Don't Let Go

by Marliss Melton

  “Why don’t you just admit you’re tempted,” he taunted, his own temper igniting.

  “Tempted?” she sneered, her fist clenching as she no doubt suffered the urge to punch him. “I don’t even like you!” she bit out.

  Oddly, her retort hurt his feelings. He kept quiet as she yanked open her car door, tossed the basket inside, and slipped in. She started up the engine, glaring up at him. “You took my son away from me,” she added with a quaver in her voice and a sheen of tears in her indigo eyes. “I don’t know if I can forgive you for that.”

  Her honesty left him speechless. He watched her back up, executing a quick, tight turn.

  As she pulled away, he read her personalized license plate: 4 miguel. A knot of uncertainty twisted slowly in Solomon’s gut. He had to concede that Jordan was far more complicated than any woman he’d ever pursued before. Her burning love for an orphaned street child captivated him. Lust ached dully in his groin. Maybe he should give up this compulsion to have her. Forget he’d ever laid eyes on her or tossed her into a helicopter screaming invectives at him.

  Heaving a dissatisfied sigh, he turned to plod down the hill toward Silas, who waved at him from high up in the live oak tree, crying, “Look at me!”

  Miguel heard a noise on the street that he had never heard before, a rumbling that shook the earth beneath his hands and knees. Wide-eyed, he glanced up from the circle that was drawn into the dirt, holding back the marble he was supposed to toss. The high cement walls that enclosed the churchyard prevented him from seeing anything. He glanced at Raúl with a question in his eyes. ¿Qué es?

  Raúl shook his head and dropped his own marble. “No sé,” he said, leaping to his feet with excitement. “¡Ven!”

  Come, thought Miguel. That was the word Jordan would have used.

  He trailed the older boy to the wall, and the rumbling grew louder. He could feel it through the thin soles of his shoes. It reminded him of the big bird that had taken his Jordan away, el hélicopter.

  “Sube el árbol,” Raúl commanded.

  Climb the tree.

  Miguel was the best at climbing, but he was afraid. He shook his head.

  Raúl nudged him forward, commanding him impatiently.

  Fear made Miguel weak. Still, he could grip the banana tree with his knees and haul himself, bit by bit, up its slippery trunk. The rumbling grew louder. He was afraid to peer over the top of the wall, daunted by the broken shards of glass cemented there to keep bad men out.

  But what if the noise was Jordan’s bird bringing her back?

  Craning his neck, Miguel peered over the glittering glass shards. His eyes flew wide. Through the dust rising into the air he watched enormous green vehicles roll past him, crossing in front of the cathedral where they stayed with Padre.

  He froze as he watched them, mesmerized by their ominous thunder. He didn’t know what it meant that they were here. He only had a feeling that they would keep his Jordan away.

  “¡Niños!” Padre’s worried voice called to them across the yard. “Come inside now. Hurry!” the priest called.

  Miguel obediently loosed his grip, slid down the trunk, and crashed into the hard earth to land on his bottom. He couldn’t move. He didn’t want to.

  The priest hurried over, clucking under his breath, and lifted him into his arms.

  Burrowing into the comfort of Padre’s arms, Miguel hid his face against the man’s crisp white collar. With a wave of longing, he remembered Jordan’s sweet, nurturing scent.

  His heart ached anew, and tears flooded his eyes. What if she never came back?

  Rafe awoke, as was his custom, when the first ray of sunlight struck the wall beside his bed. He kept his curtains open to invite it in, which it did quite early, given that he lived in a penthouse apartment overlooking the Elizabeth River. The sunrise was a reminder to him that life went on whether he wanted it to or not.

  Opening his eyes to the red-washed wall, the first thought to hit him was: Today Jillian’s horses arrive.

  She had her son Graham and his friend, Cameron, to help off-load them from the trailer, to lead them to their new stalls, to brush and soothe their distress at finding themselves in an unfamiliar environment.

  But what happened if an animal balked? Rafe drew a troubled breath at an image of Jillian wrestling down a beast that threatened to rear. She could seriously injure herself, not to mention the baby she carried.

  The thought propelled him out of bed to the bathroom, where he stood under a scalding shower, unable to stop thinking about her.

  She weighed on his conscience as he shaved his cheeks smooth. He considered what needed to be done at the office, whether it was absolutely critical.

  Wearing a towel on his hips, he stepped into his walk-in closet and eyed the suits hanging very precisely on the rod, several still in dry-cleaning bags. He reached for the light gray Christian Dior he wore on Fridays, touched the silk and linen blend of the sleeve and let go. He couldn’t go to work today.

  Jillian needed him. That didn’t mean he had to overhaul his life, but he did have to come up with a pair of jeans and work shoes.

  Turning to the storage drawers at the back of his closet, he rummaged, dragging out a pair of soft jeans from Abercrombie & Fitch that he’d worn only once. On his shoe rack, he found a pair of penny loafers he’d kept, thinking he could use them as house slippers, they were so soft and broken-in.

  Not owning a single T-shirt aside from those he wore beneath his dress shirts, he opted for the royal blue button-up Polo that his sister had given him two Christmases ago.

  Eyeing himself in his full-length mirror, he scarcely recognized himself. His reflection made him look vulnerable, painfully human.

  Today is not about me, he told himself, running his hands over the soft material of his shirt and jeans. It’s about a friend. He turned quickly toward his efficiency kitchen so as not to see how eager he looked to be spending the day in her company.

  The morning sunrise burnished the marsh grass surrounding Solomon’s houseboat. Birds twittered in the trees. A pungent odor hanging in the cool air made Jordan think of how the jungle smelled at dawn when she awakened and peered lovingly down at Miguel, asleep on his pallet beside her.

  But then she spied Solomon, lounging on his deck, and memories of Miguel took a backseat to present circumstances. As he eyed her approach over the rim of a coffee mug, every muscle in her body tensed with awareness, resentment, and self-blame.

  If it weren’t for the money he was going to pay her, she wouldn’t have returned at all today. Yet seeing him now, his powerful shoulders gilded by sunlight, that small confident smile on his face, a secret part of her thrilled to see him again while her pride insisted Silas was the only reason she returned.

  As she put her first foot on the pier, Solomon glanced at his watch. She dared him to say that she was late. It was only a quarter till eight.

  “Eager to earn your money, are you?” he called, instead.

  She drew up short, gritting her teeth against his jibe. “I have plans this afternoon. I need to get an early start.”

  His gaze narrowed at the word plans. “Silas is still sleeping,” he pointed out.

  “Then I’ll wake him up,” she said, heading for the gangplank.

  “Grab some coffee and join me first,” he countered. “We need to talk.”

  She stopped again, thoroughly annoyed by his heavy-handedness. “I’ve told you this before, Mako. I am not one of your soldiers. Try again.”

  A full thirty seconds elapsed before he said, tersely, “Would you like a cup of coffee first?”

  “Yes, I would,” she said, baring her teeth in a smile. “Thank you.” Continuing across the gangplank, she let herself in.

  Minutes later, she eased stiffly down on a chair across from his, took a quick sip of the mug she’d brought up, and shuddered. “How can you drink this?” she asked, steeling herself against his frank inspection and the warmth of his eyes as they rested on her bare legs.
“Your coffee could be used as paint stripper.”

  “I like my drinks to have a kick,” he replied.

  “Me, too, but I’d prefer my kick with cream and sugar.” She put her mug aside. “What did you want to talk about?”

  “I wanted to explain that I’m going to leave you and Silas alone this morning.”

  “Oh,” she said, surprised and privately disappointed that he was obeying her ultimatum. “Thank you.”

  “I also bought a cell phone like you said I should. Take this number down,” he suggested, rattling it off.

  Jordan jotted the number down in the notebook taken from her tote bag. “You’ll be glad you got a phone,” she predicted.

  “I doubt it. So, tell me, what methods are you planning to use today?” he asked, and she just knew he was remembering the whipped cream and how it tasted on her lips.

  Squashing the memory of his kiss, Jordan traded the notebook for a workbook. “Well, if Silas can stand to sit still for three hours, we’ll continue on through phonics,” she explained, handing it to Solomon for his approval. “He’s a dominantly visual learner, so he may do better with whole language, in which case, I’ve brought some reading material suitable for his age.” She kept that in the bag, knowing instinctively that he shouldn’t see it.

  “I’ll see you at noon, then,” he replied, handing the workbook back. “Would you like me to bring you lunch?”

  She shrugged. “Sure. Thank you. That would be nice.” It would save her from having to grab fast food on the way to her sister’s.

  “What do you like to eat, Jordan?” he inquired. His silvery eyes seemed to darken as he focused intently on her mouth.

  A blush heated Jordan’s face at the shockingly lascivious image that flashed through her head. “It doesn’t matter,” she gritted, clinging to her forced politeness. “Whatever’s easiest.”

  “And how would you like to be paid, Jordan?”

  He had to know that it rattled her to hear her name rolled on his tongue like that.

  “Day by day or week by week?” he added, helpfully.

  “Every other day would be best,” she answered tightly. She refused to squirm like a worm on the end of his hook. He was just a man, she told herself, a man with a secret talent for sentimental verse who, for whatever reason, made her think about sex for the first time in years, even though she hated him.

  Okay, she didn’t hate him, she just found him irksome.

  “Well, then,” he murmured, drawing her gaze to his taut abdomen as he stood up and stretched. “I’ll go wake up Silas.” And then he was gone, bearing his coffee mug with him.

  Jordan exhaled a shaky breath. Perhaps she could handle a relationship based on physical attraction. She was human, after all, with normal human impulses. At least, he posed no threat whatsoever to her heart. He couldn’t devastate her as Doug had.

  With that comforting thought, she grabbed her bag and followed him inside.

  As promised, Solomon returned at noon. Jordan and Silas sat in the breakfast nook, engrossed in the comic strip of Dragon Ball Z, when the front door of the houseboat opened and closed on the barest whisper of sound.

  She didn’t have time to shove the comic book out of sight before Solomon strode into the kitchen. He tossed a folded newspaper on top of the comic book, and demanded, “Read it.”

  His sudden presence was as unsettling as the agitation crackling in him. “Read what?” she asked, braced for bad news.

  “This.” He stabbed a finger at the article filling up the bottom of the page. Coup in Venezuela Leads to Revolution. He tossed a bag of Subway sandwiches onto the counter and turned to rummage in the fridge.

  With Silas trying to sneak the comic book out from under the newspaper, Jordan skimmed the article, her heart frozen in fear. She’d watched the reports of fighting in southern Venezuela every night this past week. It seemed the Populists had won in the southern states, pushing the Moderate Army out of both Las Amazonas and Apure.

  Her scalp prickled with apprehension. What did that mean for her? Would she have access to Puerto Ayacucho at all, or would the entire state of Las Amazonas be closed to foreigners?

  “If this doesn’t persuade you to stay in the States, then I don’t know what will,” Solomon growled, popping the top off a beer bottle.

  Jordan’s pulse tapped against her right temple, but she kept her own counsel.

  Solomon tossed back a swig and pinned her with a narrow-eyed glare. “Surely you’re not naive enough to think that you can just waltz back into the country, and no one will take notice.”

  Jordan squeezed Silas’s wrist in a silent message to keep the comic book hidden. “If you’re trying to scare me, Mako, it isn’t going to work,” she retorted.

  He put his beer bottle down abruptly, splayed his hands upon the table, and leaned closer, his eyes like hot steel. “What would it take to scare you, I wonder?” he mused quietly, his gaze sliding downward.

  Jordan looked at him sharply. “Are you threatening me?” she demanded, with growing outrage.

  “I can read,” Silas piped up, shattering the tense moment and wresting Solomon’s gaze from hers.

  “Can he?” he demanded. He looked back at Jordan for corroboration.

  “He’s making progress,” Jordan hedged, halting Silas as he tried again to free the comic book.

  “What are you reading?” his father predictably demanded.

  “We’ll demonstrate when he’s proficient.”

  “Dragon Ball Z!” Silas shouted with enthusiasm.

  Solomon frowned. “What is that?” he asked Jordan.

  “It’s a children’s book.”

  “Cartoons!” explained Silas, with a gappy grin. “Just like on TV.”

  With a perceptive glance at their joined hands, Solomon snatched the newspaper off the table. There in all of its colorful glory was the comic book, depicting a battle between Gohan and Friesa. Solomon’s eyes widened in horrific disbelief. “This is how you’re teaching him to read?” he demanded in a soft but intimidating rumble.

  “Well, how else do you expect a six-year-old to keep still for hours at a stretch?” Jordan retorted. “You do what he loves, and it just so happens that Silas loved watching Dragon Ball Z with Christopher and Caleb. Look, he read these three words by himself.” She pointed to the onomatopoeic words. Bam, Kaboom, and Zap. “And he also found and circled these eight sight words—see?—so he can read them with me.”

  Solomon scowled down at the page, saying nothing.

  “He’s six years old,” Jordan continued, appealing to his reason. “Even with periodic breaks, you can’t expect him to work at one hundred percent for three hours straight!”

  Solomon crossed his arms, still frowning as if called upon to make a life-and-death decision. Jordan was just warming up to her role as Silas’s defender. “And while we’re on the subject,” she added, “who’s going to watch Silas when I go back to Venezuela? You need to enroll him in a child-care program. You can’t keep him cooped up on this boat forever.” What she really meant was I’m not going to be here forever.

  A secret gleam entered Solomon’s eyes. “Who says he’s cooped up?” he demanded softly. “That’s the beauty of living on a houseboat. You’re never tied down. Eat your sandwiches,” he added tersely, turning away. “There’s milk in the refrigerator.”

  With that, he let himself out.

  “He’s mad,” said Silas, looking worried.

  Yes, he is, Jordan thought—mad in the British sense of the word: crazy. “He’ll get over it,” she comforted. “Just think how proud he’ll be when you can read this book out loud to him. Let’s eat, and then we can finish this story.”

  They were halfway through their meal when the boat gave a throaty rumble, and the seat beneath her vibrated. “What’s that?” Jordan jerked her head up to peer out the window. She caught sight of Solomon hauling in the gangplank. Oh, no, she thought. Oh, no, no, no!

  Chapter Eight

  In alarm,
Jordan dropped her sandwich and scooted out of the booth to race to the door. She snatched it open. With a loud revving noise, the houseboat started backing out of its berth. “Stop!” she called in panic, her voice bouncing off the water.

  Solomon didn’t answer. Where was he? She had to reason with him. He didn’t know what this would do to her.

  The boat started turning. He had to be steering from somewhere, but where?

  There were metal steps that appeared to lead up to a canopied pilot room. She edged toward them, catching sight of him, at last. “What are you doing?” she yelled up, clutching the siding on the houseboat, terrified to approach the rail.

  “Showing you that Silas is definitely not cooped up, as you suggested.”

  The boat was gliding over dancing little waves, like a skater over ice. Her stomach cramped in protest. “You can’t do this! We’re not wearing life vests!”

  In the next instant, two orange vests came sailing down on her head. One for her; the little one for Silas. “I get seasick!” she tried again.

  “Just don’t puke on deck,” he shouted back, pulling on the throttle to move them forward.

  “Oh, God!” Jordan cried, breaking out into a cold sweat. She eyed the brackish water in panic, unable even to bend over and pick up the life vests.

  Silas stepped through the door. “Wow!” he cried in delight. “We’re going out on the water!”

  “S-Silas, put on a life vest,” Jordan stammered, overcoming her terror long enough to snatch up the smaller life vest and thread his arms through the holes.

  “Why? I can swim.”

  “It’s the law,” she insisted, at the same time wanting to slap that little smirk she just knew was on Solomon’s face. No doubt he was having a grand time proving his point. She snapped her own life vest closed with fingers that shook. “Let’s go back inside.”

  “No,” cried Silas, darting under her arm to run to the back of the boat. He ran right up to the rail and looked over.