by Wolf (lit)
They probably thought of her as an old woman, she thought glumly, which she didn’t suppose she could quibble with when she thought of them as the next thing to kids.
She wasn’t really ‘in’ to self-denial, unfortunately. She was nearly thirty-five. She did her best to take care of her appearance, but she didn’t think she looked young enough to fool anybody into thinking she was a lot younger than she was and she knew damned well that she’d thought of anybody over thirty as old when she’d been in her twenties.
Paybacks were hell!
The more she thought about it, the more embarrassed she was by her behavior. She was lucky they hadn’t laughed at her when she’d offered to give them some for protecting her! Or told ‘old pussy’ jokes!
Oh the humiliation of it!
The only upside to her mental anguish and self-flagellation was that it kept her too preoccupied to notice her physical misery nearly as much. She was almost surprised when she discovered it was growing dark enough it was beginning to be hard to see.
“That stream I saw on the map shouldn’t be far now,” Mac said, breaking the silence that had held everyone since they’d last stopped for a brief rest.
Sylvie felt a spark of interest. “Do you think it’ll be safe to bathe in it?”
“I don’t know. Guess we’ll see … if we find it.”
“I smell it,” Beau, who was in the lead, said.
Sylvie blinked in surprise. Lifting her head, she sniffed until she was beginning to feel lightheaded, but she didn’t smell anything. She’d already decided he’d just said it jokingly when the men in front of her stopped. She halted, trying to peer around them. Mac, who’d taken the rear all day, moved around her. “I’ll check it out. Y’all find a place to bed down for a few hours.”
Hawk, Beau, and Cavanaugh obediently began to look around. Shrugging, Sylvie looked around, too, although she had no idea what they might be looking for. The forest looked the same to her in every direction. After a moment, they spread out and began walking off in three different directions. She stared at them in dismay, wondering if she should follow them—any of them—or stay where she was and hope they’d come back for her.
Finally, deciding she was just too damned tired to wander around looking for a place to settle, she examined the ground at her feet and, when she didn’t find any crawling things, sat down. When she looked around for the men again, she discovered they’d all vanished and uneasiness began to creep through her despite her weariness.
Breaking a leaf from a bush close by, she began to fan herself, trying to ignore the niggling doubts in the back of her mind, the fear that they had just brought her into the woods to abandon her.
She’d managed to scare herself badly enough that she was near tears when she heard a rustle in the brush close by. “Mac?” she called out in a quavering voice.
“It’s me, Hawk. I’ve found a good spot.”
Relief flooded her. She surged to her feet and looked around for him in the deepening gloom.
“I’m here.”
She nearly jumped out of her skin when he spoke almost directly behind her. It took all she could do to prevent herself from leaping at him. Something flickered in his eyes when he saw her face. He shook his head at her. “Come on, scaredy cat,” he murmured gruffly, dropping an arm around her shoulders.
The impulse to deny it trembled on her lips, but she tamped the urge. She didn’t think he’d believe her anyway if she tried to deny it.
She was embarrassed when he only led her twenty or thirty feet from where she’d been sitting. She couldn’t see what there was about the site that was any better than where she’d been, though.
“I think this is far enough off the trail we’ve been following to avoid any nasty encounters with animals heading to the river for water and it’s pretty high ground, so we shouldn’t wake up in a puddle if it rains.”
Sylvie surveyed it skeptically. She couldn’t tell that it was any higher at all, but the first part of his speech was enough to convince it was a better place. She didn’t want to have any nasty encounters with the local wildlife.
As she watched him, he pulled a long, wicked looking knife from a pocket on the leg of his pants and began hacking at the brush. “Go easy on that,” Mac said, appearing abruptly. “We don’t want to leave anything to make it easy for them to find us.”
Nodding, Hawk finished decimating the plant he’d attacked and mounded it in the center of the tiny clearing he’d made. When he’d finished, he lay down on it, folding his arms behind his head. “Not too bad,” he announced, sitting up after a moment, “better than bare ground anyway.”
Beau and Cavanaugh returned bearing unrecognizable dead things. “We found dinner.”
“Good! I’m starving!” Hawk said cheerfully.
Trying not to look revolted, Sylvie moved aside as they squatted down near the mound Hawk had made and set to work building a tiny fire and then made a spit out of limbs and placed the meat over it to roast.
“You want to bathe before or after you eat?” Mac asked.
Sylvie looked at him hopefully, glanced at the meat and then the darkening woods. “Before.” She didn’t want to be anywhere near the river after dark, but she was sticky from sea water and sweat from the humidity and itching from insect bites.
Leaving the others at the campsite, he led her down to the edge of a fairly large stream. The water didn’t look terribly inviting. “There isn’t anything in it that will try to eat me, is there?”
“No crocs … might be a snake or two.”
Sylvie sent him a horrified look and he laughed. “Baby, this is a jungle—not a park. Everything in it has teeth or fangs—or both.”
She studied the water unhappily for a moment but finally, resolutely, hooked her thumbs in the waist of her sweats. She was going to bathe off if she had to beat the animals off to do it, damn it!
“Don’t piss in the water,” Mac advised her.
Sylvie whipped her head around and gaped at him.
He shrugged. “Some of the watering holes have parasitic fish that will swim up a stream of piss and right into the urethra.”
“You aren’t serious?”
“I’m as serious as a heart attack.”
“Not that I was going to,” she muttered. Shaking her uneasiness, she pushed her sweats to her ankles and stepped out of them. When she turned around to find a place to hang them, she discovered that Mac had turned his back to her.
She stared at his back, wondering if he’d done it to give her privacy because he was a gentleman or if he just hadn’t wanted to see. Trying to convince herself it was the former, she caught the bottom of her t-shirt and peeled that off, as well. When she’d hung up her t-shirt, she inched down the bank until her toes were in the water and began scooping up handfuls of water and splashing it on herself. She would’ve liked to get in and actually soak. Without any soap, she wasn’t likely to get very clean just splashing in the water.
Then again, the water didn’t look all that terribly clean anyway and a little cleaner was better than nothing and she wasn’t about to swim with snakes.
An enormous splash right in front of her sent a tidal wave of water over her and she surged to her feet in sudden fright, staring at the water with bulging eyes. Mac surfaced, skimmed a hooded gaze down her length and then ducked beneath the water.
Irritation replaced her fright. The ass!
She studied him as he surfaced again and swam toward the far side, mildly disappointed to see he was still wearing his trousers, and finally squatted down again to resume her own bath—not that she needed nearly as much water when he’d succeeded in thoroughly drenching her!
“You aren’t worried about the snakes?”
He flicked a hard look at her. “Only one at the moment,” he muttered.
She sent him a blank look before it dawned on her what he was referring to. Her gaze moved to his crotch of its own accord. Warmth flickered through her when she saw his ‘pet snake’ was
indeed ready to strike.
Averting her gaze when it dawned on her that she was blatantly staring, she focused on her attempts to wash herself, wishing she had the nerve to submerge herself in the water as he had. As unappealing as it was, it was still wonderfully cool.
He waded out again before she’d managed to convince herself to take the plunge. “We should get back. The meat’ll be done enough to eat before long and I imagine the others would like to bathe.”
She hadn’t realized she was being thoughtless in taking her time! Nodding, she brushed as much water from her skin as she could and grabbed her shirt, pulling it over her head.
“You should’ve done your laundry while you were at it like I did,” Mac commented when she’d pulled her sweat pants back on.
She hadn’t thought about it, damn it! “Too late now.”
He caught her shoulders. “Nope.”
Her eyes widened at the gleam in his eyes. “Don’t!”
It was too late to object, however. She hadn’t even managed to get the warning out when he gave her a shove that sent her flying backwards into the river. She hit the water and sank. She nearly lost her pants racing out again when she’d managed to get her feet under her.
Furious when she saw the smirk on Mac’s face, she smacked him on the belly with the palm of her hand. The sound cracked like thunder through the jungle and Sylvie sucked in her breath in pure horror at what she’d allowed her temper to goad her in to. “I’m sorry!”
Mac studied the reddened handprint on his stomach and lifted his head, his expression unreadable.
She took an incautious step back, lost her balance on the sloping bank, pin wheeled her arms and fell backwards. Mac shot a hand out and grabbed her shirt, but it had been big on her to start with. It merely stretched. She fell in anyway. The tug was enough to pull Mac off balance, as well. He made an attempt to dive over her when he felt himself falling, but it was only partially successful. He still landed halfway on top of her, nearly drowning her before she could get to the surface again.
He pounded her back. She fought his hand off. “Don’t help!” she said crossly when she managed to catch her breath. “You nearly drowned me!”
“Sorry. Guess we’re even?”
She shoved her hair out of her eyes and stared at him. “I really didn’t mean to hit you.”
He nodded. “I didn’t mean to throw you in, either.”
She glared at him. “You were just helping me get my clothes washed, I suppose.”
His lips curled. “Exactly.”
She studied him for a long moment and finally shook her head. His smile was just too appealing to ignore. “Ok, I’ll forgive you for throwing me into the water with the snakes if you’ll forgive me for my temper.”
He chuckled. “Baby, I’ve had mosquitoes bite me harder than that.”
She rolled her eyes, but if he wanted to be macho about it, it was fine by her! She didn’t know what had come over her anyway! She didn’t hit people—ever. How stupid was it to lose her sense of self-preservation with a man like Mac? Deciding she was just relieved that he hadn’t decided to choke her for it, she was more than willing to let it go at that.
It took an effort to heave herself out of the water with her clothes so thoroughly soaked. She had to hold onto the waist of the damned pants to keep from losing them and she still managed to moon Mac as she climbed out. She was tempted to take them off and wring them out, but wasn’t sure she’d be able to get them on again so she just squeezed as much of the water from them as she could and slogged back to camp in them.
It was already dark by the time they reached the campsite. She didn’t think she could’ve found it at all if Mac hadn’t been leading the way, and the guys all turned and stared at her anyway.
Considering her clothes were plastered to her and left very little to the imagination, she wouldn’t have been surprised by their stares if she’d thought they had enough light to actually see her, but she didn’t think they possibly could. Deciding finally that they were just staring because they were wondering what had transpired at the river, she settled on the brush Hawk had mounded up for them to sit on and worked at getting more water out of the shirt.
After a few moments, Beau and Cavanaugh left and headed to the river—she supposed. They didn’t announce it. Hawk dug into one of his pockets and shoved something into her hand, which she discovered was a comb. Ordinarily, she wouldn’t have considered using anyone else’s comb, but these weren’t ordinary circumstances.
“Thanks,” she murmured, smiling at his shadowy face in the darkness.
“Don’t lay it down. We might never find it again,” he said, rising and following the others.
“Your clothes will probably dry faster if you move closer to the fire.”
“Maybe I should just get further and take them off and wring them out better?” Sylvie said a little doubtfully.
“Don’t worry about it on my account,” Mac said dryly. “Baby, I’ve done seen everything you’ve got … and I can see you just as well over there as I could if you were standing over the fire.”
Sylvie cleared her throat. “You’re not serious?”
“About which part?”
“I can barely see my hand in front of my face. Your night vision couldn’t be that good.”
He shrugged. “Wanna bet?”
“How many fingers am I holding up?” she asked, shooting him a bird.
He chuckled. “Three fingered salute.”
A jolt of surprise went through her. “Can they see as well as you can?”
“I’m guessing they can.”
Sylvie considered it. “Will it bother you if I take them off and wring them out?”
He was silent for a long moment. “Baby, I think everything about you bothers me,” he said finally, his voice husky.
It sent a shiver through her, and warmth, but she wasn’t sure how to take the comment. “I kept up today,” she said a little defensively.
“That isn’t what I meant, and you know it.” He was silent for a long moment. “Take them off and let me look at you.”
Chapter Six
Sylvie felt her throat close. She hesitated, uncertainty flickering through her. Finally, she stood up and pulled her shirt off. She didn’t know what to do with it when she had.
“Now the pants.”
She bent over as she pushed them down her legs. When she stepped out of them, she dropped both the pants and the shirt on the mound of grass beside her. Straightening, she tried to decide what to do with her hands and finally merely left her arms at her sides.
“I had this picture of you in my mind as an exotic dancer,” he murmured a little hoarsely. “You aren’t, though, are you?”
Sylvie sent him a startled look. “No.” She didn’t know why he’d thought so before and she wasn’t sure it was flattering that he’d decided he was wrong. In fact, she was pretty sure it wasn’t. She lifted a hand to cover her breasts.
“Don’t cover them.”
She moved her arm a little jerkily, curling her hands into fists at her sides as discomfort wafted through her. She jumped when he surged to his feet abruptly.
“Get dressed,” he said harshly, striding away abruptly. “They’re coming back.
Sylvie was too stunned for several moments to react at all. The shield didn’t protect her long, however. Dismay filled her and embarrassment, but a spark of anger flickered to life even as she dove for her clothes.
She had a damned good figure, even if she wasn’t a snot-nosed kid! She didn’t know what he could possibly find objectionable about it except her age—unless he just preferred the boy-shaped, skin and bone sticks that passed as women these days!
She supposed that was it. It was the ‘norm’ for young girls now, what they strove for instead of the curves they once had—in her day! She just didn’t understand why he’d wanted to look unless it was specifically to humiliate her.
Instead of jerking her clothes back on as she’d meant to,
she picked her shirt up rather defiantly and focused on wringing out as much of the water as she could. She wasn’t ashamed of her body just because he’d made her feel like she was lacking in some way! All three men had returned and crouched by the fire before she was satisfied. Shaking the shirt out, she finally pulled it on and then crouched down to pick up the pants and wring them out.
Instead of putting them on when she’d finished, she draped them over her arm and left the campsite, moving far enough away for privacy to relieve herself and then stumbled around in the dark until she finally found the river by pure accident. Crouching beside it, she washed the tears off her cheeks, sniffing until she’d mastered the urge to cry and finally cleaned herself up and put her sweat pants back on.
A dark shadow emerged from the deeper shadows as she straightened up and turned, she hoped, back toward camp, startling her. “You alright, baby?”
Relief surged through her when she recognized Hawk’s voice. “You startled me.”
“I didn’t mean to. I was worried about you.”
The tears she’d thought she’d mastered threatened again, stinging her eyes and nose. “I’m fine. Just tired.”
He didn’t move out of her way when she approached him. He slipped his arms around her and gathered her into a loose embrace. “You sure that’s all? You’re just tired?”
She nodded instead of answering. His hard chest was so invitingly close, though, that she leaned against it gratefully. He stroked his hand over her head and down her back. “Sorry you came?”
Was she? Given her choices at the time, the answer was no. “I’m sorry I left home,” she said wryly.
