unusually grim. 'Have you seen Lars in the last twenty-four hours?' he demanded without preamble.
When she shook her head he slumped against the door. 'I'm worried,' he said, confirming her impression. 'He went out yesterday morning and since then—nichts.'
'Anything I can do?' she asked, her worry now mirroring his own.
He shook his head. 'I know most of his beat. I'll take another look round with Suarez right now.' He was about to turn away when he gave her one of his old smiles. 'Don't worry. There's nothing you can do. You may as well continue as usual. He sometimes stays out overnight in one of the hides but he usually tells someone first.' With a lift of his hand he departed.
Wondering whether she could have done anything, she got ready to go out herself. At least she could keep her eyes open as she follo
wed the map into the forest, though soon she took another direction and came out at the foot of the ascent tree again.
*
It was maybe ten o'clock and Chrissy had been happily occupied in the clear air of the topmost layer of the canopy when she heard a distant roar. At first she thought it was thunder. Storms were rare in this region— the climate varied little throughout the year and rainfall was steady and predictable. Were there storms? she wondered. But it was too regular for thunder, and besides, it seemed to be getting louder.
Then she realised it was an aircraft of some sort. She strained her neck to see which direction it was coming from. Sound seemed to ricochet around the leafy meadow in which she was sitting and it was impossible to pin-point the direction whence it came. Then suddenly there was a whooshing roar and a dark shape seemed to burst from beneath the trees, pitching and swooping like a giant eagle. She shuddered and clung more tightly to the branch she was sitting on.
It was a helicopter. All black, an alien thing in the bright green world of the rain forest, it disappeared in a glint of sun-struck metal as swiftly as a falcon stooping to its prey.
Chrissy felt disturbed after this as if the sunlit natural world had been invaded by something sinister. Unable to settle back to a serious exploration of the new species around her, she eventually made the descent clutching a few orchids and an unusual yellow trumpet-shaped flower. There was a shock waiting for her at the foot of the tree. No sooner had her feet touched ground than she heard a sound behind her and her arms were clamped painfully to her sides. Lashing out without thinking, she felt her heel connect with something hard.
The familiar scent of vanilla and the blur of a white shirt as she jerked her head back told her abruptly who held her prisoner.
'I told you not to go up there! Didn't I?' He shook her and repeated, 'Didn't I?'
They were back to the dog-fight manners of their first meetings, before the time when he had apparently decided to contest an award for chivalry.
Jungle Lover Page 7
